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Gripping the device in my hand, I throw it as hard as I can. It crashes into the TV, fucking up the screen, but I don’t give a shit. I flip the bed and the chairs, taking my anger out on the furniture since I don’t have anything else. Finally, something on the outside matches my insides. Storming to the closet, I find my bag, rip clothes off hangers, and shove my stuff in it. I don’t even know if everything I toss in here is mine, the resort’s, or left from Eli, and it doesn’t matter.
The memories of Eli in this place are choking me. I can’t stay here any longer. Let Coach and Franklin yell at me, I don’t give a fuck anymore. I will burn this world to the fucking ground to get him back.
I storm my way to reception, wearing my hurt like a shield, protected by my anger.
“Oh, good afternoon, Mr. Vaughn, is there a problem?” the woman behind the desk asks, but I haven’t even taken the time to learn her fucking name.
“Yes, but it’s not your problem. I’m checking out and need the ferry back so I can catch a plane.”
“Of course,” she says, clicking away on the computer. “Okay, you’re all settled. Is the card on file the one you want charged?”
“Yes, for damages too. The TV was my fault.”
She pauses for a second but doesn’t ask, just adds it to the notes and prints me off a paid invoice. “The ferry will be back in about an hour. You’re welcome to wait on the dock.”
The only thought I have in my head isget him back.This can’t be the end for us. It can’t be. I can’t go back to my useless existence. I was able to bury myself in football once, workouts and games keeping me busy and exhausted, but there’s no way I can do that this time.
I’ve been standing in a rainstorm for years, the waters rising around me with no one noticing I can’t swim. Barely keeping my head above the water on my tiptoes, but a tidal wave is coming, and I can’t get out of the way. I don’t know if I should be scared or relieved of drowning.
* * *
By the timemy feet land in San Diego, I’m itchy, irritated, and pissed off. I have no phone since I left mine buried in the TV, I’ve only had airport food, and can’t call my own ride home.
As I step out onto the arrivals curb, looking for a taxi, a black BMW X5 pulls up in front of me and stops. Franklin, my agent, stands and waves me over.
“How did you know I was here?” I ask as I toss my bag in the back seat and climb in the front.
“If you think for one second the resort didn’t have orders to call me if you left, you’re an idiot,” he says without looking at me and pulls out into traffic. “You know you’re about two weeks early, right?”
“I don’t fucking care.” I close my eyes and lean against the headrest.
“You had better have your head on straight. Stay out of the news, you hear me?” he demands in that tone he gets when I’ve pushed him to the edge.
“Yeah,Dad, I fucking hear you.” I turn away from him and look out the window before remembering something he should probably know. “If I’m piss tested, I’ll pop for THC. I ate a weed brownie, not realizing what it was.”
Franklin huffs, swearing under his breath, but doesn’t say anything.
He drops me off, gives an update on the schedule for the team, and as he climbs back in the car, I stop him.
“Hey, I need a new phone. Mine broke.”
He sighs and nods. “I’ll have one dropped off in a few hours.”
Then he’s gone. Just that quickly, I’m alone again, and no one cares that I’m suffocating.
CHAPTERTWENTY-TWO
Elliot
It’s been a week since my parents convinced me to leave the island and dragged me back to the house I grew up in. This place is tainted with memories. Rooms that hold emotions that linger from the past. I haven’t been here since my eighteenth birthday.
I wander the halls or hide in Marcus’s room. His room has been cleaned, but nothing else has been touched. It’s musty and no longer smells like teenage boys, but it’s still his, while my room has zero trace I ever existed.
Laying on his bed, I stare out the window at the pool. We spent so much time out there, our skin always tanned and glowing, laughing and fucking around. Even when we would fight, it never went past an hour or two of not talking to each other. Asher would always pop over, ask to play something or shove food into our mouths, and we would get over it. All my memories include Asher and Marcus.
How do you move on when everything you know is infused with people you can’t have?
At least I’m mostly numb now, the gushing of my heart being ripped from my chest has slowed to a trickle. Shouldn’t there be a physical mark on my skin from it? The pain is so sharp it feels like you should be able to see it.
