No.
Please stay.
Please don’t leave me.
“Yes,” I whisper.
He stares at me, unblinking, not saying a word before diverting his eyes over the top of me, then he simply drops his arm around my shoulder and squeezes me again before turning around.
He doesn’t believe me.
Caleb and I follow him to the front door, and when he opens it, catching the weight on his back, he pauses, spinning back around.
His eyes roam over my face, and I already know what he’s looking at without him even voicing it.
Keaton clears his throat and says exactly what I knew he would. “That bruise… Blainey, are you sure you–”
I feel my eyeballs flicker, a tiny tremor of fear reaching past my façade. “Yes.” I swallow, lying through my teeth,again. “I would never lie to you.” I add the cherry on top.
He nods and, for some reason, it feels like finality, like he won’t ask again, then he lifts his gaze right over my head and says to Caleb, “Watch her back.”
I snap around, catching Caleb’s green eyes, noticing they have turned impossibly dark. His shoulders are taking on the weight of his body as he leans back against the gray wall, his arms crossed over his broad chest, his dark jeans tight around his legs.
“Please don’t,” I state.
He just laughs, dropping his chin to his chest, shaking through the small chuckle. And when he lifts his jaw, he looks over me, like I’m not even there, right at my brother.
Caleb nods.
The promise passes between them right before my eyes.
At this moment, the gnawing in my gut tells me Caleb is taking the place my brother wishes he could fill, the very one his secrecy only forces him to abandon.
It’s been five days since Keaton left.
I snatch up my phone, pressing on his number again. It rings twice, then goes right to his voicemail with a jarring beep.
I shudder.
He declined my call,for the seventh time.
“You’re my priority, always will be.”His dipped octave replays through my head.
Maybe I am,but not right now.Was I ever?
With a defeated sigh, I navigate into my music, pushing my wireless headphones into my ears and pressing play on “The Way It Is” by VRSTY.
He’s just busy.
That’s what I keep telling myself, only the knot in my stomach divulges an entirely different truth. I’ve always worried about Keats, the same way he worries about me. I guess you could say it’s a pointed shard that lingers in our shared blood.
The music threads through my headphones, and I shove up from the mattress, taking a seat on the gray carpet in front of the full-length mirror across the room. Reaching toward the small material bag that houses my supplies beside it, I grab a fresh bandage, scissors, antiseptic cream, and tape, and throweverything down in front of me. Sucking in a sharp breath, I screw my eyes closed and crack my knuckles nervously.
This never gets easier.
My fingers curl around the edges of the soiled bandages at my ankles and I slowly peel them away. With trembling hands, I once again anticipate what I’m about to face. I try not to wince when my eyes open and instantly latch onto milky, bare bone.
It’s dehumanizing—the sight, the shredded skin.
