Playing with Fire_Shen

by Shen, L. J.

  Then senior year happened.

  Dad decided to get out of bed on my first day of school. I still remember the morning it happened. He put on his working clothes—The North Face jacket and Blundstone boots—and went down to the farm to see the damage. After months of neglect, nothing was left. He’d let the fruit in the fields die, and whatever animals he had, he’d given away for free.

  Dad went downtown the same day and got himself a fisherman’s job. Grandpa St. Claire was a fisherman, so he didn’t have to learn the ropes, but by God, it must have been fucking humiliating to get a starter job so late in the game, especially for someone who’d been self-employed since he’d graduated from high school to support his small insta-family.

  Mom emerged from her room a few weeks later. She was the first to actually talk to me, and by that time, it had been almost a year since any of them looked me in the eye, much less acknowledged my existence.

  I’d been invisible.

  They didn’t ask me how I felt.

  How I was coping.

  Didn’t feel me.

  Clothe me.

  Ask me how school was going.

  Fuck, they didn’t even know I quit football. I was an invisible ghost, hovering in their way to the kitchen occasionally, and nothing more.

  She sat me down and told me it was not my fault. Said she appreciated how I’d stepped up and paid the bills, and that from now on, things were going to be different.

  But I knew that it was my fault, and that the quicker I got out of my parents’ hair, the better.

  In the weeks leading to my eighteenth birthday, my parents made an effort to talk to me. Mom got on some meds after being diagnosed with major depression. Dad constantly smelled of fish. They were pretending to be okay. I didn’t buy it. They spent almost a year virtually ignoring me. There was simply no way they were over what I’d done. Even if they were—I wasn’t over it.

  On my eighteenth birthday, they bought me a cake.

  I returned from a shift at Chipotle. Walked straight past the cake with the lit candles, up to my room and locked the door.

  I vowed not to celebrate birthdays ever again that day.

  Shortly after my eighteenth birthday, I moved to Sheridan. East insisted on going wherever I was going. I didn’t fight him on this, mostly because I knew I’d be all alone in the world if it wasn’t for him.

  Instead, I chose a D1 college where I knew he’d ride a full scholarship and enjoy his time.

  The fights at the Sheridan Plaza were the start of my parents’ financial recovery, but they weren’t enough. My dream was to make it up to them the best I could. And that meant rebuilding their house from scratch and getting Dad’s business back on its feet.

  But in my quest to find an answer to all of their trouble, I forgot to ask myself where the hell I fit into this equation.

  Forgot how to breathe without hurting.

  Forgot that there was more to life than earning money and surviving.

  Forgot that when you played with fire, eventually, you get burned.

  West

  In the end, it all boiled down to this: I couldn’t have Kade Appleton and his scouts know that Grace was my girlfriend. He had eyes everywhere, and confirming she and I were together was going to put her in the line of fire.

  I couldn’t do that.

  So I did what I had to.

  Dumped my ugly past at her feet.

  Aubrey didn’t die in a car accident.

  She died because of me.

  I’d be lying if I said I didn’t think about Aub the first night I laid eyes on Grace Shaw. That it wasn’t why I took the job at the food truck. Sure, the extra money was helpful, but mainly, I wanted to see what Aub would be like had she survived the fire. What kind of person she’d grow up to be.

  I realized how majorly fucked up that was to look at this chick and see my sister. But that was the thing—I didn’t see Aubrey in Grace. Not at all.

  Grace was Grace. A madly unique person. Sweet-mannered and kind and funny, but also sarcastic and feisty and intelligent. She was gorgeous—scratch that, fucking breathtaking, apart from those scars that didn’t even matter to me—and the more I spent time with her, the more it was impossible to think of her as a replacement to the sister I loved so desperately.

  Texas thought I pitied her. That she was a pet project. And I’d confirmed her darkest suspicions to make sure Kade Appleton and his rats think the same thing.

  But I never pitied her. Not even for one second.

