Page 90 of Toxic

Oh yeah, I was gonna feed him something after all!

"Shove your ‘I told you so’ up your ass!" That was a scream.

Alvin froze in shock. Surely, my amplitude of emotions was steep. From being a robot to a madman.

Slowly, I stood up, turning to face him. I’m guessing I didn’t look great—pale from a sleepless night, my lips drawn tight, and my eyes squinted.

He stammered uncertainly, "What’s your problem? Why are you so pissed? I was just telling the truth—you shouldn’t be wasting your time on that whore. You’re worth more than that…"

I lunged at him, shoving him so hard that he stumbled back against his desk.

"Never. Speak. About him. Like that. Again." I made a point of emphasizing each word.

"Don’t you think about him that way now too?"

Full stop. My eyes blinked as I stared into Alvin's scornful face.

A slight tremor ran through my body, as the memory of Soren walking away with Don, dragging him by the hand, flashed through my mind.

Don! The freaking rapist he hated so much, but that’s who he chose to break things off with me… A wave of disgust and bitterness washed over me.

Alvin’s eyebrows furrowed. He peered at my face for a moment before saying, "I told you the truth because I still care about our friendship. Friends should tell each other how things are. It's a shame you don't appreciate that, but I'm telling you, it would have ended badly for you."

"I don’t need your ‘truth’, since I know you're not unbiased. You didn’t like Soren because he kept pulling Don away from you."

Alvin grimaced, but didn’t answer.

"You have no idea what I see in Soren—and I have no idea what you see in Don. You were screwing Mark and Sean anyway, so why the greed?"

He hesitated and looked aside for a second. My question was honest—I truly didn’t know his reasons, but I felt there were definitely some.

Were they into some strange, rare kink together? And was Alvin afraid he'd never meet anyone with similar interests? But oh well, judging by his defensive expression, I wasn't going to get an answer anyway, his reasons would remain a mystery.

Silence fell between us as we stared at each other for a moment.

"Is this how we’re going to end it, Skye? We’ve known each other since high school, and now this?"

There was genuine regret and bitterness in his voice.

"It doesn’t matter anyway," I muttered, sighing deeply and shook my head in resignation. "We’re all saying goodbye. Life’s moving on."

After that, I lay down on the bed, sliding my arms under my head. Sleepiness was creeping back in, ready to take over. My eyelids were heavy, and my mind was drifting away.

Alvin stayed quiet for a while, then murmured, "I’m sorry it didn’t go the way you wanted, though I still think this is for the best." I barely heard him and didn’t reply.

Just then, I heard my laptop ping like I had a new email. I didn’t have the energy to get up, but I heard Alvin going over to check it, which miffed me.

There was a brief silence. Since the desk was behind my head, I couldn’t see what he was doing, and there was no strength left in me to ask.

Suddenly, he spoke in a funny tone. "It’s just some spam. I know some good filters—I can help you set one up to block stuff like this, you know, the kind about how to enlarge your penis, and so on…"

"How to enlarge your penis? Did I really get that kind of spam?"

"Yeah, maybe you’ve been researching it. You know how ads work—they tailor themselves to your search results," he tried to joke.

I just scoffed angrily. "I’m not even going to comment on that, but I’m always up for a little comparison session if you have any doubts," I muttered, feeling myself drifting away into slumber again.

He laughed. While we were talking, he was leaning over my laptop, clicking on something, but I had no idea what.

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