Maddie’s dark eyes darted toward where Bria stood, and I followed her gaze when Bria lifted her arms in the air. Patience completely diminished, I slammed Maddie against the nearest tree and fear sprang in her eyes.
“You’re scaring me,” she choked out.
I tilted my head and leaned into her. “What’s the matter? You’ve never been scared of me before.”Truth. Maddie never once withered against me.
“I know you, Ollie. I know when to be scared and when not to, and right now you’re fucking pissed, and I don’t know why.”
“What did you say to Mia?”
Her brows snapped together. “Mia?” confusion spilled out from her lips. She doesn’t get to say her name like that. She doesn’t get to say her name at all. “I haven’t talked to that cow.”
I slammed my palm against the tree, purposely avoiding her head, trying to control the demons inside before they became a permanent fixture inside me. I wanted to ruin her. I wanted her to disappear. Worst of all, I wanted to fade away because I couldn’t live a life without Mia in it. I couldn’t fathom it. “Who did you tell?”
“Does it matter?” She pushed me off her and straightened her shirt. “It’s done, Ollie. You two are done, and that’s not even the funny part.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’m not the one you should be angry with,” Maddie hissed—returning to her normal self. Here she was, the Maddie I’d known well.
At the corner of my eye, Bria took a step forward and laid a hand on my arm. “Come on, let’s go. She’s not worth it.” My nerves reached its limit, officially at capacity. I couldn’t contain it anymore. I didn’t know whether to scream, cry, drive my fist through a tree, or my dick into a pussy. There was only one girl that could make this all go away, and I wasn’t looking at her. “I’ll walk with you back to the building.”
I pulled away from Bria’s grasp and shoved my fists into my pockets. Clenching. Controlling. Containing. “No, I don’t need your fucking pity.” Turning to face Maddie, I fought back the evil wanting to backhand her. “Stay away from Mia, and stay away from me.”
Sitting alone, I watched Mia from afar. I hid under a beanie and a hood, blindly swiveling my fork in whatever was on my tray with my attention on Mia like a vulture. My teeth hurt from constant grinding. With eyes fixed on her, I shoved my hand into my pocket and pulled out a piece of gum before popping it into my mouth.
She couldn’t see me, but I could see her.
Her smile was gone.
She sat, staring at the table before her as the rest of them talked around her like she didn’t matter. She was lost. She needed me.I need you more—so much it fucking hurt. I was a shadow, the dark side. I was once the light casting shadows. Now I didn’t know where this light was coming from that caused me to still … simply exit.
Yes, I do.
That light was the constant reminder of what was waiting for me after this darkness would leave. It pointed above me like a flashlight—the memory of us. Instead of standing in it, with my hand in hers, I was cast to the bottom as a black silhouette. A different shade. The shade of being without.
A place I never wanted to be.
My eyes never left hers as I plotted my next move until it hurt too much. Then I clenched my eyes closed, disconnecting what we had become and imagining what we used to be. Remembering Mia’s touch, her sweet soothing voice, the vibrations of us in the same room, and the way she used to make me feel. I ignored the clinking of my rings against the edge of the table as my finger tapped nervously.
My eyes stung from the inability to shed a single tear since the moment she left me on my knees at my door. My heart was turning cold. I felt it spread to my bones. All the warmth, gone. Tighter, I screwed my eyes together. The clinking increased, the only sound now in my ears.
I couldn’t even imagine her kiss anymore. I couldn’t imagine up a single moment of us together. All I saw was the darkness.
And then I was transported, shifted to a time I never wanted to remember.
It’s cold—too cold. The only warmth is me in this small closet. Though, if I take my hands off my ears to hug myself, I hear the cries. “O,” I whisper through the pitch black. His outline is visible from the light that bleeds through the hole of the door—the hole an angry old man punched through when he heard me cry. So, now I stay silent, as quietas I can.
Oscar’s breathing grows louder as his fingers wrap around his knob when I wish they were around me, keeping me warm. I try to look away, but I can’t. He’s on his knees, eyes watching over my mum. He’s probably making sure she doesn’t get hurt again, but it looks like he’s hurting himself instead, the way his hand is moving angrily up and down his knob. Maybe he has to go potty. He doesn’t need to do that. It just comes out by itself. You just get the feeling.
“Come here,” O whispers, one hand on his knob, the other waving me over. I don’t want to move from this spot though. When I don’t, his hand reaches behind my neck and forces me forward, and pins me against the door. “Mum is getting fucked. Soon you’ll be able to do that. Not to her, because that’s gross, but you’ll be able to fuck girls like areal man.”
My eyes remain shut as I try to pull away, refusing to acknowledge the sin I know is before me. Oscar pinches my neck, the pain cuts through me, causing my eyes to pop open. Mum is leaning over the kitchen counter and I can’t turn away, but my brain begs to turn it off—to makeit stop.
My mum rocks harshly, slamming against the counter as he slams in from behind her, and her head falls back.
No, it didn’t fall.
Heyanked it.
