She moves.
Her knee lifts in a flash, and in a moment, I’m on my knees on the sidewalk, my vision white and my balls on fuckingfireas she takes off.
“Kennedy!” I suck in air and roar her name, but she doesn’t stop. Blinking tears from my eyes, I stagger to my feet as she reaches the bike rack, fumbling with the lock before she pulls her old bicycle out and swings her leg over it. “We’re not fucking done!”
She doesn’t stop as she passes me. But her hand shoots up, giving me a clear indication of her feelings on the matter with her middle finger.
I stumble out into the street, watching her pedal away from me. She’s not fast. I could catch her. But it’s obvious where she’s going. There’s not much up that side of the mountain aside from a few trailers dotted around.
She’s been here the whole time.
We haven’t seen her for months. Heard she’d gone off to college, carrying on with the plans we built together while the rest of us mourned. Another reason to fucking despise her, as if we didn’t have enough already.
She never even tried to explain.
I don’t look away from the small figure disappearing into the distance as I type out a message in our group chat. My nose is full of cherries and chocolate, broken and twisted.
Appropriate, really. As if the poison inside her has made its way out in her scent. But my hands tingle, as if I can still feel her.
Kennedy Traylor.
I hit the send button on the message as my lips twitch upward. Maybe we can finally move forward, if she’ll talk to us. Explain.
I found her.
Kennedy
Iveer the bike off the path, into the trees where I know he won’t be able to see.
I’m not paying attention. My front wheel hits a rock, sending me sprawling. I hit the ground hard, my shoulder landing first, and my choked cry barely makes its way out of my mouth before I’m shoving off my backpack and rolling onto my back as I fight for air around the tight phantom grip on my throat.
Breathe. Fucking breathe, Kennedy.
They’re here. Oscar is here.
Why the fuck is he here?
Tears spill out of my closed eyes as I grip my arm. The fucking pain – enough that I know I’ve bled through my bandages – keeps me from losing my shit completely. I push up the sleeve of my sweater, feeling the wet beneath my fingers. When I hold them up, they’re smeared with black.
I roll again, heaving into the grass, but nothing comes up.
Oscar looked – the same, almost. An almost comforting familiarity in a world where everything else has changed. His hair, that strange silver shade, was still cropped close to hishead. His face was the same. He still towered over me, my head barely reaching his shoulders. But the look in his eyes… he looked at me like I was a monster, and it hurts just as much as the hell going on in my body.
Be real, Kennedy. You knew they’d think that.
Because I let them think that. Let them believe it.
But it hurts so much more than I fucking thought it would.
You owe us an explanation.
I heave again at the thought. One was bad enough. If they’reallhere – Jake, Max, Theo – I don’t know if I’ll be able to face it.
Max and Jake, maybe. I’d considered that possibility, knowing they were staying and not going to college. Hoping to avoid it, but I knew I might bump into them at some point.
But Theo and Oscar should be gone. We were supposed to leave, the four of us. To head off to college, so Theo could study law like he’d always wanted. Business for Brett, to take over from his father. And mathematics for Oscar. He worked so fucking hard for that scholarship—
I’m crying again. My hands slam over my mouth, trying to keep the noise inside.
