Page 164 of Dare To Live

Time to say goodbye. You don’t need me here anymore.

I’ll always need you. I manage not to speak aloud. I can almost see his smile.

No, my shift is over. It’s Arabella’s turn now. Live well, my friend. Let me go.

“Eli?” Ari’s soft voice pulls me out of my head, and I turn to look at her.

“I’m okay.” And for the first time since Kellan died, I actually believe the words. “Let’s get out of here.”

I push open the door and step outside, Arabella by my side. We don’t talk during the walk back to the school buildings, but the silence isn’t awkward. It’s comfortable, peaceful, and it makes me wonder whether there is hope for a future between us. But that’s a conversation for another day. Not now, not tonight.

We stop by a vending machine on the way through the dorm building and grab drinks and snacks. Voices drift out of the common room near the stairs, and I turn toward it, curious who is inside.

Three figures are huddled around a table in one corner—two women and a man. The man, Bret, jumps up when he sees me.

“Eli!”

My eyes drop to the white band around his throat, and his hand rises to touch it.

“I know.” His voice is wry. “Will you come and sit down? I’d really like to talk to you.”

“I don’t want to interrupt you.” I look over his shoulder at the two women.

“Oh, no no. It’s fine. Linda and Tina were just catching up with me. We were talking about …” His smile fades. “Well, about what happened when we were last here.” He holds out an arm. “Please, come and join us.”

I glance back to where Arabella is hovering in the doorway. I know she’s clashed with both the girls since we got here. She shrugs.

Fuck it.

“Five minutes,” I say and stride across to the table they’re sharing.

I hold out a chair for Arabella, before taking the seat beside her.

“I’m sorry for how we treated you,” Tina says, her eyes on Arabella. “Coming back here made it easy to fall back into old habits. It was wrong.”

“Yes, it was.” There’s no forgiveness in Ari’s voice. “Where’s your leader?”

“Lacy?” Linda shakes her head. “We heard her fighting with Brad. I think they’re both leaving. He asked for a divorce.”

“It’s about time. I’m not even sure the kids are his.” Tina leans back on her chair.

“Ladies, stop gossiping.” Bret retakes his seat. “Brad and Lacy have issues to work out. They need our compassion and understanding right now, not us spreading rumors and gossip.”

I snort. Bret smiles at me.

“I know. I was an awful child, and truthfully, I got worse before I found my true path. I’ve been a priest for five years now. After we left school, I was in a bad place. I lashed out at my parents, at my friends, because I couldn’t live with myself … with the guilt of the part I played in Kellan’s death and the way we treated you both.”

I shrug. “You didn’t really do anything to me.”

“We did, by proxy. Everything Evan made Arabella do was to cause you problems.” He swallows. “But Kellan … what he did to Kellan … Everything else he convinced us was just schoolboy pranks, but that … I’m so very sorry, Eli. No one knew what he was truly capable of.”

“Is that why you joined the church? To absolve yourself of guilt?” Arabella asks.

Bret doesn’t back away from the accusation in her tone. “Maybe it was to begin with. I was searching for answers, for a reason why I followed Evan so much without question and I ended up in a church. I spent hours, days, talking with the priest and, eventually, I realized that the church was the only place I felt at peace.”

Tina picks at a napkin on the table. “I turned to drugs.” Her voice is low. “First, I’d smoke a joint or two, just to keep the nightmares at bay. Then when that stopped working, I turned to other things, until I couldn’t function at all unless I was high.” Her tongue sweeps over her lips, and she raises her eyes to look at me and then Arabella. “I can’t ever make up for my part in what we did to you, and it was far too easy to fall back into the habit once I was with Lacy again. I found an AA meeting last night and went to it because I could feel myself being dragged back into that mindset. My sponsor thought coming here would bring closure, and maybe help me move forward. All it’s doing is making me want to reach for the nearest fix.”

“Have you been clean for long?” I ask.

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