Perfectly Flawed (44 page)

From her expression, which, let me tell you,
terrifies me, I can tell that she doesn’t want to tell me a damn
thing. Her green eyes widen, her mouth drops open, and her eyebrows
skyrocket. She looks like a crazed, redheaded banshee.

No comments about gingers not having souls,
please.

“Not going to happen, Joey.” That sounds
like,
End of discussion
. But I’m a pester-er.

“Aunt Hil, please,” I beg.

She looks at me, like really looks at me,
turning fully around in her seat just to stare at me before she
says, “Joey, no. For one, I don’t really want you to remember what
happened that night.” Annoying but understandable. “I may be a
bitch for that but I’m a firm believer in
what you don’t know
won’t hurt you
and once you open that can of worms, you’ll only
be hurt. I’m doing this for your best interests, honey, I’m sorry.”
See, my aunt has a soul.

Shot down instantly, just as I thought.

Time to try Plan B.

“Will you at least tell me if my father
called me Josie?” I ask, avoiding her gaze.

The air in the room goes still and I can hear
the wheels in Hilary’s head turning. I thought that’d get her
attention.

“I thought you couldn’t remember anything?”
Hilary asks in surprise.

“There’s a worm sneaking way from the can,
Aunt Hil, I can’t help that,” I tell her, standing up to leave. I
stop at the door, turning to say, “Good luck on your date tonight.”
Smiling before I head into my room for the night.

I spend the next afternoon waiting at
Pathways for Women to speak to someone, anyone, who knows about
what I’m asking. While waiting, I notice small children playing in
front of the building and their mothers standing nearby watching
them to make sure they remain safe. I wonder about the women and
their families, about what brought them to this place. It can’t be
good stories so I stop myself before I imagine something worse than
what it could be.

“Hello.” A woman’s voice catches my
attention, snapping my gaze from the window. “My name is Felicia
Carlson, what can I do for you?” A short stocky woman with short
brown hair asks me. I stand up from the chair; I’m taller than her
by at least a foot. That’s scary because I’m only
five-foot-five.

“Hi, I’m Joey Archembault and I am a high
school student doing research for a school project,” I tell her,
holding out my hand for her to shake.

“What kind of research?” Felicia asks, taking
me back to her office.

“Research about violence against women and
families, that sort of thing, can you help me?”

Felicia nods.

That afternoon, I got my senior project
mentor and that night, I wrote up my proposal.

***

There were many things I learned about
Felicia Carlson that afternoon. The first being that she’s the
proud mother of three brilliant children; two girls and one boy,
ages from thirteen, twelve, and nine. She even showed me pictures,
as a proud mother would, and I could instantly see the family
resemblance. It was all in the eyes, a gray-blue hue that reminded
me of a frozen lake, and the smile, wide and happy despite
everything they’d been through. The next thing I learned about this
wonderful woman was her fight to send her now ex-husband to prison
for the mental, emotional, and physical abuse he put her and her
children through when they were still married. I learned how, after
she divorced him, he stalked her and her family for three years
before attempting to break into their house. She’d moved, filed for
restraining orders, told schools that no one could pick up her kids
unless it was her and her alone. Her story hit home for me.

She’s a survivor, a proud survivor.

I couldn’t be happier that she’s my
mentor.

What did she learn about me? My name. Not
even my
full
name.

I didn’t want to tell my tale just yet—it
still felt to fragile and raw when I spoke the words aloud—so I
just explained who I was, not explaining anything major about my
family or life, and why I was doing this project.

“It’s a very important topic to speak about,”
I told her that first afternoon I met her in her office. “And I
don’t feel that many people in my school know or care enough about
it to learn more,” I continued to explain. Most of that is true, at
least in my mind.

Felicia agreed with that whole-heartedly,
nodding once the words left my lips.

So we discussed what would be appropriate for
me to speak about during my presentation. Felicia made emphasis on
the statistics and research sites she outlined for me—and the list
was long. I didn’t have the heart to tell her I was going to
discuss
more
than the statistics of domestic violence and
the lasting effects. I was going to speak about personal
experiences, back-stories if I could find some people to interview;
I wanted the students of my high school to understand that this can
happen to anyone. No one is exempt from being hurt, no one is
immune to the probability of domestic violence.

