Break Me (Truth in Lies Book 1)

by Lena Maye

  “Why do you like me?” Kepler’s voice is low.

  Repeated words. Ones I’ve used over and over to break up with guys. Ones I used tonight with Ty. The question sounds so different coming from him—uneasy. I think he’s probably never asked anyone that before.

  “What?” Blondie leans through the window. She’s so vulnerable with that thick hoodie and her eyes huge in the moonlight.

  He flicks his fingers in a soundless snap as if he’s missing his joint. “I believe that’s the question of the night, Irene. Do you need me to repeat it?’ He pauses, glancing at me. “Why do you like me?”

  “Stop.” I don’t know what else to say. I don’t want to see myself repeated.

  “It was awkward.” He stares at me, but it feels like those gray eyes see something besides my face. For a second, I see the Kepler I used to know slide across his face. Then it fades like the smoke from his joint, and all that’s left are the hardened features he wears now.

  “I’m sorry. I…” Blondie bites her lip. Why the hell is she apologizing to him?

  “I was never feeling it with you,” he says in a rush. “Or did that come earlier in the script, Lo?”

  “Fuck off.” Nothing better makes it all the way to my lips. Nothing better makes it all the way to my brain. Why is he doing this?

  “My hypothesis.” He pats his shirt pocket and tilts his head. As if this is some easy conversation between friends. “You use the same speech over and over. It’s not about the dating. It’s about the breaking up.”

  No. He’s wrong. And he’s using some poor girl to prove a faulty theory. I need to do the impossible and shut him up. “Stop talking, Kepler.”

  “Not until you admit I’m right.”

  “You’re the worst kind of asshole.” I tuck my arms close to my sides and try to keep the tremble out of my voice.

  He pulls the joint out of his pocket and licks the edge of the paper to re-stick it. “I know, Lo.”

  Blondie’s mouth stretches so tight it might detach from the rest of her face. I will not look like that in front of him.

  I take a sharp breath that’s edged with cold—a little sprite of pain that curls in my lungs. Far below, the grass is a bed of sharp blades. I wish I could be weightless, floating up to the stars and away from this small town and small thoughts and small life.

  The aspen that dips a branch onto the roof is tall and lean. Aspen branches are like the branches of no other tree. Their strength is in their flexibility—in the way they move with the wind instead of standing oaken against it. They possess a quiet strength, moving like a contortionist that can bend and adapt to phrases like it’s about the breaking up.

  I wish I had that kind of strength in me. My strength is a chainsaw mowing down a whole grove of trees.

  I cross to the aspen and put one foot on the branch. My stomach does a little swoop as it bends. I shove off the roof and set my other foot onto the tree. Little offshoots scrape my calves.

  “Lo.” Kepler’s staring at me with wide eyes. Blondie’s gone. Good for her—we should all run as far from him as we can. “What are you doing?”

  I step closer to the trunk of the tree. Branches carve patterns into my legs and arms. Yellow leaves tremble and fall. One wrong step, and I will tumble with them.

  Scuffing on the shingles makes me look up. Kepler’s long fingers wrap around the gutter. What would he do if I fell? Probably shout about how I’m responsible for my demise.

  As if I don’t already know that.

  Three more branches, and I’m halfway down. When I’m six feet off the ground, I jump. Trimmed grass catches me. A giggle sputters out, and I duck under the eave of the house to escape Kepler’s stare. My breath shallows as if that will keep me hidden.

  Kepler’s wrong, wrong, wrong about me, and I don’t understand why he hurt that poor girl. He’s never done something like that. He’s always just… present. Steady like time and the seasons and death.

  I tuck myself in—hardening my skin and cells and thoughts. All of this is nothing. Just a stupid party that has no consequence. I slide around the house and start across the grass.

  “Hey, look who it is.”

  Fuck.

  Ski-team guys cluster on the porch, sitting along the rails. Ty stands in the center of them. Of fucking course.

  When his eyes fall on me, they’re wide, but the shock is erased by laughter. He looks me up and down, and I’m guessing he’s seeing the scrapes across my legs. Maybe he can even see the weight pressing on my chest.

