by Angel Lawson
I fall in stride with Reyn, arms brushing. I look up and find him looking down at me. He’s been really quiet tonight. Well, he’s usually pretty quiet. But right now, everything is loud and happy, and why shouldn’t we be, too?
I slip my hand into his, heedless of the people around us. His steps falter briefly, but he quickly recovers, sending me a curious glance as he squeezes my hand.
I notice when his eyes jump in Emory’s direction. “Everyone here already knows. What can it hurt?”
We stop when the group does, all of them huddling around Sebastian’s muscle car. I spot the car’s owner and Carlton leaning against the hood, both sweaty and dirty. They look like they’ve been having the time of their life. A strip of toilet paper clings to Carlton’s shoe.
Reyn reaches up to brush one of my curls from my temple. “You should leave first.”
I watch him, head tilting. “Why?”
His jaw twitches. “I just don’t want you around for what comes next.”
“What comes next?”
He looks toward Emory again, but instead of answering, he gives me a tight smile. “Apparently, there are plans.”
Before I can ask what that means, Carlton yells out, “Yo, Reyn!” and waves him over, hands flapping around.
Reyn lets out this little laugh before touching my chin. “Just trust me, okay?”
I let his hand go slowly, reluctantly, our fingertips dragging until the hold breaks. All of our phones shake with notifications. Caroline takes hers out first and we all tumble like dominoes. It’s too hard to resist, looking at our success; video after video, photo after photo. The whole thing is documented. I feel a slight weight off my shoulders. The resurgence of the Devils is out there, and I didn’t need to publish anything to accomplish it.
“Oh, fuck,” Afton mutters to herself. I look up and see her share her phone with Elana. Elana’s eyes dart to Reyn, then to me, her lips parted in surprise. My phone buzzes in my hand and I look down. It’s Sydney’s profile. The first picture I see is of Reyn, dressed in his suit, his bowtie perfectly straight. It’s dark, but light enough to tell the Devil’s Tower is right behind him.
The second one is a picture of Reyn and Sydney, leaned in close. His neck is bent down and she’s straining up. It’s not the greatest photo—a little blurry, kind of dark. But there’s absolutely no mistaking what their mouths are doing.
It’s tagged: #gotmarked #stairwaytohell
I stare at it for so long that it has to be burned straight into my retinas. I know the second I look away from it without finding any clue it’s a fake, this brittle thing currently invading my chest will shatter.
There are no clues.
Slowly, I look up. All the girls are silently staring back, and the looks on their faces—full of stricken pity for me—tells me they all know. They’re not stupid. I’m stupid.
Fuck, I’m so, so stupid.
I completely lose my breath to whatever’s happening inside my chest, the crash and crumble of it. Too full of hurt to cave in, and too empty to expand, I remain suspended in the ugliness of it. It’s violent and excruciating and unutterably real, and for a long moment, I don’t know what to do. I just stand there with this atomic bomb going off in my lungs. Unmoving, unblinking.
Somehow, I lock eyes with Sebastian, who’s been watching me. He instantly slides off his hood, spine going straight. “What’s wrong?”
Reyn whips around when he hears it, those green eyes examining me.
It takes me so long to speak that the rest of the guys are turning us, too. Worried. Curious. When I find it, my voice sounds frail and unfamiliar. “Take me home,” I ask Sebastian. “Please.”
He pushes off the car. “Why?”
“Hey, what’s going on?” Reyn asks, reaching out to me as I pass. I flinch away, feel wan and weak-kneed.
Refusing to turn around, I wrap my arm around my stomach, right over the scar, like I could hold my guts in if I just applied enough pressure. “Bass, I need to go home.”
His eyes dart behind me, obviously at Reyn. With casual ease, he turns and opens the passenger door of his car. “Sure. Hop in.”
I’m halfway in the car when I hear, “The fuck is going on?”
“I don’t know.” Sebastian sounds just as confused as Reyn. “Guess I’m driving her home.”
Reyn leans into the open door, brow furrowed with worry. “Come on, talk to me.”
