Split(100)

“I’d rather have the respect of my family and this town than some stupid, lonely job beside a piece of shit like you. Now leave before I grab my daddy’s rifle.”

“Fucking hillbilly.” He slams the door behind him.





THIRTY-SIX



LUCAS


The black recedes and catapults me into the light. I’m sitting on my chair in the middle of my living room and although it’s much brighter than the thickness of my blackout, it’s still dark. Nighttime. The single blub isn’t on.

My head throbs and I blink to clear my wavering vision. Beer cans, an empty bottle of liquor combined with the stench of booze in the air confirm what my body is already telling me. I’m drunk.

I rip my hands through my hair and my heart gallops in my chest. I crank back to my last clear memory. It was Shyann inside the hospital. All I wanted to do was comfort her, apologize for pushing her away.

That’s when I saw them together. Dustin had his hand around her neck and had pulled her in for what looked like a quick hug, only dropping his lips to hers at the last minute. Seeing them like that, his fingers threaded into her hair, lips that he’d used to bad-mouth her pressed to her lips. I knew what he was tasting, the sweet flavor of her mouth still so fresh on mine, and a fear like I’ve never felt before exploded inside me. She’d pushed him away—I know she didn’t want the kiss, but he took it anyway. I felt the dark close in; the thought of him taking what she wasn’t willingly giving snapped the last bit of my sanity. It was on that thought that the veil fell and Gage plunged me into darkness. That was hours ago.

My trembling fingers absently move to the scar on my jaw.

Whatever Gage did here, he clearly wanted me to know about. If only I could reach him, find him in the recesses of my soul and ask him why he continues to keep me in the dark.

I push up from my seat and head to the shower, swaying slightly and gripping my throbbing head. Once in my room, I kick off my sweatpants and the scent of unfamiliar perfume and sex socks me in the gut. I brace my weight against the wall and flip on the light. Beer cans on the floor, my sleeping bag tossed to the ground, and . . . My stomach lodges in my chest. No . . .

A used condom.

I breathe and slam my eyes closed. Please, no. He wouldn’t do this to me. Heat springs to my eyes. My arms wrap around my stomach, refusing to accept the obvious. The stench of perfume teases me and I’m reminded of similar times in the past.

Gage screwed one of his skanks in the bed still warm from Shyann. I’ll never forgive him.

Never.

I stagger to the bathroom, turning the shower on hot enough to scald my body. Punishment for what I am, what I’ve done . . . the trust I’ve destroyed. I’m disgusting. Insane.

My mom’s voice comes flooding in.

“You’re no one. Do you hear me? A dog deserves more respect than you. Now you’ll eat like one.”

I squeeze my eyes closed, remembering the way I’d cry, beg her to be nicer, plead for her love.

“No one could love a bastard. Now eat!”

Saliva floods my mouth as the vivid memory brings me back. I’d hunch over the toilet, my stomach growling as I was forced to eat her feces. My body would revolt with the burn of stomach acid and tears would pour down my face.

“You ungrateful bastard! Now you’ll have to eat that too!”

She’d crack my skull against the toilet, screaming how unworthy I was, and I’d pray I was someone else. Someone stronger who would fight back, someone she’d be afraid of. Pray for the darkness to veil me in safety.

And eventually, it would.

He’d take the punishments, be the stronger person I couldn’t be.

Then why this? I’d finally found someone I could trust. Someone who made me feel human, worthy. Why wouldn’t he want that for us?

I step out of the shower and peek into my bedroom, hoping what I’d seen earlier would no longer be there. That somehow what I saw was a figment of my imagination, a delusion conjured by a mind that can’t be trusted to reality.

It wasn’t.

Bracing my weight at the sink, I stare into the mirror. The eyes reflected back at me convey the weakness I feel.

“What did you do, Gage?” It seems so ridiculous, but I know he can hear me. “I love her and I know you do too. Why won’t you let us have her?” Unable to stare at my own reflection, knowing my body had been given to another woman, my lips pressed to a stranger’s, makes me sick. “Let her love us, please. We don’t deserve it, but it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t accept it.”

I sigh and turn to my room to grab a clean pair of sweatpants and start picking up the aftermath of what Gage left behind. Some of the beer cans are rimmed with bright pink lipstick, increasing my shame. By the time I’m finished, my shoulders feel like they’re carrying a load of two-by-fours as the need to confess to Shyann smothers me. I take the reeking garbage bag out to dump it and find Buddy standing in the drive, alert and fixated on the dense forest.

I drop the bag into the Dumpster and step toward him, expecting him to run back to his shelter under the porch, but he stays still, his eyes trained on nothing.

“What is it, Buddy?” Maybe an elk or a deer nearby?

His head jerks to the long dirt road and he growls low.

I follow his gaze and hear it before I see it. A vehicle of some kind. My heart leaps in my chest that it could be Shyann. It’s probably close to nine o’clock at night, not too late for her to still be awake.