Is he … was that … was he flirting?
I crack the door open, and he’s still there, smirking at me and eating my pancakes, looking way too good. I narrow my eyes at him.
He was just joking. I convince myself.
“So, that’s a no on you taking your shirt off?” comes the reply.
I slap my hand over my mouth to suppress my laughter.
“That’s a no,” I say back, closing the door and turning to lean against it.
I stay with my back to the door until I hear his shut, and I quickly gather my clothes and dart to the bathroom for a shower. I make mental notes of what all I need to get.
I feel right. My decision feels right, and I think I might be lifting a weight off my shoulders by not hiding this from my parents anymore.
17 Ben
Pepper’s parents are supposed to arrive today, and it honestly sounds like it’s going to be a clusterfuck. I’m hungover, and she’s nervous as hell to tell them her secret. I wish I could take it from her and be the one to tell them, sheltering her from their disappointment.
I’m heading to take money out of my savings to give to my brother, and I can’t even focus on it.
I curse and hit the steering wheel. Embarrassment blooms through my body that I’ve let myself get so involved in this girl’s life that I’m now trying to plan it out for her.
Will I ever stop trying to protect people?
“Hello?” I answer my phone, which has been ringing off the hook since I climbed into my truck. I know who it is, but it looked like he was going to drive me crazy if I didn’t take the call.
“Where are you?” His gruff voice grates on my ear, and I squeeze my fingers tighter, my jaw clenching so much that my teeth ache.
“Going to get your money,” I say, proud of myself for reining my anger in and not saying what I truly want to. “I told Mom and Dad.” My words hang, suspended across the phone between us, before I hear him breathing again.
“That wasn’t your place,” he says.
I sigh. “You weren’t going to. Where else do you get your money?”
“I know people.”
“Do you, Mark? Why didn’t you ask them instead of me?” I can feel the blood starting to boil in my veins.
It’s the same thing every time. He gets in trouble, and I bail him out. Wash, rinse, repeat. Now, he’s trying to lie and tell me he can get it taken care of? I don’t think so.
“When will you be here?” His voice changes to a pleading tone, and I roll my eyes.
That’s what I thought.
“Soon. Where are you living now?”
“Hotel. I’m moving to Pete’s place after we meet. Thank you for kicking me out.”
“You tried to steal from me,” I say as calmly as I can muster.
“I was going to pay you back.”
“When?”
The line goes silent, and I let my shoulders drop. It’s not worth it, getting so worked up over this. I can’t change him. After years of trying, I’ve finally seen that.
“Look, Mark, I’m running into the bank now, and then I’ll be there. Just sit tight.”
I glance over at the envelope sitting on my console. Dad handed it to me before we left their house.
I’m not crazy. I keep it in the console, so nobody tries to break in and steal the five thousand dollars I’m just toting around like it’s an everyday occurrence, but I can feel it as soon as I sit down, like a noose around my neck. Or around Mark’s.
I don’t want to bail him out. I don’t want to keep teaching him that I’ll always be there to rescue him. But it’s so ingrained in me now that I couldn’t stop if I tried. Maybe I don’t truly want to stop. Maybe I want to be someone’s hero.
I pull into the bank parking lot and sigh, letting my head fall forward until my forehead hits the steering wheel. After a few breaths, I pick myself up and glance out the window, seeing a young girl with her face pressed up against her car window, staring at me.
Live it up, little girl. Pretty soon, you’ll be an adult, and then your own soul will be sucked dry by leeches and people who only care about themselves.
I do what needs to be done at the bank. The teller doesn’t even bat an eye when I request to take five thousand dollars out of my savings account.
I was at least hoping for an, Are you sure, sir?
But, no, she lets me take it, no questions asked.
I looked it up, and you only have to fill out paperwork if it’s ten thousand or more.
Pulling into the parking lot of Waffle House, I see Mark sitting in one of the front booths, a stack of pancakes in front of him, and he’s eating without a care in the world.
How do people like him do it? How do they take and take, never giving back, and then fall asleep at night?
I feel like I’m about to do a drug deal. The money burns through the envelope in my hand as I stuff it in my jeans pocket. The bulge it makes is obscene, so I opt to just carry it.
“Ben, hey. You want anything?” Mark asks as soon as I sit down, so fucking cheery and willing to buy me breakfast because I’m helping him out.
Maybe he considers this payback? A couple of pieces of bacon and scrambled eggs for ten thousand dollars. Most expensive breakfast I’ve ever had.
“Nah,” I say since I just ate pancakes.
Just then a plate of every breakfast meat, plus a few pancakes, eggs, and a biscuit, is laid in front of me, proving that Mark already ordered for me before I got here. Maybe the way to a guy’s heart is through his stomach after all because even though I just ate, I can feel myself warming
