Tonight We Rule the World

by Zack Smedley

  It’s like she’d shatter if she ever came face to face with what she was really making you feel. So you had to smile after you lost, or you got in even more trouble.

  “Forget it,” I say again. Even smaller this time.

  “You know, this happened to me too.”

  I stiffen. “What?”

  “This happened to me too.” Her words are tentative, but her face is gnarled in anger. “Not just you. Both of us.” I mull that over. Then I shake my head. “No.”

  “What?”

  “You’re just wrong. It didn’t happen to both of us.” “Okay,” she says, in an aimless voice. “That’s screwed up of you. Because this is, it’s—” “You did this.” She falters. “What?”

  “You did this,” I repeat, my breath heavy. I step toward her until we’re right up in each other’s face. I force myself to look at her. “It’s no one else’s fault; this was you, all fucking you—”

  “O—”

  “Your decision, your actions!”

  “Stop yelling.”

  “This was all you! All y—”

  I never see it coming: Lily’s grip locking onto my arm, bending it shut and wrenching me backward to slam my elbow onto the deck handrail. Thud—“OW, fuck!”

  I stumble sideways, jam my hip into the table corner, and topple to the ground with a pained grunt.

  Lily’s eyes are wide.

  Lily’s hand is covering her mouth.

  Lily’s head is shaking back and forth.

  Lily tells me, “I’m sorry.”

  But she’s walking away before she’s even done saying it.

  TWELVE

  LILY BOOKS IT UPSTAIRS AS SOON AS WE GET INSIDE. I

  try to follow, but I don’t get far.

  “Hey. What was that?”

  An anvil slams into my chest—Vic’s voice. I freeze and swivel around to find all three of the others still sitting in the living room. Each of their faces—Vic’s scowl, Austin’s wide eyes, and Beth’s pursed lips—screams the same message: They saw.

  I make a beeline for the stairs, but Vic stops me cold. “Hey—hey. Owen.”

  I press a casual hand to my throbbing elbow.

  “What was that out there?” Vic’s eyes have enough anger in them to ignite the ocean.

  “Nothing, noth-ing,” I plead, my voice cracking. “Please, guys, just—”

  “Okay … dude?” Austin cuts me off. “We saw that.”

  “Come sit,” Vic says.

  “I don’t want to. Seriously—”

  Beth disappears into the kitchen and returns with a bag of frozen peas. She presses it to my elbow; the cold shocks my skin, and I shout, “FUCK, Beth!” I slap the bag to the ground, and a million frozen peas scatter over the entire room’s hardwood.

  As I start to tear up pathetically at the sight, Austin just says in a small voice, “Well, it’s a rental.”

  I wait for Beth to scamper away or curse me out. Instead she puts a hand on my shoulder, guides me to the front door, and says, “Let’s go somewhere.”

  The beach is dark and empty except for the four of us. I sit across from the others with my toes digging into the sand, the nighttime ocean to my right and the lights from the boardwalk to my left.

  Vic leans back on her heels, arms folded. “How long has that been going on?”

  I raise an eyebrow at the sand. “You sound pissed.” “I am. That’s abuse, dude.”

  “This was the first time.” When she scowls at me, I roll my eyes. “I can tell you don’t believe me.”

  “Well, about two seconds ago you were ready to tell us you got that mark on your elbow from falling down the stairs or something, so.”

  “I was actually going to go with ‘tripped in the shower,’” I say, wiping my nose on my arm. “Figured that would sell it more.”

  “So that’s what you were doing in the shower earlier,” Austin says, raising a finger in an ah-ha gesture.

  “No, then I was masturbating.”

  “Ah, of course. Hey, it’s a rental.”

  “Guys,” Vic snaps. “You swear that was the first time she’s done anything like that? What about when you guys broke up?”

  “Will you get off my ass? We didn’t break up; we had a fight,” I say. “Which we resolved, then got back together.”

  “Yeah, if you ask me, you shouldn’t have done that.” “I didn’t.”

