Broken Compass

by Jo Raven

  “West…” Sydney walks into his arms, and he holds her tightly. “I can’t leave you here.”

  “Yes, you can.” He extricates himself from her, roughly, and I bet he’s hanging on to the last threads of his control. “I’ll see you around. Don’t be a stranger.”

  “Okay.” Her tears run freely, dripping down her cheeks. “Take care.”

  And we’re off, making our way into the night.

  Book II

  Later

  Nine months later

  “Not all those who wander are lost.”

  J.R.R Tolkien, Lord of the rings

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Sydney

  “Honey, I’m home!” Nate tosses the keys into the bowl by the door and saunters into our apartment. “Come out, come out, wherever you are, or I’ll bring in friends to party!”

  I smile at him from my perch on our ratty sofa, flipping my math book shut. “Hey, you. How was your day?”

  “All better now,” he says, and warmth fills his whiskey-colored eyes.

  I used to get up and go kiss his cheek, but he’s flinched away so many times, I stopped. Since we ran away, he’s relaxed a lot, but he still gets tense when I’m close.

  Maybe if you keep kissing his cheek, he’ll come to expect it, a tiny hopeful voice whispers in the back of my mind. Maybe he’ll come to like it. Want it.

  Want you.

  But I’ve given up on Nate wanting me. Having him as my friend will have to be enough. Eventually. I thought about asking him why he hates my touch so much, but I can’t. I’m not sure I’m ready to find out.

  Not when his every look and word feel both like a caress and a cut through me.

  “Earth to Sydney. What’s for dinner?”

  I blink. “Um. Kash said something about leftovers from the restaurant.”

  “Awesomesauce.”

  “He said George insists he needs to eat more.”

  “I totally agree. We all need more Greek food in our lives.” I grin and follow him into the kitchen where he rummages in the fridge, pulling out packages of food. “Man, if I was into guys, I’d marry dear old George.”

  “Kash is prettier.”

  “But Kash doesn’t own a restaurant. Very important point.”

  “You’re not denying that Kash is pretty.”

  “Boys aren’t pretty, Shortcake. They’re handsome.”

  “Still not denying my point.”

  “Okay, fine. Kash is plenty pretty. Just not as pretty as me.”

  I laugh. God, I like this more relaxed, happier Nate. His appetite is finally back, too, and he’s not as skinny as he used to be. He eats like a truck driver, and he trains with Kash who wasn’t kidding when he said he knows how to fight. They’ve both put on muscle, and height, and I mean… oh boy.

  Whew. Hot.

  “He took care of this place until we got enough money to pay our part, though.”

  “Yeah.” He frowns as he sticks the food in the microwave. “Where do you think he got that money? I doubt George lent it to him.”

  “You never know.” But I don’t think so. “I think George sort of adopted him.”

  “Why would anyone want to adopt Kash? I’m more adoptable. And adorable.”

  I don’t know about that, but he sure is sexy. I look at Nate sideways, pretending to be studying my food, my gaze snagging on the warm amber hue of his long-lashed eyes, the wide mouth and square, stubbled jaw, the broad set of his shoulders.

  Oh my… “Sure,” I say breathily.

  Stop thinking about how sexy Nate is. Stop it, Sydney.

  “Yeah?” Nate makes puppy eyes at me, and I snicker, my trance shattered.

  “You are adorbs. Now eat your food.”

  Better think about other things, like… where did Kash get that money? I remember bills appearing under my door. I never worked up the courage to ask Kash if he was the one who put it there.

  We’ve mostly avoided talking about ourselves in these past months. Some initial attempts to clarify some things ended up in fights. Nate was too raw to even want to sit down and talk at all. He dropped out of school, got a job in a seedy, probably illegal bar, and has lived day to day for quite a long time.

  Kash closed up, too, disappearing for most of the day, working different jobs, and not talking much. My only chance to talk to him is late at night when he’s on our tiny balcony, smoking, but by then I’m usually too tired to stay up.

