Page 69 of Pretty Black

“The first time?” River asked, and it took me a moment to figure out what he meant.

“It was Alexander then, too, but it wasn’t the same.”

“Why?” River asked.“Why would he want you in there if you weren’t—”

“My only guess is control.” I exhaled, not sure how to tell my best friend I’d lied to him for the last two years. “I wanted to tell you, but by the time I got out, they’d already told you all a story, and I was so fucking embarrassed. Please don’t be mad at me for not telling you.”

“I’m not mad at you.” He squeezed me tighter. “I’m pissed they didn’t let me be there for you.”

“You were. You left Emory’s cabin and took me to Japan early.”

“It wasn’t enough.”

I put my hand over his mouth. “It was. I needed it. You’ve helped me survive as much as Caspian has. I wouldn’t have gotten through high school without you.”

He pushed my hand away. “You don’t owe me a thank you. You were here for me as much as I was for you. I wouldn’t be with Emory if it wasn’t for you. If it wasn’t for you, I’d probably be my dad by now, working a dead-end job, drinking myself into an early grave. You made this possible for all of us. You gave us all an escape from dismal futures. You’ve done so much for all of us.”

“That’s not true. Caspian’s parents are rich and well-adjusted and happy.” I said the word like it was a confusing concept. “Why he ever became a rock star and not some investment banker some place, I’ll never understand. He had everything set in his life to end up a Wall Street bro or to follow in his mother’s footsteps and become a doctor. I’m not sure I’ll ever understand.” The tears freely flowed down my face, and I didn’t try to stop them.

“You. You changed the trajectory of all our lives. He would have been miserable. There is as much music in him as there is in you. He was made to write the soundtrack of your sorrow. Of your highs and lows. Of your love. Of your life. You belong together.”

I glanced at him, animated and happy, laughing with Lowe and Saint. “He changed mine as much as I changed his. I wouldn’t have been able to do this without you two.”

“What made Alexander put you in the first time?”

“Caspian let slip something that I’d said, but I don’t know what Alexander’s real motivation was. Part of me thinks it was because I was getting worse, and he knew how close I was to breaking. Or maybe it was the start of getting more control because he saw the inevitability of keeping me on my feet with drugs. I don’t know what he expected to happen, forcing me on stage two weeks after my brother hanged himself. He pushed me so far past my breaking point, I don’t know how I was even alive.” So much of it was hazy from the drugs and depression. It didn’t feel entirely real. I only felt like I’d been out of the haze for a few months.

River’s brow pulled, and I could feel him putting it together. “You broke up right after. None of us could figure out why you were fighting, but it wasn’t a fight. It was a breakup.”

I nodded. “Yes. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I’d been keeping that from you for so long—also because of Alexander—I didn’t know how to come clean about any of it.”

“Cas said that last night.” River shook his head. “Alexander is the devil incarnate.”

“He is.”

“What did Caspian tell him?”

“He kept finding me on the roof of places we were staying. I go up there to think and to talk to my brother, and he kept asking me if I was suicidal. I told him I wasn’t, and when I tried to explain it to him, he took it the wrong way.” I tried to be vague so he wouldn’t hate Caspian.

“What did he take wrong?”

“I told him I wasn’t actively suicidal, that I was passively suicidal. I wouldn’t care if I was hit by a bus, but I wasn’t going to go out and jump off a building.” I watched him closely for a reaction toward Cas. “He was worried about me, and none of you understood who Alexander was. Don’t hate him. It took me a long time to forgive him, but I have.”

“I was really worried about you, and I might have reacted the same way had I found you on the roof of a building more than once,” River said carefully. “I’m glad I never did.”

“I go up there to talk to my brother. It was the only place in our apartment building I didn’t feel claustrophobic. We’d go sit up there to talk and hide from my stepfather.”

“I can understand that. But I still would have worried. And after the other night, you might have to find a new place.”

“I know.” I didn’t know what I was going to do, but I didn’t trust myself on the roof, and I didn’t want to put Caspian through that again.

“I can understand why you were as fucked up as you were in Japan.”

I laid my head on his shoulder. “I don’t know what I’m going to do when he releases all the stuff from my phone.”

“Maybe we should drop the lawsuit. Go back to working with him,” River whispered.

“Don’t say that. I can’t ask any of you to do that for me. All of you have lives. I can’t subject you to a lifetime of torture so I don’t have to face some. That’s not fair. It’s better for me to sacrifice so all of you can live.”

---