Page 94 of Pin-up Girl

A bit disconcerting.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Aubrey said. “This is my home. I’m not leaving my friends. The people I love are here, and that includes you, Dee.”

“Regina said she loved me, and she left.”

Kurt hopped to his feet. “I’m gonna go help Mom.” He ran from the room.

Poor kid.

Evie watched the whole exchange quietly.

Dee crossed her arms and flopped onto a sofa in the waiting room of the lobby. “You scared my real friend away.”

“Here’s the thing, Dee.” I wasn’t sure I should be this honest, but I was going to anyway.

“What?” She rolled her eyes.

“Some people are just liars.”

If she scowled any harder, her face would collapse in on itself.

“But most people aren’t,” I said. “When they promise something, they mean it at the time.” I wanted to be careful with my phrasing so she understood. “They don’t stop to think about what might stop them from keeping that promise in the future.”

“So you are both leaving me.” Hurt wove into Dee’s reply.

Aubrey shook her head. “No.”

“I won’t say I promise,” I added. “But I will tell you that right now, I don’t want to leave Haddarville. I like it here. I want to live here longer than you probably will, and I think Aubrey feels the same.”

Aubrey nodded. “Exactly.”

Some of the tension seemed to slip away from Dee’s posture, but she stayed slouched. “What if someone makes you leave?”

“That’s what happened at my last place. Someone made me leave.” My work situation wasn’t quite the same, but it was close enough to all of this to be disconcerting.

“Haddarville’s kind of like the Island of Misfit Toys,” Evie said softly.

Dee uncrossed her arms. “I like that place. I never understood why they don’t just put water in the water gun instead of jelly.”

Okay, we’d talk about this in terms of an old Christmas movie. “When someone is one way, and you tell them to act another way, it changes what people see, but it doesn’t change who that person is. If the squirt gun wants to use jelly, why make it use water?”

“That’s officially one of the weirdest analogies I’ve ever heard,” Evie said.

Aubrey shrugged. “It’s a good point though.”

“Kind of like how Dad likes both men and women?” Dee asked.

Not what I was going for, but it was a fair comparison.

“Yes,” Aubrey said.

“Or like Bree’s pretty art.” Dee pointed at the ink decorating Aubrey’s arms. “Or B’s brain.”

Dee was observant, and what she saw hit me hard, drawing on the deeper meaning in this conversation. She grew quiet, and scooted deeper into her chair, to pull her knees to her chest. “So what if you’re the squirt gun and you like jelly, and chocolate muffins, and extra cheese on your pizza, but it makes everyone else happier if you’re filled with water?”

Now the analogy was going off the rails. It was also reminding me more and more of the life I was leaving behind. The decisions that hadn’t been mine, and the product that I’d let slip away from me.

“You don’t make anyone’s life better by squirting—” Evie frowned. “Sorry, I need a different comparison.”

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