Broken Compass

by Jo Raven

  “Hey. Hey, Sydney.” Something about her posture and the dark stains on her bare legs has alarms going off inside my head. I sit down beside her, put a hand on her back, run it down over her bony spine. “Are you hurt?”

  “I fell.” A choked whisper.

  “Where? What happened?” She trembles under my hand, and I give in and wrap my arm around her, tugging her against me. “Do I need to go beat someone up?”

  A sound between a sob and a laugh escapes her. “Kash…”

  “Did someone hurt you, Red? Tell me.”

  She slumps against me, wrapping her thin arms around me. “Just some boys at school. It was West’s turn to walk me home, but he’s sick and missed school.”

  Fear stabs me. “This happens a lot?”

  “It doesn’t. Told you, the boys have my back normally.” She lifts her head, leaving a wet patch of tears on my T-shirt. “I thought I was being so careful, but they got me.”

  “And they pushed you?” At her nod, I curse. “And what else? Did they hurt you more?”

  She shakes her head, and fuck, I hope she’s telling me the truth, or swear to God, I’ll ask her for the names of those boys and go kick their asses.

  “You can call me if you need help, Sydney. I’ll give you my number.”

  She frowns. “I texted Nate, to see if he could come get me, but he never answered. I hope he’s okay.”

  “Let’s focus on you for now, okay? I’m sure he’s fine. Let’s get you upstairs.”

  But she shoves at me and scoots away, her eyes red-rimmed but flashing with anger. “Don’t pretend to care. I’ll be okay. Go.”

  I blink. “I don’t… I’m not pretending.”

  “Don’t, Kash. You’re leaving. You don’t care about us.”

  She has a bruise on her delicate jaw, and blood on her lips. She looks so battered, I can’t breathe, and I don’t care if my denial is smashed to pieces.

  “I said I’m not pretending. Come on, let’s go up.”

  I take her hand, and she lets me, her gaze wary as I tug her to her feet. “You’re full of shit,” she whispers, and she’s right. I am. Sometimes I don’t even know when I’m lying to myself.

  Surely a bad sign.

  In her bathroom, I sit her down on the closed toilet seat and check her over, finding more bruises and small cuts. Nothing looks broken or in need of stitches, so I soak a towel in warm water and clean up the cuts. I find Band-Aids and apply them to her scraped knees.

  When I look up, I find her staring at me, her jade eyes wide, a light flush staining her cheeks.

  Then she glances away and bites on her lower lip.

  This is fucked up. I shouldn’t be wanting her now. I shouldn’t wanna kiss her, tug that full lower lip between my teeth, smooth my hands over her silky skin, under her clothes, pleasure her.

  Fuck, and now I’m hard. I’m kneeling on the floor in front of her, and I’m harder than I’ve ever been in my life.

  Why do I feel so attracted to her—so protective of her? I can’t blame the kiss we shared. I’ve kissed girls before. I want to run my hands over all the freckles on her body, kiss every part of her.

  She lifts her hand, pushes my hair off my face, then runs her fingers through my short spikes. Tugs on them, until I’ve laid my cheek on her lap.

  What’s happening? Why am I letting this happen?

  “Thank you for taking care of me,” she whispers. “Sorry for what I said.”

  “About?” I clutch the hem of her shorts and breathe in her scent.

  “About not caring.”

  Ah fuck. I close my eyes, groan quietly. She’s killing me. There’s nowhere else I’d rather be than here, right now, with my head in her lap and her hand in my hair.

  But I can’t stay.

  When I pull away, the look on her face shatters me. I get up anyway, prepare to go, but have to stand at the sink for a long moment, hands braced on the cool porcelain, to try and gather my thoughts.

  She gets up and puts her arms around my waist, and I let my head hang. Can’t let her get under my skin. Can’t afford to need her. Or anyone.

  “Don’t go, Kash,” she murmurs against my back.

  “You don’t need me.”

  “And if I do? If we all do?”

  “You don’t.”

  I think of Nate, of the bruises and the hidden truths, and my lungs constrict. I bow over the sink, gasping. No, I can’t. I can’t fight this battle for him. Or Sydney, or West.

