Page 27 of Wall

“Go. Don’t worry about it. I’ll clear your place.”

He sighs, scrubbing the back of his neck.

“I don’t want to leave. I never wanted to leave.”

He shifts his eyes to meet mine head on, and there’s an intensity there I’ve never seen before. Shivers shoot from my nape down my spine.

“I thought leaving was for the best, but I was wrong. I wasn’t strong enough for us. I know that. But I ain’t making that mistake again. You can be angry, Mona. I can take it.”

My blood is pounding in my ears. I don’t need his permission to be angry. He’s not the one who’s been left wondering for years. Tormented. He knows what happened.

“I want to know.” Since he’s here, and so darned determined to stay, he can put some things to rest.

He draws back slightly in his chair. “Okay. What do you want to know?”

Everything. Every horrible little detail that I perseverate on when I can’t sleep at night. I plunge in, irrigating the wound. “Was it a blowjob or real sex?”

“Real sex.”

My shoulders hunch, but it’s too late. The blow lands, and I wasn’t prepared.

I always thought maybe it was just a blowjob. And then I’d tell myself a blowjobisreal sex, and would I really feel better if it was just a blowjob? And then I’d cry and go buy a carton of ice cream up at the Speedy Grab-N-Go.

John sits there, the picture of patience, too big for the chair, almost too tall for his legs to fit under the table.

I’m going to the Grab-N-Go after this. And I’m going to buy double chocolate chunk.

“Where did you do it?”

“At the clubhouse.”

“Where in the clubhouse?”

He looks up at the ceiling. Answer’s not there, dude. “I don’t know, Mona. A storage room. In the back.”

“How?”

“How?”

“Whatposition?”

“Uh. She was, uh, bent over some boxes.”

“Did you kiss her?”

“Yes.”

I bite down on the inside of my cheek so hard I taste copper. “Did you wear a condom?”

“Yes.”

“You had a condom? You brought condoms with you to the clubhouse?”

“She had one. She came on to me.”

“So, you had to say yes? You slipped, and oops, your dick fell in her?”

“I didn’t say that.”

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