"It is to me."
It was such a sweet thing to say, and at that moment, I almost believed him. "Thanks."
"So tell me," he said. "What was the dream?"
I gave a useless shrug. "Just an old one. I used to have it all the time."
"Tell me," he repeated.
"It's nothing big." I glanced away. "He was chasing me, that's all."
An edge crept into his voice. "Chasing you how?"
I gave another shrug. "You know, the way people chase people sometimes, like in the movies."Yeah. Horror movies.
Still, even as I said it, it struck me as stupidly funny that Flynn truly was in the movies, where he'd chased plenty of people, usually to their doom.
From across the table, he reached out and gripped my arm. "Did he ever hurt you?"
"No."
His grip tightened. "Are you sure?"
I tugged at my arm. "Actually, he didn't quite have the grip you do."
Instantly, Flynn let go. "Shit, Anna, I'm sorry. I didn't realize–"
"I know. But to answer your question, yes, I'm sure. He never touched me, but there were times, I swear, he wanted to. In high school, he kept talking about me 'blossoming' and stuff like that. And get this. One time, I found a nanny cam in my bedroom."
Flynn's expression darkened. "What?"
I tried to laugh. "Yeah. Crazy, huh?"
Across from me, Flynnwasn'tlaughing. "You ever tell your mom?"
"Oh yeah. She thought I was totally paranoid. She said I should feel 'lucky' that he'd taken such an interest in me and Becka."
At this, I felt a surge of that old rage and hopelessness. If Gordon had taken any further interest in Becka, I would've donesomething. I didn't know what, but I did know that I was insanely glad it had been me who'd "blossomed" first.
Flynn was glowering now. "That fucker."
Now I felt like crying all over again. But I didn't want to cry. And besides, there was no reason to, especially now. "It wasn'tthatbad," I said. "I mean, it could've been worse, right?" I tried to laugh. "We could've starved in the hedge-row."
He shook his head. "What?"
"It's just a line from a book, never mind. I'm just saying, some would say I had it lucky."
"And some would say you didn't."
I blinked long and hard. The look of pity in his eyes was almost impossible to bear, especially because back then, Flynn had it way worse than I ever did, even more so after running afoul of my stepdad.
But I didn't dare bring upthatsubject again. It would only drudge up all those hard feelings and make Flynn recall how much he'd always hated me.
Probably on some level, he still did.
Pushing aside that familiar ache, I said, "All right,yourturn."
