Page 52 of Mark & Don't Tell

“Don’t lie to me.”

“Where the fuck do you think you’re going?” Mom’s scream carries from deeper inside the house, and a gruff voice snaps back at her.

“Ron?”

Marco nods in answer. “New boyfriend.”

Scoffing, I drop onto the couch beside him, ignoring the immediate feeling of being covered in filth. I refuse to make Marco feel bad. “What bills are we paying today?”

His shoulders hunch, and he grabs a stack of envelopes from underneath the couch cushion. “You don’t have to,” he says, hands shaking as he hands over the notices.

“I can’t have you living on the streets,” I tell him.

As Mom and Ron make sounds I’d rather not think about, I quickly flip through the bills, sorting them by company, and pay off the most important ones—like electricity and water—then move on to rent. Since the landlord has a company that manages their properties, I use their site to pay the rent, despite the panic fluttering inside of my stomach as my bank account is quickly drained.

There goes my own rent payment, but if worse comes to worst, I can crash with Jane for a bit while scraping together enough money for a new apartment. I don’t have enough money to cover waste management, and my credit cards are already maxed out, so for now, that’ll have to do.

Marco clutches the paid bills in his hands and stares at the floor. I slip the waste management bills under the couch cushion, knowing Mom would only rip them up if she saw them, like that would magically make them go away.

Mom moans loudly, and Ron grunts like some sort of beast.

I cringe. “Gross.”

“I hate it here,” Marco whispers, swiping at his cheek.

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault,” he snaps, then takes a breath. “It’s her fault,” he finally grumbles.

“Do you want to go on a walk?”

He jumps up and rushes out the door. I follow him, glaring down the hall while Mom and her flavor of the month go to town. She’s too busy fucking and gambling and now, apparently, doing hard drugs to take care of her own kid.

But that’s nothing new.

I gently close the door, so as not to alert her, and join Marco on the broken sidewalk. We head to the left, away from the meth house at the corner of the street. My fists clench, hating that Marco has to live in a place like this, but I’m not in a position to take care of him, especially not after paying Mom’s bills.

If I get kicked out of my apartment, what then?

And how am I supposed to get him to school? He lives all the way across town, and the best part about Mom’s house is that he can walk to school, where he can get a good meal every day. I can’t take a steady food source away from him.

“How’s football?”

“I’m not playing anymore.”

I almost trip over a tree root that’s pushed up the sidewalk, breaking it into several jagged pieces of concrete. “What? Why? You love it.”

“I couldn’t afford cleats,” he says softly.

“Marco, why didn’t you tell me?”

He shoves his hands into his pockets, and we stop and wait for the cars to pass before crossing the street. “I didn’t want to bother you.”

My heart aches for him. “You never bother me.” I hate that I see so much of myself in him. He deserves so much more than our mom is giving him.

A late-August breeze coasts down the street and ruffles my hair. “I’ll get you some cleats.”

“Pre-season has already started.”

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