Page 7 of Rear View
Tears pricked the back of my eyes.
Her expression softened. “I hate this, Ryah.”
Shehated it? I wanted my life back. Wanted to stop looking over my shoulder. Wanted to trust and live and breathe again. But it wasn’t her fault. Only a handful of people knew what’d happened; the rest, including my parents, were oblivious. They’d noticed me retreat. Noticed my clothes change. Watched the light leave my eyes until I’d withered and shriveled and faded to nothing. Because that’s what I’d needed to become.
Nothing.
Mom had pushed, but the last thing I wanted was for her to worry. I’d sworn my younger brother, Miles, to secrecy, and he’d been good on his word.
My phone buzzed and I eyed the screen. I bit my lip, a smile pulling my cheeks when I spotted the name there.
Christian: Hey. You around?
Me: Meeting with Barlowe, then headed home. Everything okay?
My heart thudded against my ribs, heat crawling up my face while I waited for a response. And waited.
Zoya arched a brow. “What is it?”
I traced my finger along the edge of my screen. “Christian.”
Things with him were…tangled. We’d been friends through high school, then started dating three years earlier, in undergrad. We’d lasted all of fourteen months before he ended it, saying he loved me but just didn’t see a future for us. Still, to me, his reasoning had been…suspect.
“Oh?” She pulled a chocolate bar from her pocket, and unwrapped it, displaying the henna that crawled up her light, sepia-toned hands—a remnant from her mother’s birthday celebration three days earlier. It disappeared up her arm and under the sleeve of her down jacket. Her gold bracelets jangled when she shoved a sizable bite in her mouth, then said around it, “What’d he say?”
Zoya wasn’t a fan of my ex. Hadn’t really held back about it, not that she’d needed to, seeing as we’d known each other since third grade.
“He’s wondering if I’m free.”
Her frown was deep. “Why?”
“Does he need a reason?”
She shook her head. “No, but he never asks without one.”
“I’m choosing not to be offended by that.”
“Choose away!” Grinning wide, she took another bite. “I’m betting it’s trouble in paradise.”
Christian Fellows had been on-again, off-again with his girlfriend, Chloe, for a while, and he did have patterns. It’d stung when he’d eventually moved on—a lot. Yes, it’d been a while since we’d split, but my still beingentrenched in his life meant I hadn’t really let go. I bitterly snatched the rest of the bar from Zoya’s grasp and stuffed it into my mouth.
She stared at me, slack-jawed. “Thievery.”
I made a show of swallowing as my long, toffee-brown hair whipped over my face and into my mouth. I spit it out as my foot slid over an icy patch on the cement and shot to the side. I squeaked, arm flying out to steady myself.
“Jeez, some salt would be nice,” Z said.
Indeed. It wasn’t like they couldn’t afford it, seeing as they were one of the top-tier Canadian schools, and being West Coast meant it was ludicrously expensive to boot. Without my scholarship and TA position, the place never would’ve been in the cards for me. It wasn’t that my parents were broke, but my brother, Miles, had played competitive hockey since he was little. A goaltender, at that. So, every spare penny the family had was funneled into his dream. He deserved it. At twenty, he’d earned his way into the Major Junior League as captain of the Edgewater Sharks. And I’d been smart enough to get a full ride, so it’d worked out in the end.
I checked my watch. Late, I was late. “Oh, shit! I gotta go.” I skipped back a step.
“I’ve got my stats exam tomorrow, so there’s a study group tonight,” Zoya reminded me. Math and its offshoots were easy for her, but when it came to her finance degree, she’d accept nothing but perfection. “Don’t panic when I come in late.”
My stomach dropped. Right. I hated that I hated being alone, but I’d never let her know that, ’cause Zoya was the best kind of friend. The year before, she’d canceled a date with a guy she’d been pining over for months when I’d started having panic attacks. Not that I didn’t appreciate the love, because I did. So freaking much. But I didn’t want her dropping her life for a sad sack like me. No doubt, she’d do it again. It was bad enough one of us suffered. I wouldn’t take her down with me…more, anyway.
She jabbed a finger my way. “Text when you get home!”
“Yes, Mother.” I would. I needed people to know when and where I was—or wasn’t, as it were.
