A Perfect Mess by Zoe Dawson

intimidate you.”
    “I know. It’s working.”
    “Fuck.”
    “That was two fucks in, like, two seconds. You’re making me nervous.”
    “I’m sorry. It pisses me off. I can bunk here tonight on the couch.”
    She gulped. “Are you sure it’s not too inconvenient?”
    “No, Aubree. It’s not inconvenient. I’m not leaving you when you’re scared. I’ve slept in worse places than on a couch in a fancy house.”
    She nodded. “You should stow your car in the garage. I would hate it if it got vandalized on my property. The code for the door is 77985.”
    “Got it. Be right back.”
    “I’m going to change.”
    God, I hoped it wasn’t into those barely-there shorts. I wasn’t here to seduce Aubree. I was just hanging around so she wouldn’t be scared. Please, please, don’t let her be in those shorts. Or I’d be the one to be seduced.
    When she let me back in, I breathed a sigh of relief. She was in a pair of black stretchy pants with a white stripe down the leg and an oversized gray top with no bra straps in sight. My mouth went dry. Hey, did that mean she didn’t have one on at all. I tried to steer my mind away from that image.
    “I was thinking it would be great to have a fire, but my aunt always built it. Would you mind?”
    “It still gets chilly here in May, and I don’t mind.” We went into the fancy room with the fireplace and I started on the fire while she set up her laptop.
    “We can watch a movie if you’d like. My aunt has wireless. The TV is in another room, but I want to be near the fire.”
    “Sure.” A year ago I would have given a limb to be here next to Aubree. But a year ago I was a broke-ass no-account in this town. I was still a no-account, but no longer broke. I had something to offer her, but I was too much like my father to ever be the kind of man she would want or deserve.
    The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.
    “I think my aunt has some apple pie in the fridge. Want some?”
    Apple? For a second I thought she read my mind. But no. Pie, that’s right. How perfect. “Sure.”
    She disappeared into the kitchen as I got the fire going. I moved to the couch, settling into the cushions, staring at the flames.
    I was ten years old the day my father left. Angry people had come to our tar paper shack to find him, bringing the steely-eyed sheriff with them. My mother had been interrogated, and she had cried. I remembered how her tears had cut through me, and I knew with the anguish of a small child when I learned that my father was never coming back. At the time I hadn’t known he was a con man. It was only later, when I had been “educated” by the town, that I knew what a no-account my father had been. He’d pulled off the biggest con of all, making his family believe he was going to stay and show the town that not all Outlaws were lying, thieving, good-for-nothing bastards.
    The day he disappeared was the first time I had heard that phrase, but it surely wasn’t the last.
    When those men had shown up, I’d run, small and scrawny, barefoot and dirty-faced, running like I’d been the thief they accused my father of being, shame burning in me. Running to escape the dark mark that always seemed to hang over us all. My feet slapping on the worn dirt path, I’d run into the bayou.
    In the swamp I could be anyone, do anything. The possibilities were limitless, no expectations to live up to, no one to judge. I could conquer the water lilies, become king of the bullfrogs, be a pianist, a pirate, a writer, even a hero.
    “Here you go. I put vanilla ice cream on it because I’ve never known a guy to turn down ice cream.”
    “Thanks,” I muttered as I accepted the plate and fork she handed me.
    She hesitated for only a second, then settled next to me on the couch. Not close like I wanted, but that was for the best.
    She tapped through the menu of movies. “ Transformers okay?”
    I nodded. “Sure,” I said.
    “Okay, are you all right? That’s three sures in