  And as for me… I don’t know. I’m kind of…. lost? I guess. I hadn’t planned on leaving the apartment with just the clothes on my back. But I just couldn’t bear the thought of my boys going, and of the loneliness I’d face. Of how much I’d miss them.

  I can’t even talk about how I gave up on Mom coming back to me. Sure, West has our address and could tell her where I am if she turns up. If she ever comes back…

  God, I miss West. I was devastated he didn’t come along. I still see him in classes, and he walks me to the bus stop sometimes, but I miss spending afternoons and evenings with him, in his room, talking and playing video games. Being there for him. I’m so worried about him ever since we left. His grandfather is such a creep.

  But yeah, we don’t talk about these things. We keep to banal, everyday topics, like the weather, the bills, whether or not we had an okay day at work.

  “Fuck, this smells good,” Nate mutters, placing the steaming plate of food on the table and grabbing two dishes from the rack. “What is it, though?”

  I peer more closely at it. “Hm… I think I recognize zucchini in there. And minced meat.”

  “Okay, I’m down with zucchini and meat. Let me at it.” And he digs in and starts stuffing his face.

  I shouldn’t find that cute, right? This Neanderthal behavior? The hoovering effect? The way he bends over his plate, completely hunched over, to minimize distance between the dish and his mouth?

  Such a boy thing. Kash and West do it, too, and they are all so cute.

  What’s a girl to do, surrounded by so much eye-candy she’s not even allowed to touch?

  “If you’re not hungry,” Nate says with his mouth full, “I’ll have your food.”

  “Don’t even think about it.” I slap at his wrist, and he grunts.

  He didn’t flinch, I think randomly, taking small bites of my food—which is pretty good, by the way. He doesn’t flinch when he spars with Kash, either. It’s as if what bothers him is gentle touching.

  My gentle touching.

  Ouch.

  What happened to letting go—of that want, that desire? It’s not even as if Nate is the only one drawing my attention, getting me breathless and hot. All three of them are growing into such hunks. Tall, muscled, beautiful. All male.

  And this brings me to my question… is it normal to want three guys with the same intensity? Needing their touch, kisses, needing to be one with them?

  Asking for a friend.

  I spend my evening texting with Gigi. Remember the girl I met almost two years ago at school, the one I lied to about my age? That’s the one. Well, we’ve been talking more and more at school, and now we’re besties. Honest to God besties, talking every day, on the phone or chat. Girl’s funny and sweet and checks in on me regularly. I like that. A lot.

  I like her. She feels like the little sister I never had, someone who understands me. Not like my boys. My relationship with them is complicated, but with her it’s relaxed and fun.

  My life is sort of getting on track. If only Nate would talk to me, get better… If all three of them opened up to me and let me in, I’d be so happy.

  Kash comes in late, like usual. I hear the apartment door click open, then closed. He curses softly, and something thumps in the hallway.

  The apartment has three bedrooms. It’s a miracle we can afford it. We all got a bedroom to ourselves, and God I wish we’d gotten a studio and slept all together…

  Rolling out of bed, I open my door and pad out to say hi. Summer is rolling in again, but the floor tiles are cold un
der my bare feet.

  “Hey.” I smile at him. “How was work?”

  He shrugs, gathers his backpack from the floor where it’s fallen.

  “We had the leftovers for dinner. Did you eat?”

  “Yeah, I’m good.” His voice is low and gravelly, and it does strange things to my insides. Heat gathers low in my belly.

  He’s dressed in low-slung jeans and a white T-shirt with the name of some group called DeathMoth stamped on the front. His lean, muscled arms are bare, all that dark ink winding around them like black snakes. The silver hoops in his ear glint as he turns toward me.

  His pale eyes glimmer, and he lifts a brow.

  The heat rises to my face, scorching my cheeks. “Great, I…” I suddenly become aware that I’m only dressed in my sleep shorts and camisole, and though I’m far from naked, I feel I am, with those eyes moving over my bared skin, darkening. “Just checking.”

