Chapter Twenty – Mabel
I don’t have many clothes with me, and I was never a huge makeup girlie, so dressing nice to go out in public takes some work. I spend most of Thursday trying on different combinations of clothes. Tristan keeps me company, sprawled out on my bed, watching me with interest whether I’m checking myself out in the mirror or kneeling down near the dresser to see if I have anything else.
He’s not much help, honestly. He thinks anything I put on I look good in—which, okay, is nice to hear, but it can’t be true.
After a while, I plop on the bed next to him and ask, “What are you going to wear?”
The look he gives me then tells me I’m crazy for asking, and his answer is as straightforward as it can possibly be: “Clothes.”
The way he deadpans it makes me giggle, and I playfully shove his arm. “Obviously. I don’t think Dr. Wolf would let you out of the house naked.” Plus, I don’t think I’d like strangers—or anyone, for that matter—seeing him naked. I haven’t even seen him with all of his clothes off.
Yet.
The more I think about it, the more I want that to change.
“So is he going to take that off?” I ask, pointing to the collar around his neck.
“I don’t know. Maybe.” Tristan frowns. “Or maybe he’ll get me a turtleneck so I can hide it.”
I lean against him as I ask, “You really don’t like him, do you?”
Tristan is slow to sit up, and he pulls me onto his lap with a sigh. Something I’ve noticed about him is that if I’m close to him, he has to be touching me in one way or another, even if it’s just a hand on my leg as we eat dinner together. It’s like the man is touch-starved, and I don’t mind it one bit.
“Wolf is…” Tristan pauses, his voice so quiet I can hardly hear him. “He’s not who you think he is. Maybe he has a real degree and all that shit, but… there’s something about him I don’t like.”
“What?”
“He’s—” Again, he stops himself, almost like he’s afraid to tell me the truth. When I give him a pout, he crumbles immediately. “I guess the easiest way to describe it is that the dark parts of me recognize the dark parts in him.”
My brows furrow, and I whisper, “Like a killer?”
“Maybe. Or maybe just a cold, clinical psychopath who likes being in control. Fixing things since he can’t fix himself. I don’t know, but this field trip, as he put it, is probably only a test.”
I bite my bottom lip. “A test for you or a test for me?”
But just like that, Tristan checked out of the conversation the moment I started to bite my lip. His gaze falls to my mouth, and my question goes unheard and unanswered, because the next thing I know he’s cupping my face and lowering his lips to mine.
The moment our lips meet, everything fades away and a low fire burns bright inside my body. He falls back, and I go with him, my body on top of his. His arms are like steel, holding me against him, an inescapable prison I can’t ever slip from.
I want so badly to tell him I’m ready—because I am. Because I want to. Because isn’t that what being alive is about? Trying new things, pushing yourself, going after what you want? A life without joy, without desire, is hardly a life at all; something I learned here, in this house.
I died the day Jordan shot up our school, and then somehow, slowly but surely, Tristan brought me back to life.
Losing myself in him becomes easier and easier with each passing day. In all my life, I never knew it could feel like this —I never once understood people who acted like being in a relationship was their whole personality. Though I never had friends myself, I watched as other students around me would hook up and date, and in doing so they sometimes dropped their friend group, putting their whole focus onto the shiny, new relationship.
Never, ever understood… not until now. Now, I totally get it. I would give everything up to be with Tristan—and I’m one hundred percent aware of how strange it is to feel this strongly for a man who, by all accounts, should be locked up in prison.
I’m out of my mind. I have to be. And yet, at the same time, I’ve never been more confident, more sure.
In the end, I don’t tell Tristan that I’m ready. When it’s time, I’m sure it’ll feel right. Maybe things will progress naturally or neither of us will be able to settle for making out. Maybe we’ll both just know.
Once my lips get sore, I pull myself off of Tristan, and he lets me go, propping himself up with my pillows as he watches me go. I resume what I was doing before the make-out detour: choosing my outfit for tomorrow night. Dr. Wolf didn’t say where we would go, just to dress nicely.
Doesn’t narrow it down, I know.
After mixing and matching every possible combination of my tops and bottoms, I settle for a simple getup: light blue jeans with a heavy sweater. I’ll wear some ankle boots beneath the jeans. With the weather getting quite cold at night, I assume it’s only a matter of time before it starts to snow.
Yuck. As someone who came from a sunny, warm area whose weather never had snow and only occasionally had hail, I cannot emphasize the yuck enough.
Dad calls the house around seven, right before he’s due to go to bed. We talk for a while. He tells me he’s going to go out with his new work buddies tomorrow night, to get himself out of the house—which is a perfect segue for me to tell him about our little field trip tomorrow.
I sit on the couch in the giant living room, sprawled out beneath a blanket. The TV on the opposite wall plays a superhero movie with its volume low. Tristan was with me before my dad called, but he makes himself scarce while I’m on the phone to give me a little privacy.
“It’s good you’re getting out of the house,” I tell him. “Speaking of—Dr. Wolf is taking Tristan and me somewhere tomorrow, too. He didn’t say where.”
“Oh? That’s—” I can tell by the pause my dad doesn’t know whether to say it’s exciting or not. He settles for going in a different direction: “You and Tristan, huh? I suppose if Dr. Wolf thinks it’s good for you, then it must be. He’s got the fancy degree, not me.”
All I can do is roll my eyes. If my dad had his way, I’d still be living with him, miserable twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week—and that’s not to blame him or anything; he’s just… my dad. There’s only so much a dad can do, especially when the root of the problem is the other half of the family who are no longer with us.