  “Kash…”

  “No.” I push violently away from the sink and walk out of the bathroom, my heart banging about in my chest. “No, Red.”

  “Wait.”

  But I don’t stop. I need air. Somehow I make it out of her apartment, but I don’t head to Nate’s apartment. Can’t face anyone now, so I take the stairs down and spill out onto the street and start walking.

  Fuck. Fuck! I slam my hand over my chest, over my lungs, to get the damn things working again. I don’t know where I’m going, and I don’t give a shit.

  “Kash. Kash, wait!” By the time I turn into a side street, she’s managed to snag my hand and is jogging alongside me. “Where are you going?’

  There’s a sandwich place around the corner, with a long bench outside. I head there and sink down on the bench, pulling my hand free to wrap both arms around my middle.

  “What’s wrong?”

  I don’t trust my voice. I pull out my pouch and try to roll a cigarette. She watches my shaky fingers, a frown on her bruised face.

  “Is that why you smoke? It helps?”

  I just roll the damn cigarette, light up and get up to walk away from the shop so the smell won’t give me away.

  Suck in the smoke, hold, hold, let it out. Again, until I can breathe.

  As I start toward home, she falls in step beside me again, easily, as if we’ve done this a thousand times. “Look… I won’t ask you again to stay. I’m sorry.”

  I flinch. She realized what is wrong, why I smoke—and now she’s letting me off the hook. I should be glad. Relieved.

  I’m not. I have so many questions. So many doubts.

  Holding the sweet smoke in my lungs, I glance at her. “Where are your parents, Sydney?”

  “Call me Syd.”

  “Syd.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  But I’m not letting this go, not this time. In for a penny, in for a pound. “Are they dead?”

  “No. No, they’re not.”

  She’s marching beside me, slender brows knit, a fierceness in her gaze that catches at me, hooks inside my chest.

  “Mom left,” she says after a while, as we reach our building and climb up the steps to the entrance. “But she will be back. Any day now.”

  Goddammit.

  Putting out my cigarette on the wall, putting away the rest, I unlock the door and we step inside the dim stairwell. She has just opened up to me, told me her secret. Trusted me with it.

  She fidgets with the ends of her hair, her eyes glittering in the half-darkness.

  “Okay, Syd. I’ll stay a while longer.” I lick the sweetness of the weed off my lips. “I like my job, and… and I will see. A few more weeks. But then I really have to go.”

  She throws herself into my arms, and it takes me a few moments to catch on and put my arms around her. “Thank you,” she whispers against my chest. “Thank you.”

  I said just a few weeks, I want to remind her. Not long. I can’t.

  But I just hold her tightly to me and keep my fucking mouth shut.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Sydney

  He’s staying. He’s not leaving.

  Long after Kash has gone into Nate’s apartment, I’m still thinking of his arms around me, of his breath on my hair. I think about how he’s smoking weed to cope with whatever is haunting him, and I want to help.

  But how? He has never said a word about himself. He’s so private, so quiet and closed off, even when he’s taking care of us.

>   And the other question, of course, now that I’ve convinced Kash not to vanish into the sunset—is how am I going to stay? I can’t afford it.

  I lied to Nate. My savings—the money I made from selling everything of value in the apartment—is all gone. Even with my part-time job and my babysitting stints I can’t cover the rent and bills anymore.

  Leaving is unavoidable. If Mom returns—when she returns—she’ll have to find me. I’ll leave my new address with Nate and West.

  It’ll be fine. I’ll find a cheaper place and wait there. Maybe even close by.

  But my optimism frays around the edges when I check again the money left in my wallet. Jeez, is that even enough for this month’s rent? Crap.

  Trying not to panic, I go about cleaning my apartment. I understand why it calms West. There’s something about manual labor and keeping your hands busy when your mind’s all twisted up in knots that’s soothing. Sweep and mop the floors, dust the tables and counters, change the bed sheets, scrub the bathroom.

  West would really be proud to see me, I think. Then I remember he’s sick, and I text him.

