The Coincidence of Callie and Kayden(43)

For a minute I have hope. The night has been great and I feel like anything is possible, but then I close my eyes and it’s all stolen away from me.

Chapter 6
#8 Challenge Yourself

Kayden

After we leave the rock, I go back to my dorm, wanting to run away from everything I’m feeling. The bathroom is occupied, so I end up going to bed, staring up at the ceiling while rain splashes against the window. From across the room, Luke is lying face down on the bed, snoring.

As the alcohol lifts from my system, every emotion rushes through me like a stream full of needles. I have to turn it off. It is the only way I know how to deal with life.

I roll to my side, raise my fist, and ram it into the headboard as hard as I can. My knuckles crack and Luke jumps up from his bed.

“What the f*ck was that?” He blinks around the room as silver lights flash from the lightning outside.

“It was the thunder,” I lie and turn over, shutting my eyes and holding my hand against my chest as the burning pain explodes up my arm. Moments later, I fall into a deep sleep.
***
“Don’t sit down here all night by yourself,” Luke says, walking across the room to the mini fridge in the corner. He takes out a beer and pops off the tab. “You’ve been acting weird since the graduation ceremony.”

I lie down on the couch, flexing my hand over and over again, staring at the veins flowing through it. “I’m just feeling a little bad about leaving.” Honestly, I’m just feeling weird about life. I want to leave, go away to college, be free, but the idea of being out in the open, surrounded by things I don’t understand is f*cking terrifying.

“You should go get yourself f*cking laid, but by someone other than Daisy.” He opens the door and the music from upstairs flows into the room. “That’s what I’m going to do.” He shuts the door and leaves me alone, trapped in my own thoughts.

He’s right. I should just go upstairs and screw the first girl I come across. It’s the best way to pass time and get through life, but I can’t stop thinking about my hand and my f*cking future.

Finally I get up from the couch. Walking toward the wall, I glance at the door. Then I lift my fist and hammer it into the wall as hard as I can. The sheetrock and paint crumble and my skin separates a little, but that isn’t enough. I punch it again and again, forming holes in the wall, but causing very little damage to my hand. I need something harder—I need brick.

I turn toward the door, but it swings open and my dad walks in. He takes a look at the holes in the wall and then at my hand cut up and bleeding all over the carpet.

“What the f*ck is wrong with you?” He shakes his head as he stalks toward me, staring at the sheetrock and paint on the ground.”

“I have no idea.” I cradle my hand to my chest as I hurry around him and rush outside.

Inside the house, people are laughing, screaming, singing to the music and the lights gleam through the darkness. I walk around to the back yard, hearing him at my heels, knowing he’s going to catch up with me and he’s madder than hell.

“Kayden Owens,” he says as he darts in front of me, panting and his eyes are full of anger. His breath smells like whiskey and the wind is blowing leaves everywhere. “Were you trying to mess up your hand on purpose?”

I don’t speak as I make a detour toward the pool house, unsure where I’m going but feeling like I have to move.

When I reach the door, he snags my elbow and forces me to turn around. “Start explaining. Now.”

I stare at him blankly and he starts yelling at me, telling me what a f*ck up I am, but I barely hear him. I watch his lips move, waiting for it. Seconds later, his fist collides with my face, but I hardly feel it. He does it over and over again as his eyes drift into a state of blankness. I fall to the ground and he kicks me as hard as he can, wanting me to get up. I don’t. I’m not sure I want to. Maybe it’s time for it to be over; there isn’t that much to be over anyway.

I listen to my heart beat calmly inside my chest, questioning why it doesn’t react. It never does. I wonder if it’s dead. Maybe it is. Maybe I am.

Then, out of nowhere, a girl suddenly shows up behind my father. She’s small and looks terrified, like I should be. She says something to my dad and when he looks at her, I think she’s going to run away. But she stays with me until my dad leaves.

I sit on the ground confused and at a loss for words, because that’s not how things go. People are supposed to walk away, pretend this doesn’t exist, let the strange excuses make sense.