I can’t. The words are caught like dust in my throat. With a shaky hand, I hold up my phone.
Sebastian lets out a low, “Shit.”
The silence from Reyn is deafening.
I don’t look at him, because if I do, I’ll break. “It was her perfume, wasn’t it.” My voice emerges like gravel. “The plans you have tonight are with her.”
His voice comes out in an urgent rush. “Vandy, listen to me. That fucking picture isn’t what it looks like.”
“How is this not what it looks like? You’re kissing her.” I refuse to cry. “It’s not even the first time, is it?”
“What?” I’ll give him this, the guy’s got acting chops. He actually manages to sound confused. “No fucking way. I’ve never kissed her before!”
“Just this time then?” My tone, dripping in sarcasm, comes out stronger than I feel. “Are you telling me you didn’t drive her home? Go in her hot tub?”
“Yeah, I drove her home. You knew that. She needed a ride, but—” He keeps leaning in closer and closer. “I never fucking went into her hot tub!”
Like an idiot, I do it.
I look at him.
Just like I knew would happen, my eyes instantly start swimming. “You promised me.”
“I did,” he says, and his voice is a stark contrast to my own. Where mine is weak, his is strong, pushed forward by the anger I see sparking in his eyes. “And if you’d take a second and actually listen to me, you’d see that I never fucking broke it. This is her, V. You fucking know it is.”
“Okay, that’s it,” Sebastian says, stepping between the car and Reyn. His demeanor shifts, instantly turning intimidating. “You need to chill out and stop cursing at her.”
I swallow against the rising tide of bile in the back of my throat. “I thought this was Sydney being Sydney, just making shit up. But look,” I shove the phone at him again. “That’s you. Kissing her. Tonight. Right before you kissed me.”
“Because that’s how she wanted it to look!”
Movement shifts behind Reyn and I see Emory coming our way. His expression is steeled in anger, hands balled into tight fists.
“Sebastian,” I say, turning away. “Please. Please get me out of here.”
“You’ve got it.” He slams the passenger door and I press down the lock. Reyn is caught between trying to get to me and the barreling force of my brother. Emory told him not to mess with me, and in this moment, I understand why. Reynolds McAllister can’t be trusted. All he does is take and steal. But most of all he hurts.
Sebastian hops in the front seat, cranking the engine before his door is even shut.
I shut my eyes, but not before Emory takes the first swing.
The Ford’s engine revs, blocking out any noise, and the hot tears I’d been holding in finally run down my cheeks. I don’t look back as we drive away.
The drive is tense, quiet but for the sounds of my hitching breaths and embarrassed sniffles. He drives carefully, which I know is on purpose. If I weren’t so full of this suffocating agony, I might actually be able to appreciate it. As it stands, I’m trying my hardest to gather it all up inside myself until I get home. My abdomen trembles with the weight of it.
When he gets to my driveway, he eases the car to a stop. “I’m really sorry, V. I thought he was doing you right.”
It takes me a handful of swallows before I can speak with an even voice. “Yeah, well, I guess people don’t really change.”
“I won’t argue with that. Once a bastard, always a bastard.” He sighs, pressing his head back into the seat. “B
ut—”
I swipe at my cheeks before looking over at him. “What?”
“But remember, Syd is the master of game-play, and it really does seem like she wants to hurt you.” He taps his temple. “She’s a lot more conniving than you think.”
“He was kissing her, Bass,” I argue. “I don’t think Sydney tricked his lips to fall on hers.”
He doesn’t have a reply to that.
After asking me ten times if he should walk me in, he finally relents and leaves, engine bouncing off the neighboring houses as he goes. My feet carry me unsteadily toward my house, where Firefly meets me on the front walk. He weaves around my ankles with a soft meow. Mechanically, I bend, gathering him up in my arms, holding his soft body against mine. The night is quiet and has a chill. The dry fall leaves rattle in a passing gust of wind that should feel cold on my skin, but it barely penetrates.