  ‘Have you seen Nate?’ he asks, and I don’t want to tell him no, that he wasn’t there, that I got banged up because he didn’t show up.

  ‘Can I come over?’ I reply, and he texts back, ‘Yes.’

  My calm is quickly giving way to anger. Turns out I’m upset with Nate. He could have at least called to let me know he wouldn’t be there. Or maybe I’m just angry because I got so scared. When Kash found me, I wasn’t crying because it hurt, but because I had been terrified.

  I guess I got used to having the boys protecting me. Grew complacent and let my guard down.

  Never again. Those guys won’t get the jump on me ever again. Nobody ever will.

  I try to ignore the fear seeping back in, whispering at me that I’m all alone, that I’m lucky Nate and West took it on themselves to protect me. That they owe me nothing.

  But I twist that fear into anger, too, and let it warm me. Better angry than scared, right?

  I shower, put on loose summer pants to cover the Band-Aids on my knees, and a tank top, let my hair down and use concealer to cover the bruise. Then I slather on cherry lip gloss, and climb down the stairs to knock on Weston’s door.

  Ignoring Nate. Doing my best not to think of him, not to care. The guy I sort of kissed and who didn’t kiss me back. Who didn’t show up when I needed him.

  I need some better defenses against these boys, some buffer that won’t get my feelings trampled on and shredded apart. I knew that, but with the trouble they both were in, and with the fight they had, I’d sort of forgotten, pushed it to the back of my mind.

  They have each other. They don’t need me. Nobody needs me.

  Then West opens the door, dressed only in low-slung sweats, and all my decisions fly out the window. I’m gaping at him, and I bet I have little hearts in my eyes.

  Whoa. Heat alert. This is not a drill. How can a girl keep a cool head with such a hottie as a friend, huh?

  Where Nate’s chest is leanly muscled, West’s is powerful, with chiseled abs and defined pecs, and when he lifts a hand to rub at the back of his neck, his biceps bulge. This boy sure works out a lot, and his face is made of angles and shadows. Beautiful.

  And… I should stop gaping and enter.

  He shoots me an amused look as I saunter inside. Guess he caught me looking. I was that obvious. “Hey, Syd.”

  “Hey… home alone?”

  “Yeah.” He doesn’t elaborate. He’s usually more relaxed when his family’s not there, but…

  “They left you home alone when you’re sick?”

  “Ah… I’m much better now.” He pads across the living room to his room, and I follow, staring at his tight ass.

  He does look good.

  Christ, Sydney. Stop.

  “You missed school. You can’t be well already. Talk.” His bed is made, covers neatly tucked under at the corners, his pillows stacked on top. I sit down and grab one pillow to hug against my chest like a teddy bear.

  It smells of West, I belatedly realize, of soap and male musk and something I can’t name that reminds me of him. I curl around the pillow on his bed, my face heating when my body reacts, heat pooling in my belly.

  It doesn’t help that he’s standing there, shoulder propped against the wall, powerful arms folded over his bare chest, dark hair falling in his blue eyes. He looks… lickable.

  My face heats more at the thought of licking his bare chest, then lower… and lower.

  Crap.

  “You okay?” He lifts a brow at me. “You’re kinda flushed.” He frowns. “Is that a bruise on your face?”

  “Nah, I’m fine.” I hide a bit more behind his pillow. “So spill. Why didn’t you make it to school?”

  He’s still frowning. “Just sick. Threw up a couple of times. Probably something I ate.”

  “Or the fumes of all the bleach you use to clean.”

  He flinches and I’m instantly sorry.

  We’re silent for a few beats.

  “Have you ever thought about leaving?” I whisper.

  “Leaving?”

  “Yeah. Leaving all the bad behind and just going away. Making a new life.”

  His eyes darken. “Sounds like a nice dream. But we’re just kids. Where would we go, how would we live?”

  “We’d work. Share a place.” I bury my nose in his pillow and close my eyes. “We’d have each other.”

  Yeah. So much for not letting my defenses down and not expecting anything.

