After All(72)

Now I'm awake. "What?"

Alyssa nods and brings the tray over to the bed. In her kimono-like robe and the wiggling way she moves, she looks like Marilyn Monroe come back to life. Marilyn who is now bringing me breakfast. 

Focus, Emmett.

"Yeah," she says, lifting off the metal dome to showcase the bacon and eggs and ubiquitous avocado toast underneath. "She said she wouldn't blame me if I up and left, that some problems were too big for a PR company to solve."

"What the actual fuck?"

"Right?" Alyssa says, lifting off a piece of bacon from the tray and munching on it thoughtfully. "Anyway, I explained what happened, that it wasn't your fault. Then she reconsidered."

I stare at her openly. "You got Autumn to reconsider our contract?"

"I think I got her to reconsider all contracts," she says with a shy smile. "Yours, mine, hers. Anyway, it's all good now."

I don't know what to think about that. I don't doubt Alyssa is telling the truth so I'm sort of floored that Autumn would consider dumping me as a client over this. As she said, it wasn't really my fault.

But, at the same time, it was. I should have ignored the guy, I shouldn't have responded with violence, especially not in front of Alyssa, and most of all … I'm pretty sure Autumn is pissed that I never told her about my upbringing. She's strangely possessive over me at times, which is why I always thought it was odd that she suggested Alyssa and I get together. But she had the same idea about my past, whatever was presented on Wikipedia, and this whole time I was holding out on her like I didn't trust her.

And I don't trust Autumn. That's the whole thing. The only person I trust with all this is Jimmy and Alyssa. And Jimmy already knows the truth so …

Well, now I'm handing the truth to Alyssa with my bare hands and hoping that after all this, she'll still accept me. If not that, then at least be able to look into my eyes without disgust or pity.

"So," she says, nudging the plate toward me. "Are you going to eat?"

I nod but still push the plate to the side. "Listen," I tell her. "I want to talk to you about last night."

"I told you, I understand."

"No, not about the paparazzi. I mean, again, I regret hitting him. I know I shouldn't have done that. But I mean … why I was so upset."

She swallows audibly and nods. "Okay."

I breathe in deeply through my nose, sitting up straight and then look her right in the eye. "Most of what he said was actually true. My mother was a heroin addict. For all I know she wasn't a whore, and I know she wasn't using when I was born, but I did discover her when she had died and I did pretty much grow up on the streets."

Fuck. The words should be so simple in theory but the minute they leave my lips, they land between us like landmines. Maybe not going off now, but anytime someone missteps in the future.

But even so, she's staring at me with coaxing eyes, waiting for me to go on.

I sigh. "It wasn't as bad as it sounds. I know how ridiculous that seems, but when you're young, you don't really know what's wrong. You don't know you're poor, you don't know that you're living a life that's unacceptable for many. I guess I was just lucky. I wasn't often hungry; my mother was usually around. I went to school and saw my friends and played. After school I was either at the park or at home. I'd never been to someone else's place before so I never knew how it was supposed to look like, or smell, or feel. There were always junkies lying around but back then it wasn't nearly as bad as it is now. And again, being a kid, I just didn't know any different. I thought a man with a needle up his arm was just a man who needed medicine."

Alyssa's face crumples slightly. Not with pity. With compassion. Still, it's not easy to take.


      ///
       
         
       
        

I continue. "My only glimpses of the other life, the other side of the tracks, were what I saw on the TV. We only had three channels, but they were enough. They represented the fake world, the one I could escape into if I needed to. Maybe that's where my acting bug got started, who knows. Anyway, I'm saying all this because I don't want you to think what people want you to think. That I was suffering. I wasn't. I just happened to have a mother who loved the drugs more than me."

"Emmett," Alyssa finally says. "I'm so sorry."

"I told you, don't be," I tell her. "It happened. I'm sure I prepared for it in some way. I think on some level I knew the drugs would take her but I just thought everything would stay the same. When you're a kid, even when you're surrounded by death, you still don't think death will come for you. But it came right to our fucking door. I remember that evening like it was yesterday … " I shake my head, suddenly finding it hard to breathe. It takes a few minutes before I can continue. "I found her. My friend Jimmy eventually found the two of us. I couldn't leave her. He's like a fucking father to me, that guy. And before I knew what was happening, I was shipped off to Mission to live with my aunt. A woman who showed me a fraction of the love my mother showed me."