  He jumps over the railing and lands on the front lawn. He’s still smiling. “I knew I’d see you again.” The alcohol from all those shots lingers on his breath. “We could still go somewhere.”

  Is it Torture Jean Day? A special holiday designed just to piss me off? As if Valentine’s Day doesn’t already accomplish the task.

  I step around him, but he keeps pace with me across the lawn and to the sidewalk. Two blocks ahead of us, Blondie’s bare legs scamper under a solitary streetlight.

  “Go somewhere,” Ty slurs louder.

  “I heard you the first time.” When I don’t stop walking, he grips my arm and yanks me to a stop in front of him, slurring something about consequences.

  His darker edges are showing, and it makes my heart hammer. No—I don’t want to have that response.

  “Get over it, Ty.” I yank my arm out of his grip. “I’m over it.”

  Ty’s friends are calling to him. Telling him to forget about me and take another shot. He stumbles, and I hurry down the street. My sandals slap on the sidewalk as I jog towards Blondie. Ty laughs—I don’t even want to imagine what he’s telling his friends.

  When I’m ten paces from her, Blondie turns and glances over my shoulder like she’s looking for someone else. “I-I’m sorry about the kitchen.”

  “Already forgotten.” It is forgotten. I might be a bitch, but not one who holds a grudge.

  Not unless you’re Kepler Quinn.

  Blondie fidgets and glances down at her phone. Kepler’s name runs across the screen.

  “Fucker,” she hisses before stuffing the phone in her back pocket. I suddenly like her a bit more.

  “Need a ride home?” I ask Irene.

  Three

  I always have this dream where I’m falling. Gray walls surround me like I’m tumbling down an elevator shaft. My fingertips scratch until I hit cement with an exhalation. My mouth fills with blood. It crests my lips and runs down my cheeks to the cold floor. The rest of my life is measured in breaths I can’t take. I always wake with the same thought: Fuck you, world. Is that all you’ve got?

  This morning it’s more along the line of: Fuck you, Kepler. Is that all you’ve got?

  Then I pull on my robe, turn up the heat, and check Cassie’s empty room—her purple sheets unwrinkled and tightly fitted. Our white-walled duplex is silent, other than the faint sounds of traffic from the gas station across the street. The kitchen is even more silent as I pull out a tub of seaweed soup and heat it in the microwave.

  Soup is the last remnant of my father. Guk gives spirit, he’d say, always in Korean because he said the word didn’t have the same urgency in English. You must break day with heat. He would slide bowls across the table to Sloane and me, a pot of steamed rice between us.

  To my father, soup was a religion, a rhythm that set the day in motion. Bean sprouts and ox blood for tension, chicken and ginseng for malady, seaweed for guilt. Maybe soup was why his spirit always seemed so much stronger than my mom’s. Or maybe he just needed to keep warm. After months of pressing my mom for information, she finally told me he moved to lower elevations. That was two years ago. He could be anywhere now.

  I pull my breakfast from the microwave and sit on my stool at the breakfast bar. Cassie’s empty stool sits next to me. I should be used to the silence, but it always makes me itchy. Like I’m waiting for something to happen. So I grab my phone and Google how to work a fucking keg.

  Shit, there’s diagrams
and everything. I’ll be prepared next time. No relying on party-bros.

  But even as I’m deep into an explanation about beer flow rate, my nails play a rhythm on the counter. I can’t concentrate. Not on anything except Kepler’s words last night. My thumb skims over the phone.

  Breaking up with guys brings up a stack of how-to articles. Not what I need. I could have written most of them. There’s also a few on how to deal with a breakup. Yep, got that one covered too.

  I pause, staring at the query box. I type: addicted to breaking up with guys. Articles about love addiction—which I certainly don’t have. But nothing about dating for the breakup.

  Take that, Kepler. It doesn’t exist.

  He made up something just to get to me. I feel silly even Googling.

  Cassie’s key clicks in the lock. I set my phone face down as she bounces into the kitchen, all streaked eyeliner and tangled red hair. And a smile that dwarfs everything in the room. She has a way of smiling I rarely see other people achieve. I’m not sure what’s better—to fake smile like I do, or to avoid the expression entirely like Kepler.

