“This has nothing to do with Holland.”
“This has everything to do with him.”
“It’s not your fucking problem!“ Voice breaking off, I watched as Joey inhaled a deep breath, clearly trying to rein in his temper, and ran his hand through his hair, before trying again, this time in a relatively calmer voice. “Listen, I don’t want to fight with you.” Closing the space between us, Joey placed his hands on my shoulders, and stared down at me. “I don’t want to hurt you, Molloy.”
“Well, you did,” I countered thickly. “You are hurting me, Joe.”
Pain encompassed his features. “I’m sorry.”
“But?” I managed to squeeze out.
“I’m just…” Shaking his head, he rubbed his jaw and blew out a harsh breath. “I’m having a hard fucking time inside my head right now, and I need you to just let me deal with it my own way.”
“By taking drugs?” I deadpanned. “By destroying yourself?”
“No.” He shook his head. “That’s not what I’m doing.”
“Yes, Joey, it is.” Tears filled my eyes. “And you’re asking me to turn a blind eye to it again.” My voice broke and I dragged in a quivering breath. “I did that before and it almost killed you and broke me. Now, you’re asking me to do that again, and I can’t. I can’t watch you lose yourself again. I can’t lose you again, Joe.”
“No, Molloy, that’s not what I’m saying at all. You’re not losing me, okay? I fucking love you. I’m yours to keep for as long as you’ll have me.” He stroked my shoulders with his thumbs, breaking my heart with the gentleness of his touch, which was a stark contrast to the slicing sting of his words. “I just… I need you to not hate me for getting through my shit in the only way I know how.”
“You know other ways,” I reminded him, tone laced with bitterness. “Better ways.” Ways that don’t risk your life and break my heart.
“Fine.” Joey expelled a pained breath, unwilling to look me in the eyes. “In the only way that works for me.”
“So, you’re not even going to try?” I choked out, feeling shredded by the sudden change in him. In his unwillingness to at least try. “You’re not even going to lie to me and pretend to try?”
“I am trying,” he argued, voice strained. “I will try. I will sort this, okay? I will, Molloy. I just… I need some time.”
“Some time to get high with your druggie buddies first?”
“No.” His tone was hard when he said, “I’m not going back there, I swear.”
“Back there?” Sniffling, I reached up and batted a tear from my cheek. “If you’re using again, then you’re already there, Joe.”
“Molloy.”
“Do you love me?”
“You know I love you.”
“Then stop,” I pleaded, reaching up to cup his neck. “Stop, Joe. Please.”
“I will.”
“No.” I shook my head and stepped away from him. “Don’t say you will. Say you are.”
“Molloy…”
“You’re putting me in an impossible position,” I choked out. “You’re forcing my hand.”
“That’s not what I’m trying to do.“
“Well, whether that’s what you’re trying to do or not, that’s what’s happening,” I argued, hating how pitiful I sounded. “Yesterday, you accused me of manipulating you by using your feelings for me against you, and now, you’re doing the exact same thing to me.”
His brows furrowed. “No, I’m not.”
“Yes, you are,” I strangled out. “Because what am I going to do, Joe? Leave?” I threw my hands up in utter resignation. “I don’t have a bargaining chip here. I’m just the fool who’s supposed to sit back and watch you wreck yourself again, and that’s exactly what’s going to end up happening, because we both know that I love you too fucking much to ever contemplate walking away.”
“I promise, this time it’ll be different,” Joey tried to coax, ignoring every truthful word I had spoken in his bid to convince me of the same lies he had used to wallpaper over his common sense. “I only need a few more weeks. That’s it, Aoif. Just a couple of weeks to get me through, and I’ll be done.”
“Whatever, Joe. I’m done talking about this.” Weary to the bone, I stepped around him and grabbed my school bag off the floor, unable and unwilling to go another round with him, not when my heart had just taken such a beating. “Let’s just go to school.”
THE BIRDS, THE BEES, AND THE DUB
JOEY
“What are you doing in my room?” Shannon asked when she walked into her bedroom at lunchtime on Wednesday afternoon, breaking the rare silence I was soaking in, with everyone else out of the house.
“Sean pissed on my bed,” I explained, exhaling a cloud of smoke, as I stared up at her bedroom ceiling, coming down from my high. “My sheets are in the wash.”
“Oh.” Dropping her school bag on her bedroom floor, she kicked off her shoes and walked over to her bed. “Push over.”
Obliging, I shifted closer to the wall and rested an arm behind my head as she flopped down on her small single bed beside me. “It’s lunchtime, Shan. What are ya doing home from school?”
“Like you can talk.” Digging me in the side with her skinny elbow, she mimicked, “It’s lunchtime, Joey. What are you doing home?”
“I’m in the dog house.”
“With Aoife?”
“Yep.”
“Is that weed?”
“Nope.”
“Are you lying.”
Inhaling another deep drag of my smoke, I held it there for a long moment before exhaling slowly. “Yep.”
“Stoner.”
“Slacker.”
“So, what did you do?” she asked, batting a cloud of smoke away. “To get sent to the dog house?” She sucked in a sharp breath before I could answer and hissed, “Please tell me you didn’t cheat on her? Because that girl is amazing and you need to marry her.”
“The fuck?” I narrowed my eyes and exhaled a cloud of smoke. “No, Jesus, I didn’t cheat on her. I don’t cheat, Shan.”
“Sorry.” She shrugged sheepishly. “It’s just…well, when I was at BCS, I used to hear a lot of the girls in the bathroom talking about you and you’re, uh, well, your bedroom skills.”
“My bedroom skills,” I snorted. “Jesus Christ. Girls are fucked up.”
“Girls are fucked up,” my little sister wholeheartedly agreed. “I don’t understand them at all.”
“You know, they say fellas talk, but it’s the other way around,” I complained. “Girls talk.” I twisted my head to find her staring wide-eyed back at me. “Girls do a lot of fucking talking, Shan.”
“Yeah, I know,” she sighed.
“You know, most of what they say is pure bullshit,” I decided to add, feeling salty. “I’ve only been in one girl’s bedroom.”