Harder

by Ashcroft, Blue

  “What the hell?”

  “You just looked shaken. I can’t believe you guys went to that pool.”

  “Why?”

  “Because it’s an apartment complex pool in a crappy part of town.”

  “Well excuse me for not having parents to live with.”

  He stretches and I check out his body again. It’s easier than thinking about what he’s saying.

  “Ally?”

  “Yeah?”

  He comes closer, close enough to touch, and then presses his back to the wall next to me, facing the same way I am. Side by side with me. “Trust me? Please?”

  “I guess we are friends.”

  He nods.

  “I dunno. Oscar’s just this guy who lives on the floor below. No big deal.”

  He sighs. “What did he do before I got there?”

  “Just, I don’t know. Not much. I got Emily out first.”

  “What did he do?”

  “Touched my butt. I think he was about to do more, but didn’t get a chance.”

  Ryan sits forward, tense, and I push him back to the wall.

  “Cool it, it wasn’t much. I would have pummeled him but it’s hard in the water.”

  He brings one hand up into a fist and closes the other over it. A bunch of ugly popping noises sound from the vicinity of his hands. Ouch.

  “I should have punched him more. All I could see was that he wasn’t letting you go when you asked. Don’t go in that pool again.”

  “Don’t tell me what to do.”

  More knuckle cracking.

  “So what did you say to him anyway?” I ask.

  He sighs. “I just told him if he came near you again, I’d make him regret it.”

  “You were pretty intense back there.”

  “I can be, under the right conditions. I’ve boxed a long time.”

  “Those were the right conditions?” I ask.

  He thinks for a moment. “Yeah. He was assaulting a woman. More than that, he was going to hurt my friend.”

  A warm feeling floats through me at his words, and I look up above us. The moon is out now. Bright and beautiful in the clear dark blue sky. I can feel Ryan next to me in the water, though we aren’t touching. Can feel the little ripples of his body moving against me. I like being in this pool. I like this lush green yard. I would have liked to grow up somewhere like this.

  “Well, thanks,” I say. “You’re a good friend.” It remains unspoken that it’s more than friendship between us, and we both know it.

  “Anytime.” He pulls his hair out of his pony, dunks his head to wet it and slicks it back off his face. It’s shiny in the moonlight. I kinda want to see him swim with it out, he’d probably look like a mermaid. A dude mermaid. A dudemaid? No, I think, snapping my fingers. A merdude!

  “What?” he asks.

  “I was thinking if you swam with your hair out, you’d look like a mermaid, then I figured out you’d be a merdude.”

  He laughs, sending water all around me with his movement. It tickles. I’m suddenly aware that we’re both half naked, in a pool together, alone at night. Friends do this, right?

  “So anyway, Emily and you are going out?”

  “Yeah, tomorrow, I guess.”

  “You excited?”

  He takes a deep breath, lets it out. “Want to go in the hot tub? It’s getting cold.”

  “Sure.” I grab the wall and jump out. I run towards it, while he walks to the steps like a civilized person. But I’m cold.

  “Careful,” he says. “That’s hard concrete.”

  I drop into the hot tub, and gasp and jump out again. It’s hot. Then I lower myself in slowly. Half torture, half awesome.

  My muscles cry out in relief as the hot water surrounds me.

  Ryan watches me from his side, then looks away. His long, toned arms are spread out along the rim of the hot tub. He seems content with the beautiful night, like I am.

  “So, you excited?” I say.

  “I’ll tell you if you tell me more about Oscar.”

  “Not much to tell. He comes by sometimes. I don’t let him in.”

  His brows lower, giving him a darker look. He pushes hair out of his face. “He comes by?”

  “Yeah, I don’t know, maybe thinks I’m lonely. I know how to handle it.”

  “Call me anytime.”

  I shrug. I probably won’t.

  “Seriously, Ally.”

  I splash him. Just send that scalding hot water right over his face. He shakes it off and glares at me.

  “Seriously what?” I ask. “I know how to handle it. I’m not going to run to you like a dog with its tail between its legs.”

