Chapter 14
CHAPTER
FOURTEEN
Berlyn
My stomach hurts.
I used to love this ride. Mama would take me on it and make me giggle when I’d start to get scared. The ground always seemed so far away. Mama said it wasn’t a bad thing though. We could be in our own world up here. Up, up, and away from all the other scary things.
I never knew what other scary things Mama was talking about, but her smile was so pretty when we were in our own world. I learned to love being high in the sky and far away from the ground. Spinning around and around, almost coming back to reality only to be brought away from it once more.
Mama always knew how to make everything magical.
It isn’t the same without her here anymore. The Ferris wheel no longer a magical and wondrous place to exist away from scary things. Father made sure of it.
He brought the scary things up here where none of them were supposed to be able to reach. He’s done that to a lot of things Mama and I shared. Like he doesn’t want me to have any happy memories of her left.
“Beryln,” he scolds, his voice hard and unfamiliar. He changed after Mama was gone. “Don’t make me ask again.”
I don’t want to do what he wants me to do. I don’t like it. I don’t know why I have to do it now that Mama is gone. It makes my tummy hurt.
“We’re in our own world up here,” he repeats the same thing Mama always would. “No one can see.” That’s not why I don’t wanna do it. I just don’t want to. Even though I know I have to. He’ll only get mad. It’s not fun when he’s mad.
“You’ll have to hurry now,” he warns.
“Please no,” I beg and his eyes burn with an anger worse than any I’ve ever seen before. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I backtrack, doing what he asked. I hate the heat in my hand.
I only wanted to keep the magic of the Ferris wheel with Mama but even that’s been taken now.
I can barely breathe through the nightmare, my panic rising from the recesses of my soul and choking me. My body trembles and shakes as I fight to free myself from one of the very worst memories of my twisted childhood.
Warmth wraps around me, it should scare me. Somehow it soothes me. The shadows. The shadows are back, making the worst of the fear fade into the background as deep sadness spills out of me over everything my father stole from me until everything fades back to black.
I wake up expecting to feel like absolute garbage but when I finally gain the courage to open my eyes, I feel better than expected. Normally after a nightmare, I feel like I’ve been hit by a truck and been up for a week.
I stretch my arms over my head and get out of bed slowly, almost disbelieving that I feel rested at all.
Especially after the contents of the nightmare. I shudder to myself. I should have known the Ferris wheel from the pumpkin patch would trigger something. It always does. At least a little bit.
Though the nightmares have been rare the last few years. The more distance I’ve put between myself and my father. It’s gotten easier to keep the memories buried under lock and key.
What happened with Professor Richards must have triggered it as well. Even after all these years, I still freeze and fawn. I wish I could be someone who fought or flew.
Thinking too much about the nightmare is going to send me hurling back into those memories.
They’re all too easy to get lost in. To give up pieces of myself as I ask the what ifs?
As I look back at the memories of a child with the mind of an adult and realize how twisted and perverse my father’s games truly were.
He became the evil that lived down the hall from me after my mom passed. He wanted to destroy everything good she left behind, including—no, maybe especially—me. I was the biggest piece of my mom he still had access to and he did everything he could to punish me for it.
The doorbell rings, shocking me from my reverie. I yawn, checking I’m decent enough to let Summer in. Sleep shorts and a tattered sleep shirt? Hm, good enough.
“Come in, Sum,” I say around another yawn, disarming the alarm and throwing the door open. Only, it’s not Summer standing at my door, but Weston.
My eyes widen and my mouth opens in shock. “Weston,” I squeak, looking down at my outfit again, only to cringe. What a way to leave a lasting impression on the guy after such a great day yesterday.
Heat rushes to my cheeks and butterflies flicker in my stomach as I think about the day we spent together. It felt like a date. It wasn’t. I mean, I know he was only being nice. I always knew he was sweet, even when I couldn’t prove it. Now I can.
Everything about yesterday was so sweet. It was the best, most perfect date. Except the part where it wasn’t a date and it didn’t end in a kiss, or with him spending the night in my bed.
Nope.
Bad Berlyn.
You can’t lust after a man and his brothers. Wasn’t I just falling over Jude at the haunted house? This is not one of our books. That kind of stuff doesn’t happen in reality.
