Page 7 of What Goes Around

Then the result appeared.

Two lines.

I was pregnant.

Sobbing, hand pressed to my belly, I felt an absurd, aching love for the small life inside me, and terror that scraped the bones. How would I tell Nick? How would I tell someone who hated me? And somewhere deep down, part of me thought maybe… maybe this was something that could fix things. If he just knew, if we could talk, if he could see that what happened wasn’t my fault, maybe he’d finally believe me.

I thought it couldn’t get worse.

It did.

Two days later, a Friday night, my phone buzzed. Apple’s name flashed on the screen. I almost let it go to voicemail, but something in my gut made me answer.

“Did you hear?”

“Hear what?”

There was a long pause. I knew before she said it that the news wouldn’t be good.

“It’s Payton,” she said. “She’s gone, Ash. She… she crashed her car. They think she’d been drinking.”

The world turned to ice.

“What?” The word came out like a wheeze. “No—no, that can’t be.”

“She hit a tree outside of town,” Apple whispered. “It was instant. It was ugly.”

I couldn’t breathe. My lungs refused to work. The world tilted around me, spinning out of control.

Payton was gone.

And the last thing she ever believed about me was that I’d betrayed her.

The funeral was three days later. I wasn’t invited, I knew that, but I went anyway. I needed to say goodbye, even if no one wanted me there.

I wore black and stood at the very back of the church, away from the family seats. Heads turned as I slipped in, whispers starting up behind me.

Thomas was there too, pale and hollow, avoiding my eyes. Nick sat up front with the family, rigid and closed off.

When the service ended, I waited until most people had left before walking toward the casket. My legs felt like lead.

“Payton,” I whispered, voice breaking. “I’m so—”

“Get away from her.”

The voice behind me was sharp and cold.

I turned. Nick stood there, his face drawn, eyes bloodshot, fists trembling at his sides. His blue eyes, once so warm and familiar, burned with a fury I had never seen before.

I understood his pain, his grief. He had just lost his sister.

But I was grieving too.

Only no one believed me. No one saw that I was a victim too.

“You don’t get to be here,” he spat.

“I just wanted to say goodbye,” I managed.