His contradictory behavior, his horror when he saw my scars.Back then, I thought the whole situation had been too much forhim, when in truth, there was maybe still some kind of humanity in him.A conscience he’d been successfully ignoring.Once he finally knew what had happened in the west wing last summer, he kept absently glancing at it.
I can’t bear to look as I walk through the hallways.My steps echo in the dark arcades and I don’t know where to go.
My friends are partying in the greenhouse.My parents are living their own lives with their new partners.I’m just as alone as I was in the summer.The only one who left the Ebrington festival early, the only one on our floor in the west wing.Still the only one, and I’m fucking tired of it.
Why me?Why was I the one whose life went up in flames?Who had to give up her swimming, and let her friends go on ahead of her, and—like that wasn’t enough—now even my parents are getting a divorce.I want to rewind time; I want a second chance.I want to stay with my friends, choose fun over self-discipline.I just wanted to do the right thing.
But I did everything wrong.I let Colin Fantino toy with me and pretend to understand me.His betrayal hurts, but it hurts more to feel that I let him take me in.That I was naive and wanted to see the good in him.
I slept in the same bed as him.
I kissed him.
I told him everything and thought he was doing the same for me.
I was wrong.
I’m a million miles from sleep, but I feel overwhelmed when someone knocks on my door.Must be Tori, who’s noticed that I left and wants to talk.But I don’t want to talk.Not to anyone.Ever.
I pull my duvet over my head.There’s another knock.Louder this time.
God, is she nuts?If she keeps on like this, we’ll have Ms.Barnett out here any minute.
I throw off the duvet and stand up.
“Are you ins—” I fling open the door and the rest of the question dies on my lips.
It’s not Tori outside my door.
It’s Colin.
No.No way.
Shut the door, turn away.That’s what I should do.Instead, I make the mistake of looking into his face.
He’s drunk.Really steaming.Worse than earlier, when he could at least stand up.
Now he has to lean on my doorframe, his face pale.
“I didn’t mean to,” he slurs.Too loud.Way too loud.I glance over my shoulder in panic.I want to tell him to piss off before Ms.Barnett hears him.But Colin lurches toward me.I can smell booze.I can see blood dripping from his hand.
Fuck, is he out of his mind?
“Piss off,” I whisper, because I can’t deal with this.
“I truly didn’t mean to, do you understand?”He’s crying—when I see that, all the blood drains from my legs.“I didn’t mean to.It was an accident.I...”
He stumbles, and before I know what I’m doing, I grab his sleeve and tow him into my room.Colin staggers into the wall, and I hastily shut the door.
“It was the Homecoming Ball and I was angry at my parents,we’d had a fight, and I...I was burning myself with my lighter.Some guys walked in, some toilet paper caught on fire, but it was out.D’you hear me?It was out.It was on the floor, and I stomped it out, but it can’t have been out, not really, and I...I didn’t mean to.And I don’t know.I truly don’t know how to live with that, Livy.I truly don’t know.”
Colin’s voice breaks, and it’s like an ice-cold shower down my spine.There’s pure pain in his sobs.He’s so drunk he can hardly stand.I’ve never seen him like this, and I don’t think I can bear it even a minute longer.
I don’t want to hear his explanations because they don’t change the fact that he lied to me and ripped the heart out of my chest.But that’s the same heart that every one of his stupid wisecracks and pathetic jokes has been healing, bit by bit, over these last few weeks.It belongs to him.It will always belong to him, whatever he’s done, and no matter how much I hate that, I can’t deny it while he’s standing here, clearly a broken man.
I realize that, and I shiver.I feel a switch flick inside me, and I make the choice to function.Just for tonight.
I turn around, grab a box of tissues, and say “Stop that” without looking at him.It’s only a wee cut in his palm, but I still don’t want to know how he did it.And while I despise myself for it, I’m glad he’s here.In this state—pissed out of his skull and in total despair.I don’t know whether I regret what I said to him.
