Page 95 of Faithful

I’m frozen and speechless because I’ve been waiting for him to confess his guilt for so long that I’ve forgotten why exactly I needed to hear those words. Now that I am hearing them, I don’t know what to do with that information, how to react, if at all. So I just stand there–on the patio of his mother’s house in Everett on a Thanksgiving evening years after Ava’s death–and try to make sense out of things that aren’t meant to make sense.

“Why did you two jump?” I ask finally.

Kai shoves his fists into the pockets of his jeans and leans in slightly. Our gazes clash under the dark Washington sky. “Because we were stupid, Dylan,” he says bitterly.

I let that sink in.

“If you are hoping there’s a mystery behind it, there’s none. She was a tornado and she liked to get high, and I was going through shit when we met and needed a friend. She was that friend who listened and didn’t ask questions I couldn’t answer. And you know what happens when two fucked-up people get together? Cool art and more fucked-up things. Like making a dare on an empty bridge in King County.”

I’m shaking. My vision blurs and my knees weaken.

“Is that all it was? A fucking dare?” I force the words out.

Kai nods and runs a palm over his face, and I realize his hand is trembling too. “Sometimes, I want you to keep hating me for this.”

And I do. But I don’t.

My head is a mess.

Everything hurts.

“Whose idea was it?” I ask, terrified of the possible answer, terrified of Kai being the one to challenge my sister. “The dare?”

“Do you really need to know this?”

“I do.”

“If I tell you it was mine, will that make you feel better?”

“I want you to tell me the truth and not what I want to hear.”

“Your sister was the one who dared me,” he finally says, his gaze holding mine.

I don’t move. I simply wait for his words to take effect, to do something to me, but the world is still there, winter cold and quiet, and I think back to the time when I wished him dead instead of Ava, and all it does is send me into a state of panic. I realize I can’t resurrect my sister, but I’m not letting Kai go either.

He’s mine.

The realization that his confession changes very little in the way I feel about him has my mind pivoting.

I reach out for him, grab his wrists, and brush my thumbs over the scar tissue where the sleeves of his sweater bunch up. “I need you to talk about these now.”

He yanks his arms back.

I don’t budge.

The jacket slips off his shoulders and falls to the ground.

Kai’s face is twisted with something a lot like fear. “You know the rules.”

“The rules don’t apply to what this is, what we are in the present moment.” I draw him closer.

He makes another attempt to free himself from my grip and we are stuck in this half-struggle.

“It’s not what it was anymore, Kai. It’s changed.”

“I don’t go around poking your past. Why do you need to know about mine?”

“Because I can’t fucking protect you if you’re hiding things,” I cry out in desperation.

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