His face falls, and I go for the kill.
“Yeah, Shawn, that was my FIRST fucking time. I wanted it to be you. I wanted you to be the one, because you were the only boy I EVER fucking loved. And still, you’re the only one . . . the only one I’ve ever . . . ”
Tears scorch my eyes, and my voice cracks. When I glare at him from inches away, a few spill into the void between us. I blink hard and shake my head to regain my composure—however unstable it was in the first place. Turning my hard stare on my brothers and everyone else gaping at me at the table, I continue raving.
“I was fifteen years old, and then he just picked up and moved and never thought of me again. And I thought he didn’t remember who I was when I auditioned, but it turns out, he’s known this entire fucking time. And then he asked me to go out with him, and you know what? I said yes.” I start laughing again, or sobbing—the sounds blend together in the hysteria I’m in. “But then, he said I wasn’t even allowed to tell anyone. Because he never wanted anyone to know. All I’ve ever been is a dirty, pathetic, disposable fucking secret to him.” My anger bubbles to the surface once more, and when I turn my head and latch on to Shawn’s wide green eyes again, I scream at the top of my lungs. “Isn’t that fucking right, Shawn?”
I’m pretty sure words start coming from his mouth, but it’s lost under the sound of my chair crashing to the floor. I stand up so violently from the table that it flies backward and topples, and I’m pretty sure I broke it, but I don’t fucking care. I’m storming away from him, from everyone.
“Kit!” Shawn’s voice calls, and I hear a chorus of chairs scraping against hardwood, the thunder of footsteps following me.
I don’t stop until I’m at the front door. When I turn around, Shawn is right there. I swing open the door and stand on the threshold.
“Where are you going?” he pants, and if I didn’t know better, I’d think the look in his eyes is panic. Regret. A million things that I want to believe are there, but that I know damn well are not.
“NOWHERE.”
With the force of a woman’s scorn, I snare my fingers in the front of his shirt and yank him toward the door. Then I spin around and push him so hard, he stumbles backward onto my porch. I barely catch the pleading look he gives me before I slam the door as hard as I can in his face. The foundation shakes, my hands shake, the world crumbles, and when I turn around, everyone is staring at me. Everyone knows.
My mom, my dad, my brothers, the band. All of them are staring shell-shocked at me as I put all of my effort into simply staying on my feet. My heart is jackhammering against my ribs, threatening to tear me apart from the inside out. My skin shrinks along with the rest of me, and I can tell my eyes are wild. I’m trapped in open space with nowhere else to run.
In an attempt to stay on my feet, I find my twin’s face in the crowd, but his eyes are just as panicked as mine. I’m falling, sinking, and he’s feeling every bit of my desperation, making it his own.
I want to run. I want to hide. But there’s nowhere, nowhere, nowhere. I’m shaking in my own skin, about to lose what’s left of my dignity as I break down in hysterical, inconsolable, mortifying tears right here on my foyer floor—but before I can, before I can make the worst night of my life so, so much worse, Kale shouts at the top of his lungs, his voice echoing off the walls—
“I’M GAY!”
Chapter Twenty
MY MOM PASSED the fuck out.
One minute, she was gaping at me, at Kale, at me, at Kale, and then her eyes just kind of rolled back in her head and she dropped like a sack of bricks.
Mike half caught her since everyone else was too busy doing the same thing my mom had been doing—big eyes darting from me, to Kale, to me, to Kale.
Fast-forward to Ryan rushing to call an ambulance, a swirl of red and blue lights flashing through our windows, a team of medics sprinting into our foyer . . . and, yeah, tonight was a disaster of epic fucking proportions.
“She’s going to be okay?” Kale asks the medic standing on our doorstep, guilt weighing down his words.
“She’ll be fine,” the EMT assures him. “Just keep her hydrated and make sure she takes it easy.”
I don’t watch the ambulance pull away—because Shawn is still out there somewhere. When my mom finally regained consciousness and we were waiting for the ambulance, Adam gave me a quick hug, told me Shawn is an asshole, and went out to stand by his best friend’s side. But Mike and Joel are still in my house, with Mike running his hands anxiously through his hair and Joel gnawing on a thumbnail, neither of them knowing what to say or what to do.
Tiny step by tiny step, Joel backs toward the front door. “I’m . . . just gonna . . . ” When he’s almost there, he stops to rub the back of his neck. “Do you need me for anything?”
I shake my head. “Go.”
“I’ll see you next practice?”