Unravel Me (Shatter Me, #2)(40)

And I remember Kenji’s words, his demands for me to wake up and stop crying and make a change, and I realize fulfilling my new promises might take a little longer than I expected.

Because I can’t think of anything I’d rather do right now than find a dark corner and cry.





TWENTY-FOUR


Kenji finds me first.

He’s standing in the middle of my training room. Looking around like he’s never seen the place before, even though I’m sure that can’t be true. I still don’t know exactly what he does, but it’s at least become clear to me that Kenji is one of the most important people at Omega Point. He’s always on the move. Always busy. No one—except for me, and only lately—really sees him for more than a few moments at a time.

It’s almost as if he spends the majority of his days … invisible.

“So,” he says, nodding his head slowly, taking his time walking around the room with his hands clasped behind his back. “That was one hell of a show back there. That’s the kind of entertainment we never really get underground.”

Mortification.

I’m draped in it. Painted in it. Buried in it.

“I mean, I just have to say—that last line? ‘I wish I could love you less’? That was genius. Really, really nice. I think Winston actually shed a tear—”

“SHUT UP, KENJI.”

“I’m serious!” he says to me, offended. “That was, I don’t know. It was kind of beautiful. I had no idea you guys were so intense.”

I pull my knees up to my chest, burrow deeper into the corner of this room, bury my face in my arms. “No offense, but I really don’t want to t-talk to you right now, okay?”

“Nope. Not okay,” he says. “You and me, we have work to do.”

“No.”

“Come on,” he says. “Get. Up.” He grabs my elbow, tugging me to my feet as I try to take a swipe at him.

I wipe angrily at my cheeks, scrub at the stains my tears left behind. “I’m not in the mood for your jokes, Kenji. Please just go away. Leave me alone.”

“No one,” he says, “is joking.” Kenji picks up one of the bricks stacked against the wall. “And the world isn’t going to stop waging war against itself just because you broke up with your boyfriend.”

I stare at him, fists shaking, wanting to scream.

He doesn’t seem concerned. “So what do you do in here?” he asks. “You just sit around trying to … what?” He weighs the brick in his hand. “Break this stuff?”

I give up, defeated. Fold myself onto the floor.

“I don’t know,” I tell him. I sniff away the last of my tears. Try to wipe my nose. “Castle kept telling me to ‘focus’ and ‘harness my Energy.’” I use air quotes to illustrate my point. “But all I know about myself is that I can break things—I don’t know why it happens. So I don’t know how he expects me to replicate what I’ve already done. I had no idea what I was doing then, and I don’t know what I’m doing now, either. Nothing’s changed.”

“Hold up,” Kenji says, dropping the brick back onto the stack before falling on the mats across from me. He splays out on the ground, body stretched out, arms folded behind his head as he stares up at the ceiling. “What are we talking about again? What events are you supposed to be replicating?”

I lie back against the mats, too; mimic Kenji’s position. Our heads are only a few inches apart. “Remember? The concrete I broke back in Warner’s psycho room. The metal door I attacked when I was looking for A-Adam.” My voice catches and I have to squeeze my eyes shut to quell the pain.

I can’t even say his name right now.

Kenji grunts. I feel him nodding his head on the mats. “All right. Well, what Castle told me is that he thinks there’s more to you than just the touching thing. That maybe you also have this weird superhuman strength or something.” A pause. “That sound about right to you?”

“I guess.”

“So what happened?” he asks, tilting his head back to get a good look at me. “When you went all psycho-monster on everything? Do you remember if there was a trigger?”

I shake my head. “I don’t really know. When it happens, it’s like—it’s like I really am completely out of my mind,” I tell him. “Something changes in my head and it makes me … it makes me crazy. Like, really, legitimately insane.” I glance over at him but his face betrays no emotion. He just blinks, waiting for me to finish. So I take a deep breath and continue. “It’s like I can’t think straight. I’m just so paralyzed by the adrenaline and I can’t stop it; I can’t control it. Once that crazy feeling takes over, it needs an outlet. I have to touch something. I have to release it.”

Kenji props himself up on one elbow. Looks at me. “So what gets you all crazy, though?” he asks. “What were you feeling? Does it only happen when you’re really pissed off?”

I take a second to think about it before I say, “No. Not always.” I hesitate. “The first time,” I tell him, my voice a little unsteady, “I wanted to kill Warner because of what he made me do to that little kid. I was so devastated. I was angry—I was really angry—but I was also … so sad.” I trail off. “And then when I was looking for Adam?” Deep breaths. “I was desperate. Really desperate. I had to save him.”