Nathan jerked back as North raised a fist, but he held back. He used it to point at Nathan’s face with a knuckle. “Give me a reason not to, Nathan. Just one. Because what you did was ask Lily to dissect Sang and not trust what she was telling us herself. You don’t trust her?”
Nathan wasn’t totally sure this wasn’t just North being tired and angry with him. What hurt was that Dr. Green was taking North’s side on this. It made him question everything he’d done up until this point. “I can’t do this unless I know,” Nathan said, taking a defensive stance against the wall. “And I can’t let all of you do this to her without knowing for sure she wants it.”
“She can leave whenever she wants to,” Dr. Green said. “And she will if she thinks we’re fighting over her, among ourselves.”
“I’m not trying to fight over her.”
“You don’t think we won’t?”
Nathan looked down, not responding. He knew he would, if he had to. Finding out what she really wanted without any pressure from them...
Dr. Green continued. “We’re all tense over Erica finding out about it, giving her another reason to not proceed. She’s seeing the sacrifice we’re all making for this and what we might have to go through to keep it together.” He paused. “But I don’t think this is about Sang at all. It’s like you’re looking for anything possible to make sure this doesn’t happen.”
“That’s not true,” Nathan said.
“Sure feels like it,” Dr. Green said. He stepped around North to get closer to Nathan. His eyes and face wilder than even North appeared. “You don’t ask our opinion, the ones who are working so hard in keeping ourselves together. For. You. For us. Instead, you ask the only other person in the group who is also unsure about it. You didn’t even tell Owen.” His voice rose. “And you don’t think there’s a chance in hell Owen, of all people, wouldn’t make absolutely sure Sang would be okay with this?”
Nathan winced, pressing himself harder against the wall. “He didn’t ask Lily to ask Sang.”
“He doesn’t have to!” Dr. Green’s voice rose again, waving a hand around. “Because he knows she’ll never be okay with this with the state we’re in now. And you...” He snatched up a notebook off the desk, and he took a few swats at Nathan around his arms. It didn’t hurt, but it shocked Nathan enough to try to block it. “Stop pointing at Sang and making her your scapegoat, and have her break it off if that’s what you’re looking for. It wasn’t about Sang. It was about you.”
“You just said she was okay with it,” Nathan said. “To trust her. I want to trust her but I don’t know for sure.”
Dr. Green smacked his chest again with the notebook. He was seething. “She’s okay when we’re okay with it. Don’t you get it? Sang’s even said she wouldn’t go through with it unless we’re all happy with this. And she can’t be if you’re going behind our backs to try to pull it apart.”
“I didn’t try to do that,” Nathan said.
“You asked the wrong question,” North said. He turned away from them, looking at the door. His hands were in fists and he was shaking. “You asked Lily to prove Sang was into this. You didn’t ask Lily to help you keep us all together.”
“There’s a difference,” Dr. Green said. “We have everyone else in the outside world who is going to try to do the same thing to us. Question our loyalty. Test our commitment to this. Erica. Possibly Uncle whenever he finds out. The Academy. And Sang.” He threw the notebook at Nathan’s legs, and it slapped against the linoleum floor. “Sang is always asking. Every moment. We don’t need Lily to ask. Sang asks herself. Did you not read her new damn journal?”
“No,” Nathan said quietly.
Dr. Green sighed, shaking his head. “Maybe if you were in with us, I’d see it differently, but everything you’ve said until now has me believing you’d break it all up the moment she showed any doubt. You wouldn’t even try. Do you want to see us broken up? The team split?”
“No,” but he said this weakly. Nathan crossed his arms over his chest, glaring at the desk. Kota telling him to go talk to Lily, his change of attitude when he returned, and the way they were talking to him now twisted his heart.
He wanted to believe he had the right intention. How could it be wrong to make sure Sang wanted this?
But perhaps they were right. Were they? Wasn’t he supposed to question it all? They’d all done so before. What made this different?
When Nathan didn’t respond, Dr. Green threw up his hands. He snatched his messenger bag off the desk without the laptop and he went to the door. “If I didn’t love the hell out of you, Nathan, I’d kill you. Now I have to go find Kota and figure out where the hell we are now. Hopefully he didn’t say anything to Sang about this yet.” He slammed the door on his way out.
North still had his back turned on Nathan. Nathan remained where he was, crushed up against the wall. He glared at the notebook at his feet.
Was he right? Sang wasn’t going to be okay with this unless they were all sure and okay with it?
Eventually North spoke. It wasn’t the same angry tone as before. It was something sad, dark and it hurt Nathan more than anything else just from the depth of despair it carried. “We can’t stay together if she’s not with us,” he said. He turned slowly, his eyes glistening and his face contorted. “Do you get it now? Without her...this is over. We’re too far in.”
“You’d leave if she won’t stay?”
“She won’t stay if we can’t do this.” He turned to the door and opened it, glaring out into the hallway. “She’ll do it to spare us. It’ll just kill us.” He walked out, closing the door behind him.
Nathan slid down against the wall, practically hiding behind the desk. He rolled his head back, glaring at the ceiling. He inhaled in a long breath, holding it enough until his lungs burned before releasing.
He did it again.
And again. Causing his already high heart rate to increase, his lungs to ache. His body was tight, tense.
He couldn’t get them to understand. He’d done it to be sure. For her sake. He needed to know.
What he hadn’t realized was what they’d told him.
She wasn’t sure.
Because they weren’t totally together on it. Kota. Himself. Perhaps a couple of others. The doubt woven around them all.
Compounded by Erica and her questions.
It would just get worse.
Would she leave?
But he knew that answer. Sang would do whatever she could to ensure they were all happy and safe, like they tried to do for her. If it meant she left so they could find some sort of happiness without her, she would.
He didn’t need to be the reason.
When in Doubt, Doubt
Nathan avoided the others all afternoon. No one completely ignored him, but he sensed they all knew.
He didn’t get a chance to see Sang before he left in the afternoon before school was over. He’d asked Kota to take Danielle and Marie home.
He took Silas’s car home. He really needed his own car. He sent a text to Silas to let him know, and to feel free to pick it up later.
He told Mr. Blackbourne in a text he wasn’t feeling great. It was a bad time to be out but he thought having crashed in a car into the lake the night before warranted a little down time.
He just didn’t want to be around the others right now.
Not with the way the way they looked at him.
Maybe he was more paranoid, but he couldn’t help it. He was in his own head, consumed by what Dr. Green had said, but mostly about what North said at the end.
This might kill us.
The weather had warmed slightly with the sun bright overhead. He’d built a static charge in the car, and he zapped himself on the metal doorknob of his house before he stuck the key in. It caused his hand to shake and he dropped the keys to the ground.
He grumbled to himself, looking down at his keys and not reaching for them.
What a week. Maybe he needed the weekend off. Or a month.
“Nathan?” Erica’s voice came from behind him.
He considered banging his head against the door. Not now. Instead, he grimaced and turned slowly.
Erica was in her nurse’s uniform. She was either home early or on her way out. Her car was parked in her own drive and she was heading over, halfway into the yard.