Page 63 of Tormented

He drags a hand over his face, sighing heavily. “What is it you really want?”

Just tell him. “To get up in there,” I admit, wriggling my fingers in the direction of his pretty face. “And to find out how it is that you tick.”

“Yeah?” he scoffs. “Why?”

“Because it might just help me,” I say quietly. “Without me having to share the things I’d rather leave hidden.”

He smirks, cold and calculated. “I’m not tellin’ you a thing until you fuckin’ talk to me.”

“Well.” I chuckle. “Guess that leaves us at a bit of an impasse.”

“I suppose it does.”

He watches me closely as I cross my arms over my middle and head toward the clubhouse. I’ve reached the concrete step outside the doors when he calls out.

“I don’t understand how you think knowin’ what it is that eats at me is goin’ to help you.”

I stop, my back to him, and look to the ground as I answer. “Because I want to learn how to live on the bottom too. Sunshine ain’t all it’s cracked up to be.” I sigh. “Sick of searching out its warmth only to get burnt.”

“You want me to teach you how to quit on life?” he asks. Going by the sound of his boots on the dirt he steps closer.

“No.” I shake my head, lifting my right wrist out to the side so he can see it. “Tried quitting and it wasn’t for me.”

“What then?”

“I want you to teach me how to shut off my heart and not feel anymore. If it can’t hurt me, then it can’t destroy me. I want you to teach me to be how you were once: dead inside.”

He stops beside me and leans a shoulder against the outside wall. “One for one.”

“Pardon?”

“You give me something, I give it back. We share one for one, but, Abbey?”

“Yeah?” I give in and look up at his handsome face, side lit by the glow coming from the garage.

“You’ve got to go first. Show me you’re committed by taking the first step.”

I look away, my shoulders tense with frustration. It all sounds so easy, but when every memory stashed away in the dusty corners of my mind is nothing but a snapshot of the ugly side of humanity, I may as well agree to walk over a bed of glass and fire.

It’s going to hurt. It might also kill me. But you do it in the hopes you come out the other end stronger than before.