Today, teenagers think—no, believe—they’re
invincible, they believe nothing bad can ever happen to them. I’m
proof that horrible, horrible things happen all the time and
sometimes, there’s nothing you can do to stop it. You can’t stop
the boulder from rolling downhill once it’s already started. I just
want to help people prevent the worst from happening.

That’s exactly what I outlined in my project
proposal. I even added a little pain and heartache, hoping that
Miss Cherry could
feel
what I’m planning to write about like
a second heartbeat.

I just left out my own gory, gruesome
details. Those could wait for embellishment in presentation, that
is if I can even tell them.

I handed my completed proposal to Miss
Cherry—it only took three hours to write once I ironed out all the
basics—and she read the entire thing while I was standing right in
front of her, watching her eyes scan the pages in a hurry to devour
the next word. Her face went through a multitude of
expressions—pain, worry, wonder, intrigue—as she read it.

“This is good, Joey,” she tells me as she
flips through the pages, scanning to see if she missed anything
important. I wish I could’ve put a little more information in
there. Most of the stuff is scary but very accurate.

One in four women has experienced domestic
violence in her lifetime. That’s 25-percent. Scary fact. On
average, intimate partners in this country murder more than three
women and one man every day. That’s a scarier fact. Even more
terrifying when you know you’ve witnessed it and just can’t
remember it.

“Thank you,” I say when she reaches the end,
folding over the binder. “Do you approve it?” I ask with hope and a
beaming smile.

“Are you sure that you’re comfortable sharing
this much about yourself?” Miss Cherry asks, an eyebrow raised. I
did write that I planned to incorporate what little I know about my
past into my presentation.

I shrug—unsure. “People have been talking
about me since I moved here,” I respond, telling the honest to God
truth. I’ve been the topic of many conversations throughout my
years as a Washington State resident. “At least this time, they’ll
know what they’re talking about.” It’d be better if they hear it
all from me—the main source—rather than some random person who
doesn’t know the full truth.

“I approve it,” Miss Cherry tells me as she
signs the bottom on the line that asks for the advisor’s approval.
“It’s going to be tricky, though.”

Tell me something I don’t know.

“I know,” I respond.

“I wish you the best of luck on your journey,
Joey,” she tells me as I stand at the door, my hand waiting on the
knob.

“Thank you, Miss Cherry.” I smile, calling,
“See you later,” over my shoulder as I enter the hallway and close
the door behind me.

The air is cool in the hallway, caressing my
heated cheeks, and cooling them down, diminishing the involuntary
blush that climbed up my neck and sprouted on my cheeks.

“Did she approve it?” Harley asks as I turn
toward my locker, snapping my head back when I hear her voice.
Has she been waiting there the entire time?
I smile as she
walks up to me, the light glinting off the hoop in her lip.

“Yep, she did.” I squeal like an excited
puppy staring at their favorite chew toy.
One-step closer to
graduating
, I chant in my head. Then this place can kiss my ass
as I walk out the door and venture on to bigger and better things.
“This is going to be a fun project,” I say with faux-glee.
Hello, sarcasm
.

Harley shoots me a look. “You mean that?” she
asks as I twirl the lock on my locker, tugging it open with a loud
clang
, switching out my books for the rest of my day.

“Hell no,” I sputter. “Sorry I didn’t add
Bazinga!
but this is going to one painful thing to deal
with.” I can only imagine the things I can actually discover. There
are going to be many, many skeletons in this closet. I just need to
be sure that I’m ready to deal with them. All of them.

I close the locker and we start our way to
the cafeteria, though I swear I thought she had a makeup Spanish
test to take this period. Which reminds me, I still have ASL
homework to finish.

“If you need any help, I’m here for you,
Joey,” Harley tells me, her hand landing on my arm as we walk, a
small smile splitting her lips.

