Corbin blinked. Without a word, he turned and stormed through the door, disappearing down the path without waiting for me.
He didn’t look back.
“Th-thank you for your hospitality,” I whispered, turning away to hurry after him.
“Don’t you ever come back here again,” Corbin’s mother hissed at my back. “Corbin may be lost to us, but I won’t have Tessa and Bianca exposed to the likes of you.”
My dreadlocks slapped against my back as I fled the house. Corbin wasn’t on the sidewalk outside, and panic turned my veins to ice before I spied him at the end of the street.
He sat on the curb, his face in his hands.
I ran to him and placed a hand on his shoulder. Beneath me, his skin heaved. A sob? But Corbin never showed his emotions like this.
After a moment, he lowered his hands.
His face was dry.
“You saw that room, didn’t you?” He didn’t look at me. His voice wasn’t choked up with sadness – it was resigned.
I said nothing. I could never lie to him. He knew the answer to his question.
“It’s not even our real bedroom. At Briarwood, we each had our own room. They only bought that house after…”
I whispered. “I know.”
The words stuck on my tongue.
“They keep it like that – a shrine to the two sons they lost that day. Isn’t that sick? And they didn’t lose me. I’m right here.”
I had so many things I wanted to say, but my tongue wouldn’t form the words. Who was I to give him comfort? I didn’t have a family. I had no right to pass judgement on his.
“We shouldn’t have come,” Corbin kicked a loose stone out into the road. “It was a waste of time. They won’t even talk about magic.”
“You had to try. Besides, you made your sisters happy.”
“Yeah.” Corbin looked up at me then, and the first genuine smile I’d seen in days lit up his face, brightening the dim grey sky. “This must seem ridiculous to you. Tell me the truth – you think we should forgive each other. We should bury everything that happened like we buried Keegan?”
I nodded. I’d told him that a hundred times. He was so lucky to have a family. It seemed so stupid for them to be divided over this. Corbin’s parents left him all alone with his guilt and his grief. How could they not see it? It was written behind his eyes.
“You’re not responsible,” I said, for the millionth time. The words floated away, meaningless and useless, like me.
Corbin shrugged, but the shrug didn’t come across as carefree. Not at all. “We should get going. If we hurry, we’ll just make the next bus. I’ll text Flynn and let him know everyone is on their own for dinner. Maybe Blake will finally get that curry he’s been harping on about.”
That was Corbin, always thinking of others, always being responsible. I know he did it to distract himself, because in the quiet moments – when night fell and the house went to sleep and he had no one to watch over or care about – his own nightmares began.
What I didn’t know was how to help him.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
MAEVE
As soon as Jane and I got back to Briarwood, we went to the library and filled the others in on what happened.
“Why don’t you curse them?” Blake held up a plate piled high with Rowan’s cakes and pastries. He shovels the sweet treats into his mouth with barely a thought to proper mastication. The trail of crumbs across his black shirt indicated he’d already made a sizable dent in the stack. “Make them all grow boils or turn their toenails into beetles. It’ll be a hoot.”
“Brilliant idea, Sherlock. That would convince them I’m not an evil witch.”
“Why does everyone keep calling me Sherlock?” Blake demanded, waving an Eccles cake in the air. “Is it some kind of witch insult?”
