Page 87 of Pray for Scars
Money, power…they were a given. But happiness?
Brevis ipsa vita est sedmalisfit longior.
Our life is short, but made longer by misfortune.
And when the worst of my misfortunes comes to fruition, I’m fucking done here.
* * *
I seeCain before I see the others. It’s only us and probably some girls because the dragstrip is technically closed after midnight, even on Saturdays.
Technically, but because we’re the children of the 6, well, technicalities don’t matter.
Cain is leaned against the bathroom building, his arms crossed, eyes down. He’s wearing a black dress shirt, a grey wool coat over it, and it is kind of cold, even if all I threw on was a black hoodie. I like to feel things. Things that are outside of my control. Outside of my mind.
I’d take freezing to death over this pain in my chest when I think of Sid any fucking day.
Cain looks up as he hears me approach. The actual drag strip is several yards away from here, but I can hear an engine roaring even from this side of the building. Mayhem’s McLaren, and we all know there’s no car here that’s going to beat that.
I stand beside Cain, leaning my back against the siding, sliding my hands in my sweatpants pockets. I didn’t want to come. I wanted to go to sleep. But Sid wouldn’t get out of my head and Maverick wouldn’t get off my dick, so here I am.
“Tomorrow, Sacrificium. You ready?” Cain asks me, his dark, coal-like eyes swiveling to meet mine. He’s bigger than all the rest of us, arms the size of my head. His nose is kind of crooked, from all the fighting he does, and he scrubs a hand over his face, through his hair, which is longer on top, shaved on the sides.
He’s got light brown skin and he’s the only one of us that wasn’t born in the States. He’s from Dubai, although his dad made his mom move here right after he was born. They got themselves into a situation kinda like the one I wanted to get Sid in.
It’s fucking hell. It’s stupid. It doesn’t make sense. But Cain is alive because of it, and Sid could stay that way…
“No,” I answer him, looking away from him, out into the dirt parking lot where our cars are parked, save for Mayhem’s and it looks like Atlas’s white Range is missing, too. Why he fucking bothers here, I don’t get it. But whatever. One of us needs an SUV.
Tomorrow I’ll be twenty-three.
And I’ll pay for every one of my twenty-three years at Sanctum at the Sacrificium. I know my father intended me to do just that.
I reach into my pants pocket, pull out a lighter and a cigarette. I hear Cain scoff beside me, but I ignore him as I light up.
Two cars are ruining perfectly good engines racing right now, roaring through the silent night. I’m glad I can’t see it. I hate this place. It has memories of my stepmom all over it. I only come for my brothers.
I take a drag, exhale, looking up at the stars overhead.
After the rise of their engines, the cars slowly go quiet, and it feels strangely peaceful now. Which is an illusion, of course. Being a child of the 6, you learn quickly there’s no such thing as peace.
“How’s she liking the cell?” Cain asks me.
I want to fucking knock his ass on the ground because I don’t want to think about it, but there’s a few problems with that. No way I could actually knock Cain to the ground, not without suffering more damage than I’d really like to right now, and besides that, I know he’s asking for my sake, even if he has a shit way of phrasing his fucking questions.
I blow out another cloud of smoke, still not looking at anything but the stars overhead. I see the Big Dipper. Maybe it’s the little one. I don’t know.
“She’s not,” I answer Cain. She’s been in there nearly a week. Nearly a week and I can’t eat. Can’t sleep. Can’t breathe.
Cain says nothing for a moment, and I dip my chin down and turn to glance at him. He’s staring at me, those dark eyes like obsidian stone.
“You gonna let it happen?” He asks it with no emotion whatsoever. Cain’s style is indifference. And the shitty part is that no matter what you do to him—yell, scream, fight—he still doesn’t change his tone. Almost never.
So even though I feel myself getting worked up over it, I force myself to stay calm.
“Don’t know,” I say.
“Why thefuckdoes he want her?” Cain asks more to himself than to me because he knows I don’t know either.
