“It’s okay,” Zach said. “I’m teaching Tyler a lesson.”
“Call Dad,” Tyler yelled.
Alianna didn’t move.
“Call Dad, you failed save-the-marriage baby—”
Zach pulled his arm back harder. “Say something nice to her! Now!”
“Okay, okay,” Tyler yelled. “You’re kind of a smart girl.”
“Say something I don’t already know,” Alianna said. Her face was burning red, but her stance wasn’t yielding.
Zach tightened his grip until Tyler started to talk. “Fine. You’re smarter than me! Is that what you want?”
Alianna had tears in her eyes that made Zach ache to hug her, but he wasn’t done with Tyler, not by half.
“Go,” he told his little sister. “I need to talk to him. He won’t bother us anymore after this. Promise.”
Alianna nodded, backed out of the room, and shut the door behind her.
“What went wrong with you?” Zach screamed. “Why are you so evil? I mean, I understand that we got fucked up as kids. Believe me, I’m the only one who gets that as well as you, but why do you have to be vicious all the time?”
“You’re a weak, whiny woman, Zach. That doesn’t make me evil.”
Zach pulled his arm back even farther. It was going to snap out of Tyler’s shoulder socket at any moment. And yet the tears were burning in Zach’s eyes. It hurt to harm his brother, and that was hands down the worst part. “This is not about your sick pictures of girls. I’m here about the video. Of Jaycee’s brother. Of him dying.”
Tyler stopped struggling. “You watched that?”
“I can’t unwatch it, you asshole. You’ve completely scarred Bishop. And Jaycee…what if she knew that you had that? It’d kill her!” Zach threw the phone at the wall and it burst into pieces. “Why did you have it?”
“BECAUSE HE WAS MY FRIEND!”
Tyler whipped his body around and threw Zach off of him. He held his arm to his chest and backed into the bed. “He was fucking nuts, but he was my friend. I was his ‘photographer.’ He was trying to make a demo tape to become a reality TV host for those dumbasses who explore abandoned buildings. I was taping him when he died because I always taped him.” Tyler grabbed a box out of his closet and pulled out a small video recorder. “Here. There’s probably seventy hours of Jake being Jake on that. Give that to Jaycee if you’re so desperate to bone her.”
Zach punched his brother in the face.
It was a beautiful sort of punch. The kind that sent Tyler flying backward.
“She’s my friend. Don’t you ever talk about my friends like that.” He paused, his fist still ready for another go. “You know what? Don’t talk about anyone like that in my presence again. You make me sick, Tyler. Even if you were Jake’s photographer, why would you have that video on your phone?”
“Because sometimes I watch it. I want to remember that all we have is seconds. Why be careful? Why be cautious or hold back? It doesn’t matter in the end, because sometimes your neck just snaps.” He clapped his hands, and Zach jumped.
“You need help.”
Angry tears glazed his brother’s eyes. “Oh, so you saw a video of Jake dying? And that makes you so traumatized and noble? I was there, you fuckface. I was there, and he was my friend. Work that out. Go on, I’d like to see you do the math. I know you can’t put numbers together for shit.”
Zach stood there watching his brother for a long moment. It was the damnedest thing; Zach knew that Tyler wanted him to leave so that he could cry alone. Zach knew that because they’d grown up together, fighting over Halloween candy and NERF weapons. And yet, the fact that Zach knew Tyler so well had become its own sort of roadblock. Tyler didn’t want people around who knew his softer side. He wanted Zach to see him like the world saw him: a selfish, foul playboy.
“Stay away from Alianna,” Zach said. “Stay away from me.”
“Fuck off.”
“Okay.” Zach moved to the door. “I will. I am.”
“You going to go cry and say that I’m not your brother anymore?”
“You’ll always be my brother, but I don’t have to let your life touch mine. I’m not going to turn into you. Not for anything.”
Zach left the room and ran straight into Alianna eavesdropping in the hall. She threw her arms around him and sobbed into his chest.
