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My stomach turns over so suddenly I barely manage to twist away from Manon and bend over the bucket by the bed before I throw up water and bile. Nothing left in me to toss.
“Crap.” She scrambles up beside me and slides off the bed. “I’ll be right back.”
I pant through the dry heaves, throat and eyes burning. The fuck. Why are my eyes burning? A reaction to vomiting, I tell myself. All that acid.
Not the memory. Not the pain of the past. I’m over that.
Even if she abandoned me. My mom. Left me there for the police to find and took off. Never came back for me. Never let me know she was alive.
Becaus
e she just didn’t care.
***
“Here,” Manon says, handing me my refilled glass of water as I lean back on the pillows, panting. “It’s okay.”
It’s not, not really, but that’s another matter. My hand shakes, but I manage a small sip of water before she takes the glass away and places it on the bedside table, a wooden crate Shane brought me.
Shane. Goddammit. I close my eyes, so tired. What a messed up family we are.
Something cool brushes my brow, and I jerk back.
“Shhh.” She sweeps the wet towel down my cheek, over my mouth, wiping away sweat, tears and traces of puke. “Rest.”
Damn. Now I have something clogging my throat. I turn my head away when she swipes at my other cheek, and she sits back, leaving me be.
Only quiet is not what I need. I reach blindly for her hand, and she lets me take it. I wrap my cold fingers around her delicate ones, feeling the fine bones of her knuckles, the softness of her palm.
Wish I could tell her more. Tell her everything. Wonder if the words coming out of my mouth are like poison being let out from a wound. If it might heal me.
Then reason returns, and I clamp my mouth shut. Not because I’m afraid she’ll rat me out to Zane—why would she care?—but because she’ll run away so fast I won’t even have time to say I’m sorry.
Sorry for who I am. For not being who and what she needs. For not being someone fit for company, for the society, for normal things like friendships and hand-holding. The fact she let me so close is precious to me. And even though I know how stupid this is—and I know, believe me—I can’t help but cling to her for as long as she’ll let me.
Even if it means not telling her the truth. Lying. Pretending I don’t want more from her, that I don’t get hard just by looking at her.
Jesus.
“Feeling better?” she asks, and I jerk my chin down in a nod.
Doesn’t matter anyway. She’s done all she could. Emptied and washed the bucket, cleaned me up, brought me water. Let me hold her hand. What more could I ask for?
“How’s your knee?” She glances down at my cotton-clad legs, as she stretches out on top of the comforter. “Did the doctor see it?”
“It’s fine.” Look at me. A pro liar. “The break is all healed up.”
“Since yesterday? You could barely walk.”
Yeah. There’s that. “The leg I broke is the other one.”
And what the fuck’s wrong with my mouth? It keeps spewing out things it shouldn’t.
“The other one? Then why…?” Her face twists into a cute little frown. Her small nose wrinkles as she tries to figure out the riddle after a night without sleep. “How did you hurt it? Was it when you fell? Oh crap, it was, wasn’t it. I’m so sorry!”
Fuck. “Dammit, no. That’s not on you.” I squeeze her hand. “It’s an old thing.”
As old as I feel on days like this. Old like the world.
