“What happened?”
He uncovers his face and I see a welt rising on his left cheekbone when he sits up. He bends his knees up and wraps his elbows around them, shaking his head.
I slide onto the floor next to him and poke at his cheek. “Are you okay?”
“No.”
I wave a hand in front of his face and look into his pupils. “Are you dizzy? Do you think you have a concussion or something?”
“No. I just have a walking douchebag for a best friend.”
Oh, shit. “What happened?”
He scratches the top of his head. “Nate said you broke up with him. When I asked why, he told me to ask you. When I said I was asking him, he muttered something about your roommate being hot and it wasn’t his fault, so I fucking leveled him.”
My heart squeezes into a hard ball and I feel sick. “Thanks, but he’s totally not worth it.”
He drags himself to his feet, flexing the knuckles of his right hand. He holds his left out to me and I take it. “But you are,” he says, pulling me off the floor. “There’s a reason I didn’t want him anywhere near you. He’ll fuck anything that walks.”
I only realize my eyes are welling when Marcus tugs me to his chest. It feels so good to be back in his arms. I let things stay bad between us for too long, but I understand why now. I knew Marcus would be the only person who’d look close enough to see that I was dead inside. If I pushed him away, I was safe to self-destruct without anyone trying to stop me.
Seeing how he reacted to what happened with Caiden, I know I can never tell him Nate raped me. He’d think it was his fault, somehow, and he’d never forgive himself for not protecting me. But I need his arms so badly right now.
“It’s always been us against the world, Blaire,” he says. “That hasn’t changed. The only difference is that that cocksucker is now part of ‘the world’ instead of ‘us.’”
“When did our lives get so fucked up?” I ask into his T-shirt.
“When Dad looked at Mom with that lusty spark in his eye.”
I hear the smile in his voice and laugh through my tears, blowing snot out my nose onto his T-shirt. “Nothing good could ever come of that.”
Chapter 26
Caiden
She arrives at Tino’s alone tonight and sits with the same group of poets at a table up front. I watch from the barstool in the darkest corner, but instead of scotch, I’m drinking Coke.
There are five poets who read, and Blaire listens intently to each one. When Gloria is introduced, she squeezes Blaire’s shoulder on her way to the stage. She finishes and after her scores post, the room goes quiet and the MC, Craig, looks at Blaire like he’s going to eat her alive when he says, “We’ve got a special performance tonight, a returning house favorite, racking up sixty-three wins over a two-year period before she left us for bigger and better things. Please welcome back to the Tino’s stage, our very own, Blaire Leon!”
She makes her way slowly up the stairs and Craig wraps her whole body in a long, tight hug. He whispers something in her ear and her eyes are wide with…shock? disgust? when she pulls away from him. She watches him leave the stage and takes a minute to collect herself before she steps up to the mic.
When the bright spotlight hits her face, my heart lurches.
She looks drawn, purple circles in the hollows of lifeless amber eyes; the glow in that fair complexion gone, as if life has beaten her down and robbed her of her contagious spirit.
She stands in front of the mic collecting herself for longer than usual, and when a tear courses down her face, she makes no move to wipe it away.
She takes one last breath, then lifts her head and starts.
“Have you ever thought: What’s it all for? I don’t mean after a particularly bad day, when your whole life is sliding into a steaming shithole. I mean, have you ever sat down and really contemplated the point of life?”
Even with the tear, her voice starts light. A little whimsical.
“Is the point of life success? But how do you know when you’ve achieved enough success? How do you quantify it? Measure it? Is it how much you know? IQ points? The number of degrees you hold? Or does a sharp mind only make you more capable of justifying even your worst decisions? Maybe success is measured in the number of friends you have on speed dial? But then how do you determine which of your collection would gladly throw you under the bus when it’s in their own best interests?” She shakes her head. “So if it’s not knowledge or friends, maybe success is money? But if someone else has more than you, how can you know if you’ve hit the benchmark? Is it truly the guy who dies with the most toys who wins?”