Page 20 of Our Ruined Beginnings

Harper splashes to the top, gulping in huge lungfuls of air as Kinsley reaches out to help her clamber out of the water. It’s not cold, but she’s shivering as she climbs the steps, her eyes averted from everyone except her friend. She ignores us as if they’re the only two people in the world. Kinsley wraps a towel around her shoulders and goes to lead her toward the house, but before she moves, her eyes snap straight to me. They rove over the way Bethany leans back into me, even as my body jolts with the need to hold her. I keep myself ramrod straight, fighting the urge. Then they shove their way through the crowd and disappear from view.

My mind screams at me to go after her, but for what? What the fuck would I even say? The crowd begins to disperse now Harper has gone, and I spin Bethany to face me, my hand clamped around her bicep.

“What the fuck was that? We said get her to leave, not fucking kill her!” My temper is unmatched, the fury I feel for Harper and myself and what just happened forming a tornado inside of me.

“She said—”

“I don’t give a fuck,” I seethe, before taking a step back and addressing the whole group. “No one fucking touches her. Not one single finger.” There are scattered nods and murmurs of agreement, but mostly, people avoid my gaze, and I don’t blame them.

“Calm down,” Evan says, suddenly next to me.

“And where the hell were you?”

“Letting them get on with it, as you should’ve done.”

“And let her fucking kill her?”

“You know Bethany—she wouldn’t have hurt her. The point is to make her want to leave, Madden, not justinconvenienceher.”

I know that. I do. But I can’t sit by and watch other people harm her. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to do that, and it infuriates me. He puts his hand on my shoulder, but I shrug it off, even less in the mood to party than I was when I got here.

“Fuck this,” I mutter to no one in particular, and leave. I can’t do this tonight.

Chapter Nine

Harper

Myeyesburnthesecond I’m awake and I squeeze them tight to exacerbate it. I’m not sure if it’s the chlorine from the water or the many, many unshed tears I’m determined to not let fall, but the sting is almost pleasurable.

Lying in the dark, my body bone weary and my lungs burning from not taking a deep breath, I think back to the summer and how I woke up every single morning feeling like this. Now I have to feel this way again?

Have I not been through enough?

Coming here was always going to be hard, but it could also have been a breath of fresh air—a way to breathe without suffocating in memories and pain. Instead, all it’s brought me is a bunch of vipers—who know nothing of me and life—to my door.

But they aren’t the ones who punished themselves for two months, and they’re not the ones who have to live with the consequences of their own actions every single second of every single day.

So fuck them. Fuck them for thinking they have the right to pile onto the shit that is my life. And fuck him for instigating the whole thing.

I get it. The girl he grew up with made a mistake and took his twin brother from him. I know that; I have to live with that forever. But Kinsley’s right. It was exactly that—a mistake. If this was the other way around, I’d have been there for him from the second I found out … but him?

My chest begins to ache, and a tear rolls down my face as I remember how he so easily walked away.

Words whizz through my mind, but they refuse to sink in. They can’t. Because if they do, if Madden is right, then I ruined everything.

My life. His life. Our life.

My best friend’s life…

For as long as I can remember, he’s been at my side. They both have. When most boys still thought girls had cooties, they chose me as their best friend. Even as we grew up, settled into school at different times, and found our own friends, Caleb and Madden always found the time for me.

A party to go to? They drag me along. Their friends wanna hang? They’re stuck with me too. They’re my favorite people. He can’t be gone. He isn’t. I don’t believe it.

“Madden … it’s not true,” I implore, my eyes finding his. The green is stark against his usually tan features, his eyes wide with anger, sorrow, and a multitude of other emotions I don’t want to read. “He can’t be. He wouldn’t leave me.”

Evan steps forward, taking a place at my bedside. I should’ve known when he came in that something was wrong. He’s not my friend—not like Madden is. He’stheirfriend, and I would never expect him to be visiting me in the hospital, especially not without Caleb too. My body aches, my head thumping steadily, but I pay it no mind. It’s not real. The pain isn’t real.

“Hey, Harper,” Evan says softly, his hand finding my hair. He tucks a strand behind my ear, his fingers grazing my cheek. I resist the urge to shrink back from his touch, knowing he’s only trying to offer me comfort. But I don’t want him. The one I want is looking at me as if he has no idea who I am.

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