I return the smile before I decide to start a
different research project. I rarely have chances to do this. “You
mean when you’re not too busy playing tonsil hockey with Avery
O’Reilly?” I fish, happy my friend’s found someone.

“Shut up!” Harley yelps, turning beet-red
with embarrassment, laughing as she covers her flushing cheeks with
her hands. “We’re not playing
tonsil hockey
,” she defends.
“Who the hell even says
tonsil hockey
anymore?”

People who want information, that’s who.

“And how well does he kiss?” I ask like a
pompous asshole waiting to see her turn bright cherry red. “Are
there fireworks?”

“Fucking spectacular,” Harley announces with
a wistful sigh. I jump up and down, completely not my norm, but
this excites me. It’s so rare to see her like this. To see her full
of hope for something new. “I saw stars, Joey. He does this
wonderful thing with his tongue—”

I wave my arms in the air frantically,
anything to distract her and cut her off as she speaks.

“I do
not
need those details, Harley,”
I tell her.

As happy as I am for her, that—whatever she’s
about to say—I don’t need to know.

“You asked.” She smiles brightly. Harley
looks over to a classroom; and I’m right, she does have a test to
make up. “I’ll see you later, okay?”

“Yeah, later,” I call as she leaves, waving
her off and starting my way toward the lunchroom when something,
some little sound I would’ve normally missed in passing, catches my
attention.

It sounded like a whimper, like there was an
upset, scared little puppy loose in the halls wandering around in
search of its owner. It came from the bathroom, I know that much.
So I followed the sound, seeking it out.

“You are so fucking stupid sometimes, you
know that?” I hear someone—that sounds an awful lot like Ryder—says
to someone else in the girl’s bathroom. Who the hell is he angry
with? And why is he in the girls’ bathroom?

“I didn’t mean to say anything, Ryder,” I
hear Alexia’s melodic voice, almost pleadingly, explain in a cry.
“I’m sorry. I really am.”

“
Sorry?
” he says scarily quiet. I can
almost picture his expression perfectly. His blue eyes dark and
narrowed into thin slits, his breathing deep and steady, the red
creeping up his neck. “You’re
sorry
? Sorry doesn’t fix it,
Lexi,” Ryder continues, yelling. I take a few steps into the
bathroom, making sure to stay in the entryway where they can’t
easily see me. I catch their reflection in the bathroom mirror but
they don’t notice me as Ryder, in Alexia’s face, continues to yell,
“God, why do I even
allow
you to speak?”

Alexia takes a step back, looking affronted.
“Excuse me?” she asks, crossing her arms across her chest, the same
thing she does when someone crosses her. This is the Alexia that
challenges me. The girl that demands attention and knows how to
carry herself. I’m waiting for that manicured hand of hers to
launch out, slapping the look from his face.

But that’s not what I see.

Ryder looks to her, noticing her defensive
stance, and lunges toward her, grabbing her arms and wrenching them
away from her body, holding them up in front of her body with so
much force, I can
feel
her pain. “
You heard me
,” he
growls. Alexia’s resolve breaks, her shoulders slump, and I watch
all the fight leave her body. She cowers and I fight the urge to
walk further into the bathroom and make my presence known. I may
not like Alexia, but she shouldn’t be treated like this, no one
should be treated like this.

“Ryder, you’re hurting me,” Alexia coughs out
as Ryder noticeably tightens his grasp, twisting her arm. I can’t
decide if I should interrupt and do something or if I should just
leave. Alexia releases another whimper and I make up my
mind—choosing between being a good person or being someone that
leaves Alexia to fend for herself (May I mention that I’m too nice
for my own good?)—and walk farther into the bathroom, making it
known that I’ve been listening to the entire exchange between the
couple. I connect eyes with Alexia over Ryder’s shoulder but she
quickly looks away out of embarrassment.

She can’t pretend to be anywhere but the
present.

“You did something stupid, so fucking
stupid,” Ryder growls as he punctuates every word with a vicious
tug of her arms. “And now you want me to be
nice
about it?”
He barks out a laugh, high and commanding.