Don't Get Angry

13- Otis: A Part of You

Dalta stood in the bathroom searching for a towel. I sat on the covered toilet with my hands over my face. "This is insane."

"I know." She shook her head.

"If we keep this to ourselves, it will just be a string of lies, one after the other."

"I know." She grabbed the pink towel from off the shelf, then turned to me with crazy eyes. "Wait. You can't be thinking about telling someone about this? Otis, we will go to jail with him."

"We're minors."

"I'm black."

"I'm, like...a quarter Latino."

She scoffed and shook her head. "Otis, looking at you I would never know that. You can pass as fully white. I only pass as criminal. Besides that, this town is predominantly white. I don't want that to be how they view my family."

I stared at her. It was a disgusting thought to have. How could someone look at her and automatically assume that she was a criminal just because of the way she looked? My eyes scanned her face. My first thought looking at her would never be anything close to that. I turned away feeling my face burn with anger. "We should've just left him... Idiot."

"Are you calling me an idiot again? Because I honestly don't care anymore."

I looked at her. I wasn't referring to her. I was referring to myself. There were tears streaming down her face. I sighed aloud and sat up.

"Like, I really and truly don't." She hung the towel over her arm. "I feel like an idiot enough and you're just reminding me that I am one -"

"Then stop doing stupid things, Dalta. Stop acting without thinking. If you had thought for just one second, we wouldn't be in this mess."

"Peter is my best friend's brother. I couldn't just leave him there -"

"Oh, is that it?" I jabbed, squinting my eyes and tilting my head at her in an accusatory way. "Is it really that? Because it seems to me like you did it for Peter, NOT for Penelope at all."

"What are you trying to say?"

"Isn't it obvious? You have some sort of obsession with Peter -"

"Oh my ...-Are you kidding me?" Dalta's voice rose. "You think I'm obsessed with Peter? I don't even like him anymore."

I stared at her, then shook my head and looked down. "I'm going home...I'm not staying here tonight-"

"I don't want to stay here by myself with Peter."

"Why not? You don't like him right-"

"He's a criminal."

I rolled my eyes. "Says the girl who saved him from getting locked up..."

She pouted then hung her towel over the rail of the shower curtain. "It's fine. I'll go sleep with Penny in her room."

"You can't. We have to get you out of here before she wakes up in the morning."

"She's going to find out anyway when my mom interrogates her about last night."

I shook my head. "We can camp out in the living room-"

Peter walked into the bathroom holding some clothes for Dalta. "No. Otis and I will sleep in the living room. Dalta...you can have my room."

She looked at him then at me. I sighed.

"You both have every right to be afraid of me. I robbed a store and have a gun in my room. But the kind of criminal you're thinking of..." He looked at Dalta. "I'm far from that." He walked out of the bathroom.