Page 152 of Until Now

‘She robbed me,’ I explain, and his eyes widen.

As I step into my apartment, something crunches beneath my boots.

Glass.

Shards of it, everywhere, glittering in the afternoon sun.

‘What the...?’ I whisper, turning in a circle.

Chase moves around the living room to inspect a fist-sized hole in the wall.

The apartment looks like someone dumped it inside a snowglobe and shook it. The canvases on the walls are shredded, water soaks the wood, the crystal vases shattered, their flowers scraps as if someone has torn them apart with their hands. Chase’s mouth tightens when he spots the lines of white powder on the table, but I edge down the hall, blocking out the ache in my ribs, to the bedroom.

This room is intact. But my gaze snags on the object facedown on the floor, glass scattered around it. I crouch and pick it up, turning it over.

The picture itself isn’t damaged, but the frame is ruined.

The last thing my dad ever gave me, broken. His frail hands touched this glass, this frame; his fingerprints are imprinted on it. And now it’s gone.

‘Frankie?’ Chase crouches beside me. ‘What is this?’

‘My Christmas present. From my dad,’ I add, and in my peripheral, I see his head whip around to face me.

‘We can reframe it,’ he offers, but I barely hear him.

Too much too much too much—

I gasp as I shove my hands into the glass slithers on the floor. Almost immediately a sweeping calm courses through me.

Chase swears and grabs my wrists, jerking me upright and dragging me to the bathroom. He sits me down on the tub and rummages through the multiple cabinets.

‘Tweezers are in the top,’ I supply distantly.

He grabs them and starts plucking out glass from my palms. ‘You scare the shit out of me sometimes, you know.’

‘Sorry.’

His expression softens. ‘Don’t do that,’ he says. ‘Don’t give up on yourself.’

I stare at nothing.

‘Frankie,’ he says sharply.

I blink at him. ‘I don’t want to feel anymore.’

‘Don’tsay that—‘

‘What’s the point in anything anymore?’ His lips part in surprise, but I push on, the words wrenching through blood and tissue and heart. ‘I could have had a life. I could’ve made something for myself. But I didn’t even sit my final exams because Archer wanted us to move away. And everything was just dandy for him, because he already had an apprenticeship secured down here. I wanted to go to uni...’ My voice fades into a whisper.

He’s silent as he works. I watch his long lashes sweep over his cheekbones, watch his brows bunch in concentration. His fingers on my hands are soft, a feather-touch, and I want them on every part of me. ‘And you can’t still do that?’

‘I don’t have any qualifications, which means I’d have to attend college to gain points. And I’m too old now, anyway. I mean, I’ll be twenty-two when I finish college, and when I finally graduate uni, I’ll be twenty-five. Twenty-fucking-five, Chase. Who starts their life at that age?’ I shake my head. ‘I see so many people younger than me who have graduated and are now in top notch jobs. Some even have their own houses, or fancy cars. And I’m just… stuck.’

‘Let me guess: you’ve seen all this on social media.’

I narrow my eyes and decide not to answer, but my silence is all the confirmation he needs.

‘Social media is toxic. Everyone on it wants people to see only their success stories. No one’s posting about how they had to re-sit that exam or how much they cried over a dissertation or how they ended up working for minimum wage despite having a degree. People show us what they want us to see, and that’s all it is.’

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