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Valco isn’t exactly a physically affectionate guy, so I startle when I feel a hand on my back rubbing in gentle circles.
“Do you need to talk about it?”
I shake my head, and already I feel the itching for something to take this heaviness off my mind. Valco has alcohol stashed in his room. Blow isn’t a hard ask around here. I have no doubts finding someone to hook up with would be a piece of cake.
But I don’t want to drink. I don’t want to get high. I don’t want to fuck some chick, and I sure as hell don’t want some nasty ass man in my body.
What I want is Corvin.
But I burned that bridge and need to live with the consequences.
“I’m actually really tired,” I say, pushing up to my knees. “Any chance your bed is free?”
Maybe some sleep will clear my head of all the noise.
“We already set it up for you.”
Meaning he hid the booze and dirty underwear.
“I appreciate you guys.”
Walking back to the room has an unsettling numbness spreading throughout my body. By the time I make it to the bed, I don’t even have the energy to take my shoes off.
I fall onto the mattress, burying my face, and finally let the sob out of my chest that I’ve been holding back all day. Ever since Corvin woke me up with a string of passionate kisses that felt too much like goodbye.
You hurt yourself, and that kills the people who love you.
I don’t know how to stop. How to let myself have something good.
How to let myself be loved.
If I cry into the pillow long enough for the sun to dip down and cast an orange glow through the window, no one has to know.
If my heart breaks and I choose not to stitch it back together, does it matter if those trapped words finally spring free?
I love you, too.
Chapter 29
Shiloh
A few weeks into the new semester and I’m finally getting used to my meds. The tinkering seems to have helped, because I no longer feel like I’m drowning with a rock in my chest.
Valco called the calvary—AKA: Atlas and Blair—a few days into my stay, and my brother was so worried he booked an emergency appointment with my psychiatrist.
We moved my meds around, and with the adjustment period coming to an end and things evening out, I now feel like even more of an ass than I did before.
But I don’t want to kill myself over it, so that’s an improvement.
“Making the most of your solo room?” Atlas asks as he packs up his textbooks from our study session.
I seesaw my hand in the air. “Rascal keeps threatening to throw some freshmen in here if I don’t behave.”
When I got back to campus after the break, I found my room assignment on a different floor than it’d been before.
It wasn’t surprising, but it stung.
“I could technically move back in. I might not always be here, but—”
