Page 94 of Crybaby

I don’t know who I’m speaking about right now because every person involved is to blame.

Reaching for a fallen branch on the ground, I commence hitting the truck with all my might. Each indent is a reflection to the thousand lashes against my heart. It doesn’t make me feel any better, but when I’m breathless and soaked with perspiration, do I stop.

“Fuck!” I scream over and over again.

But this breakdown is only the start of things to come because I need to get back.

It’s kissing dawn when I return to Darcie, knowing that things are about to get messy.

Opening the door, I smell coffee brewing, so I enter the kitchen. When she sees me, she straightens from her position as she’s leaning on the bench, reading from a recipe book.

Her eyes narrow. She knows something is wrong.

“Did you get what you needed?” she asks as the note told her I was going to Carson’s.

I nod, pouring myself a cup of coffee.

She waits for me to continue, but I can’t. For the first time in my life, I’m scared, scared of disappointing her as I begin wrestling with my convictions.

Turning my back, I peer at my reflection in the splash back wall. I look like shit. I’ve lost count of which bruises and cuts are from when and where—they all mix into one huge mess.

“So we’re all set? Carson is going to die?”

On any other day, I would say hell to the fuck yes, but not today and that’s because of what sits in my back pocket like manacles around my heart.

“Rev? What the fuck is going on?”

I wish I could answer her, but I can’t. I should want to kill them all, but I don’t…and what the fuck does that say about me?

“Tomorrow, we kill Carson and anyone who stands in our way, right?”

Here it is—the moment of truth.

Deep down, I think I always wanted to know who he was because he is half of who I am. I thought that maybe if I knew who my father was, I was to better understand whoIwas.

But now that I know, I realize I was better off never knowing.

“No,” I reply, bracing for the consequences.

“What do you mean, no?”

“No, we can’t kill Carson. We’ll find another way.”

Silence…

I should embrace it as I know it won’t last for long.

But the voices inside my head will never be silenced because all I hear on repeat are the words which I read in that document. Unveiling my filthy bloodline.

My name is Augustine Blackwood…and Walter Beckett is my biological father.

Carson is my brother, and we are just two sick fucks from opposite sides of the tracks.

A coffee cup shatters into the splash back in front of me, shards sideswiping my cheek as I see Darcie’s unfaltering expression staring back at me.

Let the games begin…

Rev turns around slowly and stares into my face. His eyes are no longer those beautiful amber jewels but black holes, like I’ve just tested the patience of the reaper.

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