For the forty-five-minute drive, I take solace in his presence, his silence so much less painful than the hours spent by myself. About halfway through, his fingers trace patterns on my arm, and I relax even further.
We’re getting close to campus when his voice cuts through my near collapse against him. “Stop for coffee,” he demands.
Smith laughs, spinning toward us. “The prisoner has demands?”
“I might be on the shit-list right now, Smith, but I’m still a Westerhouse. Be careful with your words.”
Falk glances in the rearview mirror, taking in the way Trips holds me, the way I’ve melted into him, and something sparks in his expression. Then we’re in a drive through, and for the first time in what feels like forever, I’m gifted a coffee of my choice.
A murmur of contentment escapes me, and Trips pauses his soothing stroke on my arm. “Good?” he asks.
“Yeah. Not as good as serious painkillers, but still good enough to pretend I’m not channeling my inner blueberry.”
He huffs out a surprised laugh, and once again, I’m reminded of what I’m fighting for. It’s for him to laugh without censure. To find his voice. To not have to fight so fucking hard to just exist without strictures, without expectations that leave him defeated in my shower at four in the morning, the blood of an innocent man stuck under his fingernails.
He deserves that life. And if, after I wrest it from his father’s greedy hands, he still wants me in that life? Pain, different from the kind I’ve been carrying since the early hours of Tuesday, aches in my chest.
Because, for the first time, I realize Tripsdoesn’thave to choose me. I might have decided he’s mine, but once we survive this, once we finish our act and pretend so hard that we get a piece of paper saying we belong to each other, he’s under no obligation to keep me.
He cares. I know that.
But what I’m asking for—for him to join my band of boys, like I’m some sort of criminal testosterone-hoarder that wants to add him to my collection—it’s too much to assume.
We never discussed what happens after—once we’re all free to choose.
I don’t like not knowing.
I want him to choose me.
I’m early for class, so I take a seat on the edge of the room, hopeful my guard is less noticeable if I’m not front and center. But today, I’m well enough to notice the looks from other students, the questions they want to ask but won’t.
A few minutes before class, someone dares to take the seat next to me. A vaguely familiar face smiles, one that I know I’ve seen but can’t quite place. “Clara, right?” he asks, holding out a hand.
I shake it, but quickly let go, the way Smith shifts behind me warning me away from anything more. Not that I’d do anything. I can’t even figure out who this guy is.
“Jonah,” he adds, seeing my confusion. “We had business law together last fall with Trips.”
It clicks—one of the finance bros who I thought was Trips’ friend. You know, back when I thought Trips had friends outside of the house, when in truth he only has classmates, marks, and us. “Right,” I say. “Nice to see a familiar face.”
“I know, right? I knew I shouldn’t have saved a low-level class for my last semester, but who wants to take marketing? It’s like they’re trying to ruin the patterns I’ve got up here.” He taps the side of his head, and I manage half of a smile, playing along.
“Well, we can survive together,” I say as the professor comes in, bringing the class to order.
Once the lecture is done and Jonah rushes off to his next class, I’m left with an angry Smith at my shoulder and across the way, an exhausted-looking Walker.
Thank God.
“I have to go to the bathroom,” I announce, knowing he’s going to be pissy about it. Sure enough, he follows me into the singlestall bathroom like last time, but turns his back to me without a fight. I’m wearing high-end sweatpants that barely touch my skin today, and I quickly realize that was a mistake. It feels vulnerable to push them down with Smith in the room. But I do it, because I don’t have another option.
Scanning the ceiling tiles, I wait for a glimpse of Jansen, but he doesn’t appear. After longer than I should probably wait, I do what I said I was there to do, disgust and anxiety warring inside my bruised body. Should I not have let Jansen know what was going on with me? Should I have hidden it?
I was hardly walking on Tuesday. It still hurts to walk, enough that I’ve been sleeping twelve hours a night, only waking up to take more pain meds. But with no other way to communicate, I felt stuck.
Why the hell did I work on my stupid handwritten code when I should have been learning sign language?
Leaving the bathroom, I inch across the atrium, keeping an eye on Walker. He shakes his head once, like that means something.
It doesn’t. At least, not anything I can parse out. The need to be reckless spikes, and I know next week, if I don’t find out what’s going on, I’m taking the risk. I can’t today, not when I don’t trust myself to not vomit or collapse from the jostling in my insides.
