Page 129 of The Off-Limits Play

“How? I didn’t even see him leave the house this afternoon.”

“Well, we’re gonna have to keep tabs on him somehow. If that girl hadn’t been sending pics of the party, trying to get me to come, I never would have seen him lying in the background. It’s a fucking miracle I spotted him.”

Doors open and then slam shut.

I groan, my head pounding and throbbing, making me wish for death.

Someone lifts my head onto their lap. “Do you think he needs to go to the hospital? Get his stomach pumped? Or be put on an IV drip or something?”

“I don’t know.”

There’s a long pause, and then someone sighs. “Let’s just get this asshole home. We’ll take shifts and monitor him throughout the night. We’ve done it before; we can do it again.”

Why bother?

Just let me go in peace, guys. It’ll be better for everyone that way.

CHAPTER51

NYLAH

It’s dark when I wake. I have no idea what time it is, but everything hurts… right down to my soul. I don’t understand why. Was it a bad dream? Was I crying in my sleep or something? My eyes feel puffy. My head is aching. My?—

Carson.

At first, the word is just a soft whisper, but then it starts to grow. Those six letters expand in my mind until they’re pressing against my skull, then dripping down my throat, into my chest cavity, and…

It wasn’t a dream.

My belly shudders.

It wasn’t a dream.

He told me to go. He shouted at me to get out of his room. To leave him alone.

We’re over. We’re done.

Tears flood my eyes again as I struggle to wrap my head around it.

I love him.

But he won’t let me.

I want to help him.

But I can’t.

Rolling onto my side, I fist my pillow and let the tears flow unchecked.

My eyes ache.

My stomach hurts.

My brain feels overstuffed with cotton balls. They’ve been soaked in despair and disbelief, and the feeling is hauntingly familiar yet sharper and more painful.

Nick dumped me when I was lying in a hospital bed. That hurt. I cried… and I got over it.

Carson dumping me hurts so much worse, and I don’t even understand why.

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