  Before I can berate myself properly, he ambles over to me and sits down beside me. “Syd…”

  “I know, I know. That was a stupid idea.”

  “It’s not that. I can’t leave Grandpa and my sister. They need me.”

  I need you, too, I want to say, but that’s exactly what I shouldn’t say or even think.

  But then he surprises me when he lays a hand on my hip and says, “But you’re not thinking of going, right?”

  How can I tell him that I’ll have to, sooner rather than later?

  The ice cream parlor, my afternoon part-time job, keeps me busy and stops my thoughts from spinning in dark loops—well, mostly. Telling the boys I have to go won’t be easy. At last Kash and Nate kind of know why. West… he’s always been my weak point.

  And not just because of the muscles. No, it’s something about him, an openness despite his quiet manners, despite his hidden feelings. Maybe it’s that intensity he has. He may not wear his heart on his sleeve like Nate, or tell everything with his eyes like Kash, but it feels as if he’s the purest of them. The one who can’t really hide what he feels, what he wants. Can’t hide and can’t turn off who he is.

  A good guy. Genuine. Real.

  It’ll hurt to leave them all. I hope Kash will stay, look after them. He’s older, after all, even if he doesn’t look it. He’s an adult already. I saw the way he helped. He pretends not to care, but I’m not buying it.

  “Daydreaming again?” Sara, my new co-worker elbows me in the ribs and grins. “Who’s the lucky guy?”

  “There isn’t one.”

  Sara is engaged and has stars in her eyes. It shouldn’t annoy me.

  It doesn’t, okay? Life is like that. Some people seem to have all the luck. And if for a while I felt I was one of them with my boys, with my hopes and dreams, now I know better.

  Life only showed me the good things to take them away again.

  “Why so morose?” Sara asks.

  “I’m not.”

  “Well, you look really sad. Did something happen?”

  “We have a customer.” I point at the guy who just entered and retreat to the back of the shop, happy to stop this conversation in its tracks, and well aware I’m not fooling anyone.

  But how could I answer her? It’s a long story, Sara. You probably don’t have the time for it, lost in a haze of love and fluttering cherubs.

  To cut a long story short, life is a bitc
h who bites.

  Kash is standing outside the ice cream parlor when I finish work, and the sight of him through the front window is a punch to my insides. He’s so pretty.

  “Who is that guy?” Sara whispers, her cheeks flushing. “He looks like an actor or something.”

  “Yeah?” I shrug, pretending not to care, and gather my things. “Will you close up? I don’t want to leave him waiting.”

  “You know him?”

  I enjoy her shock way too much.

  He does look like an actor, I think as I step out into the warm early evening. Like a movie star from some sci-fi blockbuster, with the blue streaks in his white-blond hair and those icy eyes, the silver hoops in his nose and brows, in his ears, the unzipped hoodie and the threadbare T-shirt of a Metallica concert, the combat boots and faded blue jeans.

  Elfin, and yet badass.

  I try not to remember that I cried on his chest earlier, smearing it with snot and tears, or that I begged him not to leave us.

  “What are you doing here? How did you even know where I work?”

  He grins. “I asked Nate. Thought to walk you home.”

  “Don’t you have to be at work?”

  “I’m going in late today.”

  I don’t want to ask about Nate, but when I open my mouth what comes out is, “How is he?” I adjust the strap of my purse on my shoulder. “Did he even go to school today? He wasn’t in my classes.”

  “I haven’t seen him all day.” He frowns, pulls a rolled cigarette from behind one ear and turns it between his long, elegant fingers.

  He has an artist’s hands, I think, a musician’s, or a painter’s. He lifts the cigarette to his lips and pulls out a lighter from his back pocket to light up.

  “You smoke too much,” I mutter.

  “Yeah. It’s bad for you. Don’t do it.”

  I smile, not sure why I’m even smiling. “And they say weed addles your brain.”

  “Not if it’s too addled to begin with,” he says, not missing a beat.

  “I’m serious. You’ll get addicted to it.”

  “I am addicted to it, Red.” He says it like it doesn’t matter. “I need it.”