Angel stares into the light until she sees black daubs. She doesn’t think she can speak, but she forces herself. “My grandmother died, and I know you know, because I texted. You haven’t even said anything.”
A long silence, through which Angel hears only her own heartbeat. She turns her head to study Lizette’s profile. Tears leak from the corner of her eye.
“Do you, like, feel bad about this?” Angel gestures at the space between them. “About us?”
“Us.” Lizette gives a scraped, mirthless laugh. “Not everything is about you, Angel. You can be so fucking selfish.”
“You don’t have anywhere to go, do you?” Angel doesn’t know why she didn’t see this before, but of course it’s true.
“It’s none of your damn business.”
“Listen. Lizette. Why don’t you and Mercedes move in with my dad and me? You can.” Angel can convince her dad. She’ll do what it takes. If Lizette moves in, she pledges, Angel won’t kiss her ever again, won’t try anything. She’ll be satisfied. She won’t even think a sexual thought, if only Lizette can be near her and safe. Even as she thinks it, she knows she’s lying to herself.
Lizette sits up, exhales loudly. “I’m not ever gonna be your girlfriend.”
Angel ignores the pain in her chest. “That’s okay. You can still stay with us.”
“I’m not bringing that gay shit into my baby’s life. That could fuck a kid up.”
“No,” says Angel. She tries to remember the arguments she’s heard. “Babies just need to see loving relationships. Like, people respecting each other.”
“Is that what you think this is? A loving relationship? You think I respect you? We’re hooking up, Angel. That’s all this is.” Lizette holds her gaze, but something in her mouth twitches.
“I don’t believe you.”
Lizette raises an insolent eyebrow.
“I love you,” Angel says. Her voice is hushed and she wonders if she said it or just thought it.
Lizette’s laugh is a short rasp. “No you don’t.”
“I do,” says Angel, pushing herself up, and she says it with conviction now. She wants to hold Lizette down, to say it again and again until Lizette believes her, until Lizette knows she is loved and lets the love soften her. But Lizette swipes hair out of her face and turns her back to Angel.
“You’re pathetic,” says Lizette flatly. “Stupid and pathetic. Just get out.”
“But it’s the middle of the night.”
“You think I give a shit? I told you to leave.” Her full lips tremble. Angel reaches for her, but Lizette pushes her away. Now Lizette’s eyes are thick-glazed with tears.
“What’s wrong? Why are you doing this?”
The tears overflow and spill down her cheek. Very slowly and very clearly, she says, “Get the fuck out of my house.”
“Fine.” Angel stands and dresses. She’s quivering with anger and humiliation, a hot, dry pressure building behind her eyes. She grabs her jacket and purse, holding them tight to her, passes through the dark living room and the shadowed mound in the crib, fumbles with the deadbolt.
Outside, the half-moon is bright over the stucco and asphalt of the neighborhood. The house next door is dark now, but the trash and engine parts gleam like mercury. Dirty rinds of snow fill the gutters.
She can’t find her cell phone. Panic mounts in her, that she’ll have to go back inside, once again face Lizette. She crouches and digs in her purse. Baby wipes, her notebook and keys and Kleenexes, a squeeze pouch of apple-spinach baby food, her lipstick: it all spills on the driveway. Finally she finds her phone, tangled in a spare onesie.