  A smile tugs at his lips. “So I see.”

  That smiles makes me bold. I haven’t seen it in weeks. “Going out to smoke?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I need some fresh air, too.”

  He grabs his ever-present tobacco pouch and heads toward the balcony doors without a comment.

  A cool night breeze blows. I stand next to him, breathing in, and I get a whiff of him. Burned caramel, pepper, a hint of pine and the sweetness of the weed he’s smoking.

  “Everything okay?” he asks me after long moments.

  “Why wouldn’t it be?”

  He doesn’t reply.

  “You think something’s got to be wrong for me to want to see you?”

  His shoulders hunch. “Don’t be mad at me, Red.”

  “I’m not mad. I just…” I huff. “Just wish you’d talk to me more.”

  “What do you wanna know? I’m an open book.”

  A laugh escapes me. “Really.”

  Kash sucks in a lungful of smoke, glancing at me out of the corner of his eye. “What is it? Ask me.”

  “Seriously? I’ll mark this day in the calendar,” I mutter. “I should bring my phone and film this monumental moment.”

  He snorts softly.

  “Okay, here’s the thing. I’ve been curious how you found the money to pay for everything when we ran away. I mean, I had some cash. Nate had nothing. And George can’t be paying you all that much.”

  I watch as he struggles with something. At first I think he won’t answer, despite what he said. I did have my doubts.

  But then he says, “I had some… things of value. I sold the last of them for this apartment—for the deposit, the first months of rent, the bills.”

  “That’s real nice of you.” I smile at him, but he doesn’t seem to notice. Doesn’t seem to be seeing me at all, his gaze thoughtful. “What did you sell, then?” When he doesn’t reply, I change tack. “You never talk about your family. Are they rich?”

  He shrugs. “They’re well off.” He rolls his cigarette. “Pizdets.”

  “What?”

  “Nothing. They aren’t good people. That’s all you need to know about them.”

  “I’m not sure about that.” I lean on the rail, looking down at the empty street, shivering a little in my light clothing. I consider asking him more, pushing more, but instead what comes out is, “Was it Russian? That word?”

  He sucks on his cigarette, tendrils of smoke escaping his nostrils. “Yeah.”

  “Are you Russian?”

  “No,” he mutters. “I was born here.”

  Still cryptic. He can’t make a single clear statement, can he? “So where is home for you?”

  He shoots me a weird look. “Where do you think?”

  “I dunno. Give me a hint?”

  Turning away from me, he smokes quietly for a bit. A honk sounds from a street further down. Someone shouts. Laughter rings out.

  “Where the compass points,” he eventually says.

  “North.” I force myself not to stare at his corded forearms where he leans on the rail beside me, at the tattoos of the phoenix and the dragon. “Some island in the Great Lakes? Chicago? Madison?”

  He squints at me through the smoke slowly curling from between his lips. “Nate told you that?”

  “Nate? He knows where you’re from?” A sense of betrayal hits me. He told Nate, and not me?

  “No, I just…” He glances down at the ink on his arms, then away. “I thought he’d guessed.”

  Interesting. I make a mental note to ask Nate about the tattoos. “So what is it? Which town?”

  “You’re better off not knowing all that much about me,” he rumbles.

  Again clamming up, shutting me out.

  Straightening, I swallow a sigh and turn to go back inside. “I thought you trusted me,” I whisper. “I trust you. I’ll never forget what you did for Nate, for us. I just want to get to know you more.”

  “Syd.” He grips my arm, stopping me, tugging me back. His hand is warm, heat seeping into my bare skin where it touches me. “Ask me again,” he says.

  “What?” I blink up at him.

  “I said, ask me again.” His gaze is blazing, boring through me. “Ask me where my home is.”

  “But you said… you said it’s where the compass points.”

  “That’s where I came from, but my home isn’t there, Syd. Not anymore. It’s right here. And I won’t let any harm come to you, I swear.”

