Page 10 of Break

The whimper that comes from Mina is a sound I’ve never heard anyone make before. She cowers in front of him, pulling her arms above her head like she’s protecting herself, fearful that he’ll hit her.

My eyes grow to the size of saucers as I catch Ethan’s look, and he seems equally disturbed by her reaction.

“Come the fuck on, Mina. Stop cowering like a goddamn wimp. I’m not going to fucking hit you! Jesus!” Danny scowls at her. I look down at his hand in time to see him shaking out his fingers, likely from how hard he was clenching them. An uncomfortable feeling rolls through me as he speaks. I’m not entirely sure he’s being truthful.

“Danny, we need to get the fuck out of here,” Max warns. Danny stares down at Mina, who’s got her arms down now while facing away from all of us with her eyes clenched shut. I notice Max’s face has gone lax as he stands next to Danny.

“Whatever,” Danny mumbles under his breath. Turning toward the girls, he hooks an arm over Jennifer’s shoulder while loudly announcing, “Come on, babe! Let’s go check you over, little fighter.”

I don’t move from my spot as he leads Jennifer and her friends away, along with the rest of the dispersing crowd. Neither does Max nor Ethan. The three of us are just staring at Mina, who hasn’t moved nor opened her eyes.

Clearing his throat, Ethan’s voice is raspy. “Mina, are you-”

Her eyes snap open and fix on Ethan alone. She ignores me and Max. “I’m fine.”

“You don’t look fine,” Max adds unhelpfully. To everyone else, he would look normal, like he doesn’t have a care in the world, but I can tell that what just happened with Danny and Mina shook him up. I’m just not entirely sure why it’s gotten under his skin so much. The color in his skin is absent.

Letting out a humorless laugh, she glances at Max before letting her eyes run over me briefly, then the floor in front of her feet. “It doesn’t matter,” she says.

Ethan opens his mouth to ask, but not before I hear her say under her breath, “Bunch of bullies…”

Bullies? What the hell?I’m shocked to hear her accuse us of that when I’ve never been accused of being one in my entire life. None of us ever have! We’re basically friends with everyone here at school and around town.

Before I have time to argue that she’s wrong, she slips past us and hurries down the hall and pushes her way into the girls’ bathroom.

Frowning at Ethan, I can see he’s mulling over her words the same as I am. Max, on the other hand, has his color back and looks angry.

“Whatever. She’s just a delusional, crazy little girl,” he grumbles.

I force out a laugh, but it dies quickly. Brushing this entire lunch period off, I jerk my head in the opposite direction that Mina just went. “Come on, let’s go catch up with them.”

She’s just angry and throwing words out because the fight didn’t go her way. That’s all, right? If that’s the case though, why do I spend the rest of the day reminding myself of that?

Chapter 6

9 years ago

Max

Slamming my car door shut, I take a deep breath and enjoy the small bit of peace and quiet I have before the guys show up. They all stayed behind to help the student council with prom organizational bullshit that Vincent roped them into.

He asked me to help as well, but I just can’t. The last year had been amazing once I started dating Raquel. Even when she moved away and changed schools, we made the long-distance thing work for a couple of months. Well,Ithought it was working. Then she called me last week to break things off, saying some crap about this being too hard and we should enjoy the rest of our senior year in high school.

In other words, she wants freedom to play the field with a new group of guys two hours away. I wasn’t in love with her or anything, but I could see us getting to that point, eventually. What she’s left me with is no date for prom and no escape from my worthless father.

I’ve never admitted it to anyone, but the main reason I enjoyed dating her was because when I wasn’t hanging out with the guys, going to her house was the next best thing. She’s an only child, and her parents were normally gone until later in the evenings. I could stay there as long as I wanted and avoid going home to the screaming matches my parents got into. Before the inevitable ending with my mother cowering in their bedroom in tears.

The guys know my parents aren’t normal, but since I’ve never invited them to hang out at my place, they haven’t questioned me much about it. I’ve never felt the need to lay out all my shit to them.

I dig my palms into my eyes and rub them hard. Then I breathe out a frustrated groan knowing that I’m going to be the seventh wheel this weekend and it fucking blows. Who wants to go to their last prom stag?

“Max?” My head shoots up when I hear Danny’s neighbor, Mina, call out softly to me. I’m surprised to see that she’s only a few feet away, studying me with a furrowed brow.

Ever since last year when things came to a head with her and Danny’s girlfriend, we’ve tried to watch our words around her. I never spent a lot of time dwelling her accusation of us of being bullies, but I’m not a fan of someone thinking like that about any of us.

Still, I don’t have the energy to deal with her right now. I close myself off from whatever has her seemingly so concerned and feign indifference. “Hey Mina. If you’re looking for any of the Reeds, Danny and his parents aren’t here right now, but I’ll let them know you’re looking for them.”

“Oh… umm, no, I wasn’t looking for them. I, umm… a-are you okay? You seem like… maybe you might not be?”

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