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Then they were taken from me, too.
She was taken from me.
Eight years later, she was back, having experienced a similar loss. Almost a decade had passed, and myEve was finally back. But it was too late. We weren’t the same innocent children we’d once been.
She’d seen things no one should have to. She’d held her dad’s hand while he died a slow, excruciating death. She’d watched her mom fall apart, losing the love of her life. She lost her home next. The town that once worshiped them, abandoned the preacher's family in their time of need.
She’d done it all before she was even a teenager, and she handled the pain and mourning with grace. Because of course she had.
Eve didn’t do anything ungracefully. She was too perfect, and it pissed me off.
She lost everything, but so did I.
The Eve that was once my anchor became my enemy. All she ever was, was the golden child, the child Isaac wished he would’ve had instead of me. He constantly compared us. Pointing out my faults, while praising her every move. It wasn’t a secret she was his favorite—she was everyone’s favorite.
Shit, I’m pretty sure Chase prefers her to me sometimes.
A part of me is happy she had someone to call when she was scared. A bigger part of me is fucking pissed it wasn’t me. But the logical part, the part that I hate to listen to, knows she wouldn’t call me. And that same part knows even if she did, I probably wouldn’t answer.
If she waltzed into this party and walked right up to me, I’d turn her the fuck around and tell her to go home. Okay, that’s not true. I don’t know what I’d do. I don’t know if I’d fuck her first. Or fight her. Or just scream at her.
And that’s the problem.
No amount of therapy, alcohol, cigarettes, or time at the gym can smother the burning rage I feel in my chest. Nothing can make it go away. At some point in my life, what was once just a dull flame filled with anger and indignation began to grow, and it never stopped.
Now it’s an inferno.
And in the last four years without her to control it, I’ve been riding the edge, preparing for the moment I explode.
I feel it just under my skin, bubbling and boiling closer to the surface. I know it’s about to happen. I’m nothing but a ticking time bomb, ready to obliterate anyone and everything in my path.
One day, there will be nothing left but the smoldering embers of my anger. And I have no one else to thank for that but Eve.
And Jane.
And Isaac.
Fuck him.
I pinch between my eyes as I take a deep breath, trying to push their memory away.
Sometimes I miss her. On nights like this, I miss hearing her laugh while calling me Heathen. I miss the way her eyes sparkled in such a sincere way, you knew she was genuinely happy. And when they sparkled because she saw you…fuck. You felt a million feet tall, like you were the only thing in her orbit.
And then she’d look away, and all the air in your lungs would be sucked out. She has that power and doesn’t even know it.
Didn’t know it.
Does she know her power now? I have no idea. I don’t know who Eve is anymore and sometimes, I wonder if I ever did.
I do know one thing, though.
She’s not the same sixteen-year-old I once loved. And I'm not the same eighteen-year-old she loved back.
We’re nothing more than strangers, and it’s all her fault.
“Hey, Ro.”
I blink a few times, realizing I’ve been staring at the flickering open flame on my Zippo. Clearing my throat, I turn my head enough to look at the blonde beside me.
