Keep From Falling (Markson Grove Series Book 1)

by Amy Vanessa Miller

  “I know what I have with Skylar is real. I love her.”

  “You said it yourself, what you feel with Evan is chemical. That’s not love, that’s attraction.”

  “But I think it could be if given the chance,” I reply defensively, grasping at straws.

  “Is that what you want?”

  “I don’t want to lose Skylar.”

  “I know,” he says simply. He takes my hand into his and squeezes it tight. “But if you keep seeing Evan, you’re going to lose her. I know you know that.”

  I nod. I know that he’s right and I hate it.

  Skylar

  I lie on the floor of Bree’s bedroom next to the pieces of glass scattered all over her pink carpet. I’ve been thinking about taking a piece and pulling its jagged edges across my skin for nearly an hour now. I still haven’t yet, but even in my hesitation I know it’s only a matter of time before I do.

  I reach for the largest shard and flip it around between my fingers for a minute as I try to decide what part of my body I want to cut. I know I have to avoid the recent cuts I’ve made on my arms and on my torso that haven’t healed yet, so I decide to make tonight’s cuts on my upper thigh.

  I pull up my black, cotton skirt and begin cutting from my knee up to my pelvis. The glass cuts deep and the blood seeps out quickly. I lie back down on the carpet listening to my frantic heartbeat begin to slow, as I imagine the blood that was once trapped inside of me, now becoming free to escape the poison that is my body.

  Gradually, I begin to calm down and I feel like I can think straight. The darkness has seeped away from me yet again, but I know it will be back. It always comes back.

  I lower my skirt overtop the now aching cut to help the blood clot more quickly and stop it from dripping down onto Bree’s carpet. For the first time since I’d gotten together with Bree, I’m actually considering returning to The Misfit Mansion for a hit of ecstasy. The sadness inside of me has become more than I can bear. Not even cutting is soothing it anymore.

  I look around the room for my phone so I can text Spencer about going to the mansion with me, but the phone is on Bree’s bed and not close enough for me to reach without getting up off of the floor.

  Bree opens her bedroom door tentatively, and I sit up making sure my skirt is still covering the cut on my thigh. Once I know that it is, I grab the bloody shard and throw it under her bed.

  “I wasn’t sure you’d still be here,” she says quietly, closing the door behind her.

  Her eyes notice the pile of broken glass next to me and she instantly looks me over for cuts. When she doesn’t see anything visible she rushes over to me and pulls up my sleeves.

  I pull my arm back angrily and she apologizes, “Sorry.”

  I shrug, beginning to pick up the pieces of glass. She gets on her knees to help.

  “You didn’t have to make a scene in front of his friends,” she says finally with a sigh. She just had to make this about him.

  “He doesn’t care that you’re with me. He didn’t respect that fact at all. I saw the way he kissed you. How he put his hands all over you.”

  “He likes me, Skylar.”

  “I love you!”

  “I know you do. You think this is easy for me? It’s not. I don’t want to hurt him, ok. He’s a good person.”

  She thinks he’s a good person. Yeah, because he really looked like a good person when he was nearly doing her on top of his car! I can’t believe the words I am hearing.

  “He’s a guy who wants to fuck. Just because he’s fancying it up with a date doesn’t make it any less of what it is,” I return coolly.

  She looks surprised by my response, probably because it’s referring to what she thinks happened on my date with Parker. I can tell she’s fumbling with her reply, trying to decide if she should acknowledge the reference or not. I know it’s wrong of me to use this as my argument, since what she knows of that night, and what actually happened are two very different things, but I’m angry and it seems like the right card to play at the moment.

  “Not every guy is Parker Michelson,” she whispers, leaning into me and resting her hand on my arm. “I know he hurt you Sky, but they aren’t all like him.”

  This statement rubs me the wrong way for some reason, making me feel irritated. “How would you know? You’ve known Evan for two fucking minutes, you don’t know anything about him!”