His lips turn up in what I’m starting to think of as his signature grin. One I had never seen before yesterday, then saw a whole lot of it.
Oh no, the butterflies did not get the memo that we can’t fall for this guy. Even if he did show up on our doorstep with coffee in hand first thing in the morning.
“You brought me coffee?” It’s a dumb question, because he obviously did. He’s literally handing me an iced coffee as we speak.
He nods anyway. I have noticed he likes yes/no questions more than open-ended ones. I learned that yesterday while we were playing the carnival games. I like feeling like I know him a little better now.
“We left your car,” he explains, pointing to my empty driveway.
My car… “Oh my god,” I curse, making him laugh. “I totally forgot about my car. Who does that?”
He shrugs, but his smile feels like he’s teasing me. I let out a sound that’s half laugh, half disbelieved scoff and run my hands through my sleep mussed hair. I can’t believe I answered the door looking like this without even checking who it was.
“Do you want to come in?” I offer, cursing myself for letting him stand on my doorstep. Why am I always so rude when it comes to these guys? I make more mistakes than I ever thought possible.
He nods and follows me into my living room.
He takes in his surroundings, his eyes falling on the flowers I still have from my stalker.
“Pretty,” he compliments and I don’t know what to say.
How does one explain they have a sweet stalker who sent them flowers to the guy they went on a not-date with the day before?
My front door is thrown open, making me jump but saves me from saying something that would no doubt lead to me embarrassing myself.
“Fucking hell, Sum,” I curse before I even see her bright hair turn the corner. There’s no one else in the world who would burst into my house the way she does.
Summer throws her fingers over her shoulder towards the door.
“Shouldn’t you be keeping that locked with your—” she abruptly cuts off as her attention lands on Weston.
Thank God she didn’t reveal that I have a stalker.
I don’t want the guys to worry. Or worse, try to do something about it.
“Oh, hello,” she purrs, raising a brow at me.
Weston barely acknowledges her before turning back to me with a slightly confused expression.
I sigh and shake my head. “Yes, she does usually make her entrances that way,” I answer what he’s clearly wondering.
I probably should have realized it wasn’t her knocking for that reason alone but my brain wasn’t fully functioning yet.
His lips twitch, but he doesn’t give me his full smile. Does he feel awkward now that she’s here?
“Did you spend the night?” she asks West directly.
“Summer, oh my god!” I scold, pushing her out of the room and into the kitchen, leaving Weston in the living room. “What the hell is wrong with you?” I hiss under my breath.
She laughs, not bothering to lower her volume even the slightest. “What else am I supposed to think when you have a hot man you’ve been crushing on in your house so early in the morning? It’s not like that ever happens.”
I shush her, shoving my hands in her face in a poor attempt to get her to shut up.
It only makes her laugh harder. “If you aren’t going to make a move, someone has to,” she says, finally lowering her voice so he won’t overhear her as she moves towards my fridge and helps herself to a yogurt.
Groaning, I hand her a spoon. “He took me to the pumpkin patch yesterday,” I tell her. I was way too tired to call her last night and fill her in on everything that happened.
“Shut up!” she screeches. “You guys went on a date?”
I look over my shoulder towards the living room but can’t see where West is. “Oh my god, will you shut the fuck up?” I curse, my face flaming. Are best friend’s supposed to embarrass you this much? I fear I do enough of that on my own without her help.
“Is this why you wanted me to come over?” she whispers and I nod. “But why is he back again? He didn’t actually spend the night, did he?”
I shake my head before she even finishes her question so she doesn’t get too excited again. “No, we left my car at school. He came to take me to it.”
She smirks and I’m already groaning. “The date was that good, huh?”
I put my face in my hands, my whole body shaking with silent laughter at the absurdity of this situation. I can feel the heat in my face when I meet her eyes and she waggles her eyebrows. “Want me to leave?”
Picking up the closest thing to me—an apple—I throw it across the room at her, making her scream as she dodges. It hits the counters with a thunk before rolling to the ground and I grimace.
She waves her spoonful of yogurt at me. “Don’t be rude. I’m being your wingman.”