The End of All Things Beautiful

by Nikki Young

  The End of All

  Things Beautiful

  Nikki Young

  Copyright © 2015 by Nikki Young

  All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission from the author. Please do not participate in or encourage the piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. All characters and storylines are the property of the author and your support and respect is appreciated. The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarities to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Cover Design by Sarah Hansen of Okay Creations

  www.okaycreations.com

  For more information about me…

  Find me here:

  www.facebook.com/authornikkiyoung

  www.nikki-young.com

  nicole.rae.young@gmail.com

  Other Books by Nikki Young

  A Life More Complete

  My Winter

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  “Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.”

  -Mark Twain

  Prologue

  It wasn’t supposed to be this way. We grew up together. There were five of us; they were my first everything—each one of them. Until they weren’t anymore.

  We were supposed to be together forever. But sometimes forever is a lie and things fall apart before you even realize what is happening. An ugly interruption of perfection, an uprooting of everything you’ve ever known and everything you’ve ever come to count on. But at the time I was too young and naïve to believe what would happen.

  Invincible.

  It couldn’t happen to us.

  It would never happen to us.

  We were happy and loved, and when you grow up believing the world is at your fingertips, nothing bad can ever happen.

  But with the good always comes the bad. And it’s with the bad that you find the ugly side of life. You find people aren’t who you think they are, and that situations can separate bonds that were never meant to be broken.

  I never believed one day, one single day, could change my life, change our lives, so drastically, cause such upheaval and make me run from the only people I ever loved; but that’s exactly what happens when secrets rip apart your world.

  One day changed us.

  It ruined everything.

  Chapter One

  Nine Years Ago

  “Come with me,” Benji says, and I laugh at his words. He’s said this to me before, but the context and the scenario were different. “Get in the car, baby,” he pleads, standing with his hands on his hips, his voice firm, but still somehow playful. He’d never demand anything from me and today is no different.

  He loves me.

  He needs to be near me. I understand. Completely.

  I look down at my watch knowing I have an early class tomorrow morning, but something in his eyes won’t let me say no. He has an inexplicable hold on me, yet I know I have the same affect on him.

  “What the fuck, Cam?” Sam shouts from inside the car. He’s called me Cam from the day we met. I hate nicknames, but for some reason, I’ve taken a liking to him calling me Cam, even if I won’t tolerate it from anyone else.

  As I’m debating what I know is right and what I really want to do, Kelly jogs up behind me and climbs in the passenger seat, kissing Sam with far too much fervor than necessary.

  “See, Campbell?” Benji states, again with a humorous quality to his voice, as he reaches for me. His arms slip around my waist pulling me tightly against his chest as my heart begins to flutter. It’s moments like this that it’s a wonder I ever say no to him. He knows what makes me weak. “Baby,” he whispers, his breath tickling my neck as he presses his lips against my skin. “I just lost my spot in the front seat. Who’s going to keep me company now?”

  “Cam! Get in the fucking car!” Sam screams this time, and it makes me laugh. I bury my face in Benji’s chest and nod my head only to hear a riotous cheer leave the car as Benji lifts me off the ground swinging me around.

  “Where are we even going?” I ask, as Sam whips out of the parking lot, the radio blaring while Kelly giggles at something inappropriate that has just come out of Sam’s mouth. It’s at this that moment that I feel my body shudder, a small chill rushing through me, making me question exactly what I’m doing, as if something about this moment feels off.

  “The beach, Cam,” Sam says casually, like it’s obvious to everyone but me and in a second he lights a joint and passes it to Kelly, who in turn takes a hit and passes it to Benji.

  I know everything about this scenario is wrong. It’s been wrong since the moment we started doing it years ago. And although I’m feeling uneasy, I glance around the car and know this is exactly how it should be.

  This is our normal.

  We’ve been together now for, well, forever, honestly. All of us growing up together; the same suburban Chicago town, upper-middle class families, kindergarten through high school, living the dream.

  We never intended to go away to college together, but somehow the pieces fell into place and we found ourselves attending the same school. Looking back on it now, our connection has always been intense and I’m not sure we could’ve survived apart. Each one of us needing the other for balance, support, normalcy and love. We complete each other in ways that only we understand.

  Before I know it, I’ve taken a hit off the joint and passed it back to Benji who can’t seem to keep his hands off me. Groping at my thigh as his hand slides farther up my leg and under my skirt. His fingertips brush the edge of my underwear and I know where he’s headed and my body is already responding.

  My breathing is growing heavy, my heart racing in my chest as Benji’s fingers slip into the side of my underwear and when his fingers find what they’re seeking, he lets out a low groan in appreciation.