“I hate him,” she said.
“What’d you tell me?” He looked down at her. “He hates himself. That’s enough.”
Chapter 50
Natalie
The hospital waiting room smelled like strong cleaner. Bishop was dead asleep in the corner, and Natalie sat on the sofa with Jaycee collapsed across her lap. It had been six hours since they’d arrived, four hours since the nurse came out and said that Mik had a bad concussion but was otherwise all right.
An hour ago, the cop who’d taken their names showed up to give the good news that the property manager wasn’t going to press charges, so everything had worked out okay. But then, if everything was okay, how was Natalie going to get Jaycee back into a sitting position? And where the hell had Zach taken off to? She checked her phone, but he still hadn’t responded to her fifteen hundred texts.
At one point, she called her mother and told her what had happened. Natalie was shocked that the phone didn’t erupt into flames in her hand. Honestly, she was shocked by her mom’s rather relaxed interpretation of the whole situation. “The neural insulation of your frontal lobe won’t be finished developing until you’re in your midtwenties. You’re not fully aware of the consequences of your actions,” her mother informed her.
Was that it? Was it her frontal lobe’s fault that she felt so disconnected all the time?
Jaycee slowly sat up.
“I thought you were asleep,” Natalie said.
Jaycee shook her head. “Can’t.”
Natalie handed Jaycee her phone. “Text your dad. Something vague and positive so he doesn’t worry why we’re not on our way home yet. We’ll explain to him what happened in person.”
Jaycee thumbed a text and then leaned back, her eyes closed. “Heard from Zach?”
“Nope. And yep, I am going to kill him when he resurfaces.”
“Leave him be. That was a lot to take. Maybe he needed to get away.” Jaycee opened her eyes and stared at Natalie. “I couldn’t move…couldn’t think… I think you saved his life.”
“I only did what you would have done.” Natalie thought back to Mik beneath the bars, and her mind burned. The truth was that she’d wanted to run again. To hide from what was happening, but Jaycee was there falling down beside her, and she had to be the strong one. “Any perceived bravery is just me doing my impression of you. You and Jake.”
“He wasn’t brave,” Jaycee said with so much resignation that the words felt heavy. “He was courageously stupid. That’s what I keep thinking about. All of Jake’s ideas and challenges, what was the point? The adrenaline? The fear? The notoriety?”
“I think it was a potent cocktail of all three.” Natalie picked at a hole in her jeans. “I thought I was being brave by going out of state for college. I thought I had to get out of town to become a new person. Fresh start. Reinvent myself into someone who is not so controlling. I’ve even had this countdown going for almost two years.” She sat up and sniffed hard. “But you know what? I don’t want to be different. I want to be myself, and I think you’re the only person who’s ever made me feel strong enough to do that.”
“Zach does too, in his own way.”
“He’s not enough. Leaving isn’t enough. I need to be okay with who I am.”
“So do that.”
Natalie sat up, excited but not in a good way. “See? Right there. That’s the huge difference between us. I can’t just accept myself. I doubt, and I question, and I make up stories that seem more interesting tha
n my own experiences. I’ve been in therapy for years. I’ve been on half a dozen antidepressants, and the only revelation I’ve had is that I can’t stand that I ran away from you five years ago.”
Jaycee scowled. “Don’t let that pull you under. I can forgive you. I suppose I have to.”
“No, you don’t. And I don’t want you to. I don’t deserve it.” Natalie looked down and twisted her hands together. “Jayce, I tried to kill myself.” She’d never said the words aloud before. They come out in a gust, leaving her throat chafed.
Jaycee shrugged. “Who hasn’t?”
Natalie shook her head. “Listen. Three years ago, I took fifteen Motrin. I researched it online and found out how many I needed to take for my weight. I put the bottle back in the cabinet afterward and went to take a nap like nothing happened.”
“Did you panic and call 911?”
“My mom canceled her class unexpectedly and found me passed out in my own vomit.”