  “I’m your friend.”

  “I’m starting to think we have a weird definition of friends.”

  “Maybe. But I care about you. I don’t like you being alone there with a creep.”

  I sigh and hit the water, sending it in a different direction this time, but angry all the same. “Maybe I don’t like it either, did you think about that? Maybe I hate it.” I splash again. “But I’ve always been alone. I’ve been taking care of myself my whole life, and I think I’m doing a damn good job.”

  Ryan stands.

  “So my butt got grabbed, that’s not much.” I splash again, more violently. “Worse things can happen when you’re alone. But I’d rather be alone, than be lame, and get used to you doing everything, and lose my ability to be a badass.” I know I’m kicking up water everywhere, but it feels good, because I’m so damn angry all of a sudden, and I don’t know why.

  He’s close now, almost close enough to touch, reaching for me. I push away with another splash. “I’m not Emily, okay? I’m not some protectable flower. I’m a weed. I have thorns. I can deal. I can deal!”

  Then his arms are around me and I’m aware of the panic that’s been rising inside ever since Oscar. Ever since I realized how alone I am, and how I’ve become used to having someone like Ryan to depend on, when I should just stay used to being alone.

  “You’re taking my badass away,” I say, clutching his arms.

  “No one could take your badass away,” he says, wrapping me tight. He sits and pulls me into his lap, cradles me. I hate it and try to get off, but not too hard. I settle down. It’s warm here.

  “I hate this,” I mutter, clutching his arm.

  “I’m sorry,” he says. “It’s okay to depend on people, Ally.”

  “Hmph.”

  “Okay, just for a little while then. Just be a girl for a little while, you can go back to badass tomorrow.”

  I sigh, stay there for another minute, and then struggle to get off his lap. He lets me go. I sit across from him, sure my face is bright red.

  “That was long enough,” I say.

  He smiles. “Okay.”

  “Now you answer my question.”

  The smile is gone. “What do you want me to say? No, I’m not that excited to go out with her.”

  My blush deepens. “Why?”

  “She’s not really my type. I don’t know.”

  “But she’s a lot like you.”

  “Some similarities, yes, but maybe we’re too alike. I’m not attracted.”

  “Well you should be, she’s awesome.”

  “I’ll give it a chance,” he says in a low voice, staring at the house. “I said I would.”

  “Good. Because I like her.”

  “Fine,” he says.

  “Fine,” I say.

  We glare at each other, and then laugh, because there’s nothing else really to do.

  “How are your classes going?” he asks.

  “Fine,” I say. “Yours?”

  “Good.” He nods. “Need any help?”

  “Now that you mention it…” I look over at our stuff. I brought my backpack.

  He laughs. “Sure.”

  Its nice having friends.

  Ryan

  I watch her brush her hair back behind her ear as she stares down at the textbook.

&n
bsp; “See, this is what I don’t get,” she mutters. “I mean, how am I just supposed to look at a pair of hands with arrows around it and know what this sign is?”

  I show her the sign. “Maybe you should just come to class more often.”

  “I hate class.”

  “I’ll tell dad you said that.”

  Her eyes fly open. “You wouldn’t!”

  I chuckle. “Of course not.”

  She relaxes and gets back into the book, looking for other signs she doesn’t understand. There are more doodles everywhere, but I know I shouldn’t ask about them. She’s a pretty good artist.

  She turns to a page and sits up, pleased. She crosses her long legs in front of her and hands me the book. “These. These don’t make any sense.”

  I look down. A huge doodle of a dinosaur is completely obscuring half of the other page. Don’t mention it, don’t mention it. “Um.”

  “Oh shiz, that’s the doodle one.” She lunges forward to take it back, but I jerk it away. She falls in my lap, gasps, and backs up. “Hey, give it back.”

  “No. I like your doodles. You’re very good.”

  She scratches her head and looks away. “Thanks?”