  She doesn’t reply right away and I wish I could read her mind. What is she thinking? My heart is aching and I have no control in the outcome. I hate it! No matter how much I try to fight this from happening, it’s all in Bree’s hands.

  “You’re right,” she says finally, leaning in further and wrapping her arms around me in an embrace I reluctantly accept. “Can we just go back to the beginning, please? Like he never kissed me and you never told me to get to know him better? I just want to start over and pretend it all didn’t happen.”

  “I wish it were that easy,” I hear myself say, even though I don’t understand why I’m saying it. All I’ve wanted since this whole thing began was for everything to go back to the way it was. What the hell am I thinking, replying like that? She wants to start over. We should be starting over.

  She starts to kiss my neck softly and I fight the urge to reciprocate. Is this all it takes to make everything better? Could this be all it takes to get my girlfriend back? Just Forgive and forget.

  “I can’t,” I mumble, pulling away from her embrace.

  “Please,” she begs.

  “Will you stop seeing him?” I ask. “Can you tell him that it was all a mistake and walk away?”

  She lowers her head onto my shoulder all the while still holding me tightly. Her head lies there for minutes and she doesn’t say a word. I don’t know what I should say next because I’m suddenly filled with a deep sense of dread. She can’t walk away from him. She’s made up her mind and she’s going to keep seeing him and let me go.

  “I love you, you know,” she says finally, breaking the silence between us. She lifts her head off of my shoulder in order to look me in the eye. “You mean more to me than two minutes with him.”

  She softly kisses me on the lips.

  I close my eyes taking in every second of the kiss, almost sure that it’s all in my head, and I will be opening my eyes to reality at any moment. I feel my entire body tremble as her tongue moves deeper into my mouth, calming my insecurities with her soft and smooth caress.

  She gently lowers me on my back and although I don’t resist, I don’t reciprocate the advances either. I know the minute that I do, we are back to the beginning, starting over like nothing’s happened, and I’m not sure if we should be.

  I want her so much that my body begins to ache from head to toe, but I refuse to let her know it. She starts to kiss my neck, sucking lightly in some spots, purposely leaving little marks for me to discover in the morning. I want to explode. I let out a small moan in spite of myself and run my hands through her messy blond locks, finally giving into her sexual prowess.

  And that’s all that is needed. She’s forgiven, and all is forgotten.

  The next morning, while making breakfast, I allow myself to feel happy about last night’s turn of events. Bree was confused and I lost her there for a second, but now that she’s made her choice I finally feel like I can breathe once again.

  I love her, and I know that the secrets I keep from her make it seem as though that isn’t true, but I don’t tell her who I am because I love her so much. I couldn’t bear it if she knew the real me and left me stranded because of it.

  She lives in a different world than I do. A world I have spent most of my life pretending I am a part of, but I’ve always known that I’m not. I don’t belong in Bree’s world. Her life has no drug-addicted guardians, no alcoholics, no abuse, and no poverty. She is blessed and sheltered and I would never forgive myself if I pulled her into this world where she would be devoured by the darkness that is my life. It consumed me ages ago, but I’ll be damned if I let
it consume her too. She can’t know these dark pieces of me. At least not right now. She deserves better than that.

  When I finish making my bacon and eggs, I take the plate out to the patio with me so I can watch the sun rise as I am eating. The cool morning air is chilly on my bare arms so I reach back into the kitchen for my pink hoodie, lying on top of the counter. Once I have it on and zipped up, I take a seat in my usual patio chair and put my feet up on the little plastic table in front of me.

  I can tell by how bright the sky is already that the sun is about to break through the horizon any minute. I smile. Watching the sunrise is always the best part of my day.

  I gobble up my breakfast and put the plate down on the floor beside my chair when I finish. I’m about to light myself a cigarette when I hear my name being hissed from the ground below. I get up and cautiously look over the balcony.

  It’s Parker.

