I punch the steering wheel the second I begin to cry. I punch it several times, over and over, until the car begins to close in on me and I need to get the hell out of it. I open the door and climb out, then turn around and kick my tire. I kick it over and over until my foot starts to go numb, then I collapse against the hood onto my elbows. I press my forehead against the cold metal of the car and focus on burying this anger.
It’s not her fault.
It’s not her fault.
It’s not her fault.
When I’m finally calm enough to return to the car, Holder is sitting quietly in the passenger seat, watching me closely.
“You want to talk about it?” he asks.
I shake my head. “Nope.”
He nods. He’s probably relieved I don’t want to talk about it.
“What do you want to do?” he asks.
I wrap my fingers around the steering wheel, then crank the car. “I don’t care what we do.”
“Me neither.”
I put the car in drive.
“We could go to Breckin’s house and let you get your aggression out on a video game,” he suggests.
I nod, then begin to drive toward Breckin’s house. “You better not fucking tell him I cried.”
Chapter Eight
“You look like hell,” Holder says, leaning against the locker next to mine. “Did you even sleep last night?”
I shake my head. Of course I didn’t sleep. How the hell could I have slept? I knew she wasn’t sleeping, so there’s no way in hell I could have slept.
“You gonna tell me what happened?” he asks. I shut my locker, but keep my hand on it as I look down at the floor and slowly inhale.
“No. I know I usually tell you everything, but not this, Holder.”
He taps the locker next to him a couple of times with his fist, then he pushes off of it. “Six isn’t telling Sky anything, either. Not sure what happened, but . . .” He looks at me until I make eye contact with him. “I like you with her. Get it worked out, Daniel.”
He walks away and I close my locker. I wait next to it for a few minutes more than necessary because my next class is down the hallway where Six’s locker is. I haven’t seen her since she left the park last night and I’m not sure I really want to see her. I’m not sure about anything. I have so many questions to ask her but just thinking about having to ask her any of them makes my chest hurt so bad I can’t fucking breathe.
After the final bell rings, I decide to walk to my next class. I debated staying home from school altogether, but I figured it would be worse just sitting in my room thinking about it all day. I’d rather be preoccupied for as long as I can today because I know as soon as school is out I need to confront her.
Or maybe I’m supposed to confront her right now, because as soon as I round the corner, my eyes land on her.
I come to a quiet stop and watch her. She’s the only one in the hallway right now. She’s standing still, facing her locker. I want to walk away before she sees me, but I can’t stop watching her. Her whole demeanor is heartbroken and I want so bad to rush over to her and wrap my arms around her but . . . I can’t. I want to scream at her and hug her and kiss her and blame her for every single jumbled-up emotion I’ve spent the last day trying to process.
I sigh heavily and she turns to look at me. I’m far enough away that I can’t hear her crying, but close enough I can see the tears. Neither one of us moves. We just stare. Several moments pass and I can see she’s hoping I say something to her.
I clear my throat and begin walking toward her. The closer I get, the louder her soft cry becomes. I get about five feet away, then I pause. The closer I get to her, the harder it is to breathe.
“Is he . . .” I close my eyes and pass a calming breath, then open them again and try my hardest to finish my sentence with dry eyes. “When you talked about the boy who broke your heart in Italy . . . you were referring to him, weren’t you. The baby?”
I can barely see the nod of her head when she confirms my thoughts. I squeeze my eyes shut and tilt my head back.
I didn’t know hearts could literally ache like this. It hurts so much I want to reach inside and rip it out of my chest so I’ll never feel this again.
I can’t do this. Not right here. We can’t stand in the hallway of a high school and have this discussion.
I turn around before I open my eyes so I don’t have to see the look on her face again. I walk straight to my classroom and open the door, then walk inside without looking back at her.
Chapter Nine
I don’t know why I’m still here. I don’t want to be here and I’m pretty sure I’ll leave in half an hour. I just can’t leave before then because I’m scared of what she might think if I don’t show up to lunch. I could text her and tell her I’ll talk to her later, but I’m not even sure I feel like sending her a text yet. There’s still so much I have to process, I’d rather just ignore it all until I find the strength to sort through everything.