Page 3 of Psycho

After Kelsey gave me her number, I said, “Come on. Let’s get your stuff out of the dorm.”

She nodded, swiping at her tears, not saying anything else. I followed her out of the house, to the car parked in the driveway. It was a nice black sportscar, not Sawyer’s type of ride. It was Travis’s car, and I didn’t want to sit in it. Kelsey would drive us to the dorm in her car and then drive me back here on her way out of town.

Her Hillcrest visit would be cut short, because she’d slept with Sawyer and upset Ash so much she had to run away.

Again.

I was silent as I directed Kelsey to our dorm building, lost in my own mind. It was hard enough knowing Ash felt for Travis, but Sawyer too? I guess the signs were there, how she constantly found excuses to find him, to go to his parties and talk to him, and I just didn’t want to see the truth.

Sawyer didn’t deserve any feelings from Ash, especially love. He deserved nothing.

We got to the dorm and I led Kelsey to the elevator, to our floor, and down the hall. I unlocked the door and walked inside, feeling an odd sense of loneliness since Ash wasn’t here. Wherever she was, I hoped she was safe.

Kelsey quickly packed up her stuff, tossing a lingering glance to Ash’s bed before telling me, “That’s all of it. I…please tell her I’m sorry.” She shook her head. “I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. I didn’t know who he was, I just…” With her backpack around her shoulders, Kelsey looked like a vagabond. “I was so lost in my own problems that I…fuck, I just suck.”

I knew trying to convince her that she didn’t suck would be a pointless endeavor, so I said nothing as we left the dorm room.

Luckily, she’d gotten ahold of herself enough to drive me back to Sawyer’s house safely. I was about to step out of the car when she reached for me, grabbing my arm more tightly than I would’ve guessed she was capable of.

“I fucked up,” Kelsey said for about the millionth time tonight. Or was it early morning by now? It was hard to tell. This night had passed in a blur, and the sky outside was still dark, but I swore I could see the faintest traces of early dawn.

Or maybe that was just me wishing Ash would come back. Maybe that was me wishing this night would be over. A fool’s wish.

“I fucked up,” she repeated, still holding onto me. “So whatever you do, don’t follow my lead.”

I blinked at her, my hand steady on the handle. She was…she was telling me not to fuck up?

“Ash likes you,” Kelsey said, her eyes red and puffy from her night of crying. “She likes you all, even though she might not say it. She does. I can tell by the way she talks about you guys. I don’t want any of you to hurt her. Let me…let this be enough hurt, let me be the fuckup.”

Blinking again, I said nothing, only nodding. It was as I nodded that she released her hold on my arm, and I was able to get out of her rusty car. Slamming the door on that thing, I felt like it was going to fall apart.

I watched her drive off, a pit in my stomach. Ash liked us all. All of us. Me, Travis, and Sawyer? Again, the clues had all been there, but hearing her friend confirm it was…troubling. Of course I wanted to be selfish, to have her to myself, but it was as I stood there, watching her friend drive off, that I wondered something.

Could any of us handle Ash on our own, or did we need each other as buffers?

Ash, where are you?

Chapter Two – Travis

It was easy enough to glance at Ash’s past messages with her friend and respond to her numerous texts in the way that Ash would’ve. Her lack of punctuation, how she shortened a few words. The little intricacies that made Ash Ash when she texted. The text served its purpose though, and after I sent it, I immediately turned the phone off.

While her friend and Declan were busy going back to the dorm, I picked up Sawyer’s room. Not so much cleaned it as I got rid of all of the extra substances that Sawyer needn’t take anymore. The fucking idiot. Here he’d probably thought he’d moved past that point in his life—an addict never really could recover fully, especially when he kept a drawer in the kitchen.

If I was honest, this was what I wanted, in the beginning. I wanted Sawyer to remove himself from the picture, because it would’ve made me getting Ash to myself easier.

And yet…yet now, faced with his noncoherent words and the way his pupils were as wide as saucers, not to mention the alcohol taint on his breath, I realized I didn’t want this. I didn’t want this, because I knew Ash wouldn’t want this.

As much as I didn’t want Ash to be with Sawyer, it didn’t matter, because I couldn’t control her feelings. She cared for him, in spite of it all. In spite of his fuck-ups. She cared for Declan, too.

And…me. She had to care for me too, otherwise surely she would’ve gone to the police after I’d tried to chain her up in my room.

Hence the issue with Ash: she never did what I expected her to do. She was unpredictable, and now I knew why. Her past was not a sparkling sterling silver. It was tarnished and stained, and it was only after talking to Markus, after he told me who the man in the video was, I knew why.

Ray. Ray Ruiz. The Midtown Strangler. I didn’t have time yet to fully research him, but after a quick glance at Google, I knew enough. I knew the body count, what he did, how dangerous he was. My question, of course, was why the hell Ash felt it necessary to hide such an important part of herself from me? Did she not trust me? Did she not think I could handle it? Whatever darkness she had, I wanted it. I needed it. Our darkness could mingle and mix and become something new and beautiful. Who didn’t want that?

Sawyer tried to smack me away from his nightstand, but the bastard was out of it. The effects of the alcohol were full-force now; I doubted he’d be able to fuck anything right now. Fucking was his specialty, always had been. I knew, even before Ash, it was only a matter of time until his dick got him in trouble, and now? Now the bastard was in the dog house, for sure.

I had the garbage can from the bathroom across the hall in my hands, and I threw out everything that could possibly get Sawyer into more trouble. I didn’t know types of drugs too well; that was always Sawyer’s department. My kind of high was not something you could get from a pill, or powder, or even liquid shot into your veins. My kind of high you only got when you made someone scream.

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