Pretty and Reckless by Charity Ferrell Page A

shock. His hands trembled when he stalked my way and bent down in front of me.
    “Why are you so angry?” I asked, quietly.  
    His hands went to my knees and his head fell forward. “I could’ve stopped it. But I didn’t.”
    “When I was thirteen?” I shook my head. “No, you couldn’t have.”
    He looked up at me with sorrow in his eyes. “Let’s stop for today, okay?”
    “Okay,” I drew. He was disgusted with me. He didn’t see me as the strong girl anymore. “I’ll call a cab.”   
    “No,” he said, bringing himself up. “Let me take you to lunch.”
    I blinked, looking at him with confusion. “What?”
    “You need to clear your head. Let’s go get some lunch, my treat.”
    “I really don’t feel like going out like this. I’m a hot mess.”  
    “We’ll order in. Give me a sec.” I nodded, and he walked out of the room.
    I grabbed a handful of tissues, and swiped them across my face, removing most of my make-up in the process. I grabbed the compact from my bag, opened it up and looked at myself. Black mascara marks ran down my cheeks. I scrubbed them at with the tissue, removing the make-up, and my bruises resurfaced.
    “Quit it, you look beautiful,” Weston said, coming back into the room with a handful of take-out menus.
    I’d just told him the story of my rape, he’d just thrown shit across the room, and now he was asking me to eat? I was beginning to think he was just as fucked up as I was.
    I flipped through the menus and handed one back to him. “Chinese, good choice,” he said. “I’ll be right back.”
    He came in ten minutes later with a bag in his hand. “I told Wendy to order half of the shit on the menu, so I hope there’s something you like in here,” he said, giving me a weak smile as he held the bag up in the air.
    I forced a smile. “Thank you, I love Chinese.”
    We settled down on the carpet where he sprawled out containers of food, sauces, and two drinks on the floor. He handed me a plate and a pair of chopsticks.
    We ate in silence until I finally cleared my throat. “Why did you decide to do this for a living?” I asked.
    He shrugged, playing with his food. “It’s personal.”  
    I snorted. “God forbid we share anything person with each other.”  
    He set his chopsticks down. “I had a twin brother, Wale. He was such a good guy and full of life when we were kids. But something in him ticked when we got to high school. He felt like a social outcast, like he didn’t belong. He developed jealousy towards my sister and me. I made better grades than him. I got varsity while he got JV. My parents would boast about my achievements, but pay no attention to his. He felt like he was never good enough. I tried to make him feel better, even failed a few tests so my GPA would drop, and it worked for a few months. But everything changed when he didn’t get accepted into college our family had attended for decades. That hit him hard. He got into drugs and drinking. He didn’t give a shit about his life. I tried to talk sense into him, but he’d shut me out.
    I left for college, and he moved to Michigan because he met a girl at a bar who lived there. He called me one night, the day before my finals, and was acting different. He said his girlfriend had been cheating on him. He cried that he hated his life and didn’t think he could take it anymore. He’d talked about ending his life before, but this time it was different. His tone, his words, everything was different.”
    He looked away from me when his eyes began to glaze over. “I jumped on the first flight to Michigan. I knew he was going to do something stupid. But I was too late. He hung himself in his apartment closet. After his death, I went through his things and found his journal. It was so damn raw. It was heartbreaking to read about what was going on in his mind. He had depression, hysteria, bouts of bi-polar, but he’d never sought out help. After reading every entry, I changed my major. I