by Esme Devlin
“You’re so fucking beautiful,” I tell her, shaking my head.
She gives me a last knock, right in heart, and then pushes past me to the entrance of the chamber, clearly not giving a fuck that she’s walking into the darkness.
“Calvin get all this shit, will you,” I shout over at him but he’s still fucking consumed. I dunno how he does it?
Stamina.
I need to learn some.
I pick up the lamp and run right after her.
Chapter 21
LACEY
By the time we get back to the car it’s pitch dark. I can barely see my hand in front of my face, but somehow Shaun and Calvin navigate effortlessly.
Where before the only sound I could hear was the wind rattling through the trees, now there are sounds everywhere. Owls hoot in the distance, things rustle around us low on the ground. Foxes? Wolves? Do you get wolves in Scotland?
I don’t ask.
Relief washes over me when I see the silhouette of the cars in the silvery moonlight.
“Are you coming home?”
Where is home? I glance over at my friend, who’s standing outside the car while Calvin opens the door for her.
“I’d rather stay with Stevie tonight,” I tell him, afraid of the repercussions.
But there are none.
He nods and opens my door for me. I get in, wincing as I use my sore hand to adjust myself in the seat. He bandaged it up neatly but it still stings. Will it scar, I wonder?
He doesn’t say much at all on the drive back. Maybe he doesn’t know what to say. Maybe he’s already said everything he had to say.
There is one question that’s eating me up inside, and I’ve been holding it in because I’m terrified of the answer.
But I know I won’t settle tonight if I don’t ask it. I need to know.
“Would you have left me there alone if I had said no?”
He glances over at me in the dark car. The moon is high overhead and the only light comes from the dials on the dashboard.
“There are rules.”
“You agree with those rules?”
He pauses for a few seconds. “I don’t make the rules, not yet.”
“Answer the fucking question, Shaun. Would you have left me there alone to die?”
He sticks his elbow back up on the side of the door and plays with his lip again.
“I wouldn’t have left you there to die. I would have ran with you.”
“So why did you say you would?”
He shrugs. “I never said I would. In fact, the whole time I think I maintained that I wouldn’t hurt you. You just imagined what I was capable of.”
I try to go over the events of the night but they’re blurry already. Did he ever say he would leave me there to die? If he didn’t say it, it was definitely implied.
I’m not going to argue over semantics.
“Why would we have needed to run? No one else knows that I know,” I argue.
“Calvin knows.”
“Calvin’s your best friend.”
“Doesn’t mean shit. The secret is bigger than best friends, marriages, family.”
“But you’d have run anyway, for me?”
“I would have.”
I sit back in my seat just as the orange glow of the town comes into view. The journey back hasn’t taken a tenth of time the journey out here did.
We were going in circles.
Just like we are in our actual lives. Round and round. He hurts me, he justifies, I forgive him. And every time I do, I somehow end up more fucking attached to him than I was before.
Is he a monster? Yes.
But deep down I think I’ve always known that.
“What the fuck are we going to do?”
She slams her bedroom door shut behind us. She’s whispering, but it’s frenzied.
All I can do is shake my head.
“He told me in the car he wasn’t going to do it,” I tell her.
“Calvin said the same.”
“They tricked us.” I sit down on the bed and run my fingers over the bandage.
“They’ve tricked us since the day we met them,” she says.
She kicks her shoes off and starts undressing in the middle of the room. “I need to get out of these clothes. I can smell him. Why the fuck? What the fuck.” Her voice breaks and her hands are trembling. She struggles with the buttons on her blouse and then gives up, rubbing the back of her neck while her breathing turns harsh.
“Hey, it’s okay.” I get up off the bed and wrap my arms around her. She’s trembling. “You didn’t…” I let the sentence trail away. I was going to ask her if she hadn’t wanted it.
But that was a stupid question.
Of course she didn’t want it. She was doing it to survive, not because she wanted it.
She’s not sick in the head like me.
“It’s okay,” I tell her, rubbing her back. “Come here, let me get them.”
I break away from her and undo her buttons, even though every one makes me flinch in pain.
“You go in the shower and get cleaned up. I’ll get changed and bring us up a cup of tea, okay?”
She nods her head, trying to pull herself away from wherever she was. She looks at me and she’s back in the room. “Okay.”
She slips into the ensuite and I get changed myself. I don’t even know what time it is. I grab my phone from my bag to check, but it barely registers when I see whose name is on my screen.
Shaun.
Already?
I slide open my phone to reveal the message.
You won’t regret it, I swear.
I click the lock and throw it on the bed, heading down to the kitchen to make good on my promise of tea.
A cup of tea always helps.
We’ll untangle this mess and we’ll get through it, we always do.
“I feel like I’m losing myself, Lace.”
We’re under the covers. We’re both fed and clean and fresh, and although my body aches and my hand stings I feel heaps better already.
The tea has long been drunk and we’re facing each other in the dark.