  My head falls back and my eyes close, knowing this is the last thing we should be doing with our friends sitting in the front seat, but I don’t stop him. I can hear his labored breathing as he begins to grow desperate for me and my hand slides across the bulge in his jeans.

  “Fuck!” Benji yells out and my eyes spring open, wide and questioning as I’m hit with a moment of panic. “I dropped the fucking joint,” he adds as he scrambles to the floorboard searching.

  “Maybe if you’d kept your hands off Cam’s pussy we wouldn’t be having this problem now,” Sam says from the f
ront seat.

  I lean forward and slap him on the shoulder glaring at him as he looks at me in the rearview mirror. “Do you have to be so graphic?” I ask, disgusted with him even though this is nothing new and the only response I get is a wink. I shake my head at him, a shy smile on my face as I watch Benji find the joint and flick it out the window.

  And again a strange feeling takes over, my body growing cold as my palms begin to sweat. I mentally begin to list all the things I should be doing instead of spending the afternoon, and more than likely the evening getting drunk and high at the beach with my friends.

  I suddenly want to tell Sam to turn around, that I have a bad feeling about today, but even in my own mind it sounds idiotic and strange. There’s no explanation for why I’m feeling this way and I chalk it up to guilt about not being at home studying or working on the million other things I have due over the next week.

  The car slows to a stop and the door is immediately flung open, startling me. Tommy climbs in, forcing me over with his body until I’m practically sitting on Benji’s lap.

  “Move over, Campbell,” Tommy says, his hand squeezing my thigh, making me giggle. I remember a time when this car held all of us comfortably, before Tommy was six foot three and had a body like a pro-football player, when Benji and I could make out in the backseat without feeling like I was going to smother him, and when Sam could drive without the seat being set back as far as it could go.

  We’ve all grown up, yet for some reason, it still feels exactly the same as it always has. Like we’re still just kids. An incestuous grouping of five people who have a connection that no one understands.

  For a while, I was one of those people.

  You see, Kelly, Sam and Tommy have one of those relationships that somehow thrives despite the fact that she won’t choose. She loves them both, she says, and there was a time when it bothered me. I watched Tommy get hurt and I hated it, because he will always love her more. It never really bothered Sam, or at least he never let on that it did. But now, like everything else in our lives, it has become our normal.

  Tommy pushes up on his feet, his head bumping the ceiling as he leans forward and plants a quick kiss on Kelly’s shoulder. I see her smile grow, reaching behind her, she runs her fingers along Tommy’s cheek. I don’t doubt she loves them both, but I’ve always doubted the equality. Can she really love them both with the same amount of effort?

  Kelly and I have talked openly about her relationship with both guys and she has always explained to me that she does in fact love them both, but for different reasons. Without the two of them, she feels lost. Tommy is her constant, her calm and her understanding. Sam is her no excuses, her harsh and her unforgiving. Both guys opposite yet somehow whole when together.

  Maybe I just don’t understand it because I’ve never loved anyone but Benji. I fell in love with him before I even knew what it meant to fall in love, to be in love with someone. It was before we knew the world was full of disappointment and flawed people and liars. I found him somewhere between a dream and a nightmare. We found each other, and there was a trust there that existed only within our small bubble of a world. I remember holding his hand at age five and thinking I never wanted to be away from him. And from that day on, the connection only grew. It turned from companionship and friendship to an overwhelming need to be together. Without him, I would have crumbled to pieces.

  Maybe this is how Kelly feels about both of them. I’ve grown to understand that.

  I rest my head against Tommy’s shoulder and he presses a kiss to the top of my head. I just want him to be happy. I hope he’s happy.

  “How was your day?” he asks as he gazes out the window, his voice quiet.

  “It was okay. Long, but better now that I’m avoiding any responsibility with you assholes.”

  “There’s no better group to avoid life with than us,” Tommy says, leaning forward and flicking Sam in the ear.

  “Benji threw our joint out the window, but not before fingering Cam and trying to start my car on fire,” Sam quips,s and again I smack him.

  “Fuck off,” I answer back as I give Tommy a look that says feel sorry for me.

  “Glad I didn’t miss anything new,” Tommy says before pulling another joint from the pocket of his jeans.

  “Light it up, baby,” Kelly says with a huge smile on her face.

  A few hours later we find ourselves on the beach, the shores of Lake Erie, quiet and desolate. The season is already over, but that’s the reason we’re here. It’s empty and it allows us to do as we please without repercussions.

  We’re only nineteen and we understand the ramifications of what we’re doing, but like everyone else our age, we still do it. We live recklessly, as though we’re invincible.