I spent the last three years alone, lost. Maybe I’ve always been alone and lost. Maybe these last few weeks have been some tepid anomaly, and now the universe is making sure I know my place. But now that I know what it’s like to be part of something—to love and feel loved—the loss is that much sharper. I carry the cat into the house, sneaking past my parents and up to my room.
It’s not like I make a choice. I already know what I’m going to do before I do it. I think maybe I knew as soon as my eyes set on that photo. Hell, I’ve wanted to do it for weeks already, and only one thing held me back.
The routine settles over me like an old friend, toxic with its tainted comfort. Like the old days, I lock my door first. I lock the window next—no reason to bother with that anymore. I turn off all the lights but the one by my bed. I yank off the dress, tossing it on the floor, and change into something as worn and ugly as I feel. What’s the point of dressing like a princess if you have no prince?
With a pounding heart, the lick of anticipation creeping up my spine, I go around my room, pulling out all my stashes. The baggie tucked in the toe of a sock in my top drawer. The handful hidden inside an aspirin bottle. The six I keep in an envelope taped to the underside of my desk. Pill after pill, hidden in boxes, drawers, pencil pouches, jewelry compartments. I gather them all until I have the full stash. All of them piled on my bed.
Grabbing the bottle of water next to my bed, I pop the first pill onto my tongue and swallow.
36
Reyn
In the end, I do let Emory kick my ass.
But only kind of.
“I love her.”
The words come out in a gasp. I’m hunched over my knees, blood dripping onto the ground below. Emory groans a few feet away, still clutching his stomach. I’d punched him—hard. But just to get him off of me.
“Fuck off,” Em wheezes, grimacing. He keeps his distance, and I’m grateful. Not saying I couldn’t go another round, but my arms are tired and my lungs are screaming, and we’re not actually getting anywhere.
“I’m serious.” My head is buzzing and pounding. “I love her. I—” I turn to spit in the grass. “Maybe I always did, I don’t know.”
He looks up at me with one eye, the other already swelling shut. The Devils left. Apparently, none of them were willing to be witness to the two of us pummeling one another. Aubrey stayed the longest, begging us to stop, but even she knew there was no stopping this confrontation. It’s about four long years in the making.
As I stand here, nursing my wounds, it’s almost a relief to have it done. There’s an ominous, angry rumble of thunder rolling in the distance, and the air feels charged with the coming storm.
“Goddamn it, Reyn, she doesn’t need your bullshit!” he says, teeth clenched. “She deserves better than you.”
I slump down against a car. I’m not sure whose it is, but it’s sturdy against my back when I slide down, settling against its driver’s side door. “I know,” I agree, raising my face toward the cloudy night sky. “She deserves better. But she deserves what she wants, even more than that.”
“How convenient,” he sneers, but when he goes to stand, he wobbles, landing hard on the ground against another car. He looks briefly surprised by it, face eventually puckering into a glower. “Vandy doesn’t know what she wants.”
I shake my head. “You’re wrong, Em. She knows, just as much as any of us do.”
He volleys back, “And if you love her so fucking much, then what the hell with Sydney? I mean, are you fucking kidding me? This is exactly what I was talking about, you’re already screwing around with—”
“That’s bullshit!” It almost makes me want to start the fighting again. Almost. “I’m not my dad, okay? You know me better than this!”
“I know there’s a picture!”
I bark a humorless laugh that gets stuck in my throat. The picture. That fucking picture. How do I explain that? Sydney was right. She really had shown me a bitter bitch. “She jumped me on the way to the gym. She was pissed off and drunk, saying all kinds of crap about V. I jumped to her defense, and it just pissed her off more. That kiss lasted a fraction of a second before I shoved her away. There must have been someone else there taking video.” I push back my hair, sweaty on my forehead, waiting for the inevitable disbelief. When Emory just sits there, blinking at me through one eye, I wave a hand. “Go on. Tell me how full of shit I am.”
Emory takes an inhale that looks painful and releases it in a loud, booming laugh. He doubles over, wheezing, and I’m completely flummoxed as I watch. He raises his head to speak, but it dies off into more of that annoying, wheezed laughter.
I scowl at him. “What’s so funny, exactly?”
