Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 146548 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 733(@200wpm)___ 586(@250wpm)___ 488(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 146548 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 733(@200wpm)___ 586(@250wpm)___ 488(@300wpm)
This…is not what I expected. I try to grasp onto the truth. Uncover it. Xander was helping this kid? I don’t understand, and it’s still not okay that my brother was giving someone his meds. Even if he had extra. A pressure mounts on my chest, something screaming at me: I don’t know what’s right. Fuck. I don’t know what’s right.
I crawl onward. “Why were you bragging about it then?”
His face crushes. “I…because Colton Ford found out I was getting into LARPing with your brother. He kept calling me a…”
“A pussy?” I’m guessing.
“Yeah…” He nods.
I had that word slung in my face in high school too many times.
“Your friend is an idiot,” Charlie says bluntly.
Agreed.
Easton shifts his weight. “I panicked and I said that stupid thing, and then the next day, I told Xander and apologized. He knows.” His brows knit. “And shouldn’t you know this? He would’ve told you…” Realization floods his face. “Wait, he doesn’t know you’re here?”
Charlie and I stay silent, not giving information to a stranger.
In the quiet, Easton folds the paper like a treasure. Unable to look Charlie in the eyes, he tells him, “Thanks for this.”
I’m uneasy, and I want to interject. But I can’t figure out what to say fast enough. And I wonder if the right thing would’ve been having my parents talk to his parents. Let them help him. But what if his parents are assholes and it makes his life drastically worse?
“No problem,” Charlie says, and I pass my cousin his crutch. He braces his weight on them.
Easton steps back to his door. “I have to go.” And to me, he adds, “Xander really never mentioned me?” Not once.
I shake my head.
“I’m sorry,” I say, my head heavy on my shoulders for too many reasons.
He nods, a little hurt, and then he slips back inside his house.
Charlie and I leave the front porch, and as he slowly descends the few steps, Charlie tells me, “Well, that was not exactly how I saw that going.”
I watch him to make sure he doesn’t trip, and when we walk across the long driveway, I keep shaking my head. “You know a doctor who’s writing illegal prescriptions, and you just gave a sixteen-year-old their number,” I say out loud.
Dumbfounded.
“And I solved the issue,” Charlie tells me. “It’s done.”
“That doctor should be stripped of his license, and that kid could use that contact for something other than antidepressants,” I counter. “If he gets hooked on opioids—”
“Not my problem.” His crutches make a thunk thunk noise on the cement.
“Fucking Christ.” I rub my mouth, distressed. Everything is wrong about today.
Charlie halts at the curb. “I’m sorry,” he says. “Did I swindle you into thinking I’d choose the moral choice? People make stupid decisions, and I’m not you. I don’t bear responsibility for other people’s choices. How do you even live with that? How are you not dying from that?”
So many emotions slam at me.
So much has changed. So much is in flux. I don’t know what’s up and what’s down. Right from wrong anymore. It’s like I have paths and choices and I keep running down the darkest one.
I’m not even sure if what we did here today was right.
And I just want to shut down.
To go numb. Really, I want to call him. To talk to Farrow. Because when my universe feels like it’s spiraling and trying to drag me under, he has this ability to make me feel lighter than air.
And then I remember his text about being unavailable.
I can’t call him. I won’t fucking disturb him at work.
So I just walk forward, shoulders locked. And I carry this weight.
24
FARROW KEENE
Missing Jane’s 23rd birthday party is par for the course by now. My schedule at Philly General doesn’t allow for sick days or personal hours. Add in the overtime charting and other bullshit—and I’m sufficiently MIA more than I like.
It’s not my favorite thing.
Not even close.
Working inside a hospital wields a certain kind of discomfort for me—suffocating, aggravating, choked—and I didn’t forget its existence but it’s amplified this time around. For too many reasons.
Like missing the quietest, purest moments. My recent 22-hour shift means that I didn’t go to sleep with Maximoff. I didn’t see him wake up, and I couldn’t rake my fingers through his hair. Couldn’t see him struggle into his jeans and glare in my direction before he flips me off.
Hell, I wasn’t even there to laugh or smile or help. And there’ll be other moments to make up for those. Sure. But I sense what I’m losing because I’ve had those powerful minutes, those unbearably beautiful seconds before.
I’m trying my best not to keep tally of what could’ve been with Maximoff. Because then it starts feeling like regret. And I can honestly say that I don’t know how to deal with that emotion other than change course.