She bites her lip.
Her reaction only makes me madder. “Or maybe you think this is just amazing. I saw you smiling. You should’ve just gone ahead and laughed with them too.” Just like my dad, who’s so fucking happy right now. Proud, he said. I want to kick something. Hard.
“I wasn’t doing it because I wanted to mock you. It was either smile or cry, and I thought you’d hate it if I cried.”
She’s right. I would’ve been even madder if she cried like this entire clusterfuck was about her.
“Why didn’t you tell me about the sex toys?”
“Because it never came up…? I didn’t know you were the guy from New Orleans until, like, two weeks ago, and I just didn’t think about it. I’m sorry. I didn’t think you’d find out like this or that it would be such an issue.”
Fuck. I grit my teeth so I don’t start screaming. That’d make her burst into tears for sure. “I have to face those people on Monday. And every day after until Friday. And then the next week, and the week after that. And when they see me, all they’ll be thinking about is the fact that I’m a sex toy.”
“You are not a sex toy. You just inspire some of the products that we’re making. Two totally different things! If they treat you differently because of this, you can find a position elsewhere. You are a phenomenal economist. You won that special John Bates Clark Medal. You’re going to be in high demand.”
Is she listening to herself? Can’t she hear how selfish and ridiculous her suggestion is? “I don’t want to go elsewhere. I like being here, near my brothers. Why should I have to give up something I like? Damn it, every time I want something and think I have it, it just gets ripped away.”
“If you want something, fight for it. If people treat you badly because of this, you have to fight that to hold on to what you have. Don’t let anything or anyone take away what you want. If you do, you aren’t fighting hard enough.”
It’s all I can do to hold on to the steering wheel so I don’t strangle her. So easy for her to say the words. But she doesn’t understand what it’s like. I’ve spent so much of my life avoiding the spotlight—in spite of what my parents are, in spite of my environment.
“Like how you fought for the family of two you created by marrying that loser Todd?” I say, wanting to hurt her as much as she’s hurt me. “You wanted it one day, and then poof, you just gave up on it the next?”
She looks at me like I backhanded her. And I hate it that the pain on her face is making me feel like a villain.
I haven’t done anything wrong.
“I let him go because I decided I didn’t want him anymore,” she says, her voice cracking a little. “Just because I wanted him once doesn’t mean I want him forever, not when I realized he wasn’t the man I thought he was. If I still wanted him, I wouldn’t have given up. Because if I want something, I go for it. Nothing’s going to stop me, and I cut out people who get in the way.”
“Good for you. But I’m not you.” I stop the car in front of her house. “Get out.”
Her purple eyes are dark, wounded and pleading. “Don’t do anything rash while you’re angry.”
“I’m not angry.” A word as pedestrian as “angry” isn’t enough to describe what I’m feeling. “What I am is serious. Get out, Sierra, before I say something I shouldn’t.”
She climbs out and shuts the door. I speed away. But in the rearview mirror I can see her standing there, watching.