Jaycee’s stubbornly unaffected look transformed. Natalie realized with a start that what she was seeing was Jaycee’s fear. “That…that certainly is trying to kill yourself.” Tears glassed Jaycee’s eyes, but she set her jaw. “Your mom canceled a class? That’s unbelievable.”
Natalie choked on a laugh. “You think it’s fate?”
“Nah. We don’t believe in that crap.” Jaycee wound her arm in Natalie’s.
“I can’t believe how sure you are of everything. You’ve always been so sure, like you know me inside and out. Like we’re both these permanent, mighty beings.” Natalie was crying, but she didn’t care. “When I wasn’t your friend anymore, it was also like I wasn’t me.”
Jaycee laughed sadly. “That’s funny, because I was the one having an identity crisis. I think I became Jake for a few years, and then when I started to forget him, it was like there was nothing else inside of me. Who is Jaycee Strangelove anyway? I’m the damaged girl. No hobbies. No passions. No future.”
“Oh, I know this one!” Natalie sat up tall and faced Jaycee. If she was going to go full know-it-all, she was going to do it right. “You’re the girl who read about King Tut’s tomb and spent all her allowance money on a digital video camera so that we could do a reenactment. You’re the girl who talked me through a mile of pitch-black sewer pipe with such elaborate descriptions of Narnia that I was never once afraid. And disapparating! You convinced me that we could magic ourselves from place to place when we were way too old to believe that.”
Natalie shoved the tears out of her way so that she could keep speaking. “You’re the girl who loved her big—albeit brash—brother so damn much that I ached to have a big brother of my own. And when I figured out that that was impossible, I made Jake my big brother. That’s what it felt like that day. I wasn’t watching your big brother die. I was watching mine.”
The nurse came in, and both Natalie and Jaycee looked down, embarrassed. “I… Sorry to interrupt, girls. I wanted to tell you that Ryan is awake, and we’re going to process him to be released. You can go see him now, if you’d like.”
Natalie thanked the nurse, and when she finally worked up the courage to look at Jaycee, she found her staring at where the woman had stood. Natalie took a deep breath. “I never wanted to tell you that. I know he’s your brother. I just…well…”
“I understand,” Jaycee said, distracted and rubbing her arms nervously. “Go see Mik.”
“I think you should do that.”
Jaycee shook her head. “I think I’m furious with him, and that’s cold considering he almost died a few hours ago.” She scowled hard. “How could he want me to picture him there? Standing with Jake’s friends on the playground, laughing and drinking? Saying the words that sent Jake up there…” Her voice sputtered out. “And what about now? Does Mik want everyone to know? My dad? My mom?” Jaycee choked on her own breath. “Picture it, Nat. ‘Hey Mom, Mik is my boyfriend now. He’s studying medicine at KSU. Oh, and he’s also responsible for Jake’s death.’”
Natalie was trying to figure out what to say, but Jaycee’s voice recharged. “You want to know what’s really unhinged? Want to hear me sound so girlie you might get nauseous? I’m mostly mad because Mik ruined it all before anything even happened. I just want to talk to him. Hang out with him.”
“Kiss him?”
“Well, yeah. Hell yeah.”
Natalie was quiet for a moment. “So wait, are you mad that Mik ruined it all by daring Jake, or did he ruin it all because he wanted you to know the truth?”
“Is there a difference? It’s ruined either way.”
“There is a difference, but it doesn’t have anything to do with Mik. You either accept what happened as part of this grand, sad scheme, or you reject it—and you reject him too.”
Jaycee crossed her arms. “You know I always accept the truth.”
“So what are you waiting for? Go talk to him. I dare you.”
Jaycee’s expression hardened the way it always did when she had a challenge. She stood up, and only the slow pace of her steps proved that she was terrified.
Natalie watched Jaycee leave, and then she slumped in her chair. She glanced over at Bishop and found him watching.
“You two make sense,” he said, rolling over onto his back across three chairs. “It’s that whole ‘opposites attract’ thing.”
