Fucking Gravity

Chapter 19

We don't end up telling Kim's mom much. She gets the gist, though, and fills in the blanks on her own (even if those blanks aren't necessarily correct). Here's what she knows: something happened late last night, and I came running to Kim, as I always do. Leah and I broke up.

My bruised cheek is a bright and telling story on its own, and no one bothers trying to dissuade the woman of the seemingly obvious explanation for it. Jared doesn't even know the true reason for it, and the real happenstance of it seems far less pressing than my broken heart.

He leaves at some point after Kim manages to coax me back to her room, and Ms. Connweller leaves us be other than to randomly check in. She brings water to drink, ice for my swollen cheek and, at some point, she brings lunch (which I don't touch). I might feel bad about it if I hadn't dissociated at some point after she came in with the ice.

"Fay," - a tentative voice- like ash falling on broken glass- "do you want to, maybe, take a shower?"

It's this one inquiry, out of all other reticent attempts, that brings me out of my disconnected daze. Kim startles as I suddenly start climbing out of bed.

"I need to go home."

"What- no." She scrambles after me, catching my wrist.

"I- I have to go back; I left him in a pile of lamp shards. He's already going to be so mad- putting it off will only make it worse."

"So don't go back." She says it like it's so simple. Like there aren't laws, and custody, and my collage fund held hostage.

"I have to."

"Why? We can talk to mom- she can help- I can help-"

"You'll only make it worse," I grouse, and pull my hand out of her slackened grip. "Y-you just don't understand. I need him. It's only one more year. I've been dealing with this my whole life- I can deal with it one more year."

She stares at me, unblinking, and it's rare that I can't tell what she's thinking.

"Promise me that you won't tell anyone."

Her face twists, and I can see the protest already forming on her lips. "Fay-"

"Promise me."

I know the moment she gives in. She always does, eventually. "Okay. I promise. But no more camping trips- especially with bottles of alcohol. You come to me. No matter what I'm doing, you can always come to me. Understand?"

I feel like I might burst into tears again as I give a jerky nod.

"You promise, now," she demands and, like always, I give in.

"I'll come to you."

"Okay then," she nods, retreating back a step. "Then you should get going."

"Um," I pause. "Can I borrow some real clothes? And some shoes?"

She laughs. It comes out watery and a bit hysterical, but her smile is real.

….

It's just getting dark by the time I walk through the front door. He's in the kitchen, standing at the counter eating a sandwich. He looks up as I let the door close. We regard each other silently.

"School called," he eventually says.

"Figured I shouldn't show up the first day with this," I make a jerky gesture to my face.

After a moment, he nods and slides his plate across the counter, half a sandwich still on it, toward me. It's an apology if I've ever seen one. Though, he doesn't really apologize. Not to admit he was wrong. He's sorry he has to punish me, he's sorry I'm making him do this. He's not sorry for doing it. It's never his fault.

"So where have you been."

I lower myself stiffly onto the stool across from him and pick up the sandwich. Not because I'm hungry (I'm actually rather nauseous) or to accept his apology, but because this is the dance we do.

He's the puppet master and I'm his little wooden bobble.

"I was at Kim's."

"What does she think happened?" He just assumes I wouldn't tell her- that I wouldn't tell anyone. And he's right. I didn't tell willingly, at least.

"Accident in the auto shop."

He grunts in agreement, and silence settles as I finish my sandwich half. I do it in about three bites and then wait for him to take up my plate and excuse me to my room. A marionette waiting for her strings to be pulled.

Fortunately, the strings only stretch so far before they snap off, and I sag against my door as I gently close it.

The atmosphere feels so heavy in that moment, pressing, pressing, pressing down on my shoulders. I feel lost as I take in my room. There is a small dent in the plaster from where the door handle slammed into it the night before. The lamp shards are still on the floor, my books still scattered.

It's with suffocated lungs that I dutifully drag out the broom and dustpan from where I keep them, and then go about cleaning up the mess. The shards go into the trash, the books back into my backpack.

As I'm feeling under the bed for any binders I missed, my hand bumps into my phone, and I drag it out.

There are 14 missed messages from My Wolf Girl, and suddenly, the world is ending all over again. I shove my fist into my mouth, and I bite down hard on my knuckles to muffle the sounds of my grief.

I don't want to go to school the next day. I don't want to get out of bed, or do anything, but I won't get away with skipping a second day (I have to resist the miserable part of me that whispers 'so what').

So, I drag myself out of bed, get dressed, and make the trek to school.

