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Prologue
MARLEY
Nobody prepares you for the moment that everything you’ve been working towards comes crashing down. They don’t teach you this in school. The biggest problem isn’t that I’ve ruined my life. No. As I’m laying here, in the dark, on the ground, staring at the sky, I’m not even thinking about the fact that life as I know it will never be the same.
All I can think about is that this must be what it feels like to die because I don’t want to live with this pain.
I’ve lived through loss. I barely survived the death of my sister, but I did. This is a different kind of pain.
This is the pain of losing someone you never really had, and having to watch them carry on with their life every day as if they didn’t completely destroy you, taking your fragile heart with them in the process.
He was the first person I ever gave my heart to, and he’s the reason no one will ever get that chance again. I asked him to dance with me in the dark, and he did, but he left me there, alone with all the broken pieces.
I want to fall asleep and never wake up because at least I can have him in my dreams.
He should have killed me. I’m dying tonight anyway.
ChapterOne
MARLEY
“You could always turn them down,” I tell my mother, as I nervously twist my auburn hair around my finger.
I’m sitting on the edge of her bed, watching her pack her entire life into a few suitcases.
“You know I can’t do that,” she says, giving me a pointed look.
I’m the spitting image of my mother. We both have a sprinkle of freckles across our noses. We have the same beauty mark above our lips. And we were both blessed with the most beautiful blue eyes.
When I was younger, we even had the same haircut. These days, she’s got hers chopped into what I like to call a “business woman’s bob.” It’s her signature look. She constantly straightens it to get rid of the natural wave that I know is there.
My hair is long and thick. I let my waves run wild down my back. I’ve also got a septum piercing that my mother loathes. It’s precisely why I got one in the first place. Thanks to my long-sleeved crop top, she hasn’t even noticed all the tattoos.
“You can, you’re just choosing not to. Since when did work become more important than your daughter?” I sigh.
She doesn’t even try to hide her annoyance with me. It’s not like we’re close or anything. She was one half of the whole that didn’t even think twice about shipping me off to boarding school four years ago.
“Marley, give me a break.” She huffs.
“I don’t want to live there,” I whine.
“He’s your father,” she says, standing up with her hand on her hip.
“He’s a stranger.”
Three years ago, my parents sent me to boarding school. The summer before our sophomore year of high school, my twin sister, Mallory, killed herself. I spiraled, as anyone would, and they couldn’t deal with me. Their solution was the most expensive boarding school they could find in New York City. They hid me there until I graduated and they had no choice but to bring me back home.
“It’s not his fault, Marley.”
It’s not his fault that he couldn’t even bother to visit me? I could argue the fact that my father just abandoned me, and she only visited out of obligation, but I decide it’s not worth the trouble.
“I’m going to finish packing,” I tell her, getting up to leave the room.
She doesn’t say anything, and I wouldn’t expect her to. The only person in this family I’ve ever been close to is Mallory, and she’s gone. What’s the point?
My phone rings when I walk back into my bedroom. I slide the screen, putting it on speaker phone as soon as I answer.
“Hey, bitch.” My best friend Delaney’s voice fills the room.
