Total pages in book: 88
Estimated words: 87573 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 438(@200wpm)___ 350(@250wpm)___ 292(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87573 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 438(@200wpm)___ 350(@250wpm)___ 292(@300wpm)
The tattoos were supposed to help that. We’d gotten them after Bailey left rehab. They were a dedication to staying clean. We were only ever half unless we were together and whole. A reminder that she’d clearly forgotten.
It was then that I realized she’d never get it. Not alone. Not without me here.
She hated Dad with good reason. I didn’t blame her for that. It’d been a mistake to expect him to care about her like I did. He never had. And I couldn’t let her continue down this path because I knew if she did, she’d end up dead.
A tear came to my eye, and I brushed it off my cheek. I knew what I had to do.
“I’ll move back,” I told her.
“What?” she asked, hope blooming in her eyes.
“I’ll move back. You can live with me.”
“That’d be great!”
At her excited face, I couldn’t seem to contain my own despair. I wanted this for Bailey, but at what cost? The cost of everything I’d fought for in the last year. The life that I’d gained while she crumbled.
My new perfect job.
Gone.
My friends at the house.
Gone.
Whitt.
Gone.
And then the tears came, hard and fast.
“Eve, don’t cry. It’ll be okay.”
Bailey was comforting me. As if she had any idea what torment was going on in my mind. I couldn’t hold it back. Not anymore. My shell had cracked. And from the crack came a torrential downpour.
“I’ll have to call Wright Construction. They offered me my dream job, and I can’t work it remote.” I hiccuped. “I haven’t been on the job that long. They can…they can find someone new.”
Bailey frowned. “What dream job?”
“Piper and Blaire will have to fill my spot in the house. They probably know someone who needs a room. They take in people like stray cats.” I sniffled, scrubbing at my eyes. “It was nice to have friends though.”
“Friends,” Bailey whispered.
I nodded. “Yeah. I was on their soccer team. We were probably going to win the whole thing this season.”
“Eve…”
But I kept going. I couldn’t stop. Like a runaway train.
“And Whitt…”
Oh God, I couldn’t even say it. I had to say it.
“Well…I’ll have to break up with him.”
“What?” Bailey gasped. “Why? You could…you could do long-distance.”
I laughed. It was a raw, hoarse thing. “You don’t know Whitt. You met him once,” I said with another hysterical sniffle. “But you don’t know him. He’s…all control. And I walked away yesterday, saying I needed space to find you. Space nearly shattered his poor, precious heart. Moving away?” I shook my head. “He couldn’t take it, and he doesn’t deserve it. He deserves someone who will be there for him a hundred and ten percent, and how can I do that for him when I have to be here for you?”
And that was it, wasn’t it?
I had to be here.
Whitt had to be there.
It couldn’t work.
I sank onto the floor of my sister’s bedroom, resting my back against the wall. I dropped my head between my knees and cried. Not pretty crying. Just great, heaving sobs. Tears streaming down my face. My pain coming so quick and so fast that I couldn’t suck in enough air. In a matter of seconds, I was hyperventilating.
Bailey stood, paralyzed before me, fear in her expression. She’d never seen me like this. When she’d overdosed, I’d cried while she was in the hospital. She’d never witnessed it. I’d only shown her the strong, brave woman that I needed to be to get her clean. Now, I couldn’t hold back.
“If it looks too good to be true, it usually is. And Whitt and Wright Construction and this friend group—all of it—was too good to be true. I probably…probably”—I hiccuped—“never deserved it anyway.”
Bailey sank onto the floor next to me. Her face was hollow, and tears came to her eyes, too. “You deserve it, Eve. You do.”
“It doesn’t feel like it,” I said, clutching my chest. “Like my life was just getting so good. And now, that’s over.”
“I don’t want it to be over for you.”
“Yeah, well, I can’t leave you here with him, and I can’t bring you with me.”
Bailey opened her mouth and closed it. She looked down at the crescent moons on her wrist. Then the matching set on mine. And then she sighed, sniffled, and nodded. “I was high.”
“No shit,” I said with a tear-filled laugh. “I was there.”
“It’s just so hard.”
“Yeah, well, life is hard.”
“I wanted it to be easier,” she whispered.
“By doing drugs again?”
She shrugged. “Maybe.”
“That’s stupid.”
“Yeah. I was working so hard to get back to myself. And I still got that C in my summer class. Then, the volleyball coach said she didn’t think I should try out without talking to all the girls about it since I’d screwed up so bad last year. I couldn’t bring myself to do it. None of them understood what I’d gone through. The last thing I wanted to do was go before them and grovel.” She clenched her hands into fists and then released it. “Then, my anxiety spiraled again. I couldn’t handle it. I panicked. And then Trevor had some weed. We were making out, and I just thought a little wouldn’t hurt. It wouldn’t lead to anything else.”