He had no right talking about Bryn like that.
Before I could get to the stairs, his arm was hooked around my waist, pulling me back against the wall. I slammed into the cement behind me, my backpack grasped tightly in my hand. Pain shot through my back, but quickly went away.
“You’re a bitch,” he snarled at me. “You can’t take hearing about your sister like you didn’t know who she really was. Yet here you are pretending to be her.”
“That’s not true!”
“Isn’t it?” he questioned, looking down my body. “I don’t seem to recall you dressing like that in high school. You always wore the baggiest shit. I’m surprised anybody even noticed you. You were ugly. You were undesirable. But your sister? She was hot. She was popular. She knew how to party, how to get guys. She was everything you weren’t. And here you are years later in her image.”
My hands clenched into fists again. “Shut. Up.”
“You don’t want to admit that I’m right.”
“You’re sick.”
“If you really want to be like her then we might as well hook up right here,” he told me, his lips tipping into a grin. “She spent a lot of energy trying to get me. She was close too.”
I went to drive him in the nuts again with my knee but he stopped me, grabbing my knee with his hand. His fingertips dug into the skin, making me flinch.
“I hate you. You have no idea how much I hate you with every fiber in my body,” I told him, smacking his hand away from my knee. “You think you’re better than everybody else. You think that your daddy can help you get out of any situation. But you’re wrong. You will always be a no good son of a bitch murderer. You’re filthy, and you will amount to nothing.”
He lifted his hand up like he was going to strike me. He growled, “Little, bitch—”
Before he could hit me though, he was thrown away from me and into the wall across the hall. My breath was uneven and I didn’t realize I was shaking until Ezra was pulling me into his arms.
“Are you okay?” he asked into my ear, rubbing my back and trying to calm me down.
“No,” I croaked. “I want to leave.”
He nodded and brushed my hair back.
I was caught off guard when I heard Jayce laughing like some loony bin.
“What the hell is so funny?” I demanded, looking over Ezra’s shoulder at him.
He was laughing so hard tears started rolling down his cheeks. “This day just keeps getting better and better,” he mused.
Before I could ask what he meant, Ezra was towing me away toward the stairs. When we made it outside the cool air did nothing to my already numb skin. I felt like ice inside—just frozen and dead.
We were inside Ezra’s truck before I knew it.
“You need to tell me what that was about.”
I slowly looked over at him. “Need to?”
He was pissed. Livid even. His hands were white-knuckle around the steering wheel, and I could tell they were shaking. He muttered something under his breath that I didn’t hear, but based on how expression it was probably curse words.
“Please tell me what happened.”
I shook my head. “It’s n-not important.”
“Not important?” he blasted, making me flinch in my seat. “Jesus, Ashley. He looked like he was about to fucking hit you. Hit you! Did he lay his hands on you before I got there?”
I closed my eyes.
“I am going away for a very long time, because I am going to murder that bastard.”
I let out a small breath. “Can we p-please go home?”
“Not until you tell me how you know him.”
Why did he want to know so badly?
“Ezra…”
“He obviously knew you, Ashley. Tell me.”
“He k-knew my s-sister.”
I had never been such a mess before, but I felt it in my soul. I was unravelling just like I was when Bryn died. I was flustered, clenching onto little sanity, and feeling like I was going to dissolve into a puddle of nothing right there in his truck.
Everything inside me ached.
“How did he know her?” he asked, his voice softer than before.
I shook my head. “P-please. It hurts.”
Ezra put his arm around my shoulder and drew me into him so I was tucked into his side. He kissed my temple and whispered into my ear that it was going to be okay.
That’s where I cried. I used him like a human tissue. If he still wanted to be near me after that, it was going to be a miracle.
For ten minutes I broke down, ugly crying and snotting into his jacket. It was raw. But it was my reality, and to be honest it felt good. It felt good to let it out after years of trying to keep it together. I hadn’t cried like this since we got back from the hospital knowing Bryn would never come back.
My breathing was becoming stable again, less choppy and uneven, as he rubbed my back. He brushed my hair out of my face where it was sticking from the tears, and kissed my temple again.
“Better?”
I just nodded and pulled back, trying to use my hair as a shield so he couldn’t see my puffy eyes or pale face. I probably looked like a mess. A total train wreck. Although if he could handle hearing the sobs that escaped me, then he could probably handle what I looked like after a meltdown.
“Look at me, Ashley.”
I sniffed, wiped my sleeve across my face, and did as he said.
“I’m sorry I freaked out,” he apologized.
I laughed dryly. “You shouldn’t be the one who is apologizing to me. The things he said to me…” I shook my head. “It was like he was tainting her, Ezra. It was like he was baiting me to lash out. And it worked.”
“Were he and your sister involved?”
I shrugged and leaned my head back against the headrest. “According to him they were, but she never said anything to me about it. What she would even see in that thing is beyond me.”
He chuckled.
“Ezra?”
He looked at me.
“Why do you think he was laughing when you pulled me away?”
His lips twitched. “I don’t know,” he murmured, looking away. “Seemed like a total head case.”
