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She doesn’t see me at first. I turn around and my heart’s racing and I think I might be sick. “My cousin is here,” I hiss at Ford and he looks over my shoulder. “Don’t stare!”
“Too late for that,” he murmurs. “She spotted me.” He grins tightly and waves. “Hello, Sara Lynn, you selfish asshole. Ah, fuck, she’s coming over.”
“Oh, shit, shit, shit, fuck—” I turn around and Sara Lynn’s hovering behind me with a plastic smile glued to her face. “Hi, Sara Lynn, how are you, what are you doing here? It’s so nice—”
“Kat, can I have a word?” Her voice is high and shrill.
“Uh,” I say.
“Don’t stick around on my account,” Ford says with amusement in his voice. “Sara Lynn, it’s always such apleasureto see you. Truly, you are such a shining light.”
“Oh, go fuck yourself, Ford. Come on, Kat.” She storms off toward the bathrooms.
“You really do need to antagonize her, don’t you?”
He shrugs and raises a glass to me as I hurry after my cousin.
I should just leave. Sara Lynn doesn’t have any power over me anymore. I haven’t officially cut ties with the family but I have thrown in with Ford which means I don’t need to be afraid of Sara Lynn bullying me, I don’t need to worry she’s going to poison me to Grandfather even more, I don’t need to be afraid of her anymore.
I don’t need to follow her like a puppy dog.
And yet that’s exactly what I’m doing because I’ve been doing it my whole life. It’s conditioned into me at this point and even if I wanted to walk away and act like none of this is happening, I can’t seem to do anything but trail after my cousin like I’m under a spell.
It’s always been this way. Sara Lynn’s in charge and I can’t do anything but follow after and hope she doesn’t punch me in the nose for fun.
“What the hell are you thinking, Kit-Kat?” She whirls on me back near the bathrooms in a quiet nook where they used to have a payphone. Now there’s just an empty little cubicle thing hanging on the wall.
“I don’t know… I don’t know what you mean?”
“You’re sitting at La Mode with freaking Ford Arc and eating dinner and drinking wine like it’s no big deal, but god, Kit-Kat, it’s so freaking pathetic, even for you.”
“I’m… just having dinner.”
“I’m just having dinner.” She says it mockingly, her face screwed up. “Listen to yourself Kit-Kat. You’re a Stockton and he’s an Arc, and you’re sitting in there making eyes at him like the most pathetic girl in the entire world and I can’t believe you take yourself seriously. Do you really think that man gives a crap about you?”
“No,” I say quietly, not able to look at her. “I don’t.”
“Good. At least you’re not totally stupid. God, Kit-Kat, I knew you were low but this is just astounding, even for you. Have some dignity, you pathetic mess, and pay your check and leave before you cause a scene.”
I open my mouth to say something—to apologize, to tell her I’ll go, to say whatever I need to say to make this end because I’m buzzing with embarrassment and rage and years and shame and self-loathing—but a person appears at the end of the hall and comes closer.
I look over and it’s Ford.
“Actually, Sara Lynn, you’re the one causing a scene.”
Sara Lynn looks like she wants to strangle him. “This is between me and my cousin,” she hisses.
Ford looms over her. “I know all about you, Sara Lynn. You sit there and pronounce judgment, but you’re no better than anyone else. You’re so self-conscious and desperate to be liked that you’ll shit all over your cousin here simply for having dinner with her fiancé. But what I think you hate the most is that you have no power over her anymore and you’re starting to see how empty your life has become now that you don’t have someone to lord all over. Are you going to cry, Sar? Are you going to prove how pathetic you are? Go ahead, I think we’d love it. No? How about you go back to your table and your weak little husband, and you’d better be thankful that I don’t break your skinny little neck right here for the fucking fun of it.”
Sara Lynn stands there in stunned silence. I don’t move, afraid that I’ll draw attention to myself. I feel thirteen all over again. I can smell the dirt under the bleachers, hear the roar of the crowd, see the dappled light against the ground. He stares Sara Lynn down and her face turns bright red. For one horrible second, I think she’s about to say something back to him.
Instead, she shakes her head. “I knew you were awful even back when we were kids, and you haven’t changed one bit.” And she pushes her way past him back toward the dining room.
I lean back against the wall, my heart racing, feeling dizzy. Ford comes closer but he doesn’t reach out to touch me. I look at him and feel a dozen emotions: shame, desire, relief, anger. His head tilts and his eyes narrow.
“Kit-Kat?” he asks. “She still calls you that?”
My jaw works. “I hate that nickname. I used to be heavy when I was little. It’s her way of reminding me that I’ll always be that stupid little girl.”
