Heartbreaker by Maryse Meijer

himself; he can wait, he has already been so patient.
    Remember this? he says, slipping the ring out of his pocket, putting it on the bar. She stares at it: something flickers in the amethyst heart, the scratched gold band.
    Where did you get that?
    I found it, he says, grinning. He offers it like a piece of candy, in the palm of his hand. It might be a little big now, he says. But you’ll grow into it.
    I don’t want to, she says.
    Why not?
    She keeps her hands clasped beneath the bar. He elbows her gently. Just take it, he says.
    She remembers the box it came in, white velvet, stamped with the name of the jeweler in silver letters.
    But why? she asks. Why should I take it?
    Because it’s yours, because it’s pretty. Why does it matter? Why do you make a big deal out of every little thing?
    I don’t.
    You’re always complaining.
    She is silent.
    Hey, come on. You look beautiful. No one can tell what happened to you. Don’t worry about it.
    She turns back to him, her eyes fresh with tears; his chest clenches to see them. Water. Life.
    It’s not that , she says through gritted teeth. Her cheeks are fuller, rounder. He still can’t believe how young she looks. Is. Was.
    Can we try to have a good time? Please?
    Yes, she says. I’m trying.
    You don’t know what life was like for me before I met you. I know you had it bad, at the end, but you came from a good family at least. Not me.
    I’m sorry about that.
    You could at least thank me.
    She covers her face with her hands. He wonders what she is doing behind them—crying, or getting ready to scream. He looks around the room but no one is watching. He wipes his napkin against the damp bar.
    You can go to the ladies’ room and clean your face, you know, he says. You can get that crud out from under your nails. You can make an effort.
    She gets up from the stool and walks across the empty dance floor to the bathroom without moving her hands from her eyes.
    *   *   *
    When she doesn’t come back after a quarter hour he goes to look for her, his knuckles sorry on the door. Hey, you okay? he calls. No answer. He knocks again. Please, I didn’t mean it, just come out.
    When he opens the door there is no one inside, just a circle of dirt in the wet sink.
    *   *   *
    She walks until the pavement gives way to tall trees and soft earth. This is a different place, not the cemetery, not the side of the other road, where he might go to look for her again. This way is steep; she claws her way upward, her shoes slipping over the leaves, until the lights from the town are dim and she can start to dig.
    She remembers this: the feeling of the dirt beneath her nails, the taste of it tamped hard into her mouth as the soil sucked her dry. There are white things in this earth, pieces of young roots or teeth or bone; she still can’t quite see. Instead she sees him, recalls the naked rage in his face when she threw the ring from the window, the ring he had given her, the ring she did not want. It is on her hand now, because of him, the other one, and she takes it off, throwing it once more into black grass.
    Sitting in the shallow pit, scooping dirt over her legs like a blanket, she watches as the white dress darkens; there is no young man here, she tells herself, no ring, no knife. The dress is gone. If she is lucky, she, too, will disappear.

 
    THE DADDY
    Daddy comes over on Thursdays. My husband and son are out watching movies where people blow each other up. They have burgers afterward and buffalo wings and milkshakes and they talk about TV shows and girls and the latest bloody video game. At least that’s what I imagine they do. No way do they imagine what I am doing, sitting here at the kitchen table doing my math homework as Daddy microwaves the mac and cheese he brought over. We have three hours together and in these three hours I am twelve years old and my daddy is the most wonderful