Page 66 of Soul of a Psycho

“I can’t, Sky. I can’t say it. Please don’t make me say it.”

Chapter Forty-Four

Cade

Ican see it in her eyes. I can feel her pulling away like sinew stretching from my body. She thinks I’m unhinged.

And I am. God, I am.

But I’ve tasted her, breathed her, tucked her inside the black thing in my chest. It beats for her when I thought it was all but dead. She’s apartof me, the only living part, and I can’t lose her. I don’t think I would be able to walk out of these woods. I would lay in the soil till hunger had its way with me, till the snow froze me solid, and the earth took me back.

And yet, the only thing that will keep her breathing life into me is a disclosure so ugly that even the idea of saying it makes my legs give out.

“Please…” I beg as my knees hit dirt. “I can’t.”

The sob out of my throat is pathetic, and I hate myself for it. Ihateit. And the hate is so unbearable that I sob again.

“What could be so bad?” My angel kneels with me, her white stockings sullied by the mud. She cups my cheeks and holds me in her pristine hands. Will she ever touch me again if I tell her?

It’s been three years, and there are still moments where I wish I could rip my skin from my body, and the inability makes me heave through the night. Some months are so bad that the sleeping pills run out before the refill is due. It’s the only thingRutherford has prescribed that has been worth a damn. And lately, their effects have been waning. I wake up feeling like I haven’t slept at all, like I’ve been tugging at the skin on my face in the night.

“I was a sophomore,” I say through gritted teeth, as if the elapsed time will put any distance between what happened and now.

But it can’t. No amount of time will ever truly cleanse me. And once Sky knows, she will never see me as she does now. She will only see the filth. But maybe it’s better if she does. Maybe if she sees it, and her eyes no longer look at me as they do, I can be free of this torture. Because that’s what every day of knowing her has been. Every day that she has been here, I have felt like a lion tamer, dodging her maw of guilt, and questioning my plans. Maybe if she gave me the same repulsion as everyone else, then I could finally hate her like the rest. Maybe I could shed the sadist I’ve become.

I look up, and through blurry eyes, I take note of the last time she will ever look at me like this. Her stare is so pretty and full of empathy.For me.It will be what I hold on to when I press the button. Maybe I can get lost in a purgatory of her eyes. That’s the best I can hope for.

I blink away the last of my pathetic tears and clear my throat.

“I was a sophomore,” I say again. “And I wasso fuckingnaive.”

It isn’t long before I don’t even want to look at Sky’s eyes. They’re full of pity, anticipatory horror, as I tell her about the main floor bathroom in the academic hall. Nothing good comes from a story that takes place in a bathroom. But if I’m going to tell her, there’s an unfortunate context that needs to be explained.

I should have never gone into that bathroom. It was a revolving door to every male at Hillcrest, and I should haveavoided it, considering the hate I was getting. But I didn’t think it could be that bad. I didn’t know how deranged people could be yet.

I had a medical episode, for fuck’s sake. A seizure in the food hall where I had accidentally… Well, I had an accident. I thought the jokes that followed on my behalf were just jokes. So, I didn’t even blanch when I came face to face with Bentley and his posse inside the white-tiled bathroom. Their remarks had been rolling off my back for the past three weeks at that point. I got it. I was something to laugh at, and they had nothing better to do. I ignored it for the most part, thinking it would eventually die down.

Sky’s head tilts out of my peripheral, and I know she’s wondering what everyone thought was so funny, but I don’t think I can handle the kind of pity she’s sure to dole out at that bit of history, so I keep the accident to myself, and wish I had my hood to hide my face.

I steel myself with a crack of my neck and keep my gaze down on the dirt as I vaguely tell her that Bentley chided me.

Wow, look who’s decided to use a restroom for a change.Is what he actually said.

I rolled my eyes and stepped around him. I had chemistry next, and that was in the labs across the quad, and I still needed to stop by the infirmary for my new medication of antiepileptics.

I shake my head, remembering how simple my life used to be before the rot took hold.

You going to take your pants down this time?Bentley continued, garnering snickers from Connor and Henry.

It was so fucking stupid. And that’s what I tell Sky. That it was just stupid jabs. Even though, looking back, fourteen-year-old me was embarrassed. But I didn’t show it. I was a cocky little shit, and when Bentley smacked his buddies in the chest and proclaimed they were going to watch if I made it in the bowl,I smirked, thinking that if they wanted to watch another guy piss… Well, that said more about them than me.

So, I balanced my books and did what I went in there to do. It was a long, awkward stream with their eyes on my back, but I didn’t get stage fright, and was feeling pretty good about myself.

Enjoy the show?I asked when I turned around.

Bentley stepped at me then, but I didn’t get it. I thought we were just roasting each other. It wasn’t that wild to do. God knew that they and everyone else has said worse to me since my episode. It was just retaliation. Tit for tat. Like for like. That’s what it should have been, at least.

“I just didn’t know how cruel people could be,” I say and push to my feet, using Sky’s shivers as an excuse to put some distance between us.

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