The therapist, a middle-aged Asian woman called Dr. Angie Lee, nodded and made sympathetic sounds as Mom sobbed into a wad of tissues about how abusive Brandon had been and how horrible she was now feeling because she wasn’t feeling horrible enough about Brandon’s death.
“I mean, I miss him, I do, but—” Mom said. She glanced at me and said, “I’m a terrible mother, what kind of example am I setting for my daughter?”
You shouldn’t feel horrible, I wanted to say. You didn’t kill him. I did, and I’m mostly feeling great.
Dr. Lee looked at me and tilted her head. “Delilah, how do you feel about Brandon’s death?”
“I—” To my horror, my voice cracked, and the words came spilling out. “I’m so confused. I know I should feel really guilty and sad and whatever else, but I just—I don’t. And I feel like crap about the fact that I don’t feel guilty.” I sucked in my breath in a quick hiss and bit my lip. Had I revealed too much?
Dr. Lee smiled kindly. “How the two of you are feeling is absolutely normal. Often, people feel responsible or guilty when someone close to them passes. And with Brandon’s history of abusing both of you, you’re experiencing some very complicated emotions, which is understandable.
“Abuse victims do whatever they have to do in order to survive and come out the other side intact. Feeling guilty is part of the process, but you also need to accept that Brandon was abusing you. Both of you. You’ve been given a second chance at life. Take it. Set aside some time to grieve Brandon’s passing, but also celebrate the fact that you survived. You deserve to live your best life, especially after everything you’ve been through.”
She was looking at me when she said this, as though she knew exactly how I was feeling. It was amazing to hear a professional say it wasn’t my fault, even though the professional in question didn’t know exactly what I’d done. I left her office feeling light as a bubble. She was so right: abuse victims do whatever they have to do in order to survive.
Mom still cried that night as she did the dishes. I hugged her and wondered how she could possibly grieve Brandon, of all people. But the next morning, I woke up alone. I was worried at first, until I thought to check my phone. There was a message from Mom: Had to go to work early, have a new project to run. See you at dinner, pumpkin.
She was back at work. Gone was Brandon’s ridiculous notion that my mom, the woman who graduated summa cum laude from Georgetown, who took great pride in her job, should stay at home to serve him.
After two weeks Mom started to hum whenever she did the dishes, and I noticed that she stopped jumping every time there was a noise in the house. She even started wearing some makeup again. And though she still cried sometimes, I had the feeling she was only doing it out of some sense of obligation and not because she actually missed the guy. And I…well, I was changing too.
Now that Brandon wasn’t around to tell me I was a slut for talking to boys, suddenly the guys at my school no longer seemed as dangerous. A whole world was opening up. I could talk to whoever the hell I wanted! My posture slowly corrected itself. I no longer stared at my feet when I walked. I met people’s eyes. I returned their smiles. I didn’t shoot up in popularity, but other kids at school were starting to acknowledge me. That was okay. Popularity is overrated. I was satisfied with the friendly but aloof smiles from my schoolmates.
The person I was dying to see was Logan, whom Aisha called Hot Logan. The nickname needed some work, but I couldn’t argue with the logic of it. With his wavy, brown hair and his strong jaw and—Jesuslord, look at his abs—Logan was hot. He had this way of looking at you, this sort of dark, intense expression that made you feel like you were the only girl in the whole entire world. I probably didn’t have much of a chance with him.
But a few days after I came back to school, as I was walking to the library for my shift, someone called my name.
I grinned as he walked over, then I mentally punched myself in the face and toned down my huge smile into a more normal one. How should I stand? I shifted from one leg to the other. Argh, stop fidgeting!
“Hey,” he said.
“Hey.”
“It’s good to see you back at school,” he said.
Is it really? my mind squeaked. “It’s good to see you back at school too!” Oh my god. Be cool, damn it!
“Do you need any notes for chemistry? I could lend you mine. Mr. West’s been piling on the homework.”
