Текст книги "Pucked Up "

Автор книги: Helena Hunting

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Randy hands me a shirt to wipe my face with. It’s sticky from the soda. And bloody from one of my face wounds.

I take a stumbling step towards the trailer. “You can’t send Sunny home with him.”

Waters puts a hand on my chest and pushes. I drop back to the ground on my ass.

“Enough, Alex!” Violet gets between us. It reminds me of what she did in the locker room after I discovered Waters banging her there—except that time she was defending Alex, not me. “Do you realize what a hypocrite you’re being? I don’t even like you right now!”

“He’s been fucking my sister around for months!” Alex shouts back.

She throws her hands in the air. “No, he hasn’t!”

“Get over your goddamn ego, Waters,” I shout from the ground. “If you yell at Violet again, I’m gonna beat your ass.”

“You can’t even stand up right now, Butterson.”

“Alex! Just stop!” Violet seems as pissed as he is.

Commotion inside the trailer stops the yelling match, which is good, because it’s making my headache worse. Sunny opens the door again, more cautiously this time. Lily is right behind her, looking likes she’s prepared for fainting, round two. Sunny elbows Bushman out of the way and holds on to the door frame, still unsteady.

Looking at her makes me feel like shit. The only emotion on her face is resignation.

Lily puts a hand on her shoulder, looking past us to Randy, behind me. “Sunny, maybe—”

She shakes her off. “Alex, let’s just go.”

“Are you serious with this? Come on, Sunny. What is even going on right now?”

Her gaze swings slowly to me. “There’s too much drama, Miller. We can talk about this later, when everyone’s calmed down.”

“Later?” I gesture to the trailer. “You’re leaving. What kind of later is there?”

“I’ll call you tonight.”

“What’s the damn point? You’re gonna keep listening to whatever everyone tells you. All I asked was that you have a little fucking faith that I’m gonna do the right thing, and what happens? Your brother shows up and gets his dick all tied in a knot over some pictures he doesn’t like, and you decide you’re gonna go home with this fucking joker?”

“It’s not like that, Miller. Alex is worried.”

I turn to Alex. “I’m not with Sunny to get back at you, you self-absorbed fuck.” I hold a hand out to her. “Come on, sweets, come out. I’ll take you back to Guelph if that’s where you want to go. Let’s just have a conversation.”

“Miller, I—”

Her hesitation is my tipping point. It’s a kick in the balls I don’t need. “You know what? Forget it. Go back to Guelph with Tiny Dick and the gaping asshole.” I look to Waters. “You win. Congratulations. I hope you’re fucking happy.”

Sunny steps down from the trailer. “Miller, wait.”

“For what, Sunny? For you to finally believe I’m not fucking you over? I can’t do this anymore. It’s like being a goddamn hamster on a wheel. Stay or go, Sunny. Do whatever you want. Either way, I’m outta here.”

I drop the shirt from my forehead to check if the bleeding has stopped. Sunny faints again, and Lily catches her, just barely. I want to do something other than say fuck it, but it’s useless. I can’t make Sunny trust me, I can’t change my job and the craziness that surrounds it, and I can’t make Waters less of an interfering asshole.

I head for the back of the trailer, then remember it’s Waters’ car, not mine, parked behind it. They’re all blocking me in, making an exit impossible. I want to spin my tires and spray some gravel, maybe do a few fishtails and drive some of my anger out.

“We’ll all be out of your way in a minute.” Waters looks way too pleased right now.

“I’ll be inside, packing up my shit.”

“Stay the fuck out of my cottage,” he says.

I give him a WTF look. “Really, man?”

“Alex, you’re being a complete jerkoff,” Violet says. “You can go in the cottage, Buck.”

“Forget it. I’ll wait in the car until the jerkoff leaves.”

I climb into the rental and lock all the doors, glad the windows are tinted. I grab a ball cap from the backseat and pull it low, gritting my teeth when it hits the cut on my forehead. I check the rearview mirror. Randy’s holding the trailer door open. I assume he’s talking to Lily, or trying to. There’s so much shit going down, I can’t imagine it’s a very productive conversation.

Vi and Waters have a hand-flailing argument in front of the trailer. When Waters goes to hug her, she puts her hands on his chest, fending him off.

He pulls her close anyway, her hands trapped between them. When he tries to kiss her, she gives him her cheek. I don’t want to feel responsible for their argument, but I do. He takes her hands in his and clasps them behind his neck. Then he tilts her chin up. I’m an interloper on their private moment. His expression is earnest as he close-talks, their noses almost touching. Eventually Violet lets him kiss her, but she’s still stiff.

