Faster We Burn

chapter Seventeen

Stryker

“Long time no see,” Zan said when I walked into class on Wednesday. I kept my face neutral.

“Wasn’t feeling that great.”

“Rough weekend?”

“Something like that.”

I’d timed it so that I would get to class right before Quan started, and I planned on bolting as soon as I could. I pulled out my notebook and started drawing like I always did in this class. If attendance didn’t count toward my grade, I would skip every class but the test.

I let my pen take over, drawing random designs on a fresh page instead of adding to another drawing I’d already started.

It wasn’t until class was over and half the page was filled that I realized I’d done a duplicate of the drawing on Katie’s wrist.

“That’s nice,” Zan said, shoving his books in his bag while I tried to hide the drawing.

“Thanks.” I fished in my pocket, but I couldn’t find my lighter. It was a way to try to prevent myself from smoking. I had the cigarettes, but if I couldn’t light them, I couldn’t smoke them. In theory it worked, but not so much in practice. Zan always had that old Zippo on him.

“Can I borrow your lighter?” He handed it over and followed me to the designated smoking area outside the building. I always offered him one, but he always refused and today was no exception.

He watched me smoke, silently waiting for me to start talking. There was something so unnerving about a silent person.

“I had sex with someone else,” I blurted out after about thirty seconds of silence. Zan took the lighter back and flicked it in his hand out of habit. On. Off. On. Off.

He waited for me to elaborate.

“It was a mistake and I was drunk, but to be fair, I did break it off with Katie before it happened.”

“Then why are you hiding it?” He flipped the lighter off and put it back in his pocket.

I shook my head and tipped my face up, blowing the smoke toward the clouds.

“I don’t know.” Trish’s words came back with a vengeance.

“Look, I know I’m not good at talking, or giving advice, but this is my two cents,” he said, leaning next to me against the building. He had to tip his head down to meet my eyes.

“You and Katie have something together. We all saw it that night at the party. Whether you want to admit it or not, there is something there, and it’s not just attraction or lust. It’s something more. Something deeper. You care about her and she cares about you, despite everything she’s been through. You’re both trying to stop it, but here’s the thing. It’s going to happen anyway. Something that powerful is like a speeding train. You can slow it down, but it’s never going to stop.” That’s how it felt with Katie. Like I was standing on the train tracks, waiting to be demolished by a thousand pounds of metal coming at me.

“When it’s real like that, you can’t fight it. I know what you’re going through.” He looked up at the sky. “I tried to fight it with Lottie, but we just kept getting pulled together. And then the reasons I was keeping her away dissolved and they didn’t seem like reasons anymore, just roadblocks on our way to finding one another.”

I thought there would be more to the speech, but he just exhaled and looked back down at me. I stubbed out the rest of my cigarette and shoved my hands in my pockets.

“For a guy who’s not good with words, you sure sound like a f*cking poet. If only you could make that shit rhyme, and you’d be the next Shakespeare.”

Zan gave me a brief smile and shrugged.

“I have to get to class. You wanna hang out this weekend? Banjo session?”

“Yeah, sure thing. I’ll let you know.”

He nodded again and went to walk to his next class as I pulled out another cigarette and stared at it wishing I’d brought my lighter.



***



Katie had banged on my door so many times, I figured it was time to return the favor. I had no idea if she’d be there, but it was her face that I saw when she opened the door. She seemed surprised for a moment and I thought she was going to slam it in my face.

“I thought my people were going to call your people when I ‘found myself.’” She put air quotes around the “found myself” part.

“Yeah, well, I figured you’d showed up unannounced at my place enough times that I should see what it’s like on the other side.” She leaned against the half-open door as if she wasn’t sure if she should let me in.

After a moment of deliberation she rolled her eyes back and sighed as if I was a huge inconvenience.

“Come on.” She flung the door wide and I stepped in behind her. I would have thought my eyes had adjusted to the amount of pink from being around her, but it was like I was being eye raped by it. She never had given me an answer on why she was obsessed with it.

She spun to face me, her arms crossed over the pink shirt that draped over her shoulders and hung long over her black pants. “So, what do you want?”

I swallowed, trying to bring moisture into my dry throat.

“I got your little note. Took me two showers to wash it off,” I said, gesturing to my chest.

“That was why I used permanent marker,” she said, her voice icy, but I could see the shadow of a smile tugging at her lips. She leaned back against her bed and sat down. I remained standing.

Something that powerful is like a speeding train. You can slow it down, but it’s never going to stop.

I had to keep my distance from her. Even just being in her room and being submerged in her scent was making my head buzz.

“So what do you want? If you’re here to f*ck me, sorry, not in the mood.”

“I’m not here for that,” I said, although if she would have said, hey, let’s go for it, I wouldn’t have said no. Not this time.

“Then why are you here, Stryker Abraham Grant?” She stood up and walked until there was only a breath of space between us, our chests almost touching.

“I have something I have to tell you,” I said, but I was interrupted by her cell phone ringing. I wanted to tell her to ignore it, but she snatched it and was answering before I could form the words.

