Page 4 of The One Decent Thing

“Please just get in,” I whispered, and flashed back to that night, when he’d all but begged me to get in his car and go somewhere safe.

His jaw tightened, and something dark flashed through his eyes. Maybe he was remembering the same thing. I jumped as he tossed the bag in his hand into the footwell and climbed in after, my little car rocking and settling from his weight. He shut the door and pulled on his seatbelt in oddly careful motions, like he was afraid to make any sudden movements. Or like he was keeping himself in check.

The car felt too small for both of us, completely filled by his bulk and his presence and the miasma of my terror and doubt. I shifted into reverse and let up the parking brake. Aidan stared straight ahead, his lips pressed into a thin line, his fists clenched on his thighs.

He had huge fists. Cracked knuckles. Calluses on the sides of his fingers. Those were hands that could break me in half.

No going back now. If I made a fuss, or showed even the slightest sign of the strain I was under, those guards might pull him out of the car and take him back in. Do something worse. How would I know? I’d never been closer to a prison before than the signs along the highway that told me not to pick up hitchhikers.

Not that that was a worry right now. Instead of picking up someone dangerous on the side of the road, I’d gone straight to the source.

I backed out of the parking space, turned, and made my way to the gate. My ID was checked again, the guards visually inspected Aidan, and they looked in the back seat and had me pop my trunk, even though I’d been under the watchful eyes of at least three prison staff the whole time I’d been there.

Finally, finally, they waved us through, and I followed the long drive down the hill and toward the access road that ran alongside the freeway.

I clenched my fingers around the steering wheel so hard they ached. The hum of the engine and the faint whispery buffeting of gusts of wind were the only sounds; I strained my ears, but I couldn’t even hear Aidan breathing. It was like he’d gone catatonic.

It was hard to imagine what he must be feeling. Shock, probably, and his own brand of fear. Disbelief, maybe. I wanted so badly to feel nothing but sympathy myself, rather than the toxic stew of negativity currently turning my stomach into a heavy ball.

After a couple of miles I stopped at a stop sign. If I went right, I could get on the freeway and head south, back to Santa Rafaela, the little coastal town a few miles from my hometown where I lived and went to school. Left, and there was a Starbucks. Easy choice. A minute later I pulled into the parking lot and turned the key in the ignition.

Silence fell. Without the engine running, it was oppressive.

“Is this where you let me out?” I flailed so hard I nearly smacked myself in the face. Aidan had spoken quietly, but he’d picked up his plastic bag off the floor and was holding it in a death grip in his lap. He hadn’t looked at me, and was gazing down at it like it held the ultimate answers to everything.

“Forty-two.” It came out without any input from my brain, and then I started to laugh, high-pitched and a little hysterical-sounding.

“What?” I turned my head, and Aidan’s face was right there, turned toward me at last. He had such interesting eyes, a light brown that was almost golden. They’d always given him a striking appearance in contrast with his black hair. Striking, and attractive, and almost mesmerizing, even when they were alight with malicious mischief. Now they were narrowed in something I hoped wasn’t murderous rage. “What the fuck?”

“Sorry, sorry, I just — look, I’m really nervous. I’m sorry. I mean, you looked like you were — I can’t explain it. I’m sorry.”

Aidan listened to my babbling without so much as blinking. “That’s from theHitchhiker’s Guide.”

I nodded, bewildered. Aidan Morrison had read it? He’d readanything?

Maybe that thought showed on my face, because he let out a short, bitter-sounding laugh. “I read it insi— last year. I think. I couldn’t get the next book.”

I could see him, standing in a dingy prison library and asking for the next book in the series, only to be told it wasn’t there. He’d lost even the ability to read a decades-old book that you could find in a used bookstore or download in like, two seconds, because of me. The full reality of what I’d done to him hadn’t sunk in until that moment. I slumped back in my seat.

“Aidan. I’m so, so sorry. I can’t — I’m sorry.” I scrubbed my hands over my face. “I’m not going to ask you to forgive me, but —”

“Is that why you’re here?” he demanded, his voice rising. “To get me to what, absolve you? Are you out of your fucking mind?” That was almost a shout. I cringed back, trying to get as far from him as I could, scrabbling for the seatbelt release. If I could just get out of the car, I could run into the Starbucks, wait there until he left…and then his big hand landed on my arm, and I froze, all my joints locking up. He sucked in a deep, gasping breath. “Sebastian.” His voice had gone quiet again. “C’mon, look at me.”

I lifted my head slowly. He was leaning back too, out of my personal space except for that huge, warm hand wrapped around my wrist. “I know you can’t,” I whispered. “That’s what I was saying.”

“You’re wrong, because there’s nothing to forgive you for.” He met my eyes steadily. “You did something stupid. But you didn’t call the cops, you didn’t press charges, you didn’t testify against me. You know what the last thing I remember is, when they were arresting me?” I shook my head, and he half-smiled. “You yelling about how I hadn’t hurt you.”

He suddenly let go of my wrist, like he’d just realized he was still holding on to me. It had felt like a threat at first, but I wished he’d left it there. Wished that we could have some simple human connection in the midst of all the horrible feelings washing back and forth between us in the cramped front seat.

I didn’t know if I could get into everything that had happened after his arrest from my point of view. Certainly not in the parking lot of an off-ramp Starbucks in the middle of central California, hundreds of miles from anywhere. I did know that I’d tried to get him released. I’d begged my parents, actually on my knees. It didn’t matter. They convinced a psychiatrist to testify that Aidan had exercised ‘undue influence’ and that I had some version of Stockholm Syndrome and everything I’d said to the police, and in my videotaped statement, should be ignored. Although how the hell anyone could buy that given I’d only been in Aidan’s apartment for a couple of hours I didn’t know.

It probably had something to do with my family being richer than God and my dad playing golf with the DA. And that was definitely not something I wanted to discuss with Aidan, although I’d have to eventually — and he wasn’t stupid. He’d probably figured it out on his own, since my parents weren’t particularly discreet about the way they flaunted their money and connections.

I remembered trying to argue with the arresting officers, though those memories were a little hazy. I’d been started on an extensive regimen of antidepressants, sedatives, and anti-anxiety medications shortly after, and I hadn’t gotten my mind back to anything like clarity until a few months after my eighteenth birthday.

A full year. I’d lost a full year of my life to my parents’ insanity. And Aidan had lost four, which made me a little bitch for even thinking about myself and what I’d gone through.

“Sebastian? You okay?”

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