4. Olive

4

OLIVE

T he petals on the orchid remind me of the deep pink dress my sister made me wear for her wedding.

I hated it. God, I hated it. My hair didn’t match the color, and even if it did, pink is ill-fitting for everything else about me. I asked her to pick something else, something white or black or gray, muted , and I regret it.

Now, years later, I miss that dress. I wish I’d kept it, if only to remind me that I once had a sister who wanted me in her wedding.

I brush the petals with the back of my hand while blocking out the sound of conversation outside my hospital room. It really is a pretty flower.

A knock sounds on the open door before someone enters the room.

“Time to go, honey,” the nurse says in a kind voice. She’s chipper and sweet, and I’m pretty sure she’s the one who paid for this plant. I’ve been pretending it’s from my mother, but she likes to send carnations.

I close my eyes and allow a single tear to slide past my closed lid before I wipe it away and grab the pity plant off the bedside table.

This isn’t the first time I’ve been in a hospital bed, and it certainly isn’t the longest stay. A day is nothing. But this is the first time none of my family have come to visit, so it’s felt the most brutal. The most shameful. Even without heroin being found in my system. Even without me breaking my sobriety.

They hate me. No matter how much time passes, they’ll never forgive me.

The nurse wheels me downstairs where a car is waiting for me, paid for by my father. He can’t visit me when I’m weak, but he’ll still pay for the treatment. He hasn’t abandoned me fully.

On the way to my apartment building, we pass the turnoff for Creeper’s neighborhood, and my teeth clench so hard that I have to look away.

I don’t know what happened last night, but I know he’s responsible for it. My memory is hazy, but I have no trouble remembering all the times that piece of shit manipulated me. All the things he’s done. The lives he’s ruined, including mine.

This is his fault.

A year ago was his fault.

Damian’s death was his fault.

Everything has been his fault.

I hate him. Hate him.

By the time we pull up to my building, I’m seething. I carry the plant inside and speed walk down to my apartment to avoid Alik on the off chance that he’s around. First thing tomorrow, I’m looking for a new apartment.

I fumble with my keys but find the door already unlocked. I’m not surprised. Like I said, I don’t remember much about last night, but it isn’t shocking that in my haste to ruin my life, I didn’t think to protect myself against a home invasion.

Sighing, I throw open the door and step inside, halting when I spot my father seething in my living room.

“Daddy,” I say, dropping my keys to the floor as my eyes water. I hurry to close the door before going to him, my arms stretching.

He holds his hand up to block the hug. “I’m going to ask you this once , Olive. Have you?—”

“There was no heroin in my system.” I shake my head. “No alcohol. No nothing. Call the hospital. They?—”

“Do you think I didn’t already do that?” he snaps, making me flinch. A vein throbs on his forehead as he leans to tower over me, and when I look down, his fists are clenched. He would never hit me. Ever. But he’s angry, and it’s enough to make me cower.

He stomps to the table and jerks up a wine bottle. “What is this?! Do you expect me to believe you’ve been perfect?”

“No, I…” I dart my eyes over the wine bottle while searching through the haze. Where did it come from?

Alik brought it. Alik, my neighbor. Not the man in 3B .

He came over.

He kissed me.

I blacked out.

I woke up in a hospital bed.

They told me I’d been found at a shootout where the police ended up confiscating over a million dollars in drugs.

“It was my neighbor’s,” I finally say, confident. But I took too long to answer. I can tell by the way my dad’s face falls that he knows I was searching for a memory.

“You blacked out.”

My eyes lower to the floor.

When my dad heads for my bathroom, I follow. “What are you doing?”

He doesn’t answer. He throws open my medicine cabinet and snatches my lone bottle of pills before ripping off the cap and dumping the contents into his palm. There are maybe ten left.

“Have you been taking these?” His voice is low. Scary. It weaves tension into the tiny space and punches me in my chest.

“Of course I have.”

“Don’t lie to me,” he growls, turning to face me, his hand shaking with fury.

My eyes narrow. “I’m not lying to you. I would never lie about something like that.”

When he scoffs, it’s worse than if he’d hit me.

I scoff right back to mock him. When he glares at me, my teeth bare. It feels like ages since I’ve been angry at anyone but myself, but right now, I can’t believe him. “I know it’s hard having a fuck-up for a daughter and all, but do you actually think I’m proud of what happened a year ago? Do you think I wanted that? My life is ruined .”

He shakes his head like he’s in disbelief. “When are you going to get it, Olive? It isn’t just your life you’ve ruined. If you knew what you’ve done to your mother, you’d…” He turns his head, his eyes closing like he’s stopping himself from finishing that sentence.

“I’d what?” I fire back, but pain is saturating the anger. I bite my trembling lip and force my chin to stay high, force myself to hear this.

When he looks at me, his eyes soften. He puts the pills back in the bottle then holds out his arms for me, making all my anger dissipate.

I wrap my arms around him and squeeze as tightly as a terrified child would. Because I am terrified. I’m terrified of what I’ve done in my past and what I might’ve done last night. Of the pain it’s caused my family. Most of all, I’m terrified of what I may be capable of in the future.

For me, the heroin isn’t what fucks me up most. And it isn’t what I’m willing to do to get it. It isn’t actually about the drug at all.

It’s about what it does to my medication. Specifically, it keeps it from working.

My father’s chest rumbles, and it takes me a moment to register it as a sob. “It’s gonna be okay,” he murmurs, almost as if he’s trying to convince himself.

