by CoraLee June
Kai looked like he wanted to do anything but figure out what happened. I knew it was dangerous. Some secrets weren’t meant to be revealed. But I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t at least try to learn what really happened.
“You need to let the police do their job and stay out of it,” he growled.
“I didn’t know her, Kai. I didn’t know that she was cheating on you. I didn’t know that she was pregnant. I didn’t even know she was friendly with Lex. What kind of friend am I if she didn’t think she could go to me with this stuff? I need this. I need you. So go ahead and push me away. You’re like a riptide, Kai. The harder you fight this, the more likely you are to drown. Just let me pull you. I’m fine with this dance, but you should know I won’t leave the shore just because it’s in your nature to temporarily distance yourself. I’m already involved. I’m already in it.”
Kai seemed pacified by my statement. I wanted to know what was going on in his mind. Hell, I wished I knew what was going on in Violet’s mind. Wait. I had unbridled access to her mind. “Oh shit,” I exclaimed before shooting off the bench and running to the truck. Kai called after me, concerned and confused about what I was doing.
I grabbed my purse and ran back with it, pulling Violet’s diary from the front pocket. “What is that?” Kai asked.
“Violet’s diary,” I whispered. “I found it this morning when I went to see Chase.”
At my explanation, Kai frowned but didn’t say anything. He pulled out his phone and turned on the flashlight for us both to read. Normally, I would have started at the beginning, but a gust of wind whipped at the pages, and my thumb landed on an entry toward the end. It felt like Violet was guiding me. I read it out loud.
Dear Diary,
When do you think life starts? Is it the moment of conception? Is it the moment you decide to keep it? He wants me to get rid of it. He calls our baby a collection of cells. Like a tumor. Or cancerous love that could rot me from the inside out.
I think if we have a boy, I want to call him Sebastian.
XOXO,
Violet
“He didn’t want the baby,” I whispered before flipping to the next page, where a drawing of a mother holding her stomach greeted me. It was beautiful, the sketch meaningful and tender. I imagined Violet drawing it on her bed, barefoot and kicking her legs as she traced each intricate line.
“But who didn’t?” Kai asked. I kept flipping through the pages, searching for a name, for anything that would lead to who she was talking about, but even her diary was kept ambiguous. “You have to turn this in to the police. They don’t have her cell phone, but maybe they can find something from this.” I flipped to another entry and my heart sank.
Dear Diary,
I’m scared, Diary. And I can’t tell you why.
XOXO,
Violet
“She was scared,” I said. Kai ran his fingers over the words. “I need to turn this in.”
I closed the book, too raw to process anything else. As I hugged it to my chest, Kai and I watched the ever-rotating ball of light above us. Around, and around, and around it went.
A week went by. I turned in the diary to the police, but they didn’t call me with any leads like they promised. I wasn’t sure if I was thankful for that or not. I wanted answers, but I needed a moment to breathe. To process.
I went to school. I worked at the surf shop. I ate breakfast with my mom and saw my dad in passing. And I cried. I cried for baby Sebastian. I cried for Violet. I mourned the betrayal of her secrets. I lost myself in a pattern of my new normal, accepting a life where she didn’t exist, a routine not revolving around our friendship and her eccentric ways. I cried for myself. For our friendship. For Kai.
And I cried for Chase.
He hadn’t shown up at school for an entire week. I called him. I knocked on his door. I sent numerous texts and even threatened to call his parents, though I doubted they cared. He was hurting. Badly. I wanted to be there for him, but he wasn’t letting anyone in. Occasionally, I’d see Celeste’s car parked in the driveway at the Joneses’ house, but other than that, I had no clue what he was up to. It worried me, and I felt like I was failing Violet by not taking care of him.
True to his word, Kai made no effort to speak to me. He was pushing me away, but I caught his truck parked outside the surf shop occasionally. Lex hadn’t shown up again, but I felt safer seeing his old Chevy sitting there with smoke filtering out of a cracked window. Kai might want to keep his distance to protect me, but he was still near.
