Page 214 of Boy of Ruin
But enough is enough. She deserves happiness. It’s not in my nature to share. It’s not in my nature to surrender either.
But for her…I’d do anything.
I swallow down the lump in my throat, both hands in my pockets as I look down at the white floors of the hospital room, inhaling the antiseptic smell, and that undercurrent of something like rot. I hate hospitals.
I hate a lot of things, actually.
She’s the only thing I never have. Not really.
“I know,” I finally say, my head still bowed as my gaze connects with his. I take a jagged breath in, knowing I might fucking collapse as I say the words, but I’m good at resurrecting walls. It’s the only way I’ve learned how to survive.
She’s the only one who ever managed to tear them down.
Just for a moment.
“I wanted to kill you, you know.” I don’t phrase it as a question. I’m sure we’re both aware of what we feel for one another.
His eyes harden, but he doesn’t speak.
“I hated you. I still do, actually,” I tell him with a soft smile.
He doesn’t return it.
“I can’t stand the thought of her living a good life with you. Of you two…” The emotions clog my throat, threatening to choke me. I grit my teeth. Bite the inside of my cheek, so the physical pain can distract me from the fucking agony. “Of you two having a life. Me on the outside. Her…forgetting about me. What we went through together. How I never stopped…” I take a shuddering breath, unable to look him in the eye anymore. “Never stopped loving her. All those years. Nearly two fucking decades. I never stopped.”
He just keeps staring at me, not a trace of emotion on his face. For once, though, it doesn’t piss me off. I know this armor well. I’ve worn it myself most of my fucking life. I just keep talking anyway, knowing if I don’t get it all out now, I probably never will. If I don’t tell someone—and I don’t think she always believes me, even if she understands me, sometimes, she’s so full of self-loathing, she can’t see all the ways I fucking adore her—it’ll stay festering inside of my skin. Poisoning me from the inside out.
“The idea of you taking her, when I knew what you’ve done…” I bite my tongue so hard, I taste iron, but it’s the only way I can keep going. Keep fucking talking. “I know what you did to me.” My voice is hoarse as I stare at him, slipping my hands from my pockets, curling my fingers around the foot of the hospital bed, the plastic bumper bending and warping under my hand. “You left me in there, and I couldn’t…I couldn’t fucking let you do something like that to her. And your dad…our fucking dad sent me to kill her. And you too. And I didn’t, but you…” My eyes are filling with tears. I swallow down the knot in my throat, trying to draw breath in my fucking lungs, but fuck, it’s hard. It’s so goddamn hard. I shift on my feet, taking another breath. “I thought you would have killed her. Until tonight…”
I notice his eyes are red too, gleaming with tears. I notice that lump in his throat as it bobs, the veins in his neck straining against his skin, his knuckles blanched as he clasps his hands tight together.
“You would’ve taken that bullet for her. And before that? I saw how you looked at her. Like it was…” Something wet falls from my eyes, warm down my cheek and I hate it. I hate him. I hate her.
I hate that I don’t fucking hate them at all because I understand them. Both of them. They’re just like me. I’m them.
We’re all fucked.
“Like it was the last time. Like you were going to let her go, if it made her happy.”
He’s chewing his cheek, tears falling down the pale planes of his face as his chin quivers, but he doesn’t look away from me. Doesn’t bother trying to hide his grief or deny the truth of my words.
“You’re a fucking dick,” I say, and he laughs, wiping the back of his hand over his eyes. “You’re a piece of shit, and I swear if you don’t stop fucking using, I really will kill you.” He’s still laughing, but it’s kind of hollow. We both know it’s true. “But you love her, and she fucking loves you, and the baby…”
He drops his hand to his lap, curling his fingers into a fist. I think about the scar across his palm. About the scar on hers.
The one on her belly too.
My name.
At least she’ll have that.
“The baby is yours, and you need to be there for them.”
He’s nodding, his hands twisting in his lap again as those tears fall from his face. “Yeah,” he croaks out. “Yeah…I know. I know.” He says the words more like he’s saying them to himself, and I know that feeling so well. Trying to convince yourself you’ll do better. Be better.
But unlike me when I’m talking to myself, I think he actually means it.
“She’s okay,” I tell him, even though I know he knows. “But she’s going to need you.” Maverick came in here first without a single glance at me, to tell him exactly that. I know he loves her, too. I know he’s been a far better brother than I could have ever been to her.