Kim is there to meet me at the doors, a nervous energy about her as she flutters about my side, despite me telling her shortly, "I'm fine, Kim." In a strange turn of events, she doesn't seem to believe me.

Leah and I are supposed to share three classes together this year. It was a subject of much excitement two days ago. Now it's one of dread. So much dread that I feel sick.

Until I get to our first class together and it becomes apparent that she's not at school at all. Then I feel like a corpse warmed over. Or, maybe a corpse that was skipped over the warming process and is just a corpse- cold and dead and in the ground.

I wonder when the aching misery of heartbreak is supposed to ease, and if I can hurry up and fast forward to that part.

After all, I got over Leah once before. I'll just have to do it again.

….

It takes an entire two days before Leah shows up in class and, while I can't tear my eyes away from her, she doesn't lift her head at all.

She comes in, settles down at a seat, and goes about slowly pulling her things out of her bag. She has such an air about her that, as she sits down, the seats around her are immediately vacated as the occupants flee further into the room.

A kind of isolated bubble naturally forms around her in each class I witness, and even in the hallways, people seem to naturally and instinctively scramble out of the way.

Seth doesn't show up until the following week, and my eyes track him obsessively. By all appearances, he looks completely fine. There is no bruising, no limp, so sign that he got beat unconscious last week. But he has super-speed wolf healing, and he was gone an entire week. How bad was the damage? Did he have broken bones? How can he be walking right next to his sister- the one who beat him- and not flinch away- not seem to find anything any different?

I corner him right after the final bell, right as he's leaving his classroom (I've been interacting with Jared more lately, and he told me his schedule). Seth stops right in the doorway as he spots me, and the people behind him grumble in complaint. He turns and goes right back inside. I follow as soon as the tide of fleeing students eases.

"I'm really sorry, Mr. Stanly, but can I use your room to talk to my friend for just a minute?" I hear Seth request- and there's no way the teacher would accept.

But Mr. Stanly looks over at me hovering by the door, takes in my meek form folded in on itself, and sighs.

"I need to run to the copy room for tomorrow's assignment. You have five minutes." And then he leaves.

"I'm so sorry," bursts out as soon as the door clicks shut.

Seth's face softens. "It wasn't your fault, Fay."

"She hurt you. Leah hurt you because of me. If I hadn't been drinking, if you hadn't tried to help me-"

"It's not your fault," he says firmly. "I'm fine. I don't blame you, and I don't blame Leah."

"Why not?"

He comes closer, palms up as if approaching a skittish animal. It might offend me if it wasn't kind of true right now.

"I don't blame you because it wasn't your fault. I also don't blame you for being scared, especially with what I think is going on at home. And I can't blame Leah, either, because I know her. I know how mindless and insane she can get- how all of them can get- when they think their imprint is in danger. It doesn't matter that it was me, or that she knows I would never do anything like that to anyone- because when it looked like you were in danger, you are the only thing that matters in that moment. Protecting you is the only thing that exists. And I want you to know that she would never hurt you."

"I- I can't- I just can't…"

"I know," he offers a smile, and it looks sad and weary. "It's okay. It's not your fault. I won't ask you to talk to her or take her back."

I bunch the front of my shirt in my hand, over my chest, hoping to alleviate the pain there. "…How is she?"

"Do you really want to know?" He asks.

I think about it- what I know of the stories- what I know of my own distress in this breakup- and decide that no: I don't want to know. It will only make it harder.

I shake my head resolutely. "No."

"Okay," he says without surprise, without judgment. He hesitates, and it's awkward being alone with the boy. He's my ex's brother. She'll probably see our entire conversation the next time they are shifted at the same time.

The thought freezes and gets stuck in my brain, and I wonder if I should maybe say something- something that might ease her pain. But I don't know what that something might be and Seth is speaking again, slowly and hesitant.

He has pretty eyes, I notice. He has the same golden flecks in them that Leah does. I can almost imagine them as hers, looking at me in concern.

"At home… are you safe?"

All it took was one night. One night, and now at least three people know. No scratch that- everyone in the entire pack. Fuck. Leah's going to know. She could ruin everything if she comes after my father.

"I'm handling it," I say firmly, straightening up and meeting his gaze head on. "I mean it. No one interferes. If anyone does, I'll never forgive them."

There. Is this really the message I'm sending to her? I guess so.


A/N: Oh, my poor babies... Here, let me torture them some more. That's how it's supposed to go, right?

Thoughts please.

~Silver~