Page 89 of Toxic

"Listen, Soren. I’m saying this now, straight to your heart: let it go, let logic win. It’s for the best."

Then his hand brushed my cheek, and I knew, I felt what was coming next.

"I’ve been waiting for this moment too, the one where we’re done with college and the future is wide open," Liam whispered. "We’ve already got our apartment lined up, both starting at the same company. I know it’s awful timing, especially since you just pushed Skye away, and it's all so fresh, but I want you to know that I’ve had feelings for you for years. And I can’t hide that I’m hoping we can build something together."

How dare he mention it now?It was almost disrespectful, so inconsiderate of my broken state. I clenched my eyes shut, feeling like I was sinking deeper and deeper beneath the surface of reality, like a noose was tightening around my neck.

Another person, yet another person, who wanted something from me that I couldn’t deliver. Giving a fuck to what I felt. I gasped in shock and my eyes widened, but…

Liam must have misread my emotions because he leaned in, and his lips lightly brushed against mine. I shuddered in disgust, but he misinterpreted that too! He must have thought it meant something else because when I opened my eyes, he was smiling.

For some reason, I thought he looked a bit creepy. Almost like he had a sliver of Don’s obsessive energy in him. Those fixated eyes, with that sick intensity. Funny enough, Skye stareda lot too, but it was saturated with adoration, not just a need to possess me like an object.

Liam leaned in and tried to kiss me once more, and everything inside me twisted and died a little more. I stiffened in his arms, pursing my lips, more terrified and helpless with each passing second.

I had no escape.

Trapped. Trapped!

I didn’t know what to do. I was lost. I didn’t want Liam. I wanted Skye, but I realized that every step I had taken in the past six months had led me to this point—to disaster, to the biggest mistake of my life.

SKYE

After a night spent wandering aimlessly, feeling like I was in a fever dream, I returned to campus in the morning.

I was in a strange state of shock, like I had split into two people. A small part of my rational mind told me I had to take care of some things not necessarily related to my love life, though it barely registered.

Since college was over, I had to handle some stuff at the dean’s office, so I headed there first, walking as if in a dream, haphazardly drifting between the administration buildings. It wasn’t until around 10:30 that I finally got back to the dorm.

Archer was nowhere to be seen, Alvin was in the room alone; he greeted me at the door with a weird look, while my face remained stiff and unresponsive.

"What’s up? Had a good time? I have a feeling Soren kicked you to the curb," he spoke in an unnaturally light tone.

I froze even more, glaring at him murderously. I didn’t have the strength for his triumphant ‘I told you so’. I spent the night trying to make peace with the fact that I had failed in my pursuit, that Soren and I would never be together again. It was the worst twelve hours of my life. I’d heard once that this kind of event is called ‘the dark night of the soul’, and I had just gone through it.

And because I hadn’t slept, it felt like my mind was detached from my body, out of phase. I wasn’t fully in control of my movements, and certainly not of my emotions.

"Yeah," I responded mechanically, opening my laptop with a forced look of indifference.

There was an email from my parents, giving me all the details of their visit tomorrow.

But Alvin didn’t give up. He came over, standing behind me as I read my parents’ email in a half-dazed state.

"Are you gonna tell me how it went? Why didn’t you come back to the dorm last night?"

"I don’t have to explain anything," I mumbled.

"Oh, come on, it was totally predictable!"

Exactly ten seconds of silence—that was the time I needed to focus. I couldn't run away from this, could I? Alvin wouldn't disappear. Oh, well. I was in hell anyway, so if that's what he wanted, I let it out.

"We didn’t really break up, since we weren’t officially together. He just said he didn’t want to keep seeing me, and that’s it." My voice sounded more robotic than I expected, without any emotion. Like it wasn’t even me talking. Maybe for the best? Why feed Alvin anything he could turn into a weapon?

But he narrowed his eyes, analyzing me. "I hope you’re not taking this too hard. I warned you this would happen, but you just brushed it off. Man, you just dodged something really shitty, something that never had a chance of working out. You were so stubborn and naive."

And he chuckled.

The fucker.

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