Page 51 of Dallas

“It’s sweet,” says Lily. “No man has ever made a cake for me.”

“Me either.”

“No man has ever gone on a date with you,” Gentry says to his younger sister.

“Rude,” says Allison.

Now I’m wondering what’s in the gift box.

I can’t begin to guess because I don’t have a gauge for the kind of gift Dallas would buy. Well, not what adult Dallas might buy.

I can remember him getting me a bracelet out of one of those little machines you put a quarter in and you get a little plastic ball with a trinket inside. He was so proud that he got that for me, and I treasured it, until another kid who lived with us broke it.

She took delight in it. Like crushing something that I loved might heal something inside of her.

I punched her in the face.

I don’t know whether to cry, smile or shrug at the memory. It’s one of many just like it. We’ve lived a life full of bright little moments in the middle of a lot of sad things. Living around the sad things that other people are grappling with, and it makes for a lot of complicated memories.

I’m tired of complicated. Sometimes it feels like all I’ll ever be is a tangle of knots I can’t undo.

Well. That’s a cheery birthday thought. The alcohol is seeming like a better and better idea as time ticks by and I start getting lost in my thoughts.

My drink arrives, and I’m excited by it. I sip, and the buzz goes to my head. It isn’t the law that’s kept me from drinking, it’s my fear of losing control. On what it could mean for me. But I feel safe here. With him, with his friends. It almost makes me giddy.

The other girls order drinks, and for a minute there, I feel like I might be normal.

The more I drink, the more I feelnormal. The more all of those tangled, knotted, complex memories fade into something diffused. They’re not so sharp. They don’t have any power over me.

There’s music playing on the jukebox, and I stand up, shimmying my shoulders. I have terrible rhythm even when sober, and now, edging toward tipsy, I know that it isn’t improved. “Care to dance?”

I turn and see Colt standing there, handsome and offering, and why not?

Why not?

Yes, normally, a man’s touch would make me recoil. But I want to change that. I want to changeme. So, I take his offered hand, and it’s fine. Everything is okay. I’m not panicked. My body is loose, and I feel good. This is how things should be. You should feel good more often than you feel bad. You should be happy.

You should be able to go out with friends and have a good time, and have a birthday party. All things that I’ve never been able to do. God, Iwantit.

I want this to be fun.

So, I let him twirl me in a circle, and I laugh when he draws me up against his chest, facing away from him as we sway, and he spins me out again, and I twirl in a circle like I am the birthday queen, and I really would like to be.

The song slows down, and he brings me close, and there is a slight difference in the way he’s looking at me now. If I wanted to sleep with him, I think I could. But maybe I should start with smaller goals.

Maybe I should just think in terms of a kiss.

Akisswouldn’t be so bad.

I feel a little bit sorry for him, because he’s more guinea pig than man to me. An experiment more than an object of my desire. But my inhibitions are loosened, and I like the way I feel. My motives might not be pure, but then, maybe his aren’t either. He’s a man who’s free with his favors, as far as I’m aware, as far as everyone has led me to believe, so it doesn’t need to mean anything to him.

And that, I feel, is a good thing for me.

He puts his hand on my face, and I don’t hate it.

“Hey,” Dallas says, suddenly breaking the spell. Breaking through the haze. “You should come eat some cake.”

He’s sitting at the table, half a bar away from us, shouting like a fool. And I know he’s sober because he’s the designated driver.

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