  “I just need ten minutes,” he says before I have a chance to yell at him for being here. He’s only wearing a white t-shirt and jeans despite the morning chill, and his too-long, blond locks seem to be messier than usual. I don’t think he’s gone to bed yet tonight.

  “Go home, Parker.”

  “Let me tell you what I need to say and then I will leave you alone for good. I promise.”

  For the first time since that night happened, I want to hear him out, and that surprises me. I want to lay all of these issues out on the table once and for all because I’m tired of being scared of everything I don’t know about him. “Fine,” I say. “Come up. Top floor.”

  I don’t wait for his reply. Instead, I go back inside the apartment and across the kitchen to the door. When the elevator beeps and he walks into the hallway my stomach begins to feel uneasy. Why am I doing this? What has he done to prove to me that he can be trusted? Nothing’s changed, he still scares the hell out of me.

  “Hi,” he says, visibly nervous, and it catches me off guard. I had every intention of being angry with him, but seeing him this way reminds me of how he was with me at the mansion.

  “Hi,” I return, motioning for him to follow me into the apartment and toward my room. “Take your boots off at the door and come on,” I say, attempting to keep my tone straightforward. I turn to look at him and for a moment my heart skips a beat. He’s making me nervous, but is it out of fear or is it something else? I’m suddenly not so sure if this was a good idea.

  He looks uncertain about going into my room with me, but takes his boots off anyway and follows me inside.

  I close the door and take a seat on the bed. “Ten minutes,” I say.

  “Ok,” he begins, looking around my room curiously. He’s never been in my room before and I can tell by his behavior that he didn’t expect to actually get a chance to talk to me, let alone be standing in here. “The night I met you at the mansion was a turning point for me. I liked you. I really liked you. You know that.”

  I nod. I do know that. We had a connection with each other from the start. I felt it as much as he did, and I had tried to deny it for months.

  “I made a mistake by not telling you who I really was before we got involved. It wasn’t fair to you and I know that now. You should have known the real me so you could have made the choice to stay away before what happened that night. Not a day goes by that I don’t feel sick about what happened and it’s all on me. All of it.”

  I bite down on my lower lip, pushing away the memory of that night. I’m not ready to go there. Not yet.

  He notices my uneasiness, begins toward me, hesitates, and then stops altogether. He continues talking instead. “I know why you’re scared of me. But I need you to know that I did what I did because I care about you. What happened to you was my fault and I deserved to lose you because of it, I know that. But you need to know that what we had, it was real. I still—”

  “Don’t,” I say, needing to stop him before he says what it is I know he wants to say.

  He cuts me off, “let me finish, please. I have it all in my head and I need to get it out.” He’s frustrated. He’s finally getting a chance to say what he’s always wanted to say and he’ll be damned if I don’t let him finish.

  I nod, “all right.”

  “I deal drugs,” he says and pauses, waiting for my reaction. But it isn’t much of a surprise. I had managed to figure that much out by everything that happened that night.

  “Yeah, I figured that,” I reply bitterly.

  “I work for a very powerful man. And when I joined The Misfit Mansion and met you, that was me trying to get away from him. But it was stupid, I thought if I stayed away long enough he’d just forget about me. You got stuck in the middle of all of it…and I’m so sorry. My life is scary and dangerous. I was wrong to pretend that it wasn’t.”

  “I could have died that night,” I say, attempting to hold back an angry gush of tears.

  He nods. He’s not trying to make any excuses for what happened. He’s taking full responsibility. “You were lucky you didn’t. We both were.”

  “Why are you telling me all of this now? It’s done. So long gone.”

  He shakes his head. “You know that it’s not. It took me over a year to get you to even talk to me. I scare you. Bree thinks I hurt you… She won’t let me anywhere near you.”

  “She thinks you raped me,” I tell him quietly.

  His eyes blink a few times before narrowing. “Did you tell her that?” he asks, pain radiating from his voice.