“Yin and yang,” Natalie corrected, closing her eyes and feeling strangely at peace.
Chapter 51
Jaycee
I walked down the neon-white hospital hallway, pausing outside of Mik’s assigned room. I’d come by once while he was sleeping, peeking in at him while my fear sucked me under and whipped me around. What would I feel when I looked at him now that I knew the truth?
I leaned against the wall until a nurse came by, squinting at me. I ducked inside. “Hey—”
Mik was shirtless. He hunched over the edge of the bed while he laced his boots. A forehead bandage glared at me when he looked up, but that’s not what caught my eye.
I finally saw what had gotten Natalie so excited weeks ago.
“Tattoos,” I said like I had Tourette’s. A blush reached up my neck and cheeks. Mik sat back, and I took a few steps closer, getting a better look at the black symbols and strings of words across his chest and upper arms. I cleared my throat. “You have tattoos.”
His eyes were on me, but his mouth stayed closed.
I got closer somehow. “Am I back to the silent treatment?”
“Depends.”
“On what?”
“What you want.” His dark eyes made something in me kind of scream, and I pressed myself between his knees before I could think twice about it. He took my hips in his hands, and I started to leak those silent, slipping tears that I had no control over.
“The crying…it’s not about you. I mean, I was scared, but you’re all right.” I pushed at the tears with my palms, unable to stop. “It’s not about you,” I said again.
“It’s not about Jake,” he said like he was correcting me.
“What?”
“How I feel about you. It’s not about Jake. Never has been.”
“My parents think you’ve had a crush on me since we were kids.” My fingers brushed the tattoo on his right shoulder, a scrolling Latin phrase. Serva me, servabo te. “What’s this one say?”
“It says, ‘I’ve had a crush on you since we were kids.’” His tone hinted at sarcasm. I couldn’t say for sure, because I barely knew the angles of his voice. When I didn’t respond he added, “It means, ‘Save me and I will save you.’”
I touched the tattoo over his heart. A date written in a circle. My brother’s last day on this planet. “And this one? Does this have nothing to do with Jake as well?” I had the strangest feeling like we were on the edge of a fight, and it made me stronger. I wanted to push him over and interrogate him. Or hit him…or kiss him. Or bo
th. “Why didn’t I know that you have tattoos?”
“Because you couldn’t even look at me while we were playing Zach’s stripping game all those weeks ago.”
“Did you just call me a coward?”
“Also depends. Are you going to use all this as an excuse not to get to know me?”
I made a note of the way his voice dropped lower when he was riled. And that note read: Jaycee, you fucking love him. I touched his face, turned his chin so that I could see the bandage over that evil notch in his skull. “Maybe I’m afraid of you.”
“You don’t have to—”
“Mik, the last real time we spent together, we were building bonfires in the backyard and feeding Jake’s gecko bags of crickets.” I kept moving closer even though my words got harsher. “And what am I supposed to do? Tell my parents about your dare? Am I supposed to ignore it? You know I’ll never be able to lie about what you…about your part in Jake’s death.”
He scowled, and if this was Mik getting angry with me, I liked it way too much. “You should major in excuses, Jayce.”
I pushed away from him, and he stood, and then my hands were somehow on his chest. He pulled me close, and the world swung like a carousel with me stuck in its center. “You’re making me dizzy,” I said. “Stop.”
He let me go, but I didn’t let go of him. I didn’t want to.
My pocket vibrated. I turned my back and answered my phone. “Zach. Where are you?”
Mik’s fingers slipped through my hair, and for a solid minute, I felt like I was going to pass out. “What? No, I heard you. Meet you outside.” I hung up and realized that Mik had done a terrible job of putting my hair back in its ponytail.
He leaned down to my ear, and every nerve in my body shone. “Give me a chance.”
Natalie appeared in the doorway, literally skidding when she saw us so close. “Just wanted to say, uh, that Zach texted finally. He’s outside, ready to go.” She looked from Mik’s shirtlessness to me. “Why do you have sex hair? You guys making up?”
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