She shoves her hands in the pockets of her shorts while she waits for Waters to move his car. Randy steps back out of the trailer with a grim expression. He shakes his head as Bushman does a seventeen-point turn, clearly incapable of backing out. Waters jumps in the trailer before it takes off down the driveway.

Rain clouds roll in, blocking out the sun. My chest feels like someone punched a hole in it as the trailer disappears around the corner with my Sunshine.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

FIX IT IF YOU BROKE IT

I could get out of the car now, but I don’t. I sit there, staring through the rearview mirror at the empty space where the trailer was a minute ago. I don’t know if I wish I could take back the words or change the outcome of the whole situation.

Violet knocks on the window, looking stoic. Since the car isn’t running, I can’t roll down the window. I have to open the door instead.

“I’m sorry, Buck.”

I tear my gaze away from the rearview mirror. Sunny isn’t coming back. I know that. “What for?”

“This whole clusterfuck.” She looks so sad. It’s an echo of what’s going on inside me. “Why don’t you come out so I can take a look at your head?”

It takes a lot of effort to get out of the seat. My face hurts, and I’m dizzy. “I was trying to do a good thing with that fundraiser.”

“We didn’t know it was going to be like that,” Randy says from behind her.

“Balls, you mind giving us a few minutes? Maybe you should get your bag together. Clean up all your used condoms and such.” She doesn’t even thrust once.

His head drops, and he rubs the back of his neck. “Sure thing, Vi.” His shoes crunch on the gravel drive as he retreats. The screen door slams shut. A bird twitters somewhere above¸ and a squirrel makes that weird clicking sound. Fuck the happy sounds of nature.

Vi’s angry. And emotional. She’s on the verge of tears. I’ve witnessed a lot of girl crying lately. I don’t like that I seem to be the cause of it so often. My apology is reflexive. “I’m sorry.”

“Why? You don’t have anything to be sorry for. Well, maybe you can be sorry for the poison ivy on Sunny’s boobs, but even that wasn’t your fault. It’s not like you forced her to get naked in a forest at hard-on point.”

“Uh, no. She took her top off all by herself.”

Vi nods and keeps her hand close to my elbow as we walk over to the deck. I don’t know what she thinks she’s going to do if I drop. It’s not like she can catch me. I weigh twice as much as she does.

I sit on the edge of the deck and let her inspect my forehead. “You’re going to need a few stitches, and I think your nose is probably broken.”

“I figured as much.”

“I have to take you to the hospital.”

“I know.” I rest my elbows on my knees and press the heels of my hands against my temples, hoping to alleviate the throb. “This isn’t how I thought today would go.”

“That makes two of us.”

“Are you and Waters okay?”

Vi shrugs. “We’ll work it out. Eventually. But Boobgate is in full effect right now. I’m not happy about the way he dealt with this.”

I don’t ask what Boobgate is. I’m pretty sure I know. “The models weren’t topless, even though they looked like they were. We tried to get in and out of there as fast as we could, but it took way long, and now everything’s fucked.”

“It definitely didn’t look good, that’s for sure.”

“We would’ve left if we could.”

“I know that, Buck.” Vi pulls up an image on her phone of what looks like me being kissed by a topless model while another one rubs her boobs on Randy’s arm. “This is what everyone saw today. You left Sunny here with Lily, who’s still on the fence about you, and went to that fundraiser with Balls. Who, incidentally, can’t seem to keep a handle on his dick anywhere he goes.”

“Sunny warned Lily. I talked to her about it.”

“You should’ve warned Lily, and you should’ve told Balls to keep his hands off. Anyway, Balls and Lily are the least of your worries right now. They can sort out their own shit, or not. The fundraiser wasn’t mandatory. You could’ve skipped it. Your girlfriend being covered in poison ivy is a legitimate reason to miss a porno car wash.”

“It was supposed to be a good thing, and I wanted to talk to the guy who runs it. I didn’t know it was something I should avoid until I got there, and by that time it was too late. Sunny and I even talked about how there’d probably be pictures. I knew she wouldn’t be happy about them, but I didn’t think it’d go like this.”

Violet runs her hand over her face. “I hate the way this went down. Alex better keep Kale away from her. That dick-knob seems like the kind of guy to take advantage of how vulnerable she is right now.”

I lift my head to see if she’s serious. “You don’t think she’ll get back with him, do you?”

“I don’t know, Buck. I sure hope not. I get that you’re upset about the situation, but everyone was heated, and I’m not sure anyone was making good decisions.” She kicks at the gravel. “Sunny wasn’t wrong about letting people calm down. It would’ve been better if you could have talked to her, but Alex wasn’t going to let that happen, and she knew it. She was trying not to make the problem worse.”

