Boyfriend Bargain by Ilsa Madden-Mills

37

Zack

Isit up in bed at five on the dot. I haven’t had a nightmare in a while, and I wonder if fighting with Reece helped me get past something.

I don’t know.

I get dressed for my run. I have to or I’ll go crazy from thinking too much.

Right now, I’ve shoved everything to do with Sugar down so far I’m not sure where it is, locked up tight and stuffed in a black box shoved into a corner of my mind. I’ve got chains and a padlock around that box, and no way in hell is any of it getting out.

I’m numb inside, keeping my emotions in check and protected.

I trudge out to the hallway and Long John Silver brushes against my legs. I give her a rub. “Hey, baby girl. You hungry?”

She meows and stalks to the kitchen, and I follow.

I don’t even notice him until I look up, but Reece sits at the table, dressed in gym shorts and an old shirt. He had his head down but it bobs up when he sees me.

We stare at each other and I mumble a terse greeting as I walk by. We’ve been stalking around each other for weeks now, barely speaking, but I won’t budge about Veronica. She isn’t allowed at this house. Once I’m gone after graduation, he can do whatever the hell he wants.

I stop at the fridge to pull out a Gatorade and suck it down. His eyes are on me, and I can’t resist asking, “Why are you up?”

He swallows. “So I could catch you and talk.”

I drink down the blue liquid. “Veronica isn’t welcome back.”

He flinches. “I know. I don’t blame you. What she did…” He shrugs and looks away.

I set my bottle on the counter and study my brother, taking in his bloodshot gaze, the purple bruises under his eyes, the haggard face. “Missing her, huh?”

His grey eyes find mine. “That’s right, good old Reece, always getting what Z doesn’t want.”

Tension zings through me, but it doesn’t have much heat. These past few weeks, I’ve lost some of the vitriol I spewed out the night Sugar walked away.

One thing is sure: I’m close to losing my brother. And that scares me.

He looks down at the gold box I brought out last night and set on the counter. “Those your letters?”

I give them a brief look and nod. “Yeah.”

“What are you doing with them?”

I toss my empty bottle in the trash, grab the box, and stick it inside my running backpack. “Letting them go.”

He blanches. “Where?”

Resignation colors my voice. “Where do you think? It’s time. I…I don’t love Willow, Reece. I haven’t for a long time. What we had wouldn’t have lasted. I was too young and so was she. You get that, don’t you?”

“Sugar, huh?” There’s an expression of acceptance on his face, a quiet realization.

My shoulders shift as I turn away from him and grab a protein bar from the cabinet.

“Z?”

I look over my shoulder. “Yeah?”

He licks his lips. “The photo of us…can I keep it?”

I give him a nod. I feel so tired. “Sure. It’s yours.” I open the box, pull it out, and hand it over.

“Thank you.” He takes it gingerly, as if it might fall apart in his hands.

I rub at my unshaven face and look away from him, finding it hard to take in his unhappiness. He’s hurting too. I catch a glimpse of myself in the hall mirror, and I’m death warmed over with my thin face, shaggy hair, and scruff that’s now grown into a thick, dark beard.

I look back at Reece and he’s watching me, pain etched on his features until they contort and his face compresses, his teeth chewing so hard on his bottom lip that blood comes out.

I walk over, grabbing a paper towel from the dispenser and giving it to him. “We’ve got to get past this, man. You’re my brother.”

He blots at his lip and shuffles to his feet. Staring at me, he opens his mouth as if he wants to say something, but then he doesn’t, his teeth clamping together.

“What?”

Misery plays over his face and he pinches the skin between his nose. “I need to tell you something about the night Willow died.”

Dread crawls over me. “Okay.”

An audible breath leaves his mouth. “The night of the party…you told me to tell Willow you needed to think about the baby and figure things out, but I didn’t tell her. I let her assume whatever she wanted about your absence. I don’t know what she was thinking, but she was worried, and I didn’t say a goddamn word.”

I frown. “But you said you did. You said you told her I was just thinking.”

“I lied.” His gaze holds mine.

I swallow. “Why?”

He paces around the kitchen, his hands rubbing at his face. I see a drop of blood forming on his lip again.

“Why?” I repeat, this time sharper. Reece is my brother, but if he’s lied to me or held something back… “Reece? What the fuck?”

He stops, his face white. “We sat outside talking, and I kissed her, man. I kissed her…and she kissed me back. She was so pretty and I wanted her…” He stops, his voice off. “I loved her, and it was my one shot, because I really thought you guys might break up since you were going to college, and she and I would still be there, and I didn’t even care that she was pregnant. I just wanted her.”

I ease down the cabinets until I’m sitting on the floor.

His fists curl. “I’m sorry I never told you.”

I lean my head back against the wood, my head spinning. I blink rapidly.

