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I manage to cut my hand pretty deep while working on a car at the Garage – don’t ask, I fucking dunno how it happened – and was sent to get stitches and then home early, like a kid caught doing mischief at school.
It feels like a punishment all right, because at home all I can do is think, wallow and rehash everything that went down between Hailey and me.
Fuck, I need to stop thinking about her.
And for the record, I’m not moping.
Just being pensive, is all.
I just don’t get how she got under my skin, when no other girl ever did. When I never wanted a girl like that. With a need melting my bones. I never had to work to get a girl before, never worried I wasn’t good enough for her. I fell damn hard for Hailey.
And look where it got me.
Jesus Christ, that’s enough of this self-pity party. There’s not even booze to go with it, I finished it all. Not even my trusted bottle of Scotch has more than two drops left.
Here I thought I had enough booze in the apartment to get an army unit drunk. Had, being the operative word. Somehow, at some point, I drank it all and guess what?
It solved jack shit. So I don’t fucking know why I’m still looking for it.
The booze, not the solution. I doubt there’s a solution other than pulling my head out of my ass, accepting Hailey is gone for good and starting over. I’ll just… What?
Hit restart? I wish it was that simple. Maybe I’ll go punch the bag at the gym, even though my hand’s fucked up.
Hell if I care. I’m running on a strange sort of fury, mingled with regret and sorrow and the need to do something or I’ll come apart.
A knock on the door brings me up short.
Only one person I know knocks on the door instead of ringing the damn doorbell. What the hell does he want now? Chewing me out this morning wasn’t enough?
I open the door for Jared, and his gaze immediately slides to my bandaged hand. The guy never misses anything, but today I’m over the psychoanalysis, thank you very much.
“What,” I growl, “do you want?”
“Is that a way to greet your neighbor?” He pushes past me with the ease of long experience and plants his ass on my sofa. “Call her.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Beg all you want.” He leans back, spreading his damn legs, making himself all comfortable. “But you should listen to me.”
“Or you should shut your trap.”
“Call her.” He smirks at me. “Otherwise, with the way you’re going, you’re gonna get yourself killed.”
I wince. “Dunno what the fuck you’re talking about.”
“No? Three weeks ago, you crashed your truck and you walked away alive because you’re one lucky bastard. Two weeks ago, you burned your arm on an engine so badly you were sent straight to the ER.” He’s counting the accidents on his fingers.
Fucker.
That burn still hurts, dammit.
“And now this,” he goes on.
“This doesn’t fucking count. Cutting my hand a little isn’t fatal, Jared.”
“No accident is fatal until it is.”
I stare back at him. “Bullshit.”