  If anything, I envied her strength. I couldn’t have dealt with half the shit she’s been through and still survive.

  Hell, I still couldn’t talk to my own parents without breaking into goddamn hives.

  Now, the guilt of what I did to her at the cafeteria ate at me alive like the fire that consumed Aubrey.

  “You’re such an idiot.” East shook his head. He was cruising around town, clutching the steering wheel like he was ready to yank and throw it out the window. We’d been doing that for an hour now. I sat next to him in his Toyota Camry, wallowing in the sheer volume of my stupidity.

  “School’s full of rats. Couldn’t chance Appleton finding out about Grace and getting to her.” I fixed my gaze on the view outside the window, reminding myself to fucking breathe.

  “Appleton doesn’t want to hurt your girlfriend, you moron. He wants to hurt you.”

  “He’s hurt women before.”

  “That was his own girlfriend,” East argued.

  “Exactly what makes you think Grace, who is a stranger, is safe when his own goddamn baby momma isn’t? Not to mention, one of his errand boys has warned me that he knows where Grace lives.”

  I referred to the incident at the intersection, where the guy on the Harley commented on Tex.

  “Then why did you say yes to the fight?” East growled.

  “That was before I hooked up with Grace.”

  “Why didn’t you cancel?”

  “He wouldn’t fucking let me!” I boomed. “Were you not there when I gave you the rundown five thousand times?”

  “Why didn’t you tell her the truth?” Easton kept pushing, and that was when I officially lost it.

  “Because she had enough on her fucking plate and didn’t need my shit on top of it!”

  My roar shook the entire car, reverberating between us. I didn’t even tell him the whole truth. The truth I was able to admit only to myself. That I knew Grace would have broken up with me, and that she had the right to know. The right to get rid of my ass before things got ten times more complicated. It wasn’t a noble thing to do, to lie to the person you love, but I’d long realized that love made you do twisted things.

  Easton got back to being annoyingly quiet, and I drew a breath, gluing my gaze back to the monotonous view of yellow ranch-styled houses, the water tower, and cactuses.

  Maybe if things had been different with Aubrey, I wouldn’t be so paranoid about the people I loved. But Aubrey had died, and keeping Grace safe was my top priority, even if it gutted me inside out.

  Even leaving here wouldn’t have changed that. If anything, I’d be leaving her unprotected, in the same zip code with that asshole, Kade Appleton.

  I’d already come to terms with the dreadful fact that I loved her.

  It was the kind of love that made me roll my eyes to oblivion when I saw it in movies and TV. The intensity of it scared the shit out of me, because I never thought I could be this way with someone who wasn’t blood-related to me.

  I couldn’t stop thinking about her.

  Wanting to touch her.

  Wondering what she was thinking, where she was, what she was doing.

  It was different from the fairy tales, because I knew that I could go on without Grace Shaw. It wouldn’t kill me. Not physically, anyway. I’d just go back to being the same miserable jackass I was prior to falling in love with her.

  But I wouldn’t be alive. Not really. I would be wasting oxygen, space, and resources, going back to not-
so-secretly wishing I’d die.

  The realization dawned on me like a cold shower.

  I didn’t want to die when I was with Grace.

  I wanted to live. To laugh. To love.

  To date her and nibble on her neck and listen to her talking about plays and nineties movies and defending fanny packs vehemently.

  I’d been relishing life—actively enjoying it, even—for months, and I didn’t even realize it.

  I didn’t want to die anymore.

  Somewhere along the road, the idea of veering my bike off the road when I picked up speed stopped appealing to me. I no longer imagined what it would feel like to hurl myself off a cliff. I stopped walking into the ring wanting the asshole in front of me to throw a punch that would send me into cardiac arrest.

  And it was all because of Grace ‘Texas’ Shaw.

  “Still don’t understand why you didn’t just tell him the fight wasn’t happening.” East huffed. “How could Appleton force you to fight?”

