Page 306 of My Sweet Dollie, You Have to Love Me
“Then we have to pick another.” I mask my sniffle with a cough.
“No. You can brave it. It’s only for like two minutes.”
“I don’t want to watch anything with a clown.”
“Just close your eyes for two minutes.”
Arguing my point will mean he’ll hear the sadness in my voice.
None of this can surely be true. Life can’t be that cruel.
A horrible scene plays out on the TV, and watching this movie in the darkness of this room feels nothing like the last horror movie I watched. Safe, I was safe while that chainsaw—wielding maniac sawed through flesh and bone. Safe, in Ambrose’s presence, as blood spilled and splattered. Here, I don’t feel that way. Goosebumps still line my arms, leading down to my hands on the sheets, sweaty and sticky. Shane plays on his phone, ignoring me and my discomfort over what’s happening on the screen, a young boy murdering his sister while she screams. His parents find him in the clown mask shortly after, but that poor girl is already gone.
My parents screamed too. Their voices—their pleas—get trapped in my head, spinning around with the image of Ambrose, small and scarred in that hospital bed after we were found.
A long, hard blink takes it all away, and I glance up in Shane’s direction, seeing him through tears that stay in my eyes.
“What’s up?” he asks, as if I haven’t had the most awful news today.
“That was a scary scene.” I lie because it’s easier.
He kisses my hair, and shivers run over me, hating the feel of his mouth on me. It’s a new feeling, but it settles quickly, here to stay.
“Bless you.” He laughs, the forced sound echoing in this lifeless room.
I glance around at all my missing possessions. He’s stripping me bare, making it so I have nothing left but him.
Hate builds inside me over it.
“We should have brought some snacks,” I say in a low voice, needing just a few minutes of peace.
“Yeah, we should have. Go get us some?”
“I can’t go through the house after watching that.”
“Well, I probably shouldn’t either, not after pissing off your brother so much.”
“He’s not home. He only stopped by, then went straight back to work.”
“Really?” Shane pushes me aside with rough hands. “I’ll go get some.” He places down his phone, face flat, like he always used to, hiding whatever is on the screen.
He doesn’t notice how I’m shaking with a mix of anger and anxiety as he slips out of the room in his jogging bottoms that have been tumble-dried a few too many times.
The sound of his feet fading out takes him farther away, and I wait, sitting on the bed with so many throw pillows that I’m propped up in an uncomfortable way.
Another feeling comes to me, something familiar I’ve always felt in Shane’s presence. After the last few nights with Ambrose, I recognize it for what it is.
Loneliness.
My eyes drift across the hall to Ambrose’s room, though I know he’s not home. He hasn’t left my thoughts since the diary entry. My eyes move back to the yellow book, and Shane’s phone on top.
Switching the lamp on first, I place the phone aside, and I pick up the diary. Using the ribbon bookmark attached, I flick to the page Shane last read.
We’ve made the biggest mistake of our lives. We should have been better parents.
A tear falls and stains the page, amongst all the age stains.
They should have been better.