“If it ends up being too much for you, please don’t hold it in,” my dad goes on. “Tell Dr. Wolf, and I’m sure he won’t push you.” I hear him cough; he doesn’t sound sick, so I take it to mean there’s something else he wants to talk about, a subject that might be a little awkward.
Because I know my dad, I sigh and say, “What?”
“Tristan.” The moment he says his name, my heart skips a beat out of habit. Even though the man is nowhere in sight, he still has a hold on me. “It sounds like you two are spending an awful lot of time together now. Should I be worried?”
“Worried about what?”
“That you two are spending a lot of time together,” my dad quickly repeats what he said before. “Don’t forget Tristan is there because he’s in some desperate need of mental help—”
“Dad,” I cut in, “trust me, I know all about it. I know more about what Tristan did than you do.” And then, before I can say anything else, I stop myself. My dad is only trying to protect me; he wants to make sure I’m safe. It must bother him, knowing I’m in a house with another person like Tristan.
If only he knew…
I speak gentler this time, “He’d never hurt me, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
“I know you believe that, but if there’s one thing the past six months have taught me, it’s that you can never really know what’s going on in someone else’s head. Wanting to believe the best in someone… it’s nothing more than a projection of your feelings onto them, not a sign of what they’re really thinking.”
He means Jordan. None of us ever thought Jordan could do what he did. I don’t think any of us would’ve bet that Jordan had a single bad bone in his body. He was always full of charming smiles, always knew what to say; everyone loved him.
But now… now I’m starting to realize that Dr. Wolf might’ve been right in his original assessment. Jordan knew how to play people. He knew what to say, what to do, to get them to do whatever he wanted, including me and my parents. My brother was a master manipulator.
The thing is, it’s not the same with Tristan—though I can’t tell my dad that. When I asked, Tristan told. He shared every harsh, horrid, unimaginable detail from his past, and he didn’t have to. No one forced him to. I might not know what his favorite color is or what his favorite movie is, but I feel like I know him so much better than I ever did Jordan.
Jordan hid the true blackness of his soul. Tristan never did.
“Just believe me,” I say. “He’d never hurt me.” My dad makes a strange sound after that, causing me to ask, “What?”
“Now I’m wondering if I should be worried for a different reason.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“He’s a boy.”
“He’s not a boy.”
“That’s even worse! If he’s not a boy, then he’s a man—and I don’t know if I’m ready for my daughter to like men. I thought we’d be on boys for a few more years… you know, nothing too serious until after college—”
I have to sit up as I ask, “What are you talking about?”
My dad must not hear me. “I guess it makes sense, since it’s just you, Tristan, and Dr. Wolf in that house, but I didn’t think I’d have to worry about my daughter falling for someone—”
“I never said I was doing anything like that.” Although, if it’s said, it wouldn’t exactly be a lie, but with how concerned he sounds about it, it’s probably not the best thing for him to hear right now.
“You don’t have to. Every time I call, you bring him up. Plus, when I come over to eat dinner with you, he’s always with you, sitting way too close.” Under his breath, he huffs, “I thought maybe he just doesn’t understand personal space, but now… it all makes sense.”
“Dad, come on.” With my free hand, I pick at the blanket on my lap. “It’s not what you’re thinking.”
“It’s not? Somehow I don’t believe you. You’ve been interested in Tristan since the first moment you saw him. You brought him up when we went to get pizza, right after your first session with Dr. Wolf.”
“Just because I bring him up doesn’t mean—” I stop myself.
My dad’s voice comes out in a deadpan, “Yeah, see? You can’t even deny it.”
I sigh. “Okay, fine. Say I do, you know, like him. What would you say?”
“I would ask if Dr. Wolf knows.”
“If you asked me that question, I would say he does.”
“Then I would say why the hell didn’t the man give me a call to let me know my daughter, the one in his care, is spending a lot of time with the other patient in his care.” My dad clears his throat. When he speaks again, his voice is gentler, less judgmental, “You are, technically, an adult. I can’t force you into making any decisions, Mabel. Just promise me you’ll be safe and make smart choices when it comes to sex—”
“Oh, my God, Dad!” I bury my face with my other hand, feeling my cheeks heat up. Thank goodness he’s not here, in the room, staring at me while he tells me this. I don’t think I could bear it. And on that note, it’s a good thing Tristan is nowhere nearby, too. I’d feel even more embarrassed.
“What? I was young once. I know what kids your age do. I’d rather rip out my brain than think about it, but… just promise me you’ll be smart. Use protection. Maybe we should get you on birth control.”
“Dad, please, stop. Just… just stop.” I literally want to crawl into a hole and never come out again, ever. This is the most mortifying conversation I’ve ever had with my dad in my life. Seriously. No joke. I wish I could rewind time and never bring up Tristan to him.
“Maybe you should give the phone to Dr. Wolf, so we can discuss—”
“I’ll hang up and destroy every phone in the house before I give the phone to Dr. Wolf so you two can talk about that,” I mutter.
My dad asks, “You’re aware he has a cell phone I could call? Actually, that’s a better idea all around. Got to go, honey. Have a very important call to make. Goodnight, love you.”
“Dad, don’t—” But before I can say anything else, the call ends.
Oh, shit. I mean, I knew it was only a matter of time before my dad found out about whatever’s going on between Tristan and me, but I didn’t think it’d happen this soon… and I definitely didn’t think one of my dad’s first thoughts would be to get me on birth control.
Never had the sex talk with my parents. Not any official talk, anyway. They would make comments while watching TV shows or movies about being safe, yada, yada, yada, but that’s about it. I think the fact that I never showed any interest in any boy gave my parents hope that maybe they could push the talk out further, and the more it got pushed out, the less likely it would happen.
Until now, apparently.
Oh, God. Where is that rock that I can crawl under?