Page 120 of Ghosted

A laugh almost gets out of me, but it dies before it becomes anything. I lean forward with my forearms on my knees, watching the pool light move over my split knuckles.

The cuts look worse here. Darker. Uglier. “You still think I can scare you off?”

Alice glances at me then, and there’s enough of her in the look to make my chest hurt. “I think you scare yourself more than you scare me.”

Well fuck.

For a while, the pool does the talking for us.

Water shifting against tile. Vents humming overhead. Alice breathing beside me, close enough that I could touch her if I wanted to ruin the moment, far enough that I know she’s still deciding whether sitting here with me was smart or just another terrible choice in a week full of them.

“I don’t know what you want from me,” I say, because it’s easier than admitting I know exactly what she wants and I’m too fucked up to give it to her clean.

Alice lets out a quiet laugh, but there’s no humor in it. “I don’t think anyone has ever survived wanting anything from you.”

I look at her.

She doesn’t smile.

“I don’t need you to be good, Jagger. I know what you are.” Her voice softens, but her eyes stay on mine. “I’m not asking you to become someone else overnight. I’m asking you to understand that helping me is not the same thing as using my hurt as an excuse to get your revenge.”

The words move through me slowly.

They should make me angry, and they do, but not at her.

At myself. At Johnny.

At every fucked-up instinct in me that wants to turn care into a closed fist because closed fists make more sense than fear.

“I do,” I say.

Her brow lifts.

I drag a breath through my nose. “I’m trying to.”

“That’s not the same thing.”

“No.” I look at her. “But it’s honest.”

Her expression softens for half a second before she kills it, and I see it anyway. I always see her. That’s the problem.

My hands curl before I can stop them, and Alice notices immediately. I force them open again and hate that she saw it. Hate that she has to watch my hands like they’re another thing in the room that might go wrong.

Her face changes, small and sharp, like I said the wrong thing and the right thing at the same time.

“You can’t save me from what already happened.”

“I know.” I look at her because if I look at the water, I’ll say something easier. “I don’t know how the fuck to do this.”

Her voice lowers. “Do what?”

“Care about someone without making it ugly.”

The pool room goes still around us, or maybe I just stop hearing it. Alice’s eyes stay on mine, and for once, she doesn’t make a joke. For once, I don’t wish she would.

“I’m not good at letting go,” I say. “I’m not good at standing there while someone hurts what—” I stop, jaw locking around the word before it comes out wrong.

Alice catches it anyway. “What?”