AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“There’s barely anything left.”
He’s lying.
“You just want it for yourself,” I say, not bothering to hide my irritation.
His lips press together, eyes gleaming from the soft twinkling lights bathing the gym.
Scoffing, I wave him off and go to turn away to find someone else who’s less greedy about his booze, when Waylon’s next words chase after me, halting me in place.
“Where’s Jeremy?”
Eyes widening, I turn around, meet his gaze and say, “What the fuck do you mean?”
He shrugs, shaking his head. “I figured he was still over here with you.”
Again, all I can do is just stare at him.
In my head, I replay through the last however many minutes I spent standing here, lost in my head. How many songs…
Jeremy was right here. Next to me.
How…
How the fuck did I lose him?
My head swings all about, gaze darting all over the edges of the gym. He wouldn’t be in the middle with the rest, dancing and laughing with our peers, kissing and swaying with some girl… He just wouldn’t.
“Mason!” Waylon calls after me, but I’m already gone.
He doesn’t follow, and I can’t say I blame him. I’m shit company to be around these days. It doesn’t help that being around him is its own brand of torture. Being around…any of them…
Everyone…
But one person most of all.
One person who has me in a fucking chokehold, keeping me from falling into that dark, bottomless pit I’ve been dangling over for what feels like a century, rather than just eight months.
And yet, for some reason, the particular brand of torture that comes with being near Jeremy Montgomery, is one I welcome willingly. Seeking it out. Craving it like it’s just another flask, filled to the brim with liquid fire I can asphyxiate on. Blaze my insides. Burn it all into ash.
It’s fucked up on so many levels.
Levels beyond what anyone would be able to comprehend, or accept…
Levels beyond what even I can acknowledge.
But I can’t stop.
He’s a noose I’d dangle from in strangled, agonized hellfire for eternity.
My dress shoes squeak along the polished floors of the gym, then shift to a dull, but heavy sort of thud when I reach the thin, raggedy-carpeted hallway when I blow through the people blocking the open doorway.
I don’t miss the lingering looks and stares that follow, but unlike before, it’s just background noise. All of it. The music too.
I clench my fists at my side—palms slick with sweat. My heart’s racing, and it’s all I can hear now as I shove open the bathroom door, and look inside.
A couple guys at the urinals pivot their heads at my loud intrusion, scowling, but immediately looking away when they see who it is.
The bitterness inside me roils into something even more foul-tasting—something without a name. Letting the door fall shut behind me, I look down the hall in front of me, and then the one stretched out to my left, leading to the doors that would take me into the courtyard.
