Total pages in book: 99
Estimated words: 109903 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 550(@200wpm)___ 440(@250wpm)___ 366(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 109903 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 550(@200wpm)___ 440(@250wpm)___ 366(@300wpm)
Neil had no idea how the conversation had gone from murder to Renee. He ran over the last couple seconds of their conversation in his head, then gave up and asked, "What? I thought you didn't like her."
Nicky bolted upright like Neil struck him. "Who doesn't like Renee?"
Neil almost volunteered himself as a prime example, but he didn't want to derail the conversation further. He amended his words to, "No one likes how friendly she is with Andrew."
"Not to throw my own cousin under the bus, but everyone knows he's not good enough for her. In a perfect world Renee would settle down with a nice Christian boy who'd invest in her charity projects and love her half to death. In this world she's got her eyes set on Andrew. I'd intervene for her sake but I'm getting desperate. Andrew needs something to distract him from all of his issues."
Neil thought about his conversation with Kevin a few weeks ago. "What about Exy?"
"Now you sound like Kevin." Nicky rubbed at his temples like he was warding off a headache. "Exy isn't an option here, okay? You can love Exy all you want, but it's never gonna love you back."
Neil should let it go, but the challenge was out before he could stop it. "So?"
"Oh my God." Nicky looked torn between horror and pity. "Seriously? That might be the saddest thing I've ever heard."
Neil should have just kept his mouth shut. "I need to study."
"Don't you dare." Nicky snatched his math pamphlet off the desk and dropped it on the ground by his chair. "Listen up. There's obsession and there's dysfunction. You can't make Exy your end-all be-all. This won't last forever, okay? You'll shine bright, then you'll retire, and then what? You gonna spend the rest of your life at home alone with all your trophies?"
"Leave it," Neil said.
Maybe Nicky heard the quiet warning in Neil's voice, because he gentled his tone. "You can't be just this, Neil. This isn't enough to live for. I could take you down to Columbia sometime, just the two of us, and have Roland introduce you around. He's got a lot of great friends. At this point I won't even care if it's a girl so long as you—"
"Why don't you like girls?"
Nicky looked startled by the interruption, but he rallied quickly and made a face. "They're so soft."
Neil thought about Renee's bruised knuckles, Dan's fierce spirit, and Allison holding her ground on the court a week after Seth's death. He thought about his mother standing unflinching in the face of his father's violent anger and her ruthlessly leaving bodies in their wake. He felt compelled to say, "Some of the strongest people I've known are women."
"What? Oh, no," Nicky hurried to say. "I mean literally soft. Too many curves, see? I feel like my hands would slide right off. It's totally not my thing. I like…" He drew a box with his fingers as he searched for words. "Erik. Erik's perfect. He's a total outdoors junkie, rock climbing and hiking and mountain biking, all that awful bug-infested fresh-air stuff. But oh my god, you should see what it does to his body. He's like this, all hard edges." He drew another box. "He's stronger than I am, and I like that. I feel like I could lean on him all day and he wouldn't break a sweat."
Nicky's smile was slow and pleased as he thought about his long-distance boyfriend. It was a more reserved expression than Neil usually saw on his face. It made Neil wonder if Nicky was naturally loud or if he exaggerated his outgoing nature to balance his unfriendly cousins.
"Funny," Nicky said. "That didn't used to be my type. None of the others I crushed on growing up were anything like that. Maybe that's why none of them could help me."
Nicky turned his hands palm-up on the table and considered them. "My parents are kind of crazy, you know? There's religious and there's super psychotic religious. Me and Renee, we're the decent sort, I think. We go to different churches and have some different ideas, but we respect each other anyway. We understand that religion is just an interpretation of faith. But my parents are the black-and-white crazy kind. It's only right and wrong with them: hellfire and damnation and judgment from on high.
"For some reason I tried coming out to them anyway," Nicky said. "Mom was pretty upset. She locked herself in the bedroom and cried and prayed for days. Dad took a more direct route and shipped me off to Christian gay camp. I spent a year learning that I was infected by a disgusting idea from the devil, that I was a living test for every other good Christian on the planet. They tried using God to shame me into being straight.
"It didn't work," Nicky said. "For a while I wished it did. I went home feeling like an abomination and a failure. I couldn't face my parents like that, so I lied. I pretended to be straight for the rest of high school. I even dated a couple girls. I kissed a couple of them, but I used my faith as an excuse never to get further than first base. I knew I just had to keep it together until graduation.
"I hated my life so much," Nicky said. "I couldn't do that, you know? I couldn't live a lie like that day after day. I felt trapped. Some days I thought God abandoned me; sometimes I thought I failed Him. Halfway through my junior year I started thinking about suicide. Then my German teacher took me aside and told me about a study abroad program. She would set it all up for me, she said, if my parents would sign off on it. She'd handle admissions and get a host family and everything. It'd be expensive, but she thought I needed a change in scenery. Guess she knew I was that close to the edge.
"I didn't think Mom and Dad would go for it, but they were so proud of me for my so-called recovery they agreed to let me go my senior year. I just had to last another semester and then I could go. I was so desperate to get out of there I didn't even really pay attention when Aaron and Aunt Tilda moved to Columbia that spring. All I cared about was keeping it together until May. I know now I should have tried harder, but I would've been no good to him how I was.