Chapter 40 #2
“You’ve only been together a few months, and I just worry—with everything you were trying to tell me that night—that you’re not okay.
That he’s coercing you or financially isolating you.
And you’ve always been so careful, Birdie, more careful than all of us, but you’ve also been the least…
” Kaitlyn pauses, clearly searching for a word that’s not offensive.
“The least suspicious. The least cynical. It’s a good thing, generally.
But I worry that he’s not a good person, no matter how much this city loves him.
Everyone at Evelyn loved him too, and look at what he did. ”
I nod. I’m not sure what I’m nodding about, actually, what I could be agreeing with in anything she said, but it seems like the right thing to do.
She takes my free hand and sandwiches it between both of hers, concern scrawled all over her face. “If you need help, I’m here.”
“Very reassuring from the one person who could have helped her seven years ago and helped ruin her life instead,” Busy says from next to me, having come back to life. “If you felt so guilty all these years, why didn’t you ever reach out? Never stop by the farm? Never call, never write?”
Kaitlyn lets go of my hand and carefully tucks her hair behind one ear.
“I should have,” she says. “I’m sorry. But I want to help now, I promise.
I promise. I was wrong to have doubted you back then, Birdie, but in my work, I’ve learned so much more about assault and the effect it has on a victim, how it can affect testimony and memory.
And seeing the situation you’re in now, I think you need an advocate to help navigate you to a safer situation.
” She pulls a business card out of her slender leather clutch and sets it on the table next to my marked-up program.
“This is the number of a lawyer friend who’s got experience disentangling property and money in abusive relationships.
She’ll help you for free if money is an issue.
And I’ve got my number written on the back, and please, please, call me if you need anything.
I want to help and I want to make things right. ”
She touches my hand and gives me a final look—worried and caring—before standing up. She gives Busy a nod and walks away, perfectly balanced on sky-high heels, hair bouncing loosely around her shoulders as she’s swallowed by the milling crowd on the far side of the room.
“Busy,” I say, turning to my twin, but she’s already shaking her head.
“Not here. In the car.”
I nod. I understand. I pocket the business card, sip automatically at my coffee, and then when Busy stands, I follow her out of the convention center ballroom without seeing anything around us.
Kaitlyn is already gone, but it’s hard to feel relieved when I don’t think I feel anything at all right now.
The farm is in a trust? Why? And how could he even do that without me?
We get to the car and navigate away from the convention center to the highway. Then Busy finally speaks, her foot braced against the dash and her head thrown back against the passenger seat. She could be sixteen instead of thirty-six right now.
“Kaitlyn’s full of shit, by the way,” is what she says.
Hope, bright and painful, flares. “I’m so relieved you think so, because I don’t know what to think about the farm—”
“No, Ryan is still bad news, for fucking sure. But there’s nothing sure about Kaitlyn.
She might have reinvented herself as someone who blends past their jawbone, but she’s still the same person, just playing by new rules to get ahead.
The old rules meant she couldn’t have anything to do with you, but the new rules are all about being trauma-informed and centering victim experiences and shit like that.
She found out you were dating Bell, recognized the risk in the whole Evelyn story breaking containment, and is now trying to neutralize the situation by offering you free legal help as amends.
So now she has a neatly packaged I’ve listened and learned narrative complete with concrete action ready to go if the story ever gets in her way. ”
I steer with one hand so I can rub idly at my chest. My nervous system has been too active for me to register any kind of positive emotion about Kaitlyn’s gesture, but it surprisingly still stings to think that it was cynically made. “I guess that makes sense.”
“It doesn’t mean she’s wrong about Ryan, though.”
I don’t answer. I’m not sure what to say.
I feel Busy looking at me from the passenger seat.
“He was the guy, Birdie? Seriously? The entire reason your residency fell apart? Your art career? You told me he wouldn’t take no for an answer, that he pressured you, that he almost didn’t stop himself from committing what any court would consider a rape.
God, I can’t believe I’ve sat across a table from that guy!
I can’t believe I’ve been joking about him and his money and him buying you this truck—which is fucked, by the way.
It is really, really fucked up that this is the guy from Evelyn and now he’s buying you trucks and clothes and lumber and shit. You see how warped that is, right?”
“It’s not like that,” I argue. “It’s not—you don’t know him.”
Busy groans, shoving her hands into her hair and pulling.
“Do you know how many times I’ve heard that?
How many times I’ve said it? You don’t know him.
You don’t understand. He loves me. I love him.
We’re happy. It’s the same script. It’s like the Hail Mary of women who are with bad men.
We can all recite it without even knowing when we first learned it. ”
I’m flushing now, rubbing harder at my chest. “This isn’t the same as the situations you’ve been in. It’s not at all like them.”
“Sure. That sounds right. Tell me why this guy who won’t listen to you when you say no, this guy who made it so you can’t make a living with your art, is doing something very healthy and normal when he showers you with uncomfortably large gifts?
Why it’s super fine that he’s fucking around with the farm?
Why would you be willing to let him touch property that you’ve held on to, with your sweat and your blood and your tears, despite him destroying your ability to make money?
Your future? You’d give him our family’s past for that? ”
“I can’t—I don’t know what happened yet with this trust. I need to ask him about it.”
She sits forward, looking at me with an intensity I can feel, even if I can’t look over at her to see it. “Are you saying the trust wasn’t something you did together?”
“It wasn’t, but that doesn’t mean it’s something sinister either. He’s been helping with all kinds of things, utility bills and the property taxes, and it might be something to do with all of that, you know?”
In the corner of my eye, I see Busy looking down at her hands. “Birdie.” This comes in a guarded, wary tone. “Why is he helping you with utility bills and taxes?”
Because I was breaking myself in half trying to take care of you, I want to say, but I don’t. She doesn’t give me time to answer anyway.
“You told me you had a new job, and that was why you were working at the gas station less. You made it seem like you had plenty of money now, enough to pay my rent and take care of your bills too.”
I can’t think of a lie quickly enough and certainly not one that my twin won’t see through.
“Please be honest with me,” Busy says, sounding a little frightened now. “Is he the new job?”
I clench the steering wheel, casting up a desperate prayer, wishing I were good enough at lying to get a return on my sin investment but knowing I’m not. “It’s not like that,” I say again, and she drops her head into her hands.
“Oh my God, Birdie, what were you thinking? Why the fuck would you agree to this with him? Why would you do that to yourself?”
You is what I don’t say. You are the reason why.
“I needed the money,” I say instead, hoping that sounds neutral enough. “And I promise that it’s not…it’s not the same now. We love each other.”