Wow. Cute and sweet. I was in real trouble. “Yeah, that would be really great. I feel like I’ve missed a whole semester of work.”
“I could—uh, we could study together if you want?” Logan said, with a shy smile.
I want!
I managed to stop myself from nodding frantically. “Yeah, that would be great!”
“Or maybe we could do something more fun for our first date.”
“Our first date?” I squeaked. Stop squeaking!
Logan scratched the back of his neck, his ears turning red. “Um, yeah, I’m kinda trying to ask you out here…and doing a really bad job of it, obviously.” He laughed to himself.
“No! You’re not! I mean, you’re not doing a bad job. I’m doing a bad job! I mean, yes. Yes!” I cleared my throat. “I mean, sure, let’s go out on a date or whatever.”
I couldn’t be any more unappealing right now, but for some reason, Logan’s face lit up, and he said, “Saturday?”
I nodded, because I couldn’t trust myself to speak. If I did speak, it would be in a pitch higher than most humans could hear.
“Great! I’ll see you around, Delilah.” With that, he walked off, and I slumped into a watery puddle and died.
Okay, I didn’t flop over. Somehow, I managed to walk away, and when I was sure he was nowhere in sight, I called Aisha and begged her to come meet me ASAP.
Aisha squeaked out loud when I told her about it.
“Hot Logan asked you out! Girl, you’ve got game!”
I flapped a hand in her face and went, “Ssh!” We scurried over to one of the benches in the Eastern Garden. There were many people around, soaking in the California sun and checking one another out. There were plenty of hair flips and a lot of too-loud laughter and pointed glances.
“Oh, man, I can’t believe it. Do you know where you guys are going?” Aisha took a small purse out of her messenger bag and opened it. Inside was an arsenal of makeup. She carefully applied a layer of lipstick, and her eyes moved to look at me from the reflection in her mirror. “Do you know what you’re going to wear?”
“Um, no. I haven’t really thought about it.”
“Come on,” she sighed, shaking her head. “We’re going to have to work on…whatever you’ve got going on here.” She gestured at me before turning her attention back to her compact mirror.
Aisha grinned at me and rummaged around in her makeup bag. “Dammit, I need a tissue.” She pulled my bag open without asking and plucked out a packet of tissue paper. A small, clear baggie fell out, and she held it up. “What’s this? Oh my GOD, are you using…drugs?”
I stared at her, openmouthed. Panic blossomed as I mentally scrambled for an answer.
Aisha burst out laughing. “Oh, man! Dee, your expression!” She nudged me with her shoulder. “Yeah, right. Sweet, nerdy Delilah Wong, taking molly!” She laughed again.
I grabbed the baggie from her and stuffed it back in my bag, my cheeks burning. “Hmph, okay, well, this happens to be aspirin, but if I wanted to, I could totally take, er—mol—”
“You can’t even bear to say it!” she cried.
“Mollymollymolly!”
We glanced at each other for a split second before doubling over, giggling hard. Aisha wrapped her arm around my shoulders.
“You’re such a dork,” she said.
My phone buzzed then. I checked the message and straightened up.
“I gotta go,” I told Aisha
. “You gonna be around after my shift ends?”
“I’ll probably be in the lab, feeding Lucy,” she said. Lucy was the school’s pet snake. Each week, students volunteered to help look after her over the weekend, which was pretty weird in my book, but whatever floated their boats. I never volunteered. I didn’t even like the sight of Lucy.
I shuddered. “I don’t know why you volunteer to feed that snake. It’s so creepy.”
She gave me a wicked grin. “Extra credit. You should come watch me feed her sometime.”
“Yeah, right. Over my dead body. Okay, see you later.”
She waved me off, probably relieved that something had interrupted my nagging. I briskly walked to the library.