“You have no idea,” I muttered.
He started up his truck then and turned the heat on.
“I really hate him,” I told him, closing my eyes and letting the warm air dry my face. “I hate everything about him. Even his stupid, stuck up family. They act like they’re so much better than everybody else.”
He coughed, causing me to look at him. He asked, “You know his family then?”
“Kind of. We grew up in the same town.”
He pressed his lips together and nodded.
“Why?”
“No reason,” he answered, putting his truck in reverse. “It just seemed like you knew them since you aren’t pleased with his family.”
I rolled my eyes. “I’ve had many encounters with his father,” I told him dryly.
Ezra’s eyes widened.
I wanted to punch something just thinking about them. “He’s a total asshat. I mean this dude justifies everything that Jayce does. It’s absolutely disgusting. Jayce has always been such a…player. Like he knows that he can do whatever he wants because daddy will get him out of trouble. And as far as I’m concerned, his mother is no different. Not that I know her much.”
I only really saw her that night…
“It doesn’t matter,” I sighed. “His family is scum. He’s scum. Anybody who can trash a dead person like that’s okay is just…”
I had no words.
Hate filled my mouth like bitterness. If I could spit the flavor out I would, but it would be a flavor that I knew too well for the rest of my life.
Ezra stayed silent the entire way back to the apartment building, not that it was a far drive. It was odd though, considering he was all about comforting me before. Saying little things to make me feel better. Now it was like something shifted between us
.
It was totally the meltdown.
Ugly snot crying was so not sexy, so I couldn’t blame the guy.
I looked at him when he shut his truck off. “I’m sorry, Ezra. If you think I’m a total nutcase then I understand. I just get so irritated thinking about things, and when it comes to my sister…”
“Why are you apologizing?” he asked.
I bit my lip, my hand stilling on the door handle.
“You got kind of distant, and I thought maybe it was because you saw me differently. I don’t usually have breakdowns like that. I swear, I’m not a bad person. I just feel this hatred toward certain people, and if you only knew how justified it is—”
“Hey,” he said, cutting me off. His hand went to cup my jaw. “I don’t see you differently. You lost someone and that asshole had the balls to bring her up. That was disrespectful. You had every right to get upset with him.”
I looked at him with soft eyes. “So I didn’t scare you away?”
“Babe, you’re stuck with me.”
I laughed a little. “I’m kind of glad.”
He lifted a brow. “Kind of?”
I rolled my eyes. “Okay, I’m really glad. Ever since I met you it’s like I’m starting to be happy again. You’re showing me what it’s like to embrace the past instead of forgetting it. I don’t like thinking about my sister much, but with you it just happens. And it doesn’t hurt as bad, because I’m remembering the good times with her.”
He leaned in and brushed his soft lips against mine.
“That makes me happy to hear, babe,” he whispered, brushing his lips a little harder against mine. It didn’t last long. “That makes me really happy.”
He leaned his forehead against mine.
“You make me feel again, Ezra.”
He made a sound that I couldn’t describe.
“You just…” I shook my head. “I’ve been numb for a long time, not letting myself get close to people because it didn’t seem right. Not when my sister couldn’t live her life and be happy and feel the way that I feel when I’m around you. It scares me.”
“Oh, Ashley.”
He kissed me, not too hard but not too soft. His mouth was claiming me, saying I was his. Saying that he knew the feeling—that he was living the exact same way, feeling the exact same things.
The way he bit my lip, twirled my tongue with his, the way his hands moved around my body, it drove me insane. It was like my entire body responded to him like it was meant to my whole life—like he was some sort of key that I needed to unlock whatever it was that I was trying so hard to keep hidden.
He was going to be the end of me.
Or maybe he was going to be the beginning…
I decided not to let my parents know about the encounter I had with Jayce. Mostly because my father would probably freak out and come hunt Jayce down. Not that the idea of Jayce being hunted like the trash he was wasn’t welcoming, but I knew dad could get into serious trouble.
Jayce wasn’t worth it, and that was hard to admit.
After years of building up so much anger against him, it was tiring. I was tired. Exhausted, even. Not only had I spent so much time hating his guts, but I spent so much time trying to hold back from doing the things that would make me happy. All because of him. All because of what he’d done.
And the asshole had been right, which scarred me. Maybe I hadn’t consciously decided to take on the role of my sister years ago, but it had grown on me. She deserved to live.
What I didn’t want to believe was that she was interested in Jayce. Usually, it wouldn’t shock me that a girl would be out chasing him. But not my sister. Not my own flesh and blood. And if what he said was true, then he was probably already half drunk when she up and left the party, and if she hadn’t left, she may have never been hit.
By him.
God, she was killed by the guy she was supposedly into, and he felt nothing. No regret. No mortification. No sorrow. If anybody was an empty shell, it was Jayce Mitchell. Not me.
The whole situation sent me into a frenzy. If she had stayed at that party, it would be because Jayce gave her the attention and not some random girl. If she had stayed, she would have slept with him. I hated the thought, it made my skin crawl. But would she still be dead if she had stayed?
