Page 69 of Brick Wall
Except Maggie.
She likes to pretend we’re keeping it casual, but I know Maggie Baylor better than she thinks I do. My girl is jealous as hell.
As my feet swallow the distance between us, I have to hide the smile that fact brings to my face.
“Maggie, hold up,” I call. She’s two people and three feet ahead of me, and when those two people turn left toward the parking garage, I fall into step beside her. “Maggie, let’s talk.”
“About what?” she asks, not sparing me a glance as she speed walks out the doors and down the stone steps.
I blink before realizing she’s a few steps ahead of me again. Dammit.
“About what you think you saw back there and how it made you run away from me…again.”
Her steps slow for just a second, but she still won’t look at me. “I’m late,” she says.
The hell she is. I keep pace with her as she makes her way to the edge of campus. She’s headed to Viv’s place, I’m sure of it, and because we’ve met up there a couple times, I know right where it is. We’re having this conversation, one way or another, and the traffic light we’re standing at seems like the perfect place to start.
“That’s Fallon Zabek, Booker’s sister. We’re friends and we have Psych together,” I begin.
“That’s great,” she says, power walking away from me just as the Walk sign appears.
“I’m serious. We are just friends. I’m fluent in sign language and she’s my teammate’s sister. That’s it, Maggie.”
When we make it across the street, she finally turns to look at me. “That’s fine, JT,” she tells me, her tone making it clear that my friendship with Fallon is anything but fine. “Be friends with her, be more than friends, it doesn’t matter. I don’t care what you do.”
Her words feel like tiny, sharp little knives. They hurt, so I serve up the truth. “You have no right to care. No right to tell me who to sit with. No right to run out on me like you caught me banging someone on the checkout desk at the library. No fucking right, Maggie.”
“So do it,” she replies. “Go back and have checkout-desk-sex. It’s none of my business, right?”
Jesus.Christ. “Because you don’t want it to be your business, Maggie. Did you forget the part where I’m your dirty little secret? Did you forget the part where I’ve been sneaking into my own damn house before class in the morning because I’m spending all my time with you?”
She flinches at my words, but I don’t stop. “You need to face facts. If I’m just some guy you’re fucking, if there’s nothing happening between us, then why do you care who I’m sitting with? Why run through the library and half of campus like you’re being chased?Why do you care, Maggie?And when are you ready to admit just how much you care?”
I brace myself for the tears she’s about to cry, or the slap I’m going to feel when her hand connects with my cheek.
I was pretty much raised by TV. The moms and dads on the shows I watched became my surrogate parents because no one else was up for the job. The various relatives I stayed with always had wives or girlfriends, husbands or boyfriends. None of those relationships could be described as healthy, and I don’t need to take a Psych class to figure thatout. There were a lot of tears, most of them fake and manipulative. A lot of hitting, too, on both sides. I’ve seen people fight dirty, and I guess that’s what I’m expecting.
It’s not what I get.
“It’s like quicksand,” she says to me as we walk toward Viv’s place.
I’m quiet at first, because I don’t have a clue what she means, but I’m smart enough to know that whatever she’s saying is really important to her.
“Like quicksand?” I prompt.
She nods and looks up at me once we get to Viv’s apartment. “You know how like when you’re a kid, you think quicksand is going to be a major problem in life. Or at leastaproblem, right?”
I crack a smile when I realize she’s right. It’s a plot device in at least half a dozen shows I can name off the top of my head.
“You know I’m right,” she says, the hint of a smile crossing her face as we step inside Viv’s apartment. It’s quiet, and no one comes vaulting out of anywhere, so it’s a safe bet that we’re alone. “In all these movies and TV shows, people are getting trapped in quicksand. But it’s not really a problem I’ve faced as an adult,” she says, sitting on the sofa and holding a pillow tight against her middle. “But assholes and liars? Turns out, they’re everywhere.”
I take the seat next to her, and the privilege is not lost on me. Maggie Baylor isn’t a woman who opens up easily or wears her heart on her sleeve. She’s too guarded, too jaded, I guess, for that. It’s something we have common, so I’m not taking it for granted that she let me in this apartment or that she’s talking to me now. Time with Maggie is a gift I won’t ever turn down.
“It’s not that I never thought I’d have to deal with jerks,” she says, looking at me with eyes so wide and innocent that Iwant to find every asshole she’s ever met and punch their fucking faces.
“It’s that I thought the jerks would be more obvious,” she continues. “Bad guys are supposed to have twirly mustaches and sinister lairs, and evil sidekicks. Even the ones who look like good guys obviously aren’t. No one’s hair is that perfect, no one’s intentions that pristine. They’ve got to be up to something. But the villains I’ve met in real life look just like everybody else. They aren’t wearing capes. They don’t have fancy facial hair or nefarious smirks. The people who have hurt me haven’t come at me guns blazing. They haven’t launched their attack right after meeting me. It’s a slow process, a quiet, deceitful one. Now, looking back, I can see it so clearly. The signs were there, but they weren’t huge, waving red flags like the kind you see at car dealerships. They were small and subtle, easily mistaken for something else or explained away.”
Who the fuck hurt you?I keep the words to myself, trusting she’ll explain if I give her the time to do so. My patience is rewarded, even if her story makes me shake with anger.