  She plops down next to me at the breakfast bar in the little two-bedroom duplex we share and slaps a Post-it note on the counter.

  “What’s that?” I ask, pointing at the note. Kepler is written across it in black marker. Sharp strokes that speak of an arrogant certainty. God, everything about him pisses me off.

  She holds it up. “It was on our door.”

  I squint at the yellow paper. It wasn’t on the door when I got home last night. Is he stalking me? Should I keep it as evidence in case…

  But I can’t come up with anything that Kepler Quinn would actually do. Besides annoy me to death.

  Cassie crumples the Post-it and tosses it onto the counter. It lands in a patch of sun from our leaky old skylight. A damn spotlight.

  “I’m so tired.” Her head drops against the counter, and her red hair splays on the white tile. Her eyes close. The girl needs some ginseng soup.

  I’ve often told Cassie I’d pick her up in the mornings, but she never calls. She says she enjoys the walk. The truth is she hates cars. She’s avoided riding in cars for as long as I can remember. But I still offer.

  “Busy night?” I ask.

  She nods against the counter. “One of his friends happened in on us partway through.” She twists her head to peek at me with that wide smile. “So I got a two-for-one.”

  I envy her. I mean, not the two guys. I can hardly handle one at a time. But all of them left with something. Simple. Easy.

  What I wouldn’t give for easy. I get up, toss my bowl into the sink, and turn on the water full force. The soup splatters, leaving little bits of green seaweed on the sides of the sink.

  Cassie sits up in her chair, stifling a yawn. “Did something happen with Ty?”

  Oh, yeah, Ty. I forgot about him. “We broke up,” I admit.

  “Ah, the inevitable.” She snorts out a half-laugh.

  I flip off the water. “Inevitable?”

  She shrugs. “You wore good breakup shoes last night.”

  “What the fuck does that mean?” I look down at my bare feet like they hold the answer, but all I see is chipped nail polish. Good breakup shoes? I don’t remember why I picked those particular shoes last night. Other than they’re comfortable.

  Cassie purses her lips, her eyes sweeping me. “You always wear sandals when you break up with a guy.”

  “How the hell do you know that?” I snap. “Do you keep a fucking record on me? Track my daily shoe decisions?” Everyone is acting like they know so much about me.

  Her arms cross her chest. “Why are you digging into me?”

  Crap, she’s right. I’m digging into her because the bitter taste of Kepler lingers in my mouth. That’s not Cassie’s fault.

  “I’m sorry. I just…” I bite down on my tongue and try to stop the tension curling across my shoulders. It never works, but I still try.

  “It’s fine. I’m used to it.” She slides out of her stool and crosses the kitchen, disappearing down the hallway before I can figure how to take back my chainsaw words.

  Why do human relationships have to be so hard? I need a dog. Although I would probably just end up yelling at a dog too.

  A fish. I need a fish.

  A deaf fish.

  I make Cassie soup. It’s silly, but I’m not sure what else to do for her. So I spend Saturday working on a linguistics paper while the stock boils. And planning what I’m going to say to Kepler Quinn the next time I see him. More than swear words this time.

  I’ll be prepared for the next battle. And have curry.

  But by Monday morning, there’s so much damn soup that I have to bag and freeze it. Either Cassie doesn’t understand my apology, or she doesn’t want it.

  So when she asks for a favor on our walk to campus, I’m quick to say “anything.” And I really fucking mean it.

  Cassie gives me the first smile I’ve seen in two days. “I need you to call the Bistro and tell them I hate pancakes.”

  “Done.” I shift my too-heavy backpack and dig my toes into the sidewalk for the two-mile trudge to campus. I’m carrying a small bucket of tea—a super caffeinated one with the appropriate name of Kickass—but Monday still came too early. “I’m all for hating on gluten, but why exactly?”

  She veers off the sidewalk and plows through a lawn, flattening blades of grass with heavy steps. “They want to serve breakfast for the fundraiser.” She wrinkles her nose. “I hate breakfast.”

  Cassie’s life is divided into three responsibilities: sex, school, and SafeRide. Sex and school have been there for years, but SafeRide is this new thing that takes up more and more of her focus.

