Page 99 of What Lies Within

A slow smirk graces his lips, and he moves back to the fire again, hands held ninety degrees at his sides to warm his palms. With his attention on his brother, he asks, "Why are the officers out there? What's goin' down?"

“If I knew, I would’a said,” Harvey snaps.

Jamie chooses this moment to do what she should have at the start: she moves to his side, placing a small hand gently atop his leg as Harvey gives his older brother a death stare.

Oh, how the tides have turned.

When I arrived, the brothers were thick as thieves, Harvey looking up to his older brother while he tailed him around the town. But somewhere along the way, the blindfold fell from Harvey's eyes. He's not a stranger to his brother's arrogance anymore, blind to the way he causes trouble for no other reason than sheer entertainment.

"I'm sure we'll learn soon enough what they're up to."

"Are you now?" Kane folds his arms, a position that highlights his proclivity to work out, given his rounded shoulders, high traps, and thick biceps.

I'm sure the sight has women fawning over him most days, but for me, it's akin to staring a yawning lion square in the mouth. All he does is remind me how much stronger he is.

How much more dangerous.

The familiar wash of hopelessness drains the blood from my head, vertigo a quick chaser. I lay my head back on the sofa and let the intrusive thoughts run through my mind like a free-flowing river after rain.You're no use here. There's no bright future for you after this. You'll never be safe. Thinking anything will be any different is a joke. Your fucking parents grew tired of you; they will here too. Nobody wants you; they're just too nice to say it.Fuck.

I’m closer than I thought.

The predictable cumulation of my self-loathing hurts like a goddamn nail through my heart.You should end it.No. I close my eyes and combat the negative thoughts with positive ones.This feeling is temporary. You know happiness. You felt it today—with Digger and with Tyke. You felt love with Maddie. You belong here, and your thoughts are a liar.Ironic, considering thoughts are exactly what I grasp ahold of to save myself every month.

“You okay?” Jamie leans over the arm of her sofa, stealing a moment while Kane and Harvey talk.

“Yeah.” What would she do if I said no? Whatcouldshe do? “I just need a minute.”

I need a minute to get my head on straight, to let the hormones shift, and to let the chemical chain reaction do its thing.

I open my eyes to find Kane and Harvey watching me. "You sure?" Harvey asks. "You look like you've seen a ghost."

My own."Yeah. I'm sure." The added attention spikes my anxiety, my heart rate picking up, muscles tensing.Shit.

“You about to have a mental breakdown or some shit?” Kane laughs, but even his attempt at ridiculing me sounds half-hearted.

“Leave her alone,” Jamie scolds.

"What?" he argues, hand outstretched toward me. "She looks like she's about to start crying or some shit."

“Honestly.” I rise from the seat, hand outstretched. “I’m fine. I just need a minute.” My goddamn arm shakes.

I catalog the stares of the three club kids, and swallow down the brick of loneliness as my fears register again. I don't belong here, not with them.

I’m nothing like these people, and I never will be.

Shit.I thought I was making progress. I honestly believed I’d turned a corner this past week, despite the fucking stress of everything going on.

My hip collects the edge of the sofa in my piss-poor attempt at fleeing the room as the panic rises, a vice grip around my throat. I eye the stairs, decide they're a fucking bad idea when my head swims, and redirect to Tyke's room in search of sanctuary.

The minute I step through the door, I realize what a bad idea it is to isolate myself. The sinister thought train throws another load of coal in the fire and pumps its rods. It's so much easier to believe the bullshit you feed yourself when there's nobody around to refute the lies. Yet, there's also a strength found when forced to do it alone.

Like I have so many times before.

I drop to the floor beside Tyke’s bed and back myself into a corner made of his mattress and nightstand. Legs bent before me, I wrap my arms around them and bury my face against my knees, pushing my eye sockets against the protruding edges of the joint to feel something. Anything. A reminder to focus on the here and now.

It’ll be okay.It has to be. I haven’t come this far to quit now.One more day.Twenty-four hours max and this shit will ease. This shit will ease, and then it's the countdown until it happens again.Fuck.My panic flows at the reminder there’s no escaping this bullshit as long as I bleed.Control what you can control—here and now.Focus on the now. On the cool floorboards beneath my butt. The shadow cast by Tyke’s bedroom door. The smell of leather and liniment. The ache in my hip.

I count my breaths, throw every goddamn trick I've learned at the fucking mental shift, and bury my head again to pray.

---