His footsteps are getting closer, heavier, but I zip forward like a bolt of lightning and head straight for the opening in the forest. Blades of damp grass whip my ankles as my hair falls from its high ponytail, flying out in the wind. The tears won’t stop. Why am I crying?
Why is my mind a maze of scribble? Why am I broken? Why does he hate me so much? So many fucking questions. That’s why I’m crying. I dash down the dirt path, my toes sinking into the mud. Just as I reach the entry to the Vitiosis cemetery, I stop running, wiping the stray tears from my cheeks. The high wired gates reaching for the sky in gothic spikes distract me for a second too long, because something hard crashes into my back and I’m falling forward, my hands flying out as I land face first into the dirt. Nate’s hard chest is pressed against my back as he inches up slightly to flip me around, spreading my legs wide with his. He rests his weight on me, his hand slamming over my mouth.
“You’re going to shut the fuck up and listen to the words that I’m about to say…”
I do as I’m told, because Nate angry is scary as shit and my self-preservation isn’t on drugs.
He searches my eyes, his almost black. His lips part as he sucks in air. “You want to know why I hate you?”
I didn’t want to know now.
He squeezes my cheeks which make my lips pop out. “I’ve already told you this, but I’m going to repeat myself one more time. You fucking remind me of her!”
I freeze.
Oh no. No, I don’t want to do this. Not right now and not after everything that has already happened tonight, please, I don’t want to do this. I squeeze my eyes shut.
“You gave me the most beautiful little fucking girl in the world, and I broke her, Tillie. My world touched her and now? Now I’m always reminded of that because of your existence.”
Tears stream down my face, my throat swelling from pain. Pure, undiluted pain ripples through my blood and soars through my eardrums.
He carries on. “I’m battling an internal war with myself every second of every fucking day. I hate you. I hate your smell because I remember what it smells like mixed with her innocent scent. I hate your fucking voice because I remember how you used it on her, and how it would soften every time you would say ‘Micaela’—”
Fire burns in my chest at the mention of her name. I don’t want to listen to this.
“You’re going to hear me, Tillie, because you think that my hate for you, that my feelings toward you are as shallow as Bishop had for Madison. You know me. I don’t fuck like that. You should have known that there was more to me being like this. But you fucking didn’t. You thought I hated you because fuck knows why, because you think it gets my dick hard like it did Bishop. You’re wrong. It’s far fucking deeper than that.”
He exhales, his hand coming away from my mouth and resting on my throat.
“I never wanted to fucking hurt you. Never. But every fucking day. Every fucking day I’m reminded. I’m haunted by her through you. Yeah, that may not be your fault, but it’s how I’m dealing with it.” His lip curls. His eyes drop to my mouth, his thumb pressing over my bottom lip. “How you used to kiss her goodnight every fucking night with these lips.” Then his eyes turn ablaze, coming straight to mine. “Or how about the fact that you had more time with her than I did. I was fucking robbed.”
The tears haven’t stopped and my heart snaps in my chest. He’s right. I thought the only reason he was throwing his hate around at me was because of some sick King game that they liked to play. Riddles, hate sex, vicious abuse. It’s all their foreplay. Now he’s saying that it wasn’t the case with me? I’m confused. Hurt, dazed, and confused.
His hate is deeper than a flesh wound. I see it now. It’s in his bones and it’s there to stay.
My eyes close. “I’m sorry.”
He flies off me and I slowly stand up from the ground.
“I didn’t know. I didn’t know it went deeper than that.”
He grips at his hair and tugs on it. “You need to get your shit sorted, because I can’t be around you much longer.” His eyes come to mine. “I’m going to break you beyond repair if it’s not done soon.”
“Don’t—” I shake my head, stepping forward. My fingers itch. I need to make him feel better. Just for right now. Not for tomorrow or yesterday, I need to make him feel better for right now. He stills, his eyes staying on mine.
“I’m going to break you, Tillie.”
“Then don’t, Nate,” I answer through a whisper, my hand going up his chest and curling around the back of his neck. I stand on my toes and yank his face down to mine, my eyes searching his. “Don’t break me.”
He’s so close I can feel his heavy breath on my lips, and then I lean forward, his soft lips brushing mine. I kiss him softly, not an open mouth kissed, but not a closed mouth kiss. It’s an in-between kiss. He keeps still, not moving.
“Kiss me,” I whisper against his mouth, my heart thundering in my chest.
I bury my fingers into the back of his hair and kiss him again, lighter, taking his bottom lip into my mouth softly and then kissing him again. His lip twitches and then slowly opens as his arm hooks around my back, pulling me to him. I jump up,