Friday night, I didn’t feel like being home. My side hadn’t been hurting, so I grabbed my bike from where I left it leaning against the house and pedaled instinctually to the place where I always went when I was sad, hurt, or confused: Violet’s house. Now, it was just Chase’s house, but my heart and my feet didn’t seem to fully realize that yet. I subconsciously took the long way so that I wouldn’t have to ride by the woods.
I could hear the music from a block away, and as I got closer, I could see the parking lot of cars and a bonfire going on the Joneses’ stretch of the beach. I abandoned my bike on the front lawn, kicked off my shoes, and started walking down the sandy shore toward the fire. I couldn’t believe Chase was throwing a party. What the hell was he thinking?
A group of people were sitting around the fire, and a guy playing guitar was singing off-key while trying to woo girls dressed in cutoffs and bikini tops. A large keg was buried in the sand, and I watched as classmates pumped cheap beer into red Solo cups. Girls giggled as I stalked by them, searching every face for Chase. He couldn’t talk to me all week, couldn’t show up to school, but he could throw a bonfire? What the fuck?
I kept looking for him and stumbled on pieces of driftwood on the sand. “Fuck,” I cursed.
“Watch where you’re going, Breezy Baby,” a dark voice said. I looked to my left and saw Chase lying in the sand with the tips of his feet in the water. He wore dark jeans that were wet. His shirt was gone, and my eyes trailed over the dips and grooves of his abs.
“Chase? What are you doing?” I asked. A guy to our right picked up a petite blonde and threw her in the ocean with a laugh, splashing us both. Chase didn’t answer me, and it wasn’t until I saw him lift his hand up to his mouth and inhale from the joint perched between his thumb and index finger that I realized he was high.
“Just enjoying the night, Breezy.”
“How could you throw a party?” I asked before sitting beside him. “Why haven’t you called me?” I noted an empty bottle of whiskey on the other side of him and worried he was cross fading. He’d be puking on the sand soon.
“I don’t want to talk to you, Breezy. Why don’t you put that mouth to use, hmm? I know you’re fascinated with blow jobs. I’ll let you suck my cock if you’d like,” he teased before lifting the joint back to his lips. Fury and embarrassment flooded me. This wasn’t Chase. I reached up and grabbed the joint from his hand, burning myself in the process. He groaned in annoyance, but I put it out on the wet sand and glared at him.
“Chase, I know you’re hurting, but—”
“I’m not hurting. I’m not...anything right now. I’m definitely not a good guy.”
I shook my head. I needed backup. “Where is Celeste?”
“Probably somewhere crying.”
“Why is she crying? Chase?” I asked. He started laughing, his lips parted as a humorless chuckle made his body shake. Fucking hell.
“I hurt her. I hurt everyone in the end,” Chase replied.
I didn’t like Celeste, but with the way Chase was acting, I was worried. Besides, maybe she could help convince Chase to go inside and sleep off his drunken high. She was a bitch, but she cared about him. “Stay right here, okay?” I told him before standing up. He just waved his hand.
I got up and started looking around for Celeste. More people had showed up since my chat with Chase, and the crowded beach was becoming difficult to navigate. Teens carrying YETI coolers with ice and beer set up by the bon
fire. The guy playing guitar was now making out with someone, and the music was thumping.
A topless girl ran into the water, passing me with a giggle as four guys chased after her. Another girl from my math class was puking on the sand. I asked a couple of people if they’d seen Celeste, but none of them had, so I marched up the path to the house.
I had to step over a passed out dude on the deck, and when I went in through the back door, I saw Celeste sitting at the kitchen table, crying. “Celeste?” I asked.
Her luscious hair was covering her face, and her body was shaking with the sobs escaping her lips. “Go away,” she cried out.
I approached her like you would a wild animal—cautiously. “Celeste? What’s wrong? I just saw Chase…”
At the mention of Chase, Celeste looked up at me, and I nearly gasped at what I saw. Her mascara was running down her face. Her eyes were red, and the red lipstick she wore had smeared in the corner. But that wasn’t what concerned me. No, it was the angry red marks shaped like fingers around her neck. It looked painful. “Did Chase do that to you?” I asked gently.
