Page 68 of Fake Game

For the past week, my dreams have been haunted by visions of her. No matter how hard I try to tear her out of my mind, she’s burrowed her way in, using those sharp, decorative nails to grip the corners of my sanity. She’s an addiction I didn’t know I had until it was too late to quit.

Yesterday is only proof of that, of how blinded I’ve become.

I almost made her my fake girlfriend.

Fuck.

I have to let her go.

Now.

SEVENTEEN

JACKSON

Itoss for what feels like the fiftieth time in the last hour.

I just can’t fall asleep on this fucking couch. I don’t care how custom or expensive it is, it doesn’t make up for an actual bed. My bed. Which is less than twenty feet away. The very same bed a woman whose face won’t leave my mind is lying in.

I flip over, shoving my cheek against the pillow as I attempt to get somewhat comfortable. I’ve been trying to count sheep to empty my brain, but they just keep morphing from fluffy white animals to fluffy pink ones.

I’m starting to think I might have a serious problem.

A squeaking noise has me pausing, my body locking up as I strain to hear where it came from.

I swear to God, if Aleks and Stevie are fucking again, I’m going to murder them.

Our streaming rooms might be soundproof, but our bedrooms aren’t, and the living room echoes sound like a damn canyon.

The noise comes again, but this time it sounds a little different. There’s a hitch in the tone.

It…

It almost sounds like someone’s crying.

I bolt up, throwing off my blanket. A sinking feeling churns throughout my stomach. My feet slap against the tiles as I make a beeline for my bedroom. There’s no light creeping out from under the door, but as I lean my ear toward the wood, I hear muffled wheezing.

My fingers twitch on the door handle, but when a hiccup slips through, so does my resolve. I push the door open.

My room is cloaked in darkness, the only light coming from some charging cables in the corner.

There’s a sharp intake of breath, and the entire room feels like it is frozen in time as I move forward. My eyes start to adjust, and I make out her small form huddled in a ball, twisted in the sheets. I’m careful not to scare her as I climb onto the mattress, reaching a tentative hand out to rest on the sheet covering her body. Her breath comes in short, quiet intervals—like she is barely restraining herself from hyperventilating. I’m unable to stop my thumb from moving on its own, rubbing in a slow circular pattern.

I don’t say anything and neither does she.

She’s been here for a little over a week and this is the second night I’ve caught her having some sort of a nightmare. My throat thickens as I think about the weeks she spent before coming here when she was holed up in her apartment all alone. How many times did this happen after the incident? How many nights did she cry alone?

No wonder she looked a mess when I picked her up. She’d probably given up on sleeping altogether.

Deer releases another hiccup, but her body begins to relax under my hand. I feel some of the tension ease from the tight curl she’s been holding as her muscles start to melt.

Without giving it too much thought, I lower my body to the mattress. I curve into something like a C shape, molding myselfinto a fence of safety around her. My hand doesn’t leave her once in the process, anchoring her to me.

She begins to wriggle, and I spot the tips of her fingers as they emerge from beneath her cocoon. Those pointy nails curve around the edge of the sheet and slowly move it down until her eyes crest. She holds the sheet there, tight against the bridge of her nose as she blinks those puffy doe eyes at me. I don’t need light to know that they’re bloodshot.

“Hi.”

The corners of my lips threaten to quirk up.

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