  “You didn’t get back together with her?” “I didn’t ask you.”

  Vic stares me down. Austin and Beth pretend to play with the flashlights on their phones.

  “Listen,” I say, carefully—I need to sell it. “I appreciate this. But everything is fine; things just got out of hand. I promise.”

  “Things have been bad between you guys for a while,” Vic says. I realize it isn’t a question, and she adds, “Lily tells me things. We’re best friends. Or, were.”

  “Were?”

  “She’s been kind of bitchy lately.” “Like, this week?”

  “Like, the past year. I mean, I love her, but … I don’t know. We could all tell you guys were having trouble.” “How?”

  “Lily’s sent screenshots, you’ve sent screenshots … I know what your fights look like. And you two say some … awful shit. To me, that was the first red flag.”

  I try to muster a scoff. “I guess we bring out the worst in each other.”

  Vic leans toward me and says, hotly, “You should say that with more concern.”

  “This isn’t black and white.”

  “Okay, two things: One, yeah, it is. With hitting, yeah, it is. Two—”

  “This is stupid.”

  “Two, why did you guys break up as soon as she found out what happened to you on the trip? Was that really just a coincidence?” They all wait. Waves crash.

  This is my window. I’m being given a moment on a silver platter; the opportunity I’ve been waiting for … tell them. TELL THEM. I latch onto Vic’s urgency, and I picture unloading that whole night onto them. Their shocked looks, strong hugs, their sympathy, their support.

  But there’s still that same barrier as always—the permanence of telling them this thing they could never be untold. What if they reported it to law enforcement, got Lily arrested? What if the local papers printed stories, and there was a trial where I had to share that whole night to a room full of strangers, and only then would I realize I’m not even right about this—that she actually didn’t do this thing, and I made the most colossal misreading of a situation in my life?

  I try to hold on to all the images I just planted in my brain out on the balcony, but they’re all blank. And I circle back to the only thing I know for sure: that however miserable this is, it’s a price worth paying to preserve my daily life. It’s not ideal, but it’s a trade-off I’ve weighed and chosen knowingly.

  “It was coincidence,” I tell Vic. “Lily just had a lot of feelings about the Lanham thing because she’s the one who helped me come out then.”

  “It’s funny you bring that up,” she says. Her voice is darker now.

  “Vic,” Beth says.

  “A couple hours before then—” Vic starts. “Oh, come on, don’t—” Austin is saying. “—she told us you were bi,” Vic finishes. I freeze.

  “What do you mean, ‘told you?’” I ask. “Exactly that.” “You’re such a liar.”

  Austin sits with his head in one hand, adjusting his glasses with the other.

  “Dude,” says Vic. “Why would I lie about this?” “Why would she?”

  “She said she wanted to make sure we were all cool with it ahead of time,” Austin says to his lap. “I’m sorry, man.”

  “Okay.” I chew on my lip, relieved to have an excuse to latch onto. She had a good reason; of course she did. “That’s not a crime. That’s fine.”

  “Are you kidding me?” Vic says. “You’re saying this doesn’t bother you at all?”

  “Of course it does; will you stop fucking with me?” I snap. “She’s not, like, this cartoon villa
in who’s scheming to ruin my life—”

  “I didn’t say that, and I don’t think that,” Vic says. “What I am saying, and what I do think, is that she could steal a baby, light it on fire, punt it at your fucking head, and you’d write a poem about how great she is for trying to keep you warm. That’s what I’m saying.”

  I can’t help but smirk at how Vic-ish of an answer that is. “Fine,” I say. “I’m saying it’s complicated, and you don’t get it. She and I aren’t … we’re not a normal couple.” “I don’t know what that means.”

  “This stuff usually looks like red flags, but it’s not for us, because we have a different way of doing things.” “I don’t know what that means.” “We’re the exception.”

  It’s clear from their faces that they aren’t buying it. This is exactly why I don’t want to talk about this with anyone. They weren’t there for those moments in the very beginning. They don’t know what it felt like that night Lily and I emailed for the first time—how she plucked me out of the crowd. So of course they wouldn’t believe me when I say this is complicated.