“H-He didn’t mean to,” she rushed out. “And stop looking at me with pity. You of all people should not be pitying me.” Celeste was practically spitting her words. What the hell was that supposed to mean?
“What happened?” I asked. I didn’t like her tone, but I was trying to understand.
“He’s just mad lately. Hurting. He’s obsessed. It’s nothing I can’t handle. He just gets rough sometimes.”
I pulled out my cell phone. I would need more help. I wanted to shut this party down and figure out what was going on with Chase. This was unacceptable. And although everything inside of me was screaming for me to waltz right back out the front door and let them figure it out for themselves, this wasn’t safe. I needed to get this party shut down. I clicked Kai’s name on my phone before even thinking of it. Calling him was instinctual. He answered on the first ring.
“You okay?”
“I need you,” I said softly. Celeste rolled her eyes and then went back to crying in her hands.
“Where are you?”
“Chase’s house,” I whispered.
“I’ll be right there.”
I hung up the phone, and the uneasiness coursing through my body was slightly calmed knowing that Kai was on his way. I didn’t particularly care for Celeste, and I knew how she felt about me, but I couldn’t just leave her alone, crying at the kitchen table. I sank into the chair next to her and stared at her sobbing as I searched for the right words.
Chase’s behavior was becoming more erratic, unpredictable, and violent. I had seen him unraveling, but this was vicious, and I was coming to terms with him being capable of putting his hands on a woman. I felt a deep sense of betrayal that cut down to my core. I had known Chase almost his entire life and had secretly loved him since I was ten. Now, I felt like I didn’t even know him. Just like I didn’t really know Violet.
“Celeste,” I said gently. “I’m so sorry that Chase did this to you. I know he’s hurting and that he’s mad, but that doesn’t give him the right to put his hands on you.” Doesn’t give him the right to wrap his hands around your throat, I thought but didn’t say out loud.
“Just get out,” she shrieked through her tears. “You don’t understand how much he needs me. You’re just jealous that he doesn’t need you.”
In that moment, I saw Celeste for who she really was. She wasn’t just a mean girl who used to torture me, she was a woman so desperate for affection and unknowing of her own worth that she defended the man who treated her like dirt and hurt her. I felt a surge of compassion for her.
Two of Celeste’s friends came crashing into the kitchen and saw her in tears. They immediately sat with her, holding and comforting her, saying the words that I didn’t know how to. I stood up from the table and went to the other side of the kitchen. I grabbed a box of tissues and passed it wordlessly to one of Celeste’s friends as I walked out of the room.
I went back outside and sat on the steps to wait for Kai. I wanted to go find Chase and demand an explanation, an apology, or something from him. I didn’t even know what I wanted; nothing was going to make this right. I didn’t have to wait with my thoughts for long before I heard the rumble of Kai’s truck pulling into the driveway.
He got out and immediately jogged up to where I was sitting, his face a stormy mix of concern and rage. “You okay?” he asked while cupping my cheeks and peering at my face, as if looking for bruises or scratches.
“Yeah, I’m fine,” I said, my voice defeated. “I know you and Chase aren’t close, but I’m worried. He is drunk off his ass, and he hurt Celeste…”
Kai dropped his hands. “What did he do?”
“He got rough with her. Sh-she has bruises around her neck…”
Kai’s face soured, and he stared at the front door of the house, where a group of guys were stumbling out of the threshold and laughing. “Did he do anything to you?”
“No. It’s not like that. Chase is hurting. We need to shut this party down. He needs to grieve. Hell, he needs to speak to a therapist. Celeste insisted that it wasn’t a big deal, but I saw the marks. I don’t know what to do.”
Kai propped his hands on his hips. “Entitled bastard. He choked her? Don’t you think that is suspicious?”
“What are you saying?”
Kai shook his head, his tongue poking at his cheek in disbelief. “Chase was here, wasn’t he? The night Violet died—the night she was fucking strangled.”
I felt my skin grow cold as Kai started stomping inside. I followed after him, calling his name as he started searching the party for Chase. He was like a bull running toward a red flag. Single-sighted. Furious. Determined.
I couldn’t help but feel like this was going to end badly.