  Four years ago, Cassie had been in the backseat with her little sister, Silvia, when their mom tried to pass into oncoming traffic. Then Silvia wasn’t there anymore—at least not the Silvia whose favorite activity was sneak-tying shoelaces together. She held on for a few weeks, a tiny sliver of a girl between noisy machines, but the injuries to her internal organs from jackknifing over the lap belt were too much. Cassie’s mom was always on the edge of being able to afford anything. A booster seat happened to be one of the things on her to-do list.

  I didn’t know what to say to Cassie four years ago, and I don’t know what to say to her today. It’s like the right words are missing from my vocabulary. Like guk, some things don’t translate.

  Two years after Silvia died, SafeRide was born. A nonprofit that provides car seats for all the Silvias who can’t afford one. It was a strange thing when Cassie started it. Like purpose came down from the sky and knocked her on the head. I don’t know if I’m jealous or incredibly lucky purpose has never given me a solid whack. But the fundraiser is her first big financial investment. It’s gotta pay off.

  We cross from the town’s cracked and worn sidewalks onto the manicured lawns around the campus buildings, and I take too-big gulps of my tea. Fall teases us with unseasonable warmth and one of those clear mornings where the air is charged. The grass tickles my toes through the straps of my breakup sandals. But Cassie trudges along like she’s walking through a foot of sludgy snow. Something about this breakfast thing is really bothering her.

  “Is it the fundraiser?” I ask.

  She sighs. “What if no one shows up?”

  “People will show up. Not wanting kids to have car seats is like not liking kittens or rainbows.”

  “Or orgasms?” She perks up, stopping halfway through the square.

  “Exactly.” I slow to a stop next to her. “People are gonna show up and eat whatever the hell the restaurant serves, and you’ll raise money, and little kids will get car seats, and it’s all going to be worth it.” I reach out a hand, a few inches from hers. I’m not good at this comforting thing, but with Cassie I always try. “It’ll be worth it even if you only raise enough to buy one car seat. Silvia would be proud.”

  The weight of Silvia’s name hangs between us like an unspoken argument�
��and that lingering feeling like I’m missing the right words.

  “Breakfast.” She lemon-scrunches her lips. “You’ll call them?”

  “Of course I will.”

  “But, um, don’t go all Jean on them, okay?”

  “All Jean?”

  “You know how you can get.” She pushes the hair out of her eyes. “No yelling.”

  “When’s the last time you’ve seen me yell at someone?” I don’t mention our little argument over breakup shoes. Or Kepler. Or Ty. Or the guy at the grocery store who tried to steal the last vegetable stock out from underneath me on Sunday. Asshole.

  “That’s why I’m worried. You’re past due.” She swings her backpack to hit against my shoulder and gives me her one-hundred-percent smile.

  Hopefully that means I’m back in her good graces.

  She tilts her head. “Why is Kepler Quinn staring at us like that?”

  “What? Where?” Oh, God. Why do I sound so eager?

  Cassie points towards the math building. Sure enough, he’s sitting on the brick ledge out front with a textbook on his lap. A gray hoodie stretches across his shoulders, and earbuds are stuffed in his ears. He’s watching us through those nerdy black glasses he wears when he reads.

  At the sight of him, my whole body snaps to salute, and I grip my tumbler. I’ve got more than a few words I’d like to share with him. But my feet stay in the middle of the grass like the earth itself is holding me there. I can’t remember a damn thing I planned to say. It’s like he took all my carefully crafted sentences and tossed them into a blender. And then hit puree.

  Screw this. I’m out. I turn—I’ll write a cheat sheet for next time—when I smack into a button-down shirt.

  “Holy shit.” I jump back, about dumping my Kickass tea all over my sandals. Damn, that guy I met at a party a few weeks ago. What’s his name? “Laundry?”

  “Landry,” he reminds me. Again. Then he leans that well-over-six-foot frame towards me. The guy’s always looming. It’s up for debate if the looming is sexy or disturbing.

  Cassie raises an eyebrow at me, and I suddenly realize everyone is looking at me. Cassie. Laundry/Landry. And Kepler. Kepler sitting on the ledge watching us with this curious look like I’m some kind of mathematical puzzle.