“I feel like I lost myself a long time ago,” I reply.
Silence stretches out before us and I close my eyes. I won’t sleep, not for a long while yet, but since I can’t see anything anyway, it makes no sense keeping them open.
“I wanted it,” she whispers. “What does that make me?”
I lie there silently while relief pours over me. It’s not all selfish either. While I’m pleased to hear it’s not just me who’s messed up, I’m thankful that she doesn’t need to live her life as a victim.
“It doesn’t make you anything,” I tell her. “No more than it makes me anything. I wanted it too. I didn’t, but then I did. And literally the only thing that changed were the words that came out of his mouth. Words that could mean something but could equally mean nothing at all.”
I hear her let out a sigh and she turns over to look at the dark ceiling.
“Do you think one day we could be happy?”
Thinking she has the right idea, I do the same. Maybe I’ll find some answers in that dark ceiling.
“It’s possible. It depends what you want, though? You said uni, travel. You want to see the world?”
“I think so,” she tells me. “How is it?”
“The world? Well…” I think about it for a minute. “It’s nothing like this place.” I think about all the places I’ve been. The colors, the sounds, the people. There’s nothing at all wrong with the world, but, “I’ve never felt as alive anywhere as I do in this place.”
“Yeah. I get you. It’s not this place, though. It’s them.”
“I always just wanted a home,” I tell her. “Somewhere to put roots down. To build a life, friendships, a family. I never told Shaun that, he just knew. Is it wrong to want to believe he can give me that?”
“It’s not wrong, but only you can say if he’s lying.”
“Shaun
doesn’t lie,” I tell her. I think I believe that now. He doesn’t need to lie, he’s smart enough to work his way around them. “He told me when we have a family, his dad loses everything.”
“What do you mean?”
I turn back over in bed. My back still aches from earlier and it’s impossible to get comfortable. “Like a succession. So Jim and Alice were at the top until Shaun came along, and everything passed to his dad.”
“I see. That would mean having his child. That would mean I’d have to babysit.”
I chuckle softly in bed remembering the night we joked about that. Fucking hell. That was a good night. One of the best nights I’ve ever had.
“Do you remember that? You were so drunk.”
She laughs. “He fucked me and then we started drinking again. We were so wasted I swear, laughed all night.”
“I wish we could go back to that night,” I tell her.
“Yeah, me too. Would you change it, though?”
Would I?
If I could go back, would I have walked away? Would I have ran, just like he wanted in the first place?
“No,” I tell her, knowing full well it’s insane.
“Me neither,” she says.
Friday. The schools in Scotland have a half day every Friday — a cheeky little 12.30pm finish — and I absolutely love them. Just four hours to get through and then a whole weekend to do as I please.
We’re discussing plans as I walk across the car park with Stevie. My car is still sat in the same place I left it yesterday, so I hitched a lift with her this morning.
“What about a trip through to Livingstone?” she suggests. “There’s an outlet there, proper nice clothes and loads of them discounted. We could shop and do lunch?”
I’ve been waiting to see when or if the credit card my dad gave me gets cancelled, but since it’s still working fine, I nod my head. “Sounds good.”
I guess at some point he’ll stop paying for me and I’ll have to find a job. I make a mental note to use some of the weekend to go job hunting. Maybe a few hours babysitting or dog walking or something.
We approach the school and Shaun and his friends are sitting out the front, the same place they occupied that first day I ever laid eyes on him.
I don’t know what to do.
How do I act?
I wish I wasn’t so socially fucking awkward. You’d think after everything I’d have lost that, but no.
“Lace,” he shouts as we make to walk past them.
I stroll over, not exactly smiling but not frowning either.
He stands up from the bike rack he was sitting on and pulls me in close to him, his chin resting on my head.
“Liam’s back,” he mumbles.
I look up at him. Of course he’s back. It’s been almost two weeks, he wasn’t going to stay off forever.
I nod my head. “It’s fine.”
“Avoid him, okay? If he does or says anything you text me straight away.”
I nod again. “Okay. I’ll be fine. Have you told Heather?”
“I just text her, says she’s kipping anyway, she’s always thought Fridays were pointless. She’ll be back on Monday.”
The bell rings and I head to class. It’s only 4 hours, no lunch, one break. I’ve avoided Liam before and I can avoid him again.
Easy peasy.
As if.
I’m heading to meet Stevie for morning break when he walks out of the class in front of me, his metal crutches creaking under his weight. His leg is in a boot-cast, from his toe to his thigh, and he only has one shoe on. I stop dead, hoping that if I just hang back, he won’t see me.
But he looks both ways as he comes out the door and his eyes lock onto mine instantly.
He lets everyone else pass him, and I just stand there, rooted to the ground while they all go around me.
Perhaps this is for the best. Face the confrontation head on, and then I won’t have to avoid him for the entire school year.
And the confrontation isn’t even mine, anyway. This was about him and Shaun, and what he did to Heather.