  Hell, Vic hasn’t even dated anyone before—by her own admission, people annoy her too much. So how could she understand all my tangled thoughts?

  “No one’s trying to tell you what to do. But if you do break up, there are other … you know.” Vic flings a stick at the water. “Fish in the sea. Like, it will be okay.”

  I laugh into my hands.

  “What is it?”

  “I’ve seen what’s out there,” I tell her. “I—no, trust me. I’ve seen.”

  I think back to all those nights I spent on hookup apps a few months ago. The evenings I would be upset in my bed because some guy blocked me or said some shitty thing, when my phone would buzz with a text from Lily:

  Hey there! I hope you had a great day :)

  And I’d think to myself: Yep, nothing will ever come close to this.

  “Trust me,” I repeat to Vic. “Those people make Lily look like Florence Nightingale.”

  “Bud, there are 7.8 billion people out there, and every one of them is a gender you’re attracted to. You will find another Florence.”

  “There are other people, but they’re not this person.”

  “You are tantalizingly close to getting the point.”

  “What if she’s the person I’m supposed to be with?”

  “You’re seventeen.”

  “I know. And look at where I’m at.”

  “We are.”

  I don’t respond to that one.

  “I have a thing to say,” Beth pipes up.

  I wait.

  “Just so you know. Because I think it’s important.” She picks up a fistful of sand, letting it drain through her fingers. “Whether you were dating Lily or not … we were never going anywhere, you know. We never had one foot out the door.”

  “What’re you talking about?”

  “I’m talking about the way you always sit on the floor at hangouts so everyone else can have the nice chairs. Or how you always buy our favorite snacks and bring us food when we come over.”

  “Or how you always volunteer to be the picture-taker,” Austin adds.

  “I like doing that stuff.” Beth shrugs. “If you say so.” “Why else would I do it?”

  “Because you always thought we had one foot out the door.” She looks hard at me. “You feel like you need to make it as easy as possible to spend time with you—like if our job is to do anything other than show up, we won’t. So I’m just letting you know … in case it needs to be stated. We were always going to show up, dude.”

  “Absolutely,” adds Austin.

  Vic taps me on the knee with one finger. “You hear that, right? Lily or not; we weren’t going to stop showing up. Ever.”

  I look out to the ocean, shaking my head with a smirk. “Four years to tell me this, and you’re doing it three weeks before we move away.”

  “Well, life’s full of disappointments.” Another Vic answer. She leans toward me. “We’re just letting you know, for when you’re at college making new friends. People are going to show up for you. You.”

  That gets a real smile out of me. I can’t believe how much I love these people. All three of them on their last night of vacation, and this is how they’re spending it.

  I really don’t know what I’m going to do without them.

  “Question,” Beth says, half-raising a hand. “Do you want me to talk to Lily?”

  “No.” God, no.

  Vic: “Do you want any of us to talk to her? Send her a text?”

  “No.”

  Austin: “Muster an army of locusts?”

  “We’ll keep that one on the table.”

  THIRTEEN

  I CAN’T SLEEP, SO I GO OUT TO THE BACK DECK WITH

  my writing notebook. The ocean roars in the distance, but the night is completely clear.

  I sit at the picnic table and stare at the paper.

  It’s impossible to concentrate—I keep replaying the group’s conversation from earlier. I’m kicking myself for not telling them everything. Imagining how different their reactions would’ve been … How much more horrified they would be if they knew it wasn’t just my elbow.

  Vic’s voice turns around in my head.

  That’s abuse, dude.

  God, that word makes my skin crawl. It feels totally mismatched with my situation. Like I’m detracting from cases that are more serious, more real.

  “Plenty of abuse to go around, folks,” I murmur aloud to the dark, empty air.

  That can’t be what this is.

  I set down my pen and pull out my phone. A few keyword searches lead me to a chart called the Power and Control Wheel. I pull at my bracelet as I read some of the items.

