CHAPTER FIVE

So, you're probably wondering what happened to Nate's house, right?

Well, in a nutshell, investigators found a pack of cigarettes and a lighter—no, not Nate's. They had belonged to Jim, his mom's boyfriend. That house … keep in mind, I'd never been inside, so it wasn't until during the investigation that we learned just how full of shit it had been. Newspapers, trash, old crap someone had found on the side of the road … the place was packed. So much so that it took weeks of digging through the rubble to find the remains of Nate's mom and Jim.

But Nate hadn't died—he'd been right about that. The hospital said that creepy-as-fuck tone he'd used to talk to me was the result of his shock, and I mean, could anyone blame him? The kid had dragged himself out of a burning house just seconds before the fire reached the propane tank and it fucking exploded. By some miracle, his injuries were minimal, the worst of his burns on his back. He got himself a pretty gnarly-looking scar on his face though from where a piece of shrapnel had hit him, and it pushed us closer together. I guessed that was understandable. I mean, I was a scarred freak, and now, so was he.

He moved in with us after he got out of the hospital, and things just felt right, you know? I thought maybe things would be better. I thought he'd stop being so angry. But …

Well, I can tell you a couple of things for sure.

The bruises stopped. That was one thing that stopped for good.

And I forgot about that bird for a long time.

***

"I don't wanna go back to school," I announced to my parents during dinner one night.

Mom looked at Dad, and they engaged in a silent conversation that probably went something like …

I told you this would happen.

Yeah, well, what can we do?

She sucked in a deep breath as she turned from Dad to swing her gaze to Nate, then finally to me. "Okay. Let me ask you this. Why don't you want to graduate? You have a year left. Can't you just get through it to earn your diploma?"

I shook my head. "I don't care about that. What I wanna do doesn't require a diploma. I just need to get my GED, and I'm good."

"Or you could wait a year for your diploma," Dad suggested.

"What is it you want to do?" Mom asked, tipping her head and giving me her full attention.

"I want to go to trade school with Nate."

"Nate would have to get his GED too." She looked back at him and gave him an expression that said, You hear that, young man?

Nate nodded beside me. "I know. But that's the point. We wanna get our GEDs and go to school together, so we could, like, go through it at the same time."

Dad rolled his lips between his teeth and slowly nodded as Mom clasped her hands and held them to her mouth. Both of them seemed to be deep in thought, but neither seemed to be disapproving of the idea, and I was hopeful. Nate and I had spent the past few nights talking about this in depth. He hadn't been in school since the fire and officially dropped out around his sixteenth birthday in January. He’d spent his time helping Mom at the gym or doing chores around the house—earning his keep, Dad would joke every now and then. Now, it was April and close to my birthday, and I didn't want to go back.

School had been worse since Nate had left. It was lonely, and I went through my days, barely hanging on. I rarely remembered to do my homework, rarely remembered to listen in class; my grades had dropped so dramatically that summer school was a definite and the possibility of being held back a grade was likely. And it wasn't depression or teenage angst or whatever else my teachers and guidance counselor wanted to blame it on. It was the simple fact that I just didn't care. I wanted to work on cars. I wanted to get my hands dirty. And spending my days learning about shit I'd never apply to real life seemed like a waste of my fucking time.

Mom and Dad had easily given Nate the go-ahead to drop out if he wanted to. Because, despite them opening their home to him and treating him as one of their own, they never wanted him to feel trapped or pressured the way he had at his mother’s house. However, I was still their son and legally under their control, and if they told me no, I would be angry, but I would listen and finish school with a frown on my face.

But, fuck, I didn't want to.

Finally, after moments of tumultuous quiet, Mom glanced at Dad again, and they seemed to share another silent conversation. One I couldn't decipher.

Then, Mom looked at me and said, "Listen to me right now."

"Yeah?"

"You can drop out of high school—"

"Yes!" I threw my fist into the air as Nate grabbed my arm with both hands, giving me a hearty shake.

" If you immediately enroll in GED preparation classes. I don't want to see either one of you slacking off—do you understand? You get your GEDs, then get yourselves into trade school right afterward. Okay? If your father or I suspect even an inkling that you're not taking this seriously, you're going back to high school. Is that clear?"

I nodded enthusiastically. "Yes."

Honestly, I'd only heard half of what she said, but whatever. I was going to do anything she wanted me to do if that meant I didn’t have to go back to that fucking place that wanted me less than I wanted it.

"Okay."

Then, she resumed eating, dropping the conversation as quickly as it'd started, and I was certain I had the coolest parents to ever live.

***

And as it turned out, I wasn’t stupid after all.

I just needed to be interested in what I was learning, and, man, was I interested in auto mechanics.

Nate and I both were.

After getting our GEDs, we sailed through two years of trade school. And honestly, I couldn’t even tell you what it was about automotive mechanics I was even drawn to. Maybe it was the idea of working with cars and not people. Maybe it was because I wasn’t particularly good at much and cars seemed as good of a job as any. Maybe I just liked the idea of helping someone get out of whatever shit situation they were in by fixing their getaway ride. Whatever it was, I liked it, and by the time we were nineteen years old, Nate and I were both licensed to work on cars.

