4
Sev
I sleep like the dead after the night with Weston.
I’d gone to the Zenith night to fight—reallyfight, after feeling like a caged animal for months in my room. But it didn’t happen, at either of the last two Zenith parties.
Yesterday I got one bitter prize, at least. A trophy I’ll have in my arsenal for the rest of my time at this school.
Weston Knox, giving himself to me. A prize I didn’t know I wanted.
And God, how fucking perfect he was on his knees.
I wake up Sunday morning after the best sleep I’ve had in months. I’m outside in the thaw of spring minutes later, on my way to solidifying the routine I’ve missed so badly while healing from my injury.
I go the gym first.
I work out hard, pushing it to nearly two hours.
I call and check in on Mom, who’s still sorting through the ashes of her latest painful divorce, thefourthmarriage she’s suffered through.
And I remind her of all the shit I already know like it’s tattooed onto my soul instead of my skin:
Relationships are bullshit.
You deserved so much more.
You’re better off alone.
I’m living proof that being alone is better.
And sometimes I’m rewarded in the best ways for it, like on Saturday night, getting an infuriating frat boy eating right out of the palm of my hand.
If only everything were as easy as Weston Knox was.
“Yo,”my cousin Niko says as he swings open the front door to Onyx House the next morning, stepping out onto the street.
“Where’s your boy?” I ask.
“Sleeping in. I had him up late again last night, because he walked in wearing this stupidly fucking hot tight sweater?—”
“I don’t need the details, Niko.”
Niko’s dating one of his society frat brothers, Oliver, and they’ve been attached at the hip and mouth like they’re trying to win an award for public displays of affection.
“Anyway,” Niko says. “How are you?”
“Very good, after this weekend.”
“I assume you did something totally depraved, but you’re not going to give me the details on that?”
“You assume correctly.”
“Got it,” he says. “Not even going to ask.”
Fucked your frat bro’s throat.
But that’s my little secret.