  I go back to the signs. I can explain all of these. I glance over the book at her. Her hair is still damp. Her face is so beautiful. Pale and delicate, like a fairy face. Her neck is long, leading down to elegant collarbones that go under her tank. I clear my throat and go back to my book.

  I need to get excited about Emily. I need to at least pretend to be, so that Ally doesn’t feel threatened by me. If I don’t, she might run, and I’m the only person she has.

  I wish I could post a guard outside her apartment. I hate the thought of her walking up those stairs alone at night. But then again she’s right. She’s been taking care of herself for a long time and she doesn’t need me mothering her.

  It’s not mothering though. I like her. I feel possessive of her. I know she doesn’t really need me, and that makes me more attracted. She’s strong, and she’s a good partner. And life would never be boring with her. It was fun watching her with Emily, but I was definitely watching her more than Emily.

  “I’m glad you like my doodles,” she says softly. “Zach didn’t.”

  I meet her eyes, waiting for more. She grabs a pen out of my pencil case and pulls out her math book. She opens it, finds a blank-ish page, and starts to draw. “He said they were stupid and ugly.”

  My knuckles are already sore so I’m not going to crack them. But I’m angry, as I am every time she mentions something like this. I want to know who Zach is, and I want his address, and I want to frame Ally’s doodles and put them up in my room so she knows they are precious.

  “Zach is an idiot then. These are good.”

  “I guess so.” She laughs, and the sound soothes me. I can try to date Emily if it means she stays around me and feels safer.

  “He is,” I say.

  “But you know something?” she murmurs, making a large swirl in her book. “He could also be really sweet. We got to know each other in the foster system. I depended on him. When I got emancipated, I did it too early. I thought I could take care of myself. I had to leave the group home, but it wasn’t as easy to get a job as I thought. I ended up homeless, like a lot of us do who emancipate.”

  “Oh.” I don’t know what to say.

  “It’s okay.” She keeps drawing, like it keeps her calm. “I mean, that was four years ago. I was sixteen. I guess I like being childish sometimes now because I grew up so fast then. Anyway, Zach was a year older. He emancipated before me, knew how tough it was. He gave me a place to stay. We got married, I guess because it seemed like a way to be together. We were both minors. It was a tough situation.”

  “Oh. I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be,” she says. “At least I had a roof over my head. And I got to go to a good high school. Got on the swim team. Things got better for a while.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah,” she murmurs. “And when things got better, Zach got jealous. Senior year, I had it all. A good apartment with him, good enough anyway. A job at the pool.” She sets down the pen, grabs another one of a different color, and starts feverishly filling the picture in. “Then I got injured.”

  “Injured how?” The way she said it gives me a sick feeling, and I tense up. I tell my muscles to relax. I don’t want her to feel like I can’t handle this and stop telling me about it. I try to look calm. I sit back with my palms on the carpet behind me. But I hate thinking of this beautiful girl being hurt. I can feel sweat beading on my forehead, and I resist wiping it off.

  “Oh, you know, Zach didn’t mean anything by it. He was just jealous. He didn’t like how much I was gone. I mean, I guess he was giving me a home, and as my husband, he deserved more attention. But I was still a teen. We both were. I wanted to have fun. I didn’t really understand what he expected when I agreed to marry him.” She sets her pen down and looks at the drawing, smiles at it, then frowns and looks for a new page.

  “He didn’t mean anything by what?” I say, gritting my teeth and tensing and relaxing my shoulders. Stay calm. I knew things were bad for Ally, I didn’t know how bad.

  “You know,” she says, waving a hand. “Just, yeah. But it got worse after that. I was mad he ruined state, he was mad in general. We fought a lot. I got knocked out. Mistakes were made.”

  “He hit you? That’s how you got injured?”

  She finally looks up at me, silver eyes oddly flat and gray, blinks a couple of times, and nods. She drops her head and starts drawing again. “No big deal. So anyway, I decided to leave him. We got a divorce. He tore the door off my Lebaron when I was trying to leave. I couldn’t get it back on just right. And I haven’t had time or money since I’ve been here.”

