She’s got a tiny ration of her burger left, sitting in the cardboard box in front of us. I jerk my chin toward it. “Are you finishing that?” I ask, my stomach still begging to be fed.
“Nah,” she says, not looking up from her phone, tapping away at the screen with a smile. “It’s all yours.”
She doesn’t have to tell me twice. I snatch it up and take a bite, and just as I’m swallowing, Cam says, “Fuck yes.” She sounds so excited, and I turn my head to look at her, my mouth full of bread as I collect the spillage of sauce down my chin with the back of my hand.
“What?” Ty asks, reaching out and taking a sip of his soda.
Cameryn is still staring at her screen when she says, “Blaine is coming to the show tonight.”
I can’t help but grin.
Fucking perfect.
My phone lays on the shimmering stage between my legs when I push into the splits. Guilt is strong as it spiders around each of my ribs, and I try my best to ignore the web it has weaved when I point my bare toes and bend over at my waist. Fisting my phone, I rest the weight of my upper body on my elbows with a heavy sigh.
My eyes lock on the messages I received from Cameryn exactly twenty hours ago, along with the invite I shouldn’t have agreed to, but did for my friend.
Fuck guilt and its ugly head.
Cameryn
Come to our show tomorrow night.
Me
Can I go with you?
Cameryn
I’ll meet you at the club at four-thirty.
I stare at the top of the screen. It’s four in the afternoon. Half an hour until Cameryn is supposed to arrive, and I’m panicking.Swallowing hard, I suppress a shiver when nausea churns in my stomach.
I can’t do this. I still have time to cancel, right?
I thought I would be okay, though without the adrenaline of my show, I just feel weak.
Shivering again when the blood in my veins cools, I flex my toes.
I want nothing more than to be the same friend both Cam and Ty have always known,and love, only I’m crawling through a silo well of sinking sand, trying to find the girl who died beneath the grain a long time ago.
She’s gone.
My thumbs shadow over the screen as I tap against the glowing glass.
Me
Please don’t hate me, something has come up. I’ll make it up to you xx
I type out the words“I promise”to only find myself quickly backspacing. I know better than to make promises I have no intention of keeping.
Tears mist their way over my orbs when I fight with my trembling finger. I can’t seem to find the strength to click send. I just lie here, boneless, with my legs still spread across the stage, reading the same message over in my drafts.
What the fuck am I going to do?
I’m driving myself mad.
I swallow the sour burn of bile that treks up my throat.