“Why the fuck does Waters’ opinion matter to her so damn much?” I hate how difficult he’s made things.

“He’s her brother. He sees you hanging out with these guys who don’t seem to care whose reputation gets dragged through the mud. Then he gets to the cottage and finds her covered in poison ivy while you’re at some fundraiser that looks like a setup for a porno.”

“He knows how things can be taken out of context.”

“He sure does. But you saw what I went through when Alex publicly denied being with me on national TV. You even broke his nose over it. Yet you still seem to be okay with Sunny looking like one of your bunnies while you go out and party it up.”

“But I wasn’t—”

“I know. You weren’t partying it up, but that’s what it looks like. I believe you because I know you better than that. Alex is going to take some work.”

“All I want to do is get the fundraiser stuff going. It just backfired on me.”

“It sure did.” Her phone beeps. She pulls it out. A picture of her and Waters—taken before they even started dating, with her tongue in his mouth—fills the screen. She shoves it back in her pocket.

“Aren’t you going to check that?”

“I will in a few minutes. He can wait.”

I’m not sure if me being a priority over Waters is a good thing. “Can I ask you something?”

Vi rests her cheek on her knee. “Sure.”

“Why’d you get back together with Alex after the relationship denial?”

“You mean aside from the fact that he has a giant cock and can make me come like a freight train on nitrous?”

“Don’t be an asshole right now, Vi.”

She sighs. “It’s complicated. I love him even though he hurt me. I wanted to hate him for saying we weren’t together in such a public venue, but I couldn’t. People make bad decisions, especially when they’re under a lot of pressure. Some are worse than others. He knows he fucked up hardcore, and I didn’t sugar-coat how badly. I also don’t pretend to be over it.”

“You mean still?”

“I have moments of insecurity. He’s good about it.” She spins her engagement ring around so the diamond is facing her palm. “What I have with Alex, it’s all-consuming when I’m with him, and when I’m not. And it’s rare. It’s not perfect, but we work, and that makes it worth fighting for.”

“I thought maybe I’d have that with Sunny. I guess not.” I saw how hard it was on Vi when Waters screwed her over. She bawled her eyes out over that asshole for weeks. And then just like that, they were back together. I’m angry at Sunny for not having faith in me, and for letting other people affect her decisions. But I still hope she doesn’t get back with Patchy McBushman Tiny Dick.

“You had an argument, Miller. That doesn’t mean it’s over.”

“I’m pretty sure I broke up with her.”

“It doesn’t have to be the end. I’m mad at Alex right now for being an asshole to you. I won’t be mad at him forever, but I’m going to let it ruminate for a while. It’s why he’s going back to Guelph with Sunny, and I’m here with you.”

“We fucked up a vacation for you, didn’t we?”

“Alex fucked it up by overreacting. I swear he could have a second career on the stage if he wanted. We can come back up once we get things sorted out. Sunny was willing to talk. I’m sure she still is. I think what it comes down to is deciding whether she’s worth the effort. Relationships take a lot of energy. I get that you want her to trust you, but you have to give her some time. One conversation about it isn’t a magic recipe for perfection. Loving someone is a lot of work, Buck.”

“Maybe I’m no good at relationships.” I don’t want to be doomed to a life of bunnies and no substance. They’re not what I want. I want someone consistent. But caring that much about someone gives them a lot of power, and that makes me nervous. Power hurts people. Then I admit the thing that’s been gnawing at me ever since I went to visit Sunny in Guelph and we finally sealed the deal: “I think I might have fallen in love with her.”

“Then you need to talk to her, Buck.”

“I need some time to think first.” I wipe away a trail of blood from the bridge of my nose. “I wish there was a drive thru for relationship problem-solving.”

Vi laughs, but it’s humorless. “Don’t we all.” She stands up and wipes the dirt off the back of her shorts. “Come on. Let’s see how Balls is doing. Then we need to get you to the hospital. You probably have a concussion, and I won’t be able to forgive Alex if anything happens to you. Then my whole future’s fucked, and I’ll have the moops for the next year, and I’ll probably start dating Balls because I’ll have to break off the engagement.”

I know she means it as a joke, or that’s how she wants me to take it, but there’s an undercurrent of worry she’s trying to hide.

Her phone buzzes again. It’s the song about peacocks. “I have to get this.”

She wanders out of earshot, but I don’t need to hear the conversation to read her body language. She runs a hand through her hair, stunted by her ponytail. Then she stares up at the sky.

