By the time we make it there, I'm feeling insignificant, little more than a charity case that has been picked up off the streets. He pulls the Mercedes around the corner and into an adjacent parking garage, stopping there and slipping the car in park, blocking the entrance.
"Thank you again," I say nervously, unfastening my seatbelt and reaching for the door handle. "Really."
I don't give him time to respond … this is uncomfortable enough without forced conversation. I step out, clutching my coffee, and slam the door behind me. Before I can walk away, the window rolls down, and his voice calls out. "Karissa."
I turn around, wondering why he just can't make this easy on me, and freeze when I see the pink object in his extended hand.
My phone.
Really?
Sighing, I step back that way and reach through the open window, taking it from him. I try to pull away but he grasps my hand, clutching it tightly. It doesn't hurt, but it locks me in place, his skin warm and rough to the touch.
"A word of advice?" he says. "Be careful who you trust. There may not always be someone there to save you."
"I, uh … " Those words are chilling. I have no idea what to say. "Okay."
He lets go, his hand grasping the gearshift to put the car in reverse. I back up a few steps, away from the car.
"Call me sometime," he says. "It would be nice to see what you look like out of those clothes."
"Karissa, it's your Mom … sorry I missed your call … "
"Hey, kiddo, call me back when you get the chance!"
"It's been a few hours and I haven't heard from you, honey. I hope everything's okay. Call me."
"Karissa, I'm starting to worry … call me, please."
"I swear to God, Karissa Maria, if you don't call me back right now-"
"That's it. You're grounded. Forever."
Sighing, I hang up and stare at the screen of my phone. It still works, thankfully, once I got it plugged in and charging. It sprang to life with a whopping thirty-two missed calls-a few from Melody, wondering where I was, but most from my mother. She went from asking to pleading to threatening all within the span of a few hours.
I'm surprised she hasn't called the police to report me missing.
On second thought, she probably did.
If they ever gave out an award for overprotective mother of the year, Carrie Reed would win it, hands down. For eighteen years she kept me on lock down, always two seconds away from a mental break whenever I was out of her sight for too long. I was a bubble wrapped package marked 'fragile'-do not bend, do not break. We moved around so much it was hard for me to keep friends. She was restless, always needing to move on to something else-a new town, a new hobby, and new people-while I just wanted nothing more than to have somewhere I could call home.
Despite migrating and starting over practically every year, homeschooling in a lot of the places we lived, my application and SATs were enough to get me on the waiting list at NYU. I figured it was hopeless, and nearly gave up, when at the last minute a spot opened up and I was offered admission.
She cried when I told her. I thought she would be happy, but she sobbed and pleaded, asking me to reconsider moving to New York City. I told her I had to follow my heart, follow my dreams. She eventually backed off, but she never full accepted my leaving.
Abandonment issues, I guess. My father walked out on her when she was pregnant, and I don't think she has been the same since. I only vaguely remember seeing a photograph once, a flash of a mustached face, like a faded old Polaroid with a name scribbled on the bottom: John. It doesn't bother me-I can't miss someone I never had, can't mourn someone I don't know-but I know she feels the loss.
I know it, because I've heard her cry, muttering to him when she's in her bedroom, like he could hear her wherever he was.
She can't have him, so she overcompensates with me.
I lay back on my bed, too exhausted to do much more than move. My bed smells faintly like laundry detergent, but I smell like him. The scent lingers on my clothes from sleeping tangled in his sheets. It's half the reason I haven't bothered to shower, or change … the other half is because I can hardly think straight to function. My mother's messages are already slipping from my mind as Naz's words creep back in, replaying over and over, like a CD skipping.
It would be nice to see what you look like out of those clothes. I just gaped at the car as he drove away, disappearing into traffic. He'd seen me wearing something other than his ridiculous eighties get-up … the first time he saw me I was dressed normally.
It wasn't until I was in the elevator, heading up to my thirteenth floor room, that the double meaning behind those words hit me. It would be nice to see what you look like out of those clothes.
Holy shit, did he mean naked?
I'd been so startled I dropped my phone. Of course.
Sighing, trying to push it from my thoughts, I turn back to my phone and scroll through my contacts. I need to call my mother before she really does call the police. I make it to her name, Mom, when my finger hesitates, my eyes drifting to the name right below it. Naz.
I stare at it. He put his number into my phone at some point yesterday. I don't remember it happening, but that isn't surprising, considering I don't remember most of last night. I wondered how I was supposed to call him and shrugged the entire thing off, but now something stirs inside of me-anxiety, mingling with excitement. Butterflies tear up my stomach. I want to scream, to squeal, to puke. Before, it was harmless flirtation, but now … Jesus, now I can call him.
Oh God, no … I can't. I can't call him.
Can I?
I'm locked in an internal debate, trying to rationalize those feelings, when my phone starts ringing, my mom's name popping up before I can press the button to call her. I answer it, bringing the phone to my ear. "Hey, Mom, I was just about to call you."
"Karissa, where have you been? I've been worried!"
"I'm sorry. I, uh … " I went out drinking last night and was drugged and woke up in a strange guy's bed with one hell of a hangover. You know, all those things you worried would happen to me when I moved to NYC, but I told you only happened in the movies. "I dropped my phone yesterday and messed it up. I just got it working again."
That's true, at least.
"I thought something happened to you!"
"I'm fine, Mom," I say. "I just talked to you the day before yesterday … or the one before that. Nothing's going to happen to me."
She lets out a deep sigh. She doesn't argue with my words, but I know they don't reassure her. Switching the subject, I ask her how everything's going in Watertown and how things are working out at the flower shop she opened.
Watertown is where we lived the longest, the place that finally started to feel like home. We moved there from Syracuse right after my sixteenth birthday and she hasn't left yet.
Yet.
She's rambling on and on about how spring's coming and the flowers will soon bloom, and I'm trying to pay attention, but the words are fading away into a fog. The door flings open after a few minutes as I'm humming in acknowledgement to something my mom says, Melody appearing in the doorway. She does a double take when she sees me, her eyes wide. I can see the questions written all over her face and know, in about twenty seconds, an interrogation is coming.
"Mom, I need to go," I say, not wanting to be on the phone when it happens. "I'll call you later, okay?"
"Okay," she says, hesitating like she doesn't want to hang up. "I love you, Karissa."
"Love you, too."
I hang up with my finger still touching the screen when the dam breaks and the questions start flooding out. "What happened to you? Where did you go? Where have you been? Why haven't you called? And why the hell are you still wearing that?"
Rolling my eyes, I sit up. My head is still throbbing, despite the handful of pills I popped when I got to the room. I've had hangovers before, but this is more. This is a fuzziness I can't seem to shake.
"You first," I say. "What happened to you at Timbers?"
"I met a guy. Your turn."
Melody stares at me, awaiting some sort of response as I try to get my thoughts together and decide how much to tell her.
"Same," I respond. "I met a guy, too."
Her eyes widen. "Really? Who?"
"He's nobody," I say, not believing it even as the words leave my lips. That man is indisputably somebody. "So did you leave with the douche in the flight suit or what?"
She eyes me for a moment in silence, as if debating whether to push me for more, but she thankfully shrugs it off. "Yeah. His name's Pat or Pete or something, I can't remember. Maybe it's Parker? We made out and then passed out."