“Lacey,” he says. His tone is ice cold.
“Liam.”
He hobbles over to me. I don’t back away. I’m not scared of him, even less so now that he’s a cripple.
He looks me up and down and his eyes settle on my ring.
“So the rumours are true, then?”
He’s still staring at it when he asks the question.
“I didn’t know there were rumours, but if they’re saying Shaun and I are married now then yes, they’re true.”
He smirks and then laughs, shaking his head. He looks me up and down again and this time his eyes stop on my other hand, the one still covered by the gauze bandage.
I quickly put it behind my back.
“Cut yourself?”
“Smashed a glass,” I tell him with a shrug.
“You ought to be more careful,” he says.
“Noted. Did you want something?”
His eyes flick towards mine and he smiles.
“You know exactly what I wanted.”
I roll my eyes and go to head past him, but he sticks his crutch out against the wall, effectively blocking me in.
“We don’t get what we want,” I tell him. “Throw your tantrum all you want, it doesn’t change anything.”
He shakes his head, tutting at me. “You know I would have really enjoyed adjusting your attitude.”
It’s me who smiles now. Who the fuck does he think he is?
“I pity the girl who does end up with you.”
He drops the crutch and pulls it back in beside him, signalling that I’m free to go.
I don’t hesitate.
“You should,” he shouts after me. “I’ll take great pleasure in making her life a misery.”
I stop at the end of the corridor because the threat in his voice was fucking undeniable.
He’s not worth it.
With a sigh, I round the corner and race down the stairs.
He can’t touch me. Not anymore.
Shaun promised.
“There’s a meeting tonight. I want you there with me,” he tells me as he walks me out to my car.
His gray Q5 is parked in the space next to mine.
“A meeting?”
“Aye.”
“Where?”
“I’ll pick you and Stevie up at 7pm.”
I nod my head and open the door of my car, taking a last look at him. He smiles and comes over to me, taking a hold of my sore hand.
“I never said thank you,” he says, his fingers pressing into the tender flesh.
“What for?” I look up at him, confused. His eyes are happy. It suits him.
“For trusting me. After everything that’s happened.”
Did I ever have a choice? I don’t think I did. So I don’t say anything, I just let him bend down and kiss me on the lips.
“I’ll see you at 7,” he says, breaking the kiss and then diving into his own car.
I let him reverse first and then head home.
Well, the only home I know now.
Chapter 22
SHAUN
“You spoke to Stevie today?”
Calvin shrugs next to me. “Seen her in the passing at break.”
“And?”
He looks sideways out of the car.
“I’ve never been able to talk my way out of situations like you have,” he says, tapping his fingers along the side of the door.
I chuckle because it’s probably true. “She’ll come around.”
“Probably.”
I pull up outside the house. It’s just gone seven PM, and I beep the horn to let them know we’re here.
I’ve not told anyone about what happened last night. My dad will probably shit, because technically it’s his call to make and not mine or Calvin’s. But he’d have known this day was coming.
He knows his days are numbered.
The girls hop in the back seat, and by the
time I’ve pulled the car away you could cut the tension between Stevie and Calvin with a knife.
Calvin looks out the window. I check the mirror and Stevie’s looking down at her phone.
“We’re likely going to get shit for this so the pair of you better sort your attitude and get on the same side before we get there.”
Calvin clears his throat but doesn’t say anything.
“Stevie, Calvin’s sorry,” I continue.
“Shaun, Calvin should learn to tell Stevie he’s sorry by himself,” Stevie replies.
Lacey snorts behind me and I can just picture her amused little face.
“Calvin, tell Stevie you’re sorry.”
“This is childish,” he says.
“Exactly.” I pull the car up on the side of the road. We’re about three minutes away from my dad’s club — a ten-minute walk. “Out.”
Calvin looks at me. I unclip his seatbelt for him to show him I’m not fucking about.
“You’re a prick,” he says, opening the door.
“Exactly. Stevie, move your arse doll.”
She huffs but opens the door and climbs out of the car anyway, slamming the door behind her. I watch as she storms off down the road and Calvin jogs to catch up with her.
Lacey giggles behind me.
“Shift your arse in the front, darlin,” I tell her.
“You’re being extra ass-holey tonight,” she says, sliding through the gap between the seats.
“They’ll be fine by the time they get there, I bet ya.”
We get to the club two minutes later and I notice the concerned look on her face when I pull the handbrake up.
“You alright?”
“What did you mean when you said you’ll get shit for this?”
“It’ll be fine. Don’t worry yourself, if anyone says anything it’ll be to me and Calvin, not you.”
She looks over at me but her face is still wary. I take her hand and press it up to my lips, squeezing it gently. She winces and I realize what I’ve just done. “Shit, sorry,” I tell her, giving her her hand back.
“You’re lucky I can’t make a fist with this or it would be going right through your jaw,” she threatens playfully.