  “Easily, by playing dirty. As soon as I got it on with Texas, I went to Max and told him I was bailing. Max said he’d try, and from the moment I got the text that Appleton wanted to go ahead and make it happen, I’d been threatened, ambushed at the food truck, and slammed at an intersection on my way home. Kade has eyes on me everywhere. He wants to see me in that ring—and not in one piece.”

  “Fuck.” Easton scratched at his stubble.

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, even if you’re not going to be with Grace—which, by the way, I think is a fine decision, seeing as there’s no chance she is going to take your sorry ass back after the public humiliation you put her through—I still think you should explain yourself. You made your point. Everyone on planet Earth knows you guys are not a couple. Now’s the time to apologize.”

  “I will,” I said with conviction. “I’m going to kiss her fucking feet and bow to her after this is all done. But I can’t contact her right now. I haven’t even visited her the entire week. I need to keep this shit on lock. Slipping now would just confirm everything she said is true. That we are a couple.”

  “You aren’t a couple.”

  He didn’t have to remind me.

  The hole in my heart did the job.

  The week leading to Friday was the worst of my life.

  Well, maybe the second-worst week.

  The week after I’d lost Aubrey, I knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that I would never see my baby sister again in the flesh. She could only taunt me in my dreams. But Grace—she was everywhere. She was on campus. In the cafeteria. In the provisional auditorium. She walked past me—always accompanied by Karlie and her new unlikely ally, Tess.

  It was both comforting and taunting.

  We both acted like the other person didn’t exist.

  I couldn’t make it plainly obvious I was pining after her, even if it killed me.

  Seeing her at work was no longer an option, as my ass got fired after the cafeteria scene. Not even an hour after I broke up with Texas publicly, I received a text message from Mrs. Contreras, advising me that my employment was terminated. She left a check and a formal letter in my mailbox the following day. She didn’t even give me the good luck in the future bullshit. Straight up cut me loose and didn’t look back.

  To make my pathetic-o-meter ding even louder, I found myself driving around her neighborhood often. Each morning and every evening, skipping gym time. It wasn’t like I was capable of thinking about anything beyond her. I even managed to forget sending my parents their weekly stipend.

  I spotted Grace a couple times during my stalking.

  One time, she was coming home from a shift at the food truck. Sensing being watched, she turned around and impaled me with a death glare.

  I pretended not to notice her, and drove off.

  Another time, she threw a goodbye party for Marla. I saw Mrs. Contreras, Karlie, and a few other people through the window. Grace made Marla cupcakes and delivered a pretty neat speech (yeah, I creeped around long enough to listen to most of it).

  Eventually, Marla got out of the house and trudged over to me, spotting me from way across the street. The old lady clutched my arm in her bloated, oily hand and shook it as hard as she could.

  “I heard what you did to Grace, and I’m here to tell ya just because I’m movin’ to Florida don’t mean I won’t be watchin’ her, makin’ sure she’s okay. You better turn around and go back to the hellhole you came from, because if I hear you’re following her, I swear to God I’ll tell Sheriff Jones, and make sure he kicks your butt outta town. And if that don’t work, just remember: shotgun. I ain’t afraid to use it.”

  As dearly as I wanted to see Grace, it was pretty obvious the feeling wasn’t mutual.

  The clock ticked more slowly as Friday approached. I couldn’t wait to get it over with so I could finally talk to Tex, explain myself, and beg for forgiveness. I wasn’t so stupid as to think I’d actually get another chance. All I wanted was for her not to think she was nothing but a fucking Band-Aid.

  East and Reign told me I would be stupid to get in the ring. My mind wasn’t in the game; it was with Grace.

  Even Max said if I knew what was best for me, I’d skip town.

  But I stayed, if only to lay eyes on Tex a few more times before school ended.

  Wearing that little negligee, playing Blanche.

  Thriving as I fell apart.

  Grace

  I got back to working at the food truck two days after the cafeteria incident.

