Page 91 of Bloom

She lays the magazine on the counter and slides it toward James. “Maybe now you’ll believe me,” she says to him.

James glares at her. “What the hell, Ginny? I told you to stop bringing this shit home!” He takes it and begins heading toward the trash.

“Wait, James,” I say. “I probably need to find out what it says.”

“No, you don’t. It’s just a bunch of lies, Elle.”

“It’s a bunch of lies that color the way the entire world views me. I need to know.”

“You’re the one who needs to read it, James,” says Ginny. “It’s time you knew who you’re dealing with.”

He ignores her. “Do you want me to read it first?” he asks, meeting my eye. He knows I’m petrified. I shake my head mutely. The truth is that if it’s bad enough, I don’t want him to ever read it. I’m worried that if it’s bad enough, he might believe it’s true.

I take it out onto the back deck. Inside, I can hear James’s voice, harsh and angry, directed at Ginny.

The article is titled “‘I Made a Mistake.’” I relax a little. It seems like a promising start.

I’m tense again by the second line. And three paragraphs in I am boiling mad. By the end of the article I’m ready to kill someone. I don’t even have the heart to ask James not to read it. It’s so bad that you’d have to live in a cave not to hear about it eventually.

Edward’s ‘mistake’, apparently, was that he allowed himself to be ‘seduced’. I am no longer a clueless 19-year-old intern in this tale, but a nympho with a thing for older men and power. Apparently I am some combination of Mata Hari, Helen of Troy and the Sirens from “The Odyssey.” No one, it seems, can resist me when I put my mind to it. They’ve even created a nickname for me: “The Teen Temptress”.

And then there are the pictures. In one I’m draped across Ryan’s lap, though his face is blurred out. In another I’m the only female in the middle of a group of frat guys, dressed like the St. Pauli girl, all bosom in the German dress I rented for Halloween. And then there’s one where I’m leaning over and you can see straight down my shirt.

A source ‘close’ to me tells the magazine “she’s always had a thing for older men”, and “what Elle wants, Elle gets.”

I know enough about how the media works to know that any idiot could have given them those quotes. But there are things here that couldn’t have come from just anyone. Things only a few people knew. It mentions the flowers Edward’s sent here and even the notes that came with them. It claims I’ve been caught emerging from “more than one” of my male housemates’ bedrooms this summer. And there’s one quote in particular that destroys me: “There’s nothing she likes more than taking what belongs to someone else.”

It’s nearly verbatim what Ginny said the other night.

I reenter the house. My voice shakes as I face Ginny. “Did you do this?” I ask, holding out the magazine.

Her brows pull together. “Do what?”

“Are you the source, Ginny?” I shout. “Are you the one who told them all this shit? About the flowers? Who said I was hooking up with multiple guys in this house?” James places his hands on my shoulders, as if he thinks I’m going to throw a punch. Maybe I am, come to think of it.

Her face pales. “I didn’t say any of that to the magazine,” she says.

Her answer is too specific.

“Then who did you say it to?”

“I may have said some things to Allison.” I feel James stiffen behind me.

“I knew it,” I say quietly. James’s grip tightens on my shoulders and I shrug him off. “I’m not going to hit her,” I snap. I turn back toward Ginny. “She’s not worth the effort.”

I can’t be around any of them anymore. I grab my keys and go outside. My car is blocked in. I drive straight across the front yard to get out.

**

Three minutes later, James calls. “Where are you?” he asks.

“I’m at the park, by the canal,” I sigh.

I really didn’t make it far. I’m not sure why I even bothered to drive.

He’s there in five minutes, on foot. He sits on the bench beside me, breathing heavily.

“You ran?” I ask.