“Hey, Kayla. What’s up?” I watched as her eyes went wide, her other hand went to her mouth and she let out a sound as if someone had stabbed her.

And then she was falling to the floor, as if her legs had decided they didn’t want to support her anymore and had gone on strike. I caught her just in time.

The phone slipped from her hands and she screamed. No, it wasn’t a scream. It was the sound of a soul ripping itself in half. Pure agony.

I was finally able to speak.

“What happened?”

She was only able to get out two words.

“My. Dad.”

I looked down and realized Kayla was still on the other end of the phone call. I picked the phone up.

“Hello?”

“Who’s this?” She sounded stuffed up, and I could tell she’d been crying.

“Stryker. What happened?” I was still trying to hold Katie up. She was silent, as if she’d gone into shock, but her body shook, like she was freezing. I had to figure out what was going on.

Now.



Katie



Kayla’s words banged in my head over and over like a sledgehammer. I heard them over Stryker talking to me, and Stryker talking to Kayla and trying to figure out what had happened to me.

Dad had a heart attack.

We took him to the hospital.

He didn’t make it.

Words strung together in a particular order that had dropped me to my knees. Words that made sense, but didn’t.

“Katie!” Stryker waved his hand in front of my face and then smacked me in the cheek. The little sting of pain brought me around.

“I have to go home. Right now.” I used his arms to pull myself to my shaky feet. “Where are my keys?” I knew I’d just seen them a moment ago. They had a stupid pink elephant on the keychain that Kayla had gotten for me.

Stryker wouldn’t let go of me.

“Let go. I have to go home.” I thrashed, but he wouldn’t budge.

He shook his head and blinked, as if he was stunned himself.

“No, I’ll drive you.”

More words strung together.

“I have to get there now. We’re wasting time.”

He didn’t make it.

He blinked rapidly. “It’s okay, I’ll drive you. Right now. Let’s go.”

Before I could protest, he was shoving my arms into my coat, grabbing my purse, throwing my phone in it, and dragging me down the stairs. The next thing I knew he was putting me in his car and buckling my seatbelt with hands that shook just a little before peeling out of the visitor’s parking lot.

“Shit,” he said, trying to fiddle with the GPS. “Can you give me directions to the hospital?”

“Yeah,” I said, and my voice didn’t sound like mine. It sounded like it belonged to someone else.

“Are you okay?” Before I could answer he swore again.

“I shouldn’t have asked you that,” he said under his breath as he took a corner too fast and almost hit another car. “Shit, shit, shit.”

“Slow down,” I said.

He was still muttering to himself, and every other word was a curse. I took my coat off and rolled down the window.

“What are you doing?”

“It’s hot in here.” I fanned my hands, trying to get some cool air into the car. I couldn’t breathe. My skin was on fire. I was on fire. “Why is it so hot in here?”

“Katie!” he said, his voice cracking like a whip in the confines of his car.

“What?”

He blinked a bunch of times and slammed his foot on the gas to pass a car he perceived to be going too slow.

“You have to calm down, because I’m freaking out, and I should be the calm one in this situation. Because I don’t know if I can handle this.” His voice was controlled; too controlled.

“Pull over,” I said, feeling my stomach heave once.

“We have to get there, we can’t stop,” he said, pushing the accelerator to the max.

“Pull over!” I screamed, and he pulled into the breakdown lane. Even before the car stopped, I had the door open and was crashing to my knees, my body deciding it was going to be sick.

I choked and coughed, but nothing came out. The sound of the highway was muted in my ears, as if they were stuffed with something. A hand touched my shoulder.

“Are you okay?”

No, I wasn’t f*cking okay. How could I be okay?

“You’re not supposed to ask me that question. Ever.”

“Shit,” he said, rubbing my shoulder as he crouched down beside me. “Listen, we need to go. You need to get there. I need to get you to your family. I’m not the person you should be with right now. I suck at this. Anyone would be better than me.”

His hands were finally steady, and he put them on my shoulders. They were strong, and his grip was firm.

“I can’t believe this is happening. How come I’m not crying?”

“I’m not a doctor, but I think you’re in shock.”

“Oh.”

That made sense, except shock wasn’t the right word. I didn’t feel shock. I didn’t feel anything, except for Stryker’s hands on my shoulders. They were the only things that felt real in this moment.

“Let’s get you in the car, sweetheart. Come on.” His arms went under my armpits, sort of getting me partially to my feet before he swept one arm under my legs and another behind my shoulders.

He tucked me in the passenger seat, rolling it down so I could lie back instead of sit up. He buckled me in again, this time more gently. I looked up to meet his eyes, which, I decided were exactly the color of a stone I’d seen in a ring once in a little shop Kayla had dragged me into. A color midway between green and yellow, if there was such a thing.

My dad.

I shouldn’t be thinking about Stryker’s eyes. He blinked and closed the door softly before getting in himself.

“Thank you,” I said as he put on his blinker and waited for someone to let him get back onto the highway.