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“What happened?” I asked, surprised Mya was finally opening up to me.
“He fell into a bad crowd. At first it was just young boys thinking they be gangsters. But last year, things changed. He changed. He was the same old Jermaine when it was just the two of us, but he started running for a crew. I begged him to stop, but money talks and he thought he was invincible.”
“Sounds like someone I know,” I grumbled.
“Jermaine wasn’t involved in some high school football rivalry, Felicity. He was running drugs and errands for the kind of people you don’t say no to.”
“Oh.” My cheeks heated.
“I know this rivalry has you all on edge,” her expression softened, “but it’s not life or death.”
“Did Jermaine—”
“Die? No, but he did get taught a lesson after he screwed up, and I...” Mya gulped, her whole demeanor turning dark. “I was collateral.”
My eyes grew to saucers. “You mean you were... hurt?”
She nodded slowly. “My momma finally told J we were done and she shipped me off to the ass crack of nowhere to finish up senior year. I haven’t heard from Jermaine since.” My new friend shrugged as if it was nothing, but pain radiated from her.
“You’ll be safer here,” I said, as if that mattered.
“Safe but not whole. I spent my entire life with Jermaine at my side. Even though I know it’s for the best, even though I know I couldn’t stand by any longer and watch him ruin his life, it doesn’t make it any easier. If I’m not there, who’s going to protect him?” A single tear slipped from the corner of Mya’s eye, but she quickly swallowed the rest down, and I couldn’t help but wonder what she’d been through to have hardened so much.
“He’ll be okay,” I added.
She gave a little shrug. “It doesn’t matter anymore.”
But something told me it did. She was lying to herself. Just like I’d been lying to myself. About Jason. About my perfectly mapped out future courtesy of my parents.
“So what’s the history between you and Jason?”
“That is a story for another day.”
“I’m not going anywhere.” Mya gave me a pointed look.
“Jason is … well, he’s complicated. He’s always been this asshole, you know? Untouchable. Cold. Cruel. He made Hailee’s life hell ever since she moved to Rixon. I never liked him, hated what he stood for, how he treated her.”
“What changed?”
“Everything.” I smiled sadly. “Everything changed. I started to see glimpses of behind his mask, and I was so sick of being the good girl. Of being the girl always overlooked. And he’d look at me with this intensity… But it was nothing more than a game.”
A game I’d lost.
Silence descended over us while we both got lost thinking about the guys in our life we wanted but couldn’t have. I grabbed the bottle of liquor and took another mouthful, wanting nothing more than to erase the pit in my stomach.
“You’re vibrating,” Mya said after a couple of minutes. “It’s Hailee.”
“Let it go to voicemail.” I waved her off, tracing patterns into the fluffy white clouds drifting across the dusky sky. The vibrations finally stopped, only to start again seconds later.
“She’s calling again.”
“She probably just wants to tell me all about Cameron. He’s always doing cute things for her.”
“He seems nice.”
“He’s the best,” I sighed dreamily.
“Makes you wonder why a guy like him is friends with a guy like Ja—”