I squeeze harder as my heart cracks. “I know, Daddy. I know what I have to do.”

He kisses my head then pulls away, wiping under his eyes as he nods. “I’ll call Dr. Blunderson first thing in the morning.”

“No, I… That’s not what I mean.”

His face seems to freeze over. A moment passes while he stares at me incredulously. “I can’t take this anymore.”

“Daddy…”

“How many times, Olive?” His eyes well with tears. “I’ve been bailing you out since you were twelve years old, and I haven’t had a restful night since. How many times are you going to do this to me?”

Twelve. The time I blacked out at Alexis Alley’s slumber party. I don’t remember a single piece of the night, only the next morning waking up in my bedroom with my mother crying and the police downstairs because the Alleys were pressing charges. Apparently, I tried to drown their cat.

He hasn’t slept since then?

I look down at my feet as blood drains from my face and my palms start to feel clammy.

I’m sorry, Daddy .

I want to say it. The words are heavy on my tongue, but they just sit there like a weight because they’ve been spoken a hundred times before and no longer hold meaning. They’re as burdened as he is.

I have to make this right.

And I do know how. I do. I can .

“I don’t know how many times I’ve done it, but I’m never going to do it again.”

His shoulders deflate with a sigh. If he wasn’t so defeated, I imagine his eyes would roll.

“I won’t . The medicine works, Dad. It worked for two years before I met Damian, remember? And I haven’t had a single blackout this entire year I’ve been sober.”

“Except for last night.”

My mouth hangs open. Part of me wishes there had been drugs in my system so I could explain the blackout.

“Right, but I was stressed. Creeper has been texting me, and it’s been making things really hard, and?—”

“Please, no more excuses.” My dad holds up his hand.

“I’m not trying to make excuses; I’m trying to take action. The drugs are obviously not the whole problem. It’s the people too.”

“Take action?” He squints, looking to my side like he’s thinking. “What are you talking about?”

A lump of shame unwedges from my spine to allow me to stand tall. “Something I should’ve done a long time ago. I’m turning Creeper in.”

I brace for relief. For pride. For dimmed love to brighten in my father’s eyes, so when instead I see skepticism, it takes me back a step.

“Turning him in for what?”

My mouth opens and closes as I curl my toes inside my sneakers. “He’s a drug dealer.”

“He’s your drug dealer. Is that how you’ll tell the police you know what he does?” His mocking tone makes my face heat.

“He isn’t my dealer anymore, and it wouldn’t matter anyway. I could leave an anonymous tip. Jesus, Dad, you’re the head of the DEA.”

“Which is how I know you aren’t thinking straight. The only reason anyone would put that thug in a room is to make a deal to get someone higher profile. And what happens if he knows you narced on him? Do you think he’ll keep your secrets to himself?”

“He doesn’t know my secrets.”

“You don’t know that.”

“Yes, I do,” I say, my voice growing louder.

I thought he would be proud. I can’t believe he’s fighting me on this.

Flexing my fingers, I force my shoulders to lower. “Creeper and Damian were friends. If he knew what happened, I would be dead.”

“You mean they were in the same gang. Not friends.”

“ Brotherhood ,” I correct, although I don’t know why I feel the need to defend them. I think because while most men in the brotherhood were undeniably despicable, I always admired the bond they shared. The loyalty. With everything I lost, it made me want to be a part of it. I was desperate to be a part of it.

And now, ironically, I’m desperate to break it apart.

“You’re not turning that man in, Olive. You’re staying away from him.”

My eyes widen. “Excuse me?”

He’s the head of the DEA. The DEA . Why is he discouraging this?

My dad runs a hand over his head like he’s exhausted from having to explain such complex things to me. He’d rather I just blindly obey. Wave my flimsy restraining order in Creeper’s face the next time he decides to fuck up my life instead of take any real action.

“That brotherhood is affiliated with the Irish mob.”

I throw my hands up. “All the more reason to turn them in. There are your higher profile people right there.”

“No, there’s your death warrant. That’s what they do to witnesses. Would you like to see pictures? I have an endless supply I could show you at the office.”

A gust of air rushes past my lips as my hands find my sides. “Is this what you tell all the witnesses who come to you?”

“No, this is what I tell my daughter.”

“I’m not a coward.”

“Then you must be an idiot .”

I stumble backward like he physically slapped me, all my bravado draining from my veins. He doesn’t seem to register the hurt on my face because not an ounce of anger leaves his as he stands there admonishing me.

I stare at the floor.

After a minute, a sigh rushes from his lungs. “I’m calling Dr. Blunderson in the morning. I’ll text you the time of your appointment. If you don’t show up?—”

“I know,” I whisper before he can finish the threat.

No more money.

No more help.

And really… No more love.

Another minute goes by while I imagine him trying to think of what to say. He must give up because, without another word, he turns for the door and leaves me alone.

I want to consider what he said. The whole time I plug my dead phone in and wait for it to boot up, I try to convince myself that he knows best.

But when I find the text message from Creeper I knew would be there, the one I must’ve seen when I was blacked out, his words lose their merit.

This is Creeper’s fault. It was his fault last time, and it’ll be his fault the next time unless I change things. My dad was right about one thing… It isn’t just my life I ruin with my actions, so it isn’t just me I’m protecting by getting rid of him.

I know where he deals. Who he deals to. Where he gets his supply. Where he lives. I know everything .

I don’t need to take the stand in a courtroom to put him away.

All I need is a video camera and an anonymous tip.