Violet’s jaw is hard; her eyes glitter. I know this face. She’s holding back tears. She lifts her hand as the sun peeks through the clouds and watches the diamond catch the sun, sending prisms of light dancing over her face. Then she spins the diamond to face her palm and closes her fingers around it. She brings her closed fist to her mouth.

Maybe it’s better if I leave things with Sunny alone, even if it hurts more than a puck to the balls after being bitten by a damn spider. I don’t know if I ever want to love someone as much as Vi loves Waters. It seems to cause an awful lot of pain.

***

Apparently Lily wasn’t too happy about the pictures of Randy with the models at the fundraiser. All of his clothes have ASSHOLE scrawled across them in various colors of permanent marker. On the front of his boxers is the warning: SMALL DICK INSIDE. It’d be funny if it happened to someone else.

Usually he and Lance would laugh off something like this. Not this time. Randy looks legit sick over it, and not in an I-have-a-new-stalker way. It’s in a this-is-fucked-up way instead. He throws the last of his ruined clothes into his bag and zips it up.

“We should get you to the hospital; that needs stitches.” He points to my forehead.

“Vi’s gonna take me.”

“I can follow in the rental.” He picks up a note off the nightstand, flips it open and scans it, then shoves it in his pocket.

Vi appears in the doorway. “That’s okay. It might take a while. You can head back to Toronto if you want and I’ll bring Buck back with me.”

“Won’t it be outta your way if you have to take me to the airport?” I ask.

“It’s fine. I don’t mind.”

My head hurts too much to argue, so I let Randy deal with the rental vehicle. I have to wonder if he’s going to make a stop in Guelph. If that’s the case, he should probably stop at a sports store and grab a cup, just in case.

Violet runs back into the cottage once the car is loaded to grab something she forgot. She comes back holding the orange Play-Doh sculpture with the superhero cape. She hugs it, then tucks it safely into the backseat with a sweatshirt wrapped around it.

“Do you wanna explain that?”

She pats the head. “It’s the Super MC. It’s an homage.”

I shouldn’t ask the next question. I’m almost positive I don’t want the answer. “An homage to what?”

“The near-fatal strangling of Alex’s MC when I made it into a superhero. It’s a long story. I promise you don’t want to hear it, but someone might tell it at our wedding—if we end up having a wedding. I hope I can convince him to elope.”

I was right. I didn’t need to know any of that.

***

We find our way to a hospital in Bracebridge. It’s small compared to the ones in Chicago, but the people are nice, as is typical in Canada. Someone recognizes my name, and Violet knows all the right things to say, so they see me almost right away. Head injuries always take precedence. I’m concussed, but only mildly. My nose is broken, and the gash on my forehead takes six stitches to close. Up until today, I’d managed to get by without breaking any parts of my face since I got my teeth knocked out in high school. Figures it’d be Waters who changed that.

I get the usual spiel about having someone wake me up every couple of hours. A doctor sets my nose and bandages it. The black eyes haven’t appeared yet, but I’m sure they’re coming. While I wait for someone to give me the requisite painkillers and sign off for me to leave, I check my messages. I have emails from Amber that, had I checked them yesterday, would have given me the information I needed about the fundraiser and why it might not be the best idea. I wish I’d read them sooner. Or checked my voice mail, since I missed a call from her as well. Sometimes I feel as dumb as people assume I am.

I’ve got nothing from Sunny. I hope Bushman isn’t consoling her right now. I want to message her, but at the same time I don’t. I’m conflicted, and it sucks.

From the hospital we drive toward Toronto. The canvas of pale blue dotted with soft white turns pink at the edges as the sun starts to sink behind the tall trees lining the highway. It’s already late; by the time we get to Toronto it’ll be dark. I feel bad that Vi has to drive. I’m on pain meds, so I’m not safe behind the wheel.

“I’mma call the airline and see if I can get a flight out tonight.”

“Why don’t you come back to Guelph with me?”

“I don’t see the point. It’s not gonna change anything. Sunny’s still not gonna trust me, and Waters and Lily are still gonna hate me.”

“Lily doesn’t hate you.”

“Randy said the same thing. I have a hard time believing it, though.”

“Even she was trying to get Alex to calm down. Randy’s a whole different story. I don’t know what happened with those two, but man, is she scorned. You’re also lucky I’m the one who went through your bedroom, not Alex. Do you and Sunny even know what a garbage can is?”

“Why were you in Sunny’s bedroom?”

