Held A New Adult Romance(25)

He stops stock still when he sees me. "Fucking hell," he says, a sure sign that I've really surprised him. "You're really out of your comfort zone, aren't you?"

"You're not going to fire him," I say, trying to sound like I mean it, but the moment Dad points out that I'm way past the point of panic, it's like my body just wants to quit. My legs shake so hard I think I'm going to fall, but Dad catches hold of me.

"Deep breaths," he says, ushering me over to the couch. "That's it. In through the nose, out through the mouth. You're okay. You're doing great."

"Promise me..." My breath comes in big, dramatic heaves. While my lungs are working just fine it's like my brain has other ideas. My heart feels like it's going to explode out of my chest. "Don't fire him."

We're not going to talk about this now. He's too concerned about getting me to the other side of this panic attack.

"Please," I say. "Listen."

He brings me water and I sip carefully.

"How many drinks did you have?" he asks, which is such a Dad thing to say that I shake my head.

"Amber - how many?"

"One," I gasp. "Okay, maybe one and a half." I take another sip of water. My heart is still racing but I can breathe easier now. "It was only Zinfandel. Like eight per cent."

"Eight per cent is a lot when you're not used to it," he says. "And on top of your meds."

"I'm fine."

"Well, it's obviously made you brave. Look at where you are." He sounds unreasonably proud of me for having left my room and walked down the hall. But we both know it's another matter entirely to get me to leave the house.

"Promise me you won't fire Jimmy," I say.

He sighs.

"You didn't do it already?"

He shakes his head and sits down on the couch beside me. "What's going on, Amber? You need to tell me."

"Nothing's going on. We're friends."

My denial is pathetic and the look on Dad's face says it all. A friend - for whom you wash your hair, put on lipstick and a dress. There's no way that scene of mine could have looked like anything but what it was - some kind of idiotic attempt at seduction. "We're not having this conversation," I say, feigning embarrassment. "Just no way."

"We are," says Dad, who was never one to play along with American standards of delicacy concerning sex. "You're not ready for it. The last thing you need right now is another man in your life."

"I'm an adult, in case you hadn't noticed."

"Yeah, and in case you hadn't noticed, it all went a bit tits up with your last boyfriend, didn't it?"

"Jimmy isn't Justin. I would have thought that much was obvious."

He sighs. "You don't see it, do you? The fact that you're even comparing the two says to me there's trouble ahead. For God's sake, Amber - you just left your bedroom for the first time in over six months. There is no way you're ready to start thinking about boys."

I'd like to tell him the truth, that it wasn't the first time, that I'd been going out by the pool, but I know that will call my motivations into question. He'll find out that I used to go out there to smoke, and then to meet Jimmy. And that will be a whole new Pandora's box of issues for me and Dr. Stahl to try to close. I know my lessons by now - I have to get better for me; I have to learn the ways in which my relationship with Justin was unhealthy.

"I need friends," I say.

"Nobody is stopping you from picking up the phone."

I shake my head. Oh God, he's right. I'm not ready for anything. I'm definitely not ready for that. I can still see the look in her eyes. She was no stranger to psychodrama - Kiersten Rowe was the queen - but that night she was really rattled. "This is bullshit, Amber," she said, still shaking. "He's not worth this, not even if his dick has more speeds and rotations than your very best vibrator."

There is nothing I can say to make this better. The louder I protest about not revisiting old mistakes, the more obvious it will seem that I'm about to do so. I watch the fish, little jewel bright things darting in and out of the corals. In pride of place is the 'No Fishing' sign I made in pottery class when I was thirteen. Art was one of the few subjects my school was really enthusiastic about and I'd enjoyed it. I liked the coolness and the texture of the clay in my hands. I liked pricking out the letters on the sign, careful not to smudge the illusion of wood grain I'd pressed into the clay. I was careful to avoid air bubbles - back then having my work explode in the kiln seemed like the worst thing that could happen.

"You still have that stupid sign," I say, feeling like I should feign embarrassment.

"It's not stupid. It's one of my most treasured possessions."