  Using intimidation – Making her afraid by using looks, actions, gestures.

  Emotional abuse – Putting her down. Making her feel bad about herself. Calling her names. Playing mind games.

  Isolation – Controlling what she does, what she wears, where she goes.

  Minimizing – Not taking her concerns seriously. Saying the abuse didn’t happen. “It’s all in your head.”

  I sigh into my fingers.

  “Fuck.”

  Okay.

  I want to un-read the words. All this ugliness bubbles to the surface with them. Memories, like when I told Lily I wanted my first kiss to be special and planned out; then the next day she grabbed me and kissed me on the bus because now I wouldn’t have to worry about it anymore. Or when I decided to silence my phone for a night after an argument, and she showed up in my yard to shine a light in my eyes through my window until I responded to her.

  I pick my pen back up and try to get back to my sketch.

  (Blank page.)

  I start to write Caesar, the twisted game show host that Lily and I created that night we emailed.

  (Blank page.)

  Caesar laughs and claps.

  “We have a winner, folks! We asked one hundred people the question, IS THIS ABUSE, and survey says yes! Congratulations … what will you do next?!”

  I squeeze my eyes shut.

  Everyone is waiting.

  “Oh gosh.” I cock an eyebrow, putting on my best sarcasm face. “Do I have to choose, Caesar?”

  “Hahaha! Well, of course you do.”

  I dial up the charm. “Come on, I’m bi. You know we hate choosing.”

  Laughtracklaughtrack!

  “Oh, you thought you were out of the woods when you solved the riddle, didn’t you? Didn’t he, folks?!”

  LAUGHTRACKLAUGHTRACK!

  I lean against the table, cradling my head in my hands as my lip trembles. Whatever you do, don’t fucking cry.

  “What are my … options?”

  Options.

  “Now we’re talking! Don’t worry; we’ve got lots of help for you!”

  Help.

  “Let’s ask our first audience member—the wisest woman in the world!” Caesar hands the microphone to MOM, who waves
nervously, blushing among the cacophonous applause. But her face turns serious when she answers, echoing words she told me when I was twelve.

  “Buddy: I just need to tell you that you are the most wonderful boy in the world, and anyone who can’t see that isn’t worth your time. Don’t let anyone hurt you in a way you wouldn’t want someone to hurt me. Make it important to love and respect yourself as much as I do.”

  I grip my pen until my knuckles go numb.

  “Well, what do you think about that?” Caesar asks me.

  I shake my head, wiping my eyes.

  “I don’t know.” My voice rattles.

  “You don’t know?” Caesar balks at me. And no sooner has he taken the microphone back than Lily appears, grabbing my mother’s elbow and slamming it into the concrete wall behind her. A sharp cry of pain. Mom is knocked to the floor and out of sight among the cheering crowd.

  “Stop it! Stop it! STOP!”

  I write on the page in front of me:

  JUST END THINGS WITH HER, YOU FUCKING IDIOT!!!

  “What other options—let’s ask this guy right here!” Caesar walks right up to a boy: seven-year-old Owen, who has racecar pajamas, a stuffed panda bear, and a black eye.

  “What happened to your eye, buddy?” The boy looks away shyly. “Daddy hit me.” “Oooh,” the crowd purrs.

  “Well now, that must mean he didn’t love you much. According to that nice lady over there.”

  “That’s different—he can’t help it.”

  “Says who?”

  “That nice lady over there! She told me we need to make sure it doesn’t happen again, but not give up on him.”

  I write.

  MAKE SURE IT DOESN’T HAPPEN AGAIN, BUT DON’T GIVE UP.

  Now the crowd starts yelling all at once.

  “Boys will be boys!” cries a woman in a cross necklace.

  “SITFU, you pussy!” yells an old man to a boy with my face and no limbs.

  The boys from elementary school yell and throw rocks at the rest of the audience members who laugh as they get hit because they’re eager to be included.