“Alex wanted me to check her poison ivy. Poor thing. Her boobs look bad.” Vi grabs her own boob as if she’s suffering sympathy pains. “Anyway, I don’t want Alex to be a prison wife. If he’d found those condoms after seeing the pictures at the fundraiser, you’d have a lot more than a broken nose.”

I want to mention the lack of fairness, considering what I walked in on with Vi and Waters, but I get that this is a different situation, and my fuck-ups outnumber his.

When we get close to Toronto, I insist she take me to the airport.

“You’re sure you want to do that? Maybe you should get a hotel room for the night and sleep on it.”

“I have things I need to deal with when I get home.”

“Are you still going through with that fundraiser?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.” I think about that Michael kid and how much harder his life is than mine. “Yeah. I’m still gonna do it.”

“Good. It’s about time you did something that shows people how great your heart is.”

“I hate the interviews.”

“You need to get over that.”

“I have to memorize everything. You have no idea what it’s like to be dyslexic.”

“Nope. I sure don’t. I do know what it’s like to be awkward.”

“That’s not even remotely the same. Speeches were the worst in middle school.”

“Speeches are your beef? You think it was any easier to be in the enriched math classes as a girl? Fuck that. It sucked. Like I wasn’t nerdy enough without that label slapped on me. None of those guys even bathed regularly. And then there was you, needing ‘help’.” She makes air quotes. “When really you were screwing everything with a pulse, getting everyone to do your bidding because you were King Jock of Turd Hill. Being your stepsister was a pain in my damn ass in high school. But I got over it. So should you.”

“Yeah, but you’re super smart and shit’s easy for you.”

“Easy? Because I’m good at math? You do realize I have to work more than sixty hours a week to make less than two percent of your yearly salary, right?”

“Less than two percent?”

“Plus bonuses, but yeah.”

“Wow.”

“It’s cool. I’m marrying a millionaire who likes to buy me ridiculously expensive things. I’m sure I can handle my crappy salary, all considering. This isn’t about me, though. I get that you work hard, too, but come on! You’ve got an incredible skill set that allows you to get around your perceived deficiency, which, if you decided to be more vocal about it, might actually win you some serious points.”

“No one wants to hear about my deficiencies.”

“Are you kidding? People always want to hear about other people’s challenges. It makes them feel like anything is possible. And it makes some people feel better about themselves because they’re assholes.

“If you wanted, you could go into schools and talk about how hard it was for you and how you struggled to pass your classes, but that you persevered. I mean, obviously you don’t want to tell them you fucked all your tutors, and your poor stepsister had to listen to loud music in the next bedroom while it all went down. But you can give millions of kids false hope, and a few awesome kids the inspiration they need to make it to the next level.”

I ignore the part about screwing all my tutors. I’m not going there with her right now. “I don’t know, Vi. That’s like . . . personal.”

“Personal? Are you kidding? This coming from a man who lets his friends take pictures of his balls and post them on the Internet?”

“I didn’t let him do that. And anyway it was to figure out what kind of spider bit me. No one was supposed to know they were my balls.”

“And that makes it so much better.” She twists her ring around her finger. “I don’t get why being classified as a manwhore is so appealing—especially when being the guy who’s overcome challenges and volunteers at camps and even helps kids afford them is so much less offensive.”

“I’m not trying to be a manwhore. I was trying to be Sunny’s boyfriend, and look how that turned out. I spent my teen years dealing with all the shit that came with being the dumb kid; I’m not interested in going back to that.”

“Who says you have to? Come on, Buck. Life is tough. Teenage years suck balls—cheesy ones that haven’t been washed in a week. You make five million dollars a year. You’re not dumb. Relationship-inept maybe, but definitely not dumb. If you want to change how things are going, you need to do something selflessly selfish.”

“That doesn’t even make sense.”

“Let me explain. Did you know you’re mentioned in an article recently that has nothing to do with who you’ve boned?”

“The only person I’ve boned lately is Sunny. I mean, had sex with. I’m not boning Sunny. That’s not what you do with someone you care about.”

“Sometimes all you need is a good boning, even with the person you love. Anyway, I’m not talking about media perception of who you’re boning. I’m talking about that camp you went to. You did an interview, and it was awesome. People are already falling in love with you.

“Get more positive attention. Stop going to the bars, stop going to Lance’s for parties, and stop getting yourself into more trouble. Find out what’s going to be happening at places before you show up. Regardless of what goes down between you and Sunny, this thing you want to do is good. It’s the version of you everyone should get to see.”

Funny how losing someone important is the thing that finally makes me decide to step outside my comfort zone. Now I wish I would’ve done it sooner.