Bryn was known for partying. Mom and dad hated it, they told her to pull herself together. But she didn’t listen. Bryn was the rebel of the family, the girl that didn’t care what anybody said to her or thought of her. She was so confident, so sure of herself, that she just lived her life like she was on cloud nine all the time.
All the partying, the drinking, the guys. Yeah, that was her. My own little sister, while I was at home trying to study for my next big exam. We would fight about how much she went out, how much she drank. Once, I had to pick her up because her friends called me saying she was so drunk they were afraid she had alcohol poisoning. I was terrified for her the minute I saw what kind of state she was in.
Since then, she made sure not to drink as much, but it never stopped her from drinking completely.
It made me think of the last time I spoke to her.
“You’re not mom,” she pointed out. “I can do whatever the hell I want. Just because you want to live a boring ass life, doesn’t mean I have to.”
“You almost died last time.”
“I didn’t even need to go to the hospital,” she argued. “You’re being melodramatic.”
“Please, Bryn. Can’t we stay in and watch a movie together? You don’t have to go to every party that’s being thrown. And even if you did, you don’t have to drink. It’s not good for you.”
She rolled her hazel green eyes while she applied a layer of pink lipstick. “Don’t be stupid, Ash. I get that you want to live your life a certain way. Get good grades, get a good job, live a long, boring life in a white picket fence housed property. But that’s not me. I have no intention of sitting from 9-5 behind a desk, wondering what all is out there. I’m going to have fun. I’m going to live in the moment. Kiss guys that are cute. Sleep with them if they’re hot. Who cares? We only live once.”
“But—”
“I’m going.
“Will you just wait?”
“No!” she snapped, heading toward her bedroom door. “I’m done waiting. You should stop waiting around too. You don’t live, Ashley. You go by the books, follow every rule. Have you even been to a party? Aren’t you supposed to be the fun one breaking rules and making mistakes for me to learn from?”
I huffed. “We both know that you wouldn’t learn from them even if I made mistakes.”
She opened her door. “You got a point there, bitch.”
I rolled my eyes. “I just want to hang out with you. And not when you’re so inebriated that you’re not yourself. We used to have fun together just binging on shows and food.”
She slipped on her leather jacket. “That was when we were younger. Just go back to campus and do whatever it is you do. And I’ll be here, living it up for the both of us. I suggest you soak up the college life while you can, Ash. I’m sure those years will fly by before you know it.”
She shifted the blue dress she wore, one dad would totally have a heart attack over if he saw her in it, and slipped on her black heels. She bought them for her sixteenth birthday. They were four inches, thin heeled, and made her look way too mature for her age.
“Fine,” I muttered, standing up. “I’ll go back to my dorm. But just don’t do anything stupid, Bryn. I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you.”
She rolled her eyes. “You’re being melodramatic again. Nothing is going to happen to me, Ash. Just leave, and we’ll talk tomorrow. I’ll fill you in on all the details of my night.”
I didn’t want her to, but I agreed.
I gave her a hug before I left. “Love you, B.”
“Love you, A.”
12
I didn’t want it to be true, but it was.
The outfit that Jayce descr
ibed is the exact one that Bryn wore the last time I spoke to her. A blue dress and black heels. Personally, she looked like a prostitute, but that seemed to be her M.O. That meant that Jayce was actually telling the truth, and that Bryn probably was trying to hook up with him that night.
She had wanted to tell me the details of her night, and she never wanted to do that before. She knew I hated the stuff she did, which meant that she had been planning to get with Jayce for a while. What did she think I’d be? Proud of her? Jayce was a year older than me, and even though that made him only three years older than her, it was sick. She even knew how much I resented him.
Or, at least, I thought she did.
Before I knew it, I was knocking on Ezra’s door.
He opened it after the first three knocks, giving me a warm smile until he saw my expression. I walked in, pushing back the tears that I knew wanted to spill from my eyes. I was not going to let Jayce get to me. Not again.
“He was telling the truth,” I told him bitterly.
Ezra came over to me where I stood in the middle of his living room. “What’s wrong?”
“I remember. He told me exactly what she was wearing that night, and I remembered just now that the last time I spoke with her she was wearing that outfit.”
He looked at me in confusion. “I’m not following.”
“She wanted him, Ezra. She wanted that monster.”
The thought made me feel dirty.
He nodded in understanding. “People tend to like a certain image. She must have liked the image that he was giving her.”
I gagged. “It’s just…ugh. She could do so much better than him, Ezra. She could get any guy she wanted. She was that beautiful, that confident. But instead she chose him. She set her eyes on him, and it ended badly.”
“Badly?” he repeated.
I ran my hands down my face. “The things that I keep hidden are things that make the bad version of myself come out. I don’t want that version to come out around you. Around anyone. Believe me, it’s not pretty.”
Before he could say anything, there was a knock at the front door. He gave me a sympathetic look and walked toward the peephole to see who it was. He opened it, clearly knowing the visitor.
A Hard Place to Breathe Page 13