Page 19 of Drowning Erin

Brendan helps my dad to his bed and then gracefully departs, telling me he’ll waitoutside.

“What an awful thing to let a stranger see,” my mother says after he leaves. “What’s he going to think ofus?”

She wants me to apologize, to agree that tonight is all my fault. Ithasto be my fault, the whole evening, because if it’s not mine, it’s my father’s, and we can’t have that. But I don’t have it in me to apologize or play this game right now. I pretend too much. I lie too much. I’ve been caught at it tonight, again and again, and I’m just too damn tired to keep going, to lie and pretend for her sake or myown.

“He’s probably going to think Dad’s sick, Mom. And he’s going to think you and I are pathetic and broken. And I’m not going to apologize, because it’s alltrue.”

I’ll pay for that comment, but right now I don’t care. I walk out, shutting the door behindme.

“Everything okay?” Brendanasks.

I nod, too choked up to speak. It’s not unusual to feel this way. When one of my familial crises ends, I often find I’ve been holding my grief at bay until there is room for it, but I don’t think that’s what this is. Not entirely. I think what’s making me tear up now is kindness. Because Brendan—beautiful, reckless, irresponsible, hateful Brendan, who I’ve loathed for so long—has been kinder to me tonight than anyone I can think of,ever.

I want to continue hating him, and I know I can’t anymore, not entirely. I handed him my secrets tonight—things I’ve never trusted to anyone—and I look at him and know with a certainty I have about almost nothing in this life that he will guard them as if they are his own. Brendan, who I wanted to believe was cruel, is actually kind. And Brendan, who I thought could not be trusted, is someone I trustimplicitly.

* * *

Brendan parks on the street,and we walk toward the house together. “I won’t tell Rob, but I have one condition,” he says. “I want you to call me any time you have to go deal with yourdad.”

“I’ve been making some version of that trip for a long time, Brendan.” No sense pretending at this point that tonight was a one-off. “I’ll befine.”

“You know who says things will befine?” he demands. “Every person who insisted they weren’t too tired to drive and then wrapped a car around a tree. Every woman who has ever been raped after figuring it was safe to walk home. Your belief that you will befineismeaningless.”

A day ago I’d have expressed some surprise over the fact that he cares whether I’m injured, that he actually seemsangryat the possibility. It shocks me less now, but it’s disconcerting, once again, to think I may have misjudgedhim.

“What do you want me to do?” I ask. “You’re barely everhome.”

“Just text me. By 1 or 2 AM, I’m usuallyin.”

“No, you’re sleeping at some girl’s place. You’re really going to leave that to come with me toDenver?”

“Yes.”

“No,” I reply. “No way. The whole thing is embarrassing enough withoutthat.”

“Perhaps I didn’t make myself clear,” he says, his eyes darkening. “Youwilltext me the next time you make that trip, or I will tellRob.”

“You’re blackmailingme.”

“If you want to call itthat.”

“Only you would somehow turn an offer of assistance into blackmail,” Ifume.

He opens the door to the house and shoos meinside.

“I’m gonna take that as acompliment.”

“It wasn’t!” I shout, but he’s already closed thedoor.

14

Erin

Present

IcallOlivia the next afternoon on the way home from work. Despite my lack of sleep, the pressing matter of Brendan is my first priority. I don’t know what all that was last night, but I know I don’t like feeling indebted tohim.

“I need to get Brendan a thank-you gift,” I tell her. “What would hewant?”

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