He takes my mouth with his, a hand grazing my throat like a warm, rough necklace.
"Touch me," he breathes onto my lips.
My hands slip under his shirt, over his abdomen, his muscles tight and warm against my fingertips. I touch the places on him I'...
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4:13 PM
As I knew would happen, Pat pushes my bedroom door open, his face etched with disappointment. Yes, I was fired. Yes, it was...horrible. But there's much I can't say.
My uncle comes over and sits beside me, the bed shifting and bouncing as he settles.
With a groan, I sit up, tossing my blankets away. I sit so both our feet on the floor, and reach for my hat again just to have something to fiddle with.
"My temper got the best of me," I explain. A partial truth. "Ada had enough, so she called it. I don't know what else to tell you."
"It's so...unlike you. I thought you liked Ada. And Keiko. The whole job. I thought you were more careful than this."
Oh, come on. That doesn't feel fair. I don't need this right now. I'm already on the verge of tears, like, all the damn time.
I still hold my peach hat. The hat that came back to me.
Pat places a hand on my knee and I flinch away so quickly that I have to blink and roll my shoulders. I look up to see tears in his eyes, his thin and wispy grey hair all over the place.
"Sorry about that," I whisper, laughing a little.
"You're scaring me, sweetheart."
I try to smile. "Everything's okay. I only had weeks left, anyway."
I glance up in front of me at my wall, polaroids of my dead parents with me as a ginger-haired infant. Some bad sketches I've done for art class. A few expired driver's licenses I've pinned up. Memories. Ghosts.
"Ember," Pat says, "the greatest loss of my life was Henry."
I squeeze my eyes shut, gripping my hat. "You're disappointed in me. I get it, okay? Trust me when I say you don't have to guilt trip me today."
"Just listen. When you lose a child, nothing matters anymore. There's a hole that won't be filled with pills or alcohol or another person." He breathes in deeply. "I've suffered many losses. Many. First, my own parents. Then my love, Lynn. Then my child, my little boy. Then my sister, your mother. It was too much. The pain was hollow. I almost lost myself. I almost let go." He meets my eyes, his expression strong, determined.
"There was you," he says, grabbing my hand. "You were so young, so little. They delivered you to me in a police car. You were crying."
"I don't cry so much anymore," I say, trying to get him to knock off all this desolation. It doesn't work. His gaze is deep and earnest as he takes me in now, nearly twenty years old.
"Your big eyes were swollen and red. I took you inside and gave you some scrambled eggs. You always liked those. Your mother would scold me for putting too much pepper on hers when we were kids." Pat exhales a small laugh, and a smile finally makes its way under his moustache. "You ate, and then said how tired you were, so I took you into Henry's room and laid you down."