  I couldn’t afford the luxury of taking time off, even if that was exactly what I wanted to do. Luckily, Karlie had taken care of the West situation and had him fired faster than twice-struck lightning.

  On Wednesday, I threw a farewell party for Marla. It was the least she deserved. It was the same day I finally asked her to tell West to get off my case and stay the heck away. I didn’t know what kind of cruel game he was playing. Not only had he put a sword into my heart, breaking it in half for everyone to see, but he’d been driving around my block every day, making sure I was reminded of what I’d lost.

  He did take a step back after Marla gave him the shotgun spiel, but that didn’t stop him from shooting me looks whenever we crossed paths at Sheridan University.

  I didn’t know what he wanted from me. If he didn’t like being my enemy—why did he make me one?

  “The way he looks at you …” Karlie let loose a vindictive grin when we sat at the cafeteria on Thursday, a day before the fight. She tore a packet of hot sauce open and poured it over her basket of Doritos. “How does it feel to have the most unattainable man at Sheridan University at your feet?”

  “Pretty crappy,” I admitted.

  What I didn’t admit was that I had the nagging feeling West wasn’t the only person to watch me.

  That there was more. That I was being followed. I couldn’t pinpoint what made me feel that way exactly, but the lingering feeling of danger hung in the air, bloated and hot. Like someone wished me harm.

  Of course, telling this to Karlie without backing it up with facts was just overdramatic.

  “Well, if you want a silver lining, here’s something to think about—with the way he is staring at you, there’s no doubt who really did the dumping.”

  But West’s misery didn’t comfort me one bit. It only made me hate him more for doing this to us for no reason.

  As if things weren’t reaching an alarming level of weirdness, Tess had begun to hang out with Karlie and me. I didn’t stop it from happening. I was too emotionally exhausted to shoo her away. And she seemed genuine. Like she was back to being the girl I liked before West laid his eyes on me.

  Maybe she was growing up.

  Maybe we were all growing up.

  I knew I certainly was, with the next decision I made.

  “All right, Grams, it’s showtime. You ready?”

  I pushed the Chevy’s door open on Saturday morning. I had to cancel Friday’s rehearsal to spend the evening packing away
all of Grams’ belongings, with the help of Karlie and Marla.

  Everything was last-minute, but when we got the call about the vacancy, we couldn’t waste time.

  Heartland Gardens Nursing Home was situated right outside of Austin. I actually found its brochure in one of the thick stacks West had left on my desk. It was full of glossy pictures of botanical gardens, open spaces, and fun activities, and offered dancing classes and bingo nights. It even had a small church. It was rated one of the best places in the state for people who were suffering from health issues, dementia, and other cognitive disorders.

  In fact, the place specialized in taking care of people with Alzheimer’s. And the real kicker was I never really bothered looking at the stack, but West had not only found me potential nursing homes, he’d also called each of them and gave them a rundown of the situation. There’d been a note attached to the brochure.

  T,

  I did some digging. Called the place, took your insurance card out of Mrs. S’s purse, and ran a check. Your insurance covers most of the cost for this one. If Mrs. S goes through her tests and the results determine she needs assisted living, you’re gold.

  —W.

  Sadly, I knew that the tests would turn back positive. So I gave Heartland Gardens a call. The director answered and we did a virtual tour, after which I drove up to see the place for myself. Grams had been mostly out of it that week, but in the hours she was lucid, she’d asked about West.

  I didn’t have the heart to tell her she was never going to see him again.

  “So. Whaddaya think?” I tried to make myself sound playful, happy, now that Grams and I were in front of her new home. I still couldn’t believe my luck in securing an immediate spot.

  Grams slid out of the passenger seat as I grabbed her suitcases and bags from the bed of the truck, examining the regal, alabaster exterior of the place.

  It looked like a small mansion. Manicured, lush front lawns, a tennis court, a pool, and impeccably tended flowers.