“Not even me?” Drew asks.
“Especially not you.”
A short silence.
“How much cash was it?”
“A hundred grand. Combined with my savings, I had enough to get where I was going.”
“And where did you go?”
“Everywhere, but nowhere special.”
“And you settled in Seattle?”
“I like it here.” She frowns. “Why does it feel like you’re interrogating me?”
“Because I am. I’m trying to make sense of it, why people around you tend to end up dead.” Drew’s voice hardens. “Think about it from my perspective. Charles Baxter. Mae Ocampo. Jimmy fucking Peralta. What’s the common denominator? You. And you’ve already proven you have the incredible capacity to lie. Your entire life now is a lie. Every one of those people died prematurely from exsanguination. That means—”
“I fucking know what ‘exsanguination’ means,” Paris snaps. “I probably knew that word before you did. And don’t come at me with your Occam’s razor bullshit. Life is complicated, Drew. And in case you didn’t notice, I’m not a girl anymore, and you’re not allowed to lecture me. Thank you, by the way, for reminding me of how self-righteous you can be. It’s probably your only flaw, but you might remember it’s the reason things didn’t go so well the last time we spoke.”
Drew sighs and puts a hand up. “Okay, look, it’s been a long few days—”
“I’m not finished.”
Paris stands up, puts their plates in the sink, and leans against the counter, trying to stay calm. She thinks carefully about what she wants to say to him now, because this may be the only opportunity she has to say it before she throws him out.
“You always came across as this self-aware, sensitive guy who was willing to listen,” she says. “And I know you’ve apologized, but even your apology comes with an agenda. Telling me you’re sorry is just your way of manipulating me into letting my guard down, so that I’ll talk to you. But the truth is, you were the person who judged me more than anyone else ever did. My mother never had expectations for me. She thought I was nothing, and that was an easy standard to meet. But you? You had all these hopes for what you thought I could be, which were really just expectations disguised as optimism.”
She looks down at him, her breath coming fast.
“And when I didn’t turn out the way you hoped, when you decided that I didn’t meet your definition of what a good person was, when you couldn’t fix me, I became less than to you. Even now, all these years later, you’re expecting me to apologize to you for the choices I made when I was twenty, that had nothing to do with you. I can say that I’m sorry I left Toronto with you thinking I was dead—I agree that was a shit move. But I won’t say I’m sorry for anything else, because you don’t know what it’s like, Drew.”
Paris is heaving.
“You don’t know what it’s like to be born into a life of cruelty and abuse, and you don’t know what it’s like to have to claw your way out in order to have any sense of self-worth. There’s probably a long line of people who will always wonder if I actually did kill my husband, and there’s nothing I can do about that. They’re allowed to think whatever they want. But not one of those people is allowed in this house, because I decided a long time ago that I’m done being everyone’s toilet. You no longer get to shit your opinions on me. So if you’re going to sit there like the king of perfect, you can take your Raptors hat, go back to Toronto, and go fuck yourself with it.”
She gets up and walks away. If she stays in the kitchen, she doesn’t know what she’ll do. She plops down on the living room sofa and puts her head in her hands.
She’s so tired. So tired of the journey she took to get here, and already exhausted just thinking about the thousand more miles she still needs to go. It doesn’t matter that the murder charge was dropped. There will always be whispers, questions, doubt.
And she hasn’t even dealt with Ruby yet.
A few minutes later, Drew takes a seat beside her on the couch. He hands her a fresh beer. He’s gotten himself another one, too.
“I deserved that,” he says quietly. “Joey—”
“It’s Paris now.”
“It feels weird to call you that,” Drew says. “But you’re right. You’re Paris now. I’m sorry, okay? In another life, you and I were best friends. I don’t know where things stand now. I do know I want to understand. The last time I saw you, you were on a stretcher under a tarp, being moved into the back of an ambulance. I saw your body. I saw the burns. If not for the tattoo and your necklace…”