Page 30 of Pretty When He Bleeds

“I need to go,” I mutter, turning on my heel and heading down the street without looking back.

“Damon, wait—!”

I don’t stop. I don’t turn around. Because if I do, I know I’ll fuck this up even more than I already have.

And I’m not sure either of us can handle that.

Roman

Thehouseisquietnow that the party’s over. Empty bottles and Red Solo cups litter the floor, and the faint smells of sweat and stale beer permeate the air. Kill said not to bother with cleaning because he’s gotten a team in to do it in the morning. Life of a trust fund baby, I guess.

I’m sitting on my bed, staring at the wall like it’s going to give me answers, but all it does is reflect how fucked up tonight was.

I shouldn’t have kissed him back.

I shouldn’t have wanted to.

But I did and now I can’t stop thinking about his lips on mine, the way his hand felt around my throat, his body pinning me to that wall. And the way his voice dropped when he told me he hated me, but kissed me like he meant the opposite. Now I’m sitting with this bite mark on my shoulder—a display of ownership I never asked for.

I drag a hand down my face, groaning. “What the fuck is wrong with you, Roman?”

It’s not just that Damon is Caleb’s brother. Caleb was my first love, my first everything, and I’ve spent the last two years trying to come to terms with how it ended. With howheended.

I lean back against the headboard and grab my phone from the nightstand. My chest feels tight as I open the gallery with a specific set of pictures that I keep hidden—pictures of Caleb and me.

There’s one of us from sophomore year, sitting on the hood of his old Jeep with beers in hand, both of us grinning like idiots. Another from that summer, the two of us by the lake, his arm slung around my shoulders like it was the most natural thing in the world.

I keep scrolling, my chest tightening with every photo. There’s one from prom, the two of us in our suits, grinning at the camera like the world was ours. I remember that night so vividly—how we snuck out early, ditching the afterparty to drive aimlessly until we ended up at our favorite diner.

God, he had the best laugh. The kind that could make you feel like everything was going to be okay, even when it wasn’t.

I swipe to the next picture, and it’s one I’ve avoided looking at for months. It’s just Caleb, sitting on the hood of his Jeep with that easygoing smile on his face, sunglasses perched on his nose. He always kept his hair short on the sides and longer on top, but he started growing it out before this. I took this picture without him knowing, and it’s one of my favorites.

They’re all the same—full of life, full of him.

Then they stop.

Because that’s the thing about losing someone. The pictures end, but the memories don’t.

Now they rush in uninvited. Caleb’s voice, his laugh, the way he used to call me out on my bullshit but always had my back. The way he kissed me that first time like he’d been waiting forever to do it.

And then the worst memory of all—the day I lost him.

I couldn’t sleep that night and Caleb had said goodnight to me early, saying he was tired and would see me tomorrow. I’d been staring at my ceiling for hours after another fight with my dad that ended in a split lip and bruised rib; the quiet of my room was too loud and suffocating. Caleb always knew how to quiet the noise in my head even when he wasn’t saying anything.

So, like I’d done a hundred times before, I climbed out of my window and made my way down the street to his house. He only lived six doors down, and even though it was cold as fuck out, I didn’t care. I needed to see my boy.

Caleb always kept his bedroom window unlocked for me. His parents never checked on him late at night, they just assumed he was asleep, doing everything right and being the perfect son they raised him to be.

They didn’t know he wasn’t their version of perfect.

They didn’t know we’d spent months sneaking into each other’s rooms, they had no idea that we were more than just best friends who grew up together.

No one knew because Caleb’s father made damn sure he couldn’t be anything other than what he wanted—a good, God-fearing son who’d grow up to marry the perfect girl and lead the perfect life. His mom, who treated me like her own, never had a say.

I climbed up the ladder left by the window and slipped through it onto his balcony like always, my foot landing softly on the carpet. His room was dark, but there was just enough moonlight streaming through the blinds to see. My breath caught, my whole body freezing as I registered the shape in front of me.

Caleb was hanging from a makeshift noose above his bed; the rope attached to the rafters from where his LED lights were usually wrapped around.

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