Exit Wounds

17 | mean girl

          "Was it? It didn't look like you regretted any of it."

          I lean back on my chair, enjoying the warm sun of May. It's not summer yet, but the temperatures are far more comfortable than I expected them to be, especially considering Los Angeles is a revolving door of trauma and I don't want heat-caused dehydration to be yet another thing on my plate. "It's complicated."

          "What isn't?"

          My ambivalence about being honest—fully honest—with Michelle hasn't dissipated since last night; if anything, it's risen in intensity following my conversation with Sadie from this morning about the NDA and all that. Though I know Sadie is doing her job and looking out for me, she doesn't know Michelle like I do, and the Michelle I know would never betray me like that. I want so desperately to be able to trust her and not come out of this trip stabbed in the back once again, but I know girls like me can't afford such luxuries. Girls like me don't get to blindly trust people anymore.

           I know Michelle is angry about the NDA, though she has yet to utter a word about it to me. I'd be too, if I had to hear someone I don't even know assume I'm about to run my mouth about deeply personal things regarding someone else's life, especially when that someone is my sister, but I get both sides.

          I understand being so deeply frustrated about not being believed, about screaming so hard my voice runs out and no one hears a thing, but I also understand being so terrified about those details running wild that you resort to desperate measures to keep them locked in.

          I know we don't trust each other that much.

          I can't completely trust her to keep things to herself, not when she has to keep our mother and Adam happy, and I'm aware she still resents me for all of this—for leaving unannounced, for leaving her alone, for ruining her perfect illusion of Adam's character, for unleashing Sadie's wrath on her—and she can get unpredictable when she's emotional, prone to blind fury. I can be impulsive as well (see: keying Adam's car), but I spend quite an embarrassingly long time mulling over every single decision I make and every possible consequence of said decision, whether it's been already made or not, in my head. I'm calculating. I'm manipulative. Michelle has never had a reason to be stopped in her tracks immediately before doing something, so she jumps headfirst.

          She doesn't trust me enough to be certain I'm not wrecking everything around myself when I inevitably leave Los Angeles for the second time in my life. She'll want me to come back, but I loathe the person I am when I'm back here, and I can't do that to myself. I can't betray myself like that.

          "It's just complicated," I echo. "Reputations follow you around, and you'll know just enough about the person I need to be in order to be marketable. All of this is very on brand for me."

          She scowls. "For you? Or for Harley Kane?"

          "I am Harley Kane. Rebecca is gone. Dead. Buried." I down my mimosa—a terrible decision, really. "I drowned that bitch years ago."

⊹˚. ♡

          Sadie refuses to let me out of her sight on the drive to my father's house.

          It's not far from the manor, which surprises me, as I assumed he'd find a place as far away from that woman as possible, but that's the difference between the two of us.

          Whereas I only allowed myself one moment of hesitation before turning my back on this city and the terrible things that happened to me, he keeps his wounds at arm's length where he can always find and poke them whenever it's necessary. Though we both run away from things instead of facing them head on, as Michelle ever so eloquently threw to my face yesterday, I deal with the consequences and take responsibility when it comes to it. I call out problematic behavior, including my own.