The library was hands down the most beautiful building at Draycott. It wasn’t the biggest, but it felt like the most well-thought-out—built out of sandstone, columns in a neat row, and large stained glass windows. The main entrance led to a bright, airy dome that magnified sound, so people immediately became self-conscious about every bit of noise they made. It was ingenious. I stopped by the Secrets board as usual, scanning the new posts, before making my way down the spiral steps. I pushed open the heavy steel door at the bottom and headed into the climate-controlled stacks, where Lisa was waiting for me.
“There you are,” she chirped when she saw me. “How are you, Dee?” She skittered toward me—I mean it literally, the woman couldn’t seem to walk like a normal person, she always took a series of tiny, dainty, quick steps. Her bird-bone arms lifted, and for a horrifying second, I thought she was going to hug me, but then she changed her mind—phew!—and patted me on the shoulder instead. “Oh, what happened to your stepdad is awful, just awful.”
If you were to open an encyclopedia and go to the entry marked L—Librarian, you’d see a picture of Lisa. Midforties, single, wears mustard-colored knit cardigans complete with a brooch above the left breast. The brooch looked ancient, probably some sort of family heirloom. And glasses, of course. Sometimes, I tried to imagine what Lisa was like as a kid. Each time, I failed miserably. Lisa looked prepackaged, like she came into existence wearing her knitted cardigans, sensible chiropractic shoes, and argyle stockings.
I liked working for Lisa, but I hated that I knew next to nothing about her, especially since our work was so sensitive in nature. I didn’t know where she lived, what she spent her weekends doing, what she liked to eat or watch or whatever. And not for a lack of effort, either. I was dying to know more about Lisa. There was so much more to her than meets the eye. But each time I asked her stuff like, “Did you do anything fun last weekend?” she’d say, “Yes. Let’s get to work.” I’d looked her up online once, but gave up when I realized there were about twelve million Lisa Smiths in the world.
All I knew was she owned multiples of the same cardigan and she had a pet of some sort; I sometimes saw gray strands of fur caught in her cardigan. I prided myself on the pet knowledge—that was some next-level detecting.
“I know you’re supposed to have one more day off to mourn,” Lisa said, “but we are so swamped here. There are new orders and special shipments and—” She shot me an imploring look. “You know how voracious the kids here are, and so spoiled too. Not you, of course. But some of the kids here… They expect everything to arrive instantly, and when they don’t get what they want, they get really cranky. I’m dying. Can you come back a day early?”
“Yeah, of course,” I said. I wasn’t the one who chose to take time off work in the first place. Mom had suggested it, and I’d thought it looked right. It was the kind of thing people did when someone close to them died in a horrible accident. But I was keen to get back to work. Ever since Brandon took over the finances, I knew how important money was.
Some nights, as I lay in bed pressing an ice pack to my legs or my back, the only thing that kept me going was the knowledge that I was ferreting money away. Money nobody knew about. Money I would one day use to escape the hellhole I’d found myself in. And although Brandon was gone, as much as I loved Mom, I didn’t trust her not to fall for yet another asshole. She was vulnerable and probably burned out after having the last two men in her life die in horrific ways. I couldn’t count on her for stability.
Lisa sagged with relief. “You, my dear, are a godsend.” She hurried to the back of the stacks and plucked a folder from one of the many boxes piled up against the wall. “Here’s the latest inventory. Catalog them and make sure the deliveries are safe, use the usual security protocol—oh, what am I saying? You know what to do.” She paused to smile at me, her eyes shining behind her glasses. “I am so glad to have you back, Dee.”
“Me. Too.” I went away with my heart singing. Brandon was out of our lives, I had a well-paying job that I loved, and I scored a date with the hottest guy in my year. Honestly, it felt like the universe was rewarding me for getting rid of Brandon. If I’d known killing him was all I had to do to make everything come together so beautifully, I would’ve done it a lot sooner.