  I let all the air I’ve been holding in my chest out. “Ally, that’s awful, I’m so sorry.”

  She glances up, then down at her work again. “Don’t be. I don’t want any pity. I got out. We both did our best, it didn’t work, so I left him. He had a right to be mad. I had a right to leave though.”

  “Yes, you did.”

  She shrugs. “It’s not always that simple though. Sometimes I still miss him. But that’s crazy.”

  It kind of is, but I’d be a jerk to say so. I don’t understand what it’s like to be hit by someone you love, but I’m sure it’s confusing. “I’m sorry that happened to you,” I say.

  She waves it off again, then finishes her picture, closes the book, and looks up smiling. “Feels good to tell someone though. Get it off my chest. You okay?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You’re pale. You don’t look so good.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “You’re shaking,” she says. “Relax.”

  I stand and pace. “I’m fine. No, I’m just mad. I’m mad because your whole life has been shitty.”

  “You swore!”

  I give her an exasperated sigh, and keep pacing. “And yeah, I just hate it. I hate him, and I hate the guy downstairs from your apartment, and I hate your parents, wherever they are. And I hate that you won’t let me make things better for you.”

  “You do make things better.” She stands, puts her hands in her pockets, and leans against the nearby wall.

  “But you don’t want me to do too much. Worry too much.”

  “No. It’s not your place.”

  “Whose place is it then?” I say, throwing up my hands. “Whose?”

  “No one’s,” she shouts. Then she drops to her knees and shoves everything into her backpack. It keeps falling back out. She stops, wiping tears away. I come closer, but she puts up a hand.

  “Ally,” I say.

  “Don’t,” she says, hand still up, warding me back. “Don’t put pressure on me. Don’t try to own me. I’ve been there.” She finishes packing up and puts everything in her backpack. “Don’t think you know me. Don’t think you can judge me.”

  “I’m not, I just, I’m sorry.” I put
my hands in my pockets and wait.

  “So, Emily. You should get me home and go to bed. You’ve got a big date tomorrow.”

  My lip curls. I can’t believe she’s still stuck on that, but if it makes her feel better to focus on that, fine, we will. “I guess so.”

  Something flashes across her face before she turns away. I don’t know what. Maybe disappointment, maybe I’m just imagining it because I’m hoping that was it. That she cares for me like I do for her. Even as a friend.

  “Can you take me home?”

  “Of course. Have you eaten?”

  “I’ve got stuff at home,” she says, shuffling her feet.

  “Okay.” I’m not going to hurt her pride by challenging her on that. But she’s thin. As her friend, I’m going to keep trying to shove food at her when I can.

  The ride home is quiet. She’s next to me but it doesn’t feel like she’s really there.

  “Ally?” I say.

  “Yeah?” She’s watching out the window as streetlights pass by.

  “Thanks for telling me all of that. For trusting me.”

  “Sure.”

  “I won’t overreact again. I’m sorry.”

  “Okay.”

  “I just, it makes me angry to think about you getting hurt. Being treated like less than you deserve.”

  “If I deserve anything different than this, then why has my life always been this way?”

  Now it’s my turn to stare absently at streetlights, trying to comprehend the unfairness of the universe. “I don’t know. But maybe you’ll be happier someday. Maybe things will even out.”

  “Don’t bet on it,” she says. “Besides, I’m happy now. I have a good place, a good job, and hell, a good friend.” She smiles at me.

  I smile back, feeling like it hurts my face to do so. But it’s impossible not to return that smile.

  We pull up in front of her place. She doesn’t get out right away.

  “Emily really is a terrible swimmer though. Don’t take her in water unless you want to be a babysitter.”

  “Okay.”

  “And don’t make any quick moves?” She shakes a finger at me. “Girl is innocent. A delicate flower, and—”

  “I don’t think she’s as innocent as you—”

  “Ah ah,” she says, wiggling the finger. “Ally knows best. Behave.”

  I laugh. “So you care about her now, right?”