Undone

by Amelia Wilde

  We’re standing on the main street of Patriot, Arizona, fittingly named Main Street. It’s nowhere in the middle of nowhere. It’s a ghost town, save for the two—maybe three—businesses that are still open. One is a bank. The other is a bar. I can’t tell if the corner store is open or not. When we lived here, I’d walk down in the afternoons for a candy bar. I don’t want to go in now.

  “This was a terrible idea,” I say, tapping my foot. The sun beats down on our shoulders. The rental car idles by the curb. Beau refused to turn it off. He said we’d die of heatstroke if he did that. He might be right. “She’s not going to come.”

  “She still has ten minutes.”

  We’re meeting my mother.

  I feel sick with excitement and fear, but Beau hasn’t let me back out. Not even for a second. After I moved into the penthouse, he coaxed me into calling her, first once a month, then more often. We made a promise to each other that we’d call our parents—that we’d visit. I’m still not sure I want to visit my mother. But, as Beau said, she won’t be here forever. Here on the planet, anyway. I know she won’t be in Patriot forever. Neither will I. I already want to be gone.

  I’m about to insist on driving away when a beat-up Honda Civic rounds the corner, speeding up right until she slams on the brakes. This is so like her. My heart is in my throat. I don’t remember the last time I saw my mom. That’s not quite true. I remember it vaguely, but I was pissed at her for leaving, and I mainly remember that.

  She pulls up in the middle of the lane, right next to our rental car, and throws the Honda into Park. There’s no lingering look through the front windshield. There’s no awkward hesitation. She leaps out, her face lit up with joy.

  Joy.

  “Annabel!” she shrieks, running around to fold me into her arms. I breathe her in. I was kidding myself before. I remember the last time I saw her. It was the day she left for Brazil, and she hugged me exactly this way, the way she always did.

  “You’re choking me,” I get out.

  She takes a step back, holding me by the shoulders while she looks me up and down. “Look at you!” I look at her. It’s like looking in a mirror, if the mirror showed me twenty-two years older and without even a trace of pink hair. We have the same green eyes, same dark hair, and same smile. “You’re gorgeous, Anna. How are you?”

  I take another step back, getting some distance, because I’m going to burst into tears, and I don’t want to. I want to get the words out. “Mom, I’m great. But I have something to say to you.”

  Beau steps to my side, but he doesn’t touch me. I’m doing this on my own, and he knows it.

  “You hurt me when you left and never came back.” My voice wavers, and I hate it, but I plunge ahead. “I’m sick of being your last priority. I want you to come visit at least once a year. I live in Manhattan now, and I won’t be going anywhere. Unless I’m on vacation. In which case, we could meet, but—”

  “Annabel,” my mother gasps, her hand at her throat. “Honey, I—” She shakes her head, tears coming to her eyes. “You were never last. Never. I thought you’d moved on from me.” She looks into the distance, then back at my face. “Every time I called you were someplace else, always busy, and I figured it was payback for that shitty childhood. I figured you were finished with me. I thought you needed some space.”

  The last hard shell around my heart dissolves, falling away like it was never there.

  “Are you serious?” I whisper.

  “Of course I’m serious!” she cries. “Jesus. I love you, Anna. You’re the light of my life. I’ll visit. I’ll visit too much, if that’s what you want.”

  “Not too much,” I say, and then she’s hugging me again for a long time.

  When she pulls back, her eyes are shining. “God, this is rude. Are you going to introduce me?”

  I take a deep breath. “Mom, this is Beau.” I’m going to say boyfriend right up until I don’t. “He’s the love of my life. Beau, this is my mom.”

  “Aren’t you something else?” she says, and then she shakes his hand, smiling. “I heard you’re a very wealthy man.”

  “Mom.”

  “It’s true, Mrs. Forester,” he says. “Annabel will never want for anything.”

  My mother bursts out laughing, and it’s a mirror image of my laugh. “I’ll let you in on a secret. She never wanted for much. That girl knows how to take her own.”

  Beau grins at her, then looks over at me. “I’d love to hear more.”

  “I’ll tell you whatever you want to know, buddy,” she says. She gives the place one more look. “But first can we get out of here? This town seems haunted.”

  “I told him we shouldn’t come here,” I tell my mother. It hardly seems real, talking to her in person.

  “And he didn’t listen?” She clicks her tongue. “We’ll teach him.”

  We’ll.

  My mother abandons her car—“I bought it from a guy for five hundred dollars to make it here. I never want to see it again.”—and climbs into the back seat. The inside of the car is perfectly cool, thanks to Beau’s insistence on wasting gas. “Where to?” she says.

  “Anywhere,” Beau says.

  “A man after my own heart.” My mom smiles.

  Mine too.

  Hard Cash

  Josephine’s hand flies through the air, her palm aimed squarely at my face, but it’s clear she’s not slapped people very often, because I see it coming from a mile away.

  I put my hand up to stop her, wrapping my fingers around her wrist.

  She gasps, two red spots high on her cheeks, her other hand scrambling for the towel, breasts rising, threatening to spill over the top.

  We’re frozen like that for the space of one heartbeat. I’ll never forget how she looks in this moment—indignant, yes, but also powerful in a way I didn’t expect. She looks like a pissed-off goddess who also might be turned on, ready to go.

  Which one of us moves first? I can’t tell, but everything in my body responds. She’s tilting her face up toward mine, offering herself up at the same time that I move to take her. My momentum carries us both into the bungalow and the door swings shut behind us.

  Josephine is panting, her arms thrown around my neck, and the towel crumples to the ground. Neither of us reaches for it.

  I reach for her instead.

  Holy fuck, it feels good to touch her, and I do, everywhere that I can think to get my skin against hers. I have my hands on her face, pulling her in, trailing down over her shoulders, her waist, her hips, cupping her ass. Josephine doesn’t resist. She melts into me, lifting one knee like she can climb straight up and onto me, and if she could pull it off, I would let her.

  She sucks my bottom lip between her teeth, biting down hard enough for it to hurt, and then pulls back, breathing hard. “You’re such an asshole.”

  “You’re unbelievable.”

  Then we’re crashing together again.

  Why not? Let the world burn.

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  For more books by Amelia Wilde,

  visit her online at awilderomance.com.