“So you got a tattoo of a swastika . . .” Bonnie moved to stand in front of him. She was biting on her lip, worrying it between her teeth like it held the answer to her dilemma. “I still don’t understand that. Was that something Fisher was involved in too?”
“No!” Finn shook his head vigorously, not wanting Bonnie to lay that on his brother’s head. “I got that tattoo a month after I arrived at Norfolk. I’d tried to impress some people by showing them what I could do with numbers, with cards. It didn’t go over very well. I got beat up, they marked up my back, and I was sure if I didn’t find a gang, I was going to die just like my brother, and die soon. So I joined up with the only gang who would have me.”
Bonnie’s eyes were wide like she was putting it all together.
“Funny,” Finn said, though it really wasn’t funny at all. “What feels necessary on the Inside makes you a freak on the Outside.”
“The inside?” Bonnie asked.
“Inmates call prison the inside.”
“And the outside is . . .”
“Life. Freedom. Everything beyond the walls. I thought the tattoo was necessary. I thought it was survival. In the end, though, the tattoo didn’t save me. I was saved by numbers. I was attacked, yeah, but I’d made my point, and eventually I had people coming to me, powerful people, and I didn’t need the tattoo after all.”
There was a long silence between them, Bonnie staring wordlessly at him, Finn staring back, wondering if she could really understand. Finn touched his chest and her eyes followed his fingers.
“The tattoo is a reminder that choices made out of desperation are almost always bad choices.” Finn paused, hoping Bonnie was thinking about her choice to climb the bridge. She’d been desperate too, and it had been a bad choice. “I don’t take off my shirt at the beach or in the weight room or when I go for a run or play ball with my friends. And I would never have shown you. It’s there, over my heart, making me look like something I’m not. Pretty hard to get past, I know. But it’s over my heart—not in my heart. And hopefully that makes a difference.”
Bonnie nodded and reached over and placed her left hand over his right one, peeling it off his chest so she could hold it. Finn was so surprised that he let her. It hung between them, and she wrapped both of her smaller hands around it, cradling it.
“I’m sorry about Fisher,” she said sincerely.
Finn snorted in disbelief and pulled his hand away. She grabbed it back and swung on him fiercely, bringing their conjoined hands to her chest, his arm resting between her br**sts, her right hand clinging to his forearm.
“I’m sorry that happened to you, Finn.” She repeated the words with a vehemence that had him snapping back at her.
“Don’t do that, Bonnie! Don’t be one of those girls who thinks I’m something to save! You can’t save me. I can’t save you. I sure as hell didn’t save Fish, and you couldn’t save Minnie, could you?”
Bonnie’s brow was furrowed, resistance written all over her face.
“Could you?” He was being a son-of-a-bitch. But it was the truth, a truth he didn’t think Bonnie had come to terms with.
“No.” Her lips trembled, and she shook her head. “No. I couldn’t. I didn’t.”
Finn swore, an ugly word for all the ugly feelings in his chest, and he tried to pull his hand free. Instead he just pulled her with it.
“But you did save me, Finn.” Her face was tipped up to his, his arm pinned between their chests.
“No, Bonnie. I interrupted you. If you wanna die, you’re gonna die. You know it, and I know it. I just hope you change your mind, because you’re better than that. Fish and Minnie are gone. Maybe we failed them. Hell, I don’t know. But we don’t help them by jumping off bridges.”
“I am?” she asked, still clinging to his hand.
“What?”
“I’m better than that?”
“Yes!” Finn sputtered. “You are!”
She smiled at him then, just a wry twist of her lips and a softening through her eyes. But her tone was wry as she said, “You’re gonna have to make up your mind whether or not you hate me, Clyde.”
“I don’t hate you, Bonnie.” How could he hate her with her lips inches from his and her chocolate eyes so full of compassion? “I just don’t know what the hell to do with you. And now, I’ve got the police looking for me, thinking I’ve kidnapped you.”
“You don’t hate me, but you don’t like me very much.” Bonnie ignored the part about the police looking for him. She was still holding his hand and Finn felt ridiculous and irritated and more than a little turned on with his hand clasped between her br**sts. He tugged again but she held fast.
“I do like you, Bonnie.” Damn it all. He did, too. “But you’ve got to call your gran, your friend Bear, and everyone else who needs to know where the hell you are, and clear this up. Do you understand? Remember what I said about games? This isn’t one. This is my life, my freedom, and I don’t want to go back to prison.”
Bonnie sighed but didn’t respond. She just held tight to his hand for a minute longer and then released it. Together they walked back to the Blazer, climbed in, and without further fanfare, headed down the road.
Finn was tired, and he felt filthy, the result of sleeping in the car all night, wearing the same clothes for two days solid, and brushing his teeth with snow and his middle finger—his way of saying eff-you Mother Nature. They needed to find a hotel and recoup. And Bonnie was going to make those calls if he had to hold her down and dial for her.