* * *
Saturday morning, Aisha came over to help me get ready. Her presence and the fact I was about to go on my first date revived Mom. She and Mom fluttered about me like annoying butterflies, fluffing my hair and adjusting my shirt. I rolled my eyes, but I didn’t actually mind having them fuss over me. Aisha used to come over all the time, especially when she first started boarding at Draycott and got really homesick. She’d climb out of her dorm window and take the bus to my place and make Mom and Pa swear they wouldn’t tell her parents, and they’d sigh and agree, but this would be the last time, okay? In the morning they’d drive her back to Draycott, and by nighttime she’d be back at the front door again, telling us Draycott kids were monsters. But over time, she started making other friends and she stopped running away to my place. And of course, when Brandon was around, I didn’t allow any friends to come over. I was too afraid of what Brandon might say, too scared my friends might somehow piss him off, and too ashamed to have anyone see how afraid I was.
“Maybe you should undo the top button,” Mom said as I combed my hair.
“Ew, Mooom!” I cried at the same time Aisha said, “Ooh, yeah, your mom’s right!”
The room went silent as we stared at one another, and then we burst into screams of laughter.
“I am being the worst mom ever, aren’t I?” Mom gave a dramatic sigh.
“Mom, stop freaking out.” I exchanged an eye roll with Aisha, but we were both still grinning. Aisha reached to unbutton my top, and I swatted her hand.
“I can’t help it. Look at my little baby all grown up and going on dates.” Mom dabbed an imaginary tear from her eye. “I feel like I should play the part of an overly protective father. Should I greet this boy at the door with a shotgun?”
“Yes, please greet Logan with a shotgun. Pleeease,” Aisha said. “I’ll have my camera ready.”
“We don’t have a shotgun,” I said.
“You don’t?” Aisha said. “How unpatriotic.”
“We do have an electric drill,” Mom said.
“Stop it, you guys,” I said, laughing. Then it hit me: the electric drill was Brandon’s. Just one of the many tools he’s brought with him when he moved in. The memory of Brandon made my jaw tighten and my heart rate triple in the span of two seconds. What if I got caught? I pasted a smile on my face before Mom and Aisha noticed my mood darken.
Mom cupped my cheeks with her hands. “You look gorgeous. He’s one lucky guy.”
I didn’t look anywhere close to gorgeous, but her words made me tear up all the same. Less than a month ago, I wouldn’t even have imagined being able to put on makeup without being accused of trying to whore myself out, and now here I was, about to go on a date with one of the most incredible guys I’d come across.
“Where’s he taking you?” Mom said, as we walked down to the kitchen.
“He said it’s a surprise,” Aisha piped up with an eyebrow waggle
. “But he did tell her to wear clothes she wouldn’t mind getting dirty. Hence this questionable top.”
Mom’s eyebrows met in the middle. She opened her mouth then shook her head. “Be safe, okay?” She opened the fridge and took out a carton of orange juice. “You girls want some juice?”
I shook my head. I was about to assure her that I could take care of myself when the doorbell rang. The three of us perked up like meerkats.
“I got it!” I said.
Aisha and I hurried toward the door, but Mom made a ninja leap and beat us to it. The woman was fast. She flung it open all breathless and then stood back and stared.
“Um, hi, Mrs.—uh, Ms.—um, ma’am,” Logan said. His eyes widened a little when he saw Aisha. “Oh, hey, Aisha.”
“Hey, Logan.” Aisha grinned at him.
I elbowed her in the ribs.
“Wasn’t expecting to see you here,” Logan said. His bangs flopped over one eye, and he brushed them back and then stood there, looking awkward. It was completely adorable.
“So nice to finally meet you, Logan!” Mom turned to face me with a face-splitting grin. He’s cute, she mouthed, as though Logan wasn’t right there in front of us. I wanted to crawl under a very big, very heavy rock. She turned back to Logan. “So, Logan, where are you taking my daughter today?”
“Mooom,” I groaned. “Ignore her.”
“Um, it’s actually kind of a surprise, but I can show you the itinerary.”
“An itinerary!” Mom clapped her hands. “Dee, go wait in the kitchen. I don’t want to spoil the surprise.” She and Aisha huddled around Logan.
The Obsession Page 7