  His words echo in my head as I sit in bio lab with West, the desperation in his voice, the honesty in his eyes.

  Why would any harm come to me? What is he trying to protect me—us—from? I never thought Kash’s story was any different from that of most runaway youths. Parents who are either addicts, or violent, or too poor to care for their kids.

  Or who never come back, like mine.

  But what if it is a darker tale than those I’m used to hearing or reading about? What danger was he referring to? Who is he? Who is he hiding from?

  Or am I imagining things, reading too much into words spoken in the dead of night, meant to somehow reassure me?

  What does Nate know that I don’t?

  “Syd. Eyes on the target. And… fire!”

  “What are you talking about?” I blink at West who’s smirking at me, brandishing a pen in front of my face. “Hey. Put that down.”

  Why am I thinking of Kash, when I should be focused on West, cherishing every second I get to spend with him?

  Stupid, Syd.

  “You were supposed to be taking notes about the experiment.”

  “Yeah, well, I’ll just copy yours.” I stick my tongue out at him. “Like always.”

  “Why am I not surprised?” He heaves a long-suffering sigh. Then his brow furrows. “You okay, Syd?”

  Heat licks at my neck, in part because I was thinking of Kash, and in part because I like West’s attention and concern. It washes over me like sunshine.

  “Yeah, I’m okay. You?”

  He nods. Takes a deep breath. “How is everyone?”

  “Fine. They’re fine. Kash found another student to tutor, and Nate got all excited yesterday because Kash brought home a syrupy Greek desert. He ate it all by himself. Good thing it was way too sweet for me.”

  West smiles, turns his face away.

  Once again we ignore the elephant in the room. Because since we left, Nate pretty much stopped talking to West, hanging out with him. He completely cut him out of his life.

  It’s tearing West apart.

  It’s not like he replaced him. He’s not much closer to Kash, or me. But with West he used to have that special relationship. They’d been friends for years when I first met them both, and now… it’s as if that special bond between them cracked. I know West is distraught. He can’t hide his sadness. Not from me.

  Nate is much better at hiding everything he feels nowadays. He’s pulled on a mask, hardened it, glued it to his face, and won’t let me read him. Not anymore. He’s always making jokes and laughing things off and shying away from me like a wild animal
.

  “What about you? How’s your granddad?” I paste a smile on my face and peek at West’s perfect notes, marked with bullet-points and highlighted where the important bits are. “Still grumpy as ever?”

  “Worse,” West mutters, and I wince.

  “And your sister?”

  His blue eyes turn stormy. “Teacher is looking our way. Better stop talking.”

  The teacher is in fact writing something on his phone. It’s always the same when I ask West how things are at home, and especially about his sister. The night we left, he said his sister is a danger to herself, and it’s been like a thorn in my brain since then.

  “Are you walking me to the bus stop today?” I whisper, playing along. I don’t want to hurt West. I just want to help, and I’m not sure I know any more about him than I know about Kash or Nate.

  “Yeah.”

  “Good.” I’m not giving up. I don’t know where I stand with any of the boys, my boys, but one thing I won’t do is sit back and watch as they suffer.

  Not if there’s any chance I can make it better.

  Hey, you never know.

  Predictably, West is quiet and wary as we walk out of the school a few hours later. I have so many questions on the tip of my tongue and I keep swallowing them back.

  How do I handle this?

  I feel I’m losing Nate. Kash was always a mystery. And now West is drifting out of my reach.

  “Look.” I stop and turn to face him, forcing him to stop. “We’re friends, right?”

  “Syd, what…? Of course we are.”

  He tries to sidestep me, but I’m having none of it. “We tell each other everything.”

  “Like I had to find out about your mom from Nate?” he sneers.

  This time I step back, feeling like I’ve been punched in the gut. “Not fair.” My voice barely comes out. “I explained to you what happened. I don’t have secrets from you, West.” Tears blur my vision. “Not fair, jeez.”