Flock (The Ravenhood Duet #1)(94)

Even when I was a kid, I always had a sick fascination with the deep end, with putting myself at risk. The sickness that resides inside me isn’t new. But I’d let it out, and in Sean’s words, I’d made peace with the devil inside. I let that devil rule me for one summer, and it was just as reckless with my well-being.

This is that time, where I can sink or sob in relief. It’s time to kick and pull myself out of it. But it’s my heart, my memories, my lingering sickness that weighs me down, threatening any sign of progress, leaving me helpless in the deep end.

Time to kick, Cecelia.

“Cee?” Christy prompts as I keep my eyes on the little girl, splashing around before leaping off the step and into the safety of her mother’s arms.

“I’m thinking it’s not okay. I’m thinking…” I need to find that concrete. At the same time, I’m thinking I need to kill the curious part of that little girl, so this never happens again. I don’t credit myself much for the life I’ve lived, but maybe I should. I survived raising an adolescent and slightly neglectful mother. I put myself through school, kept my head above water without supervision. I’ve made it this far on my own without the true guidance of the people I was supposed to count on, and I did a damned good job of it, up until a few months ago. I made it through nineteen years of kicking, and I’ll make it nineteen more. With new resolve I turn towards my best friend. “I’m thinking I forgot who the fuck I am.”

“Atta girl,” she says. “Had me worried there for a minute. What are you going to do?”

“For myself, move on. To them? I don’t know. Maybe nothing. But revenge is a dish best served cold. I’ll know it when I see it. For now, it’s about getting my head straight. I don’t completely trust Karma, so if I’m ever in the position, I’ll make sure she delivers.”

“Damn, to be a fly on the wall,” she says, “you’ve got this, baby.”

All I can do is nod.

Christy twists from the cheap plastic lounger, planting her long legs on the deck between us before reaching for my hand, her light brown eyes full of empathy. She’s a beautiful girl, my best friend. Medium-length, wavy brown hair, an athletic build, soft, full features. Seeing her after taking that sledgehammer to the chest made breathing possible when she met me at my car in the late hours of morning, arms wide open. “I don’t blame you, Cecelia. I might not fully understand it. And I’m telling you now, I can’t say I wouldn’t do it myself, but God, girl, two men? I can’t even pretend to imagine what it would be like.”

“It’s not that uncommon anymore.”

“I know,” she says, “but,” she shakes her head. “You really went all in, huh?”

“I believed them, you know? I thought they were enlightened. Thought they were some rare breed. What a fucking idiot.”

“But you are now. You are enlightened. They might have been preaching some bullshit, but you believed it, and you still do. You liberated yourself. You can be proud of that.”

It’s the truth, the absolute truth. Hypocrites they may be, but with them, I’d unleashed the truth about myself, about my nature. I’ve changed, and my mind’s changed too, despite their slut-shaming hypocrisy and damning cruelty.

“You better call me every day.”

“I will.” I turn to her, my only true friend. My only real family. “Let’s go visit my mom.”





CHRISTY SNIFFLES AS HUBBLE WALKS away from Katy before they glance back at each other. “W-w-wait, they don’t end up together?”

The credits roll as Christy shifts murderous eyes from the screen to me. “They don’t end up together?!”

“Nope.”

Christy’s jaw drops as Mom and I laugh at her where she sits on the couch, tossing Milk Duds at us both. “What kind of shit is that?”

“Not all love stories have happy endings,” my mother says softly. I glance over to where she rests in her recliner, the only piece of furniture she moved to her boyfriend’s place. He’s absent today, his excuse ‘fishing’ to give us a day together. She’s gained a little weight, and there’s a little color in her cheeks, which was absent before I left. I can only be happy for her. She’d been a shell when I moved to Triple Falls. But her last statement piques my curiosity.

“Who did you love like that, Mom?”

“One too many.”

I nod in perfect understanding.

“I. Cannot. Believe they don’t end up together!” Christy exclaims, exasperated as we both turn to her.

“It’s called The Way We Were for a reason. First of all, he cheated,” Mom points out. “More importantly, he couldn’t handle her personality or her beliefs, or her strength; therefore, he did not deserve her. And given the choice, he didn’t have a damn thing to do with their daughter because of it. You still think they should be together?”

“But—” Christy objects.

“That’s the truth,” I add, “people don’t want the brutal truth in love stories anymore, but that, there,” I gesture at the screen, “is the brutal, ugly truth.”

“Right on,” my mom says with clear pride in her eyes. “And that’s a story that will stick with you, too.”