It's tempting to drive off and hit Ryan on the way out of here…but if I did hit him with my car, I'd have to feel all his pain.
With a sigh to brace myself, I crack my window the tiniest bit possible, shuffling uncomfortably when his familiar and now very unwelcome scent curls around me along with the smell of booze.
"I hope you didn't pee somewhere like an angry toddler this time," I grumble. "What are you doing here, Ryan?"
He scowls. "I'm here to talk, since you went and fucking changed your number and—"Hiccup. "—and now I can't get a hold of you. How the hell are we going to fix this if you won't even talk to me?"
Ryan raps loudly against my window again, mad that I won't roll it further down. My inner animal has been silent all day, likeusual, but the threatening tone and anger of my ex makes her go on alert.
Already, she wants to run. Flee the car and take off into the woods.
"We broke up. There's nothing to fix," I tell Ryan firmly, trying not to wince when that earns a wave of suffocating anger from him. "And you shouldn't be driving drunkoranywhere near my house. I don't want to see you anymore, so just?—"
"Do you know how fucking insane that is? You cutting me out of your life, just like that? We've cared about each other foryears,El. I treated you so good, and now you're acting like this? Insane."
"Ryan," I begin, trying to reason through his drunk haze. "You weren't good to me. You?—"
"The hell I wasn't! I mean, look atme, and look atyou." He slaps the glass again to gesture at me. "I'm fighting for a girl who's so fucking insecure, you can't even let anyone see you without makeup. And don't even act like you haveoptions,but you're justso happybeing single. I know you've been holed up for months all alone—"Hiccup."And no shit, because it's not like most guys would even notice someone like you, anyway. So why the hell amIthe one trying so hard here?"
"How delusional is this guy?" Jessica growls. "Has heseenyou? He's lucky you even gave him a second glance, let alone wasted your time dating him! This is why guys should never be allowed to date someone way out of their league. It makes them forget what league they're actually in."
She's trying to help, but Ryan's words and his temper are scraping against my skin, pooling in my stomach, and heating my cheeks until I'm fighting tears.
My body always thinks that being angry is the perfect time to cry.
I call it rage lube.
"Trying? Give me a break. You cheated on me before the Upheaval, so I ended things, and then I found you holed up in my house, fucking around in my bed with yetanotherwoman when I came back eight months ago," I remind him, mad enough to swear for once.
A thin wave of guilt drifts off of Ryan, but the disgust and resentment that comes with it are solely directed at me. I flinch when his fisted hand slams into the glass directly beside my head this time, making my inner animal panic.
Jessica gasps in open-mouthed outrage like she can't believe he just did that.
"I thought you weredead!"Ryan hisses through the crack in my window."What else was I supposed to think? And I told you already, I was just staying at your place after mine got wrecked by some legacy shits. We were going to move in together anyway."
"No, we absolutely weren't. We broke up way before?—"
"And why the fuck are you bringing that chick up? She was no one. She was just taking cover here. Everything was a mess, everyone was only doing whatever they had to do to survive—and where the hell were you anyway, huh? You've never answered that little mystery. You showed up after the Upheaval, all slimmed down and touch-phobic. What's that about? Were you out there cheating on me with some other guy for a whole month? Huh?"
Oh my gods.
Slimmed down? I was literally starving in a Nether dungeon, and it's taken months for my body to get back to its normal, healthy weight.
Andcheating?Where on the gods' green earth does he get the audacity to accuse me of that after everything he put me through?
Not to mention,we were broken up.
"Cheating? Get the fuck out of here with that! You're the cheater here, Douchenozzle!" Jessica fumes, throwing her hands in the air.
There's a lot I could say to Ryan, but in the end, there's no point arguing with a hammered, emotionally stunted jerk like him.
Besides… he's right about one thing.
Although it was dubious and I was locked up in a haze of painful need, Iwaswith someone else when I was imprisoned in the Nether.
A half-demon.
And despite our circumstances, that half-demon treated me better than any past boyfriends ever did.