  I shake my head. “She assumed it and I didn’t say any differently. I couldn’t tell her about the guys with guns, watching you get beat up, and then getting beat up myself… almost being raped…and you…” my voice trails off.

  Parker flinches, making me aware that the memory of that night still haunts him as well.

  “I told her nothing. I just let her think what she wanted.”

  “Well, no wonder she’s so pissed at me. She thinks I’m a fucking monster,” he murmurs, completely dejected.

  “She hates you,” I say, but immediately feel bad about it. The words are too harsh, even for him.

  “What about Spencer? Does he know?

  “Spencer knows the truth, well some of it, but I don’t think he trusts you,” I say, and I can tell that this bothers him as well, but he brushes it off quickly.

  “Can I sit?” he asks, pointing beside me on the bed.

  I look to the empty spot beside me uncertainly.

  “Skylar,” he whispers, sadness etched all over his face. “I’m still me.”

  I take in a deep, unsteady breath. “Ok,” I say finally.

  He sits beside me and cautiously angles his body in my direction, waiting for my reaction. When I don’t move away, he continues on with what he wants to say. “I know that telling you all of this doesn’t change anything. You don’t trust me, you’re with Bree now, and I fucked up everything that you and I had. I get that. But I can’t stand you being petrified of me the way that you have been. I saved you that night. That has to count for something.”

  “This life of yours scares the shit out of me,” I confess, and he gazes at me sympathetically. His electric blue eyes burn into mine and I’m momentarily reminded of just how much I was addicted to him while we were together.

  “It scares the shit out of me too,” he tells me honestly.

  “Do you still work for this man?”

  He nods, not taking his eyes off of mine. I can see the pain and fear he’s feeling; the fear that I know he never lets anyone else see. I lower my eyes trying to avoid the intensity of his stare, which has always had a profound effect on my emotions in the past.

  We sit in an uncomfortable silence as I allow myself to think about that night for a moment, and everything he did to protect me. All this time I’ve been petrified of the world he lives in and I’ve pushed him away because of it. He did everything he could so that the darkness in his life didn’t consume me, but I stupidly punished him for it. I did to him what I’m scared that Bree will do to me.

  �
��I’m sorry,” I say, breaking the silence. I lift my gaze to his. “You did save me that night. I’ve always known that. I was just too scared to let myself believe it.”

  He reaches to touch my face, his eyes glimmering with hope, but I move away gently and shake my head. “I can’t,” I say, taking his hand into mine. “I’m with Bree now. I love her.”

  He pulls his hand away quickly and clenches it closed as if he’s trying to resist physical pain. “Yeah, sorry,” he mumbles.

  “It can’t be like it was with us before. I forgive you, but I can’t be yours anymore. I’m not telling Bree the truth about us or that night.”

  He stares at me in disbelief. “I’m not a monster.”

  “I can’t tell her. It’s too late now. I let it go too long.”

  “You have to tell her,” he insists. I think I hear panic in his voice when he says it, but I can’t be sure.

  I take in an unsteady breath, trying to keep my composure. “I…” the sound of someone walking through the apartment door, cuts me off. I jump up from the bed in a panic.

  “Cecelia?” I call out, hoping it’s only my aunt and not Bree. This couldn’t be explained to Bree. She would never understand.

  “What?” Cecelia grumbles, irritation oozing from her voice.

  I let out a sigh of relief before hastily turning to Parker. “Go out the window,” I hiss.

  He looks at me like I’m crazy. “I’m not going out an eight story window! Besides, my boots are in the kitchen, she already knows I’m here.”

  Fuck. He’s right.

  “Who do you have in your room, Skylar?” Cecelia asks suspiciously, knocking the door loudly with Parker’s boots and then dropping them to the floor. I see the boots hit the floor under the crack of the door with a loud thud just before she pushes it open.

  Parker nudges himself away from the bed as she enters the room.