Kai ran into a laughing dude that had lipstick markings all over his bare chest. “Whoa, man. Watch where you’re going,” the guy said with a lazy drawl.
Kai shoved him into the wall and closed in on him. “Get the fuck out of my way. This party is over.”
I watched wide-eyed and trembling. “Whoa. Calm down!” the playful drunk yelled, but Kai kneed him in the balls before stalking off. I stood in shock as the guy crumpled to the ground.
Fuck. This wasn’t good. I briefly wondered if I had made a mistake calling Kai.
“Chase!” Kai yelled while heading toward the back door. Luckily, Celeste was no longer crying at the kitchen table. Kai’s anger was growing by the second, and he didn’t need to see the evidence of what Chase had done. I followed Kai outside where the party was gearing up. Loud music greeted us, and Kai looked at the ground, finding where the giant speaker system was plugged into the wall. He ripped the extension cord out, effectively cutting off the music. The entire party seemed to stop.
“What the fuck, dude?” a girl sitting on the deck with a bottle of beer in her lap screamed.
“Party is over!” Kai screamed.
“Fuck off!” a familiar, slurred voice yelled. Oh shit. Found Chase. I kind of regretted inviting Kai here, but it was too late now. Chase started stumbling through the sand. Kai didn’t waste a single second. The two of them collided. Kai had his chest puffed out, and Chase swayed. They looked close enough to kiss, a precious distance reserved for boxers and lovers.
“Who the fuck invited you?” Chase asked while poking Kai’s chest.
“Breeze did. She said you’ve lost your fucking mind. You like choking innocent girls, Chase? Maybe the police got it all wrong. Maybe you killed Violet!”
A low murmur and a few shocked gasps washed over the crowd. I could hear accusatory whispers all around me. Chase didn’t seem bothered, though. He just grinned playfully.
“Breeze called you, huh? Breezy Baby, I thought you had higher standards. If you wanted someone’s face to ride, you know my—” Chase didn’t even get to finish his drunken statement, because Kai had reared back and slammed his fist into his jaw.
Chase fell
backward onto the sand. Girls screamed. Guys started forming a circle around the two of them. I had to push through the growing crowd to see. Kai got on top of Chase and started landing punch after punch.
“Stop! Stop!” I screamed. “Please stop!” I ran closer to them, not sure what the hell I was going to do.
Chase managed to get a hit in, but his movements were slow from all the alcohol. Blood dripped from Kai’s lip, and Chase had sand covering his sweaty face.
“Stop!” I screamed again before reaching for Kai. I grabbed his arm and yanked. “Get off of him.”
“Police!” someone in the crowd yelled. Suddenly, all this felt all too familiar. My breathing became shallow. People started running around me. Drinks spilled. Teens screamed. It was just like before.
“Go outside. Find Kai. He’ll take you home. I have to stay here.”
“Come with me!” I pleaded. There was no way in hell I was leaving her here.
“Chase is here. Can’t let the asshole get in trouble without me,” she grinned mischievously.
“I’ll help you find him,” I offered.
“I don’t have time. Please.” She pushed at my shoulders. “Go. I’ll call you.”
I nodded my head and squeezed her hand. “Be safe.”
The panic hit me hard and fast. I clutched my chest, stuck in a memory I hadn’t processed yet. She died after a party like this. Violet was dead. I sucked in air, but it felt like my lungs couldn’t expand. No, no, no. Not again. Never again.
“Breeze?” A warm voice was calling to me. “Breeze!”
I covered my ears with my hands. No. No. No. Muscular arms picked me up, and I was soon cradled against a hard chest. Kai. “Let’s go, Little Whisper.”
Chase
Shit.
I really fucked up last night. I lost control. Again. I don’t even know what happened. One moment I was balls deep in Celeste, and the next my hands were around her neck, squeezing. Celeste and I usually got a little rough; it’s why the chemistry was off the charts. She liked her tight little ass spanked, and I was more than happy to oblige. But last night went too far. Breeze called that fuckwit, Kai. But I guess that was better than her calling the police. Not that it mattered, someone else did while he was beating the shit out of my stoned ass.