Still laughing, he points a finger at me. “You,” he manages to eke out.
I roll my eyes. “Great.”
Eventually, he leans back against the car, wiping his eye. He’s still panting, but he sucks in a big breath and says, simply, “I believe you.”
I eye him warily. “You do?”
“Completely.” He lifts a shoulder. “That’s a classic Syd maneuver.”
“Well, I’m glad it could amuse you,” I sneer. “Because I’m fucked.”
“Oh, you’re absolutely fucked.” He nods. “Totally fucked. Colossally fucked. They don’t even make words yet for how fucked you are. Because like I’ve been fucking saying,” his voice roughens to a tight growl, all mirth gone from his face, “V is naïve! She doesn’t have experience, Reyn. She doesn’t know when she’s being yanked around yet.”
“I wonder why!” I gesture widely. “You and your parents never let her do anything! Maybe if you’d loosened the fucking reins a little, she’d know by now what an asshole really looks like! But then she wouldn’t need you, would she? Her big bad brother, always standing between her and anything even remotely exciting.”
“It’s not like that.” His smile is back, but it’s sharper now. Meaner. “You think I enjoy this? You think it’s fun staying up all night worrying about her? You think I like the fact my stomach lining is getting eaten away by all this fucking stress? Sure, it’s a real party, puking my guts out when she gets into a car with someone else. It’s a blast seeing my mom drop everything when V has the tiniest problem, but never even fucking asking me why I can’t keep dinner down. Seriously, you think I like this?” He gestures to the space between us. “You think I like beating the shit out of my best friend, even though I can’t even blame him?” He lifts a shoulder in a belligerent shrug. “Because I can’t. The two people I love most in this world love each other. It’s the only thing that’s made sense to me in years.”
I look at him, my jaw gone slack. “Then why—!”
“Because that’s not how this works!” he yells, voice cracking. “You don’t get to do what we did, and then just act like we fucking deserve to be anything more.” He swipes a knuckle under his nose, head shaking. “Nah, dude. You and me? We made our bed.”
“Emory…” I rub my eyes, not unaware of the irony of what I’m about to say. “Vandy doesn’t blame you, and even if she did, she would have forgiven you ages ago.
Fuck, she’s already forgiven me.”
He peers at me through a slitted eye. “When?”
“That night she fell asleep at my house.”
Emory scoffs derisively. “You had no right to ask for that.”
“I didn’t ask.” I shrug. “You need to forgive yourself, you can’t just—you can’t just keep living your life like it’s a goddamn prison sentence. It’s not what she wants, and the more you do it…” I sigh, head feeling heavy. “You’re driving her away, Em.”
He rests his elbows on his raised knees, picking at his bruised knuckle. “It’s not that simple.”
“Don’t I fucking know it.” Sensing an ‘in’, I carefully choose my words. “When I got here, Vandy was lonely and isolated, and I get how this all looks. But I was all of those things, too.” I make sure he’s looking me in the eye when I promise, “I never took advantage of her. In fact, she’s the one who kissed me first. I’ve let her take the lead for every step of this. That stupid fucking destructive protectiveness you feel toward her? You think I don’t feel that way, too? Because I do. You have to know that, Em.”
“You knew it was wrong,” he says, voice rough. “That’s why you kept it a secret. You knew, Reyn.”
“It doesn’t feel wrong.” My head thumps against the car. “I just knew you’d never listen and—I’m not special here, Em. You would have kicked anyone’s ass. Don’t pretend I’m wrong. No one could ever be good enough.”
He takes in a long, bloody sniff, and doesn’t argue.
“But no one would treat her as good as me, Em. No one.”
After a long pause, he mutters, “Yeah,” and looks away, eyes tight. “I know.”
“Then why,” and I hate the frustrated pleading in my voice, “why can’t you trust me with this?”
He’s quiet for a long beat. So long that I begin to wonder if he’s even heard me. “Sky’s about to open up,” he finally says, slowly and awkwardly pushing himself to his feet. “I need a hot shower, an ice pack, and a blunt.”
My shoulders fall in defeat. “Right.”