He pulls at his hair. “I’m the reason she ran out of that party. Me. She felt guilty for kissing me, and I tried to stop her, but all she wanted was you. She was going to find you.” He squeezes the edge of the table. “You’ve been carrying all that guilt and…I let you.”

I rub my chest. “Why?”

He closes his eyes. “Because part of me hated you for having her heart.”

“Fuck.” A knife stabs me square in the torso.

He flips around and slams his fist into the wall, and sheetrock sprays. “I’m the reason she died on those rocks, not you.”

The silence stretches between us as I grapple, my head spinning.

“It’s taken me this long to get the balls, to man up and tell you. I’m sorry, Z. I’m sorry about your nightmares. I’m sorry about your game.” A long sigh. “I’m sorry for everything.”

I can’t think straight.

“Do you hate me?”

I don’t know.

I pull myself to standing and weave as I head to the den. I sling my backpack on and start for the door.

His voice is behind me, low and broken. “Forgive me, Z. Please. I’m living with this guilt too. Please, man.”

I pause with my hand on the doorknob, but I don’t know what to say.

“Z?”

I can’t deal with this. I want to stuff it away. I want to bury it down deep where all my other shit is.

I open the door and head out for my run.

Long minutes later, there are a million things running through my mind, and before I realize it I’m at the Quickie-Mart. I stop and take a breather, my head aching.

I think about Reece and Willow. I knew he loved her, but to actually make a move on her and then lie…

My mind is still churning when I buy my pack of smokes and light up in the alley.

The nicotine is sharp and visceral as I blow a puff of smoke up in the air. It tastes good, this little rule break, and I lean against the wall.

I think about fate and how we have no control. People come into our lives and they slip away from us. They make their own decisions. I think about how young we were, the bad decisions we made. Willow drove that car herself. It wasn’t me. It wasn’t Reece. Maybe the outcome might have been different if I’d showed up to the party or if Reece hadn’t kissed her…but there’s no certainty in that.

I suck down the cig, watching the tip of it burn.

Out of the corner of my eye, I think I see a familiar banged-up truck pull up in front of the donut store next door, and my gaze sharpens as I see Sugar get out.

She’s got a knit hat on her head, one of those with the hole in the top so her messy bun can spill out. She’s wearing her glasses and her black coat.

I immediately light up another cig, but then she always did make me crazy. My body strains to go over to her, to take her in my arms and tell her she’s mine, but we’re past that. I hold myself back. It’s the only way I know how to protect my mind from going off the deep end.

The closer she gets, the more I tense up. I blow my smoke up in the air, making rings, but my eyes are on her, all her, and I wait for her to feel me looking, to know the force of my gaze as she walks toward the entrance of the shop.

It happens.

She glances up, her hand on the door, and halts. Beautiful, intelligent blue eyes widen as she runs them over me. My chest heaves.

All it would take…

All it would take…

All it would take is one indication from her, a crook of her finger, a longing in her eye that she wants me, goddamn just anything and I would slay anyone in my path to get to her.

But she doesn’t give it to me.

She inhales a deep breath, turns away, and goes inside the store.

And that’s why I have to leave her alone—because she will break me—and focus on making myself better.

I stub out my cigarette, throw it in the trash along with the pack, and adjust the backpack. Jogging away quickly, before she comes back out and I change my mind, I cross the intersection and head to Willow’s grave. As I have so many times before, I follow the path to her plot, a small one near her grandparents. I was fortunate that her family buried her here, just a few minutes from where her parents live in the city. There’s a fresh bouquet of flowers, magnolias and evergreen inside a stone vase, and I wonder if perhaps it’s Reece who’s been leaving them all these years. I don’t know. He and I…we have more long conversations ahead of us. I take the letters out one by one and place them inside the vase with the flowers. Some of what’s written on those pages is an outright lie, and I guess somewhere up there Willow knows the truth.

I think she’d forgive me.

I talk to her. I tell her about Reece and our fight. I tell her about hockey and how I don’t think it’s going to work out for me. Most of all, I talk about Sugar, my voice gentle. I tell her how someday when I’m ready, I’m going to get her back; I’m going to win this fight with darkness and make her see that it was her all along.

The air brightens and the sun is rising as I stand and stare down at her gravestone. I feel lighter, my shoulders lifting as I kiss two fingers and send it to her. “Rest in peace, sweet girl. I won’t forget you.”

And then I’m gone with the wind, running, always running.

I run all the way back to the house.

Reece is sitting on the couch, an ice pack on his hand.

I walk over and sit down next to him. He’s looking at me, and shit, he looks so young, even though he’s only a year behind me. I feel fucking ancient.

He stares down at his hand. “Are we okay?”

“We can deal with this,” I say, my voice thick.

His eyes gleam with emotion and he hugs me, and all that shit between us, the tension…some of it eases. Our relationship has a long way to go, but somewhere inside me, I know we’ll make it through this. I think about Sugar and the poem about the bird. Like hope, no matter the storm, I’m not giving up on the people around me.