  I’m on my third beer, falling behind the rest of them as I lay with my head on Benji’s leg listening to Sam drag on about god knows what since I tuned him out at least twenty minutes ago. Kelly and Tommy have disappeared and I often wonder if Sam rambles on, all nonsensical and bullshit-like to keep his mind off what’s going on with Kelly.

  I watch him grab another beer and down it quickly while Benji follows, giving my side a pinch to tell me to get moving. He knows me well enough by now to know that by the fourth beer I’ll be buzzed, by the sixth I’ll be drunk and he’ll more than likely get laid. And right now, the more I drink, the less anxious I feel, so I keep drinking. While everything looks normal on the surface, I can’t help but feel like I’m watching the slow sinking of everything we’ve ever known go down with the ship.

  I’m being stupid.

  It’s nothing.

  The music from the car is playing in the distance as Benji strums along on his guitar. I close my eyes; listening to the sound of his voice as he sings with the music. Sam has grown quiet now and the only noise is coming from the comfort of Benji’s guitar. A few seconds pass and the music blends with the noise of the water. I feel Benji press his lips lightly to my forehead, and then his hand weaves with mine as he pulls me up off the sand and into his arms. His arms wrapped around my waist, he tugs me close and begins to slow dance in the darkness, singing softly into my ear. His voice is melodic and deep, and each word makes me press into him even more. But something about this moment feels different, like it’s the beginning of the end. It’s like the dying breath of our relationship, and I whisper, “I love you.”

  “I love you more than you’ll ever know, Campbell,” he says back and I know now that something awful is going to happen. I feel his lips brush lightly against my cheek and what he says next nearly kills me, “You’ll always be the only light I’ll ever see.”

  By the time night falls, we’re all drunk and attempting to sober up so one of us can drive back to campus. It’s a forty-five minute drive and while we’ve stopped drinking, none of us will be legally sober to get behind the wheel. Yet we’ve done it hundreds of times before and tonight will be no different.

  “You ready?” Benji asks, slipping his arm around my waist and pulling me against his side. I nod and make my way back to the car. Feeling exhausted and still drunk, I stumble into the backseat, taking my place in the middle between Benji and Tommy.

  Before Sam has even started the car, Kelly is passed out and Benji has his face pressed into the curve of my neck. I’m giggling as he nips at my neck, I feel his breath hot against my already flushed skin.

  I remember very little from the night and after the car starts; it’s all a haze. I fall in and out of consciousness as I feel Benji’s hands run up my thighs, his lips on mine, needy and pleading as his tongue parts my lips.

  I catch bits and pieces of a conversation Tommy and Sam are having, punctuated with long pauses. Either that, or I’m blacking out. Something about deer and tans, or is it beer and cans?

  Before I know it, I’m straddling Benji’s hips, his hands are moving up my shirt until he’s pushed it up over my head and it hasn’t occurred to me to be concerned about the other people in the car. I’m lost in him and what he
’s doing to me. Lost in the drunkenness and the darkness, and wanting only one thing.

  Benji.

  I’m sliding my hand into the front of his pants, completely prepared to forego my inhibitions and do god knows what with him in this car, when the sound of squealing brakes cuts through the quiet of the night and the next thing I hear is the sound of metal scraping on metal.

  I feel a jarring, violent shaking of the car and it feels like we’re spinning. We collide ruthlessly with something equally as heavy and the car finally gives way, crumbling under the pressure. I vomit spectacularly, my stomach emptying all over Benji and me as he screams out loud.

  But something about this moment is strange, like I’m watching it from a distance, like it’s a dream and I’ll wake up and find myself in bed or still on the beach. Passed out from too much alcohol and pot. In slow motion almost, the car fills with the cold air from the night, I realize the windows are gone; tiny circular glass particles raining down on us and covering the floor.

  Then everything around me goes black, yet my nose stings with the smell of burnt rubber and gunpowder. My eyes are watering and a searing pain radiates through my head as if I’ve been hit with a baseball bat.

  I call out, but no sound escapes my mouth. My eyes feel heavy and every time I attempt to open them, they fall shut again. Over and over, everything is weighed down, like I’m swimming through mud.

  I hear my name, but the voice sounds distant and when I finally place it, I smile.

  Benji.

  I can hear him calling my name and I see his face. His beautiful blue eyes are staring at me, making me feel safe and I want him to take me in his arms and tell me this is all a dream. I love him and he loves me. Everything will be just fine. But the panic I hear in his voice startles me and he begins tugging at my arm, screaming at me to get up.

  I turn my head to catch the time on the clock. I blink and when I open my eyes, it’s gone, but not forgotten. I crawl out of the car, my knees hitting the gravel on the road, cutting into my flesh as I gain purchase and stand up. My legs are weak and Benji catches me before I fall, but when I look up at his face, it’s covered in blood.