Dad helped us secure jobs pretty much right out of the gate. An old buddy of his owned a shop not far from our house, and the guy was more than thrilled to offer us a job. We started right away and did well for ourselves, and when the money began to roll in, Nate asked what I thought about us getting an apartment together.

I didn’t think it was the worst idea. It would certainly give us the freedom to do the things we wanted to do—like smoking or bringing girls home—without having my parents watching our every move. And to my surprise, Mom and Dad didn’t disagree.

“You’ll stay local though,” Mom said, more a demand than a suggestion.

“Obviously,” I replied because, honestly, I didn’t want to be far from them either.

“And you’ll stop by whenever you can,” she added.

“Where the hell else would I go?” I asked with a laugh. “I mean, apart from work and the apartment.”

We laughed because we all knew I didn’t have any other friends besides Nate, and at that point, I had never been in any kind of relationship with a girl.

But Nate had other plans for us, and in a few months, I’d learn exactly what those were.

***

"All right, are you boys all set?" Dad asked, leaning against the kitchen counter. "You got everything you need?"

"And if you think of anything else," Mom added, her eyes already misting with tears as she headed toward the door, "you just give me a call. Or stop by and take whatever you want from the pantry."

Nate was already lounging on the new couch from IKEA, flipping through the channels on our gently used TV. I glanced around the small kitchen/living room/dining room, taking it all in and realizing that— holy shit —this was mine and this was really happening.

It had taken a little while for Nate and me to find a nearby apartment in our price range, especially one with two bedrooms—which, for me, was a must-have. Nate hadn't seemed to mind either way, but there wasn’t a snowball’s chance in hell I was going to bring a girl home to my shared bedroom with my roommate/sort of adopted brother.

Mom had found this place just a few weeks ago. Someone had posted the listing on social media—a two-bedroom apartment right above a Chinese restaurant on Main Street. The rent was steep, but utilities were all included, which helped to cut costs. Parking was free, and the place came with two spaces in the lot behind the store. Pets were prohibited, which sucked because I would've liked to have a dog or something, but I figured that could come at some point later down the road. But for now, as our first place, this one seemed to check off most of the boxes, so we took it … under the promise that there would be zero parties at the property. But, as we had told our new landlord, we were each other’s only friend, and unless she considered that a party, there was nothing she needed to worry about as far as we were concerned.

But the day we’d signed the one-year lease felt so far in the past, despite it being only a couple weeks ago. Now, I looked around, hardly able to push beyond how fucking surreal it was to call a place home that wasn't my parents' house.

I shrugged. "Nah, I think we have everything we need for now."

"You sure?" Dad asked, his voice teetering toward teasing. "You got enough ramen and Dr. Pepper?"

I rolled my eye at his jab toward my latest food addictions. "The grocery store is, like, five minutes away."

"And we"—Mom came to wrap her arms around my waist, pressing her cheek to my chest—"are even closer. The door is always open."

"I know, Mom," I said, hugging her back and suppressing the urge to groan impatiently.

"I mean it. Whenever you need us, you come home. No matter what time it is. Okay?"

"Ah, come on, Susan," Dad said, his voice gruff and tight. "We're two minutes down the street, not three states away."

"I know," she whispered, inhaling slowly. "But that doesn't mean I won't miss him."

My chest felt constricted as I puffed out my cheeks with a full exhale. If she kept this up, I was going to get stupid and emotional, and that was the last thing I needed. I glanced over her head and caught Nate's obnoxious expression of mockery and boredom, and I made a mental note to kick his ass when I got the chance. Sometimes, he seemed to forget who had kept a roof over his head the past few years, and it pissed me off.

Finally, Mom let go, patted my chest, and made me promise for the gazillionth time that I'd give them a call if I needed anything—or just came home, which seemed to be preferred. Then, Dad dragged her out of there and closed the door behind him, not forgetting to wink at me before he disappeared.

"Jesus Christ," Nate groaned the second they were gone. "I didn't think they were ever gonna get the fuck out of here."

"Yeah, well, you don't need to be a dick about it either," I pointed out, walking through the apartment to drop down on the other end of the couch.

"Oh, okay, what was I supposed to do instead? Take out the camera and document your little Kodak moment?"

"No," I muttered, snatching the remote from him. "But you didn't have to be over here, rolling your fuckin' eyes. Don't forget, they've been feeding your ass for the past, what? Eleven years?"

Fuck, had it really been that long since we were eight?

I might not have had peripheral vision on my right side, but I could feel his glare burning a hole through my face.

"Oh, so you've been keeping count, huh?"

"I'm just saying."

"How about we tally up all the times I kicked someone's ass because they’d said some shit about you?"

I pulled my bottom lip between my teeth and jabbed at the remote button with my thumb.

"Or maybe you'd like to talk about how many times I covered for you when you wanted to go out and do whatever the fuck you were doing with Ashley—"

"What?" I barked an incredulous laugh at the mention of a girl I had studied with a couple of times in school. "The hell are you talking about?"

"Ashley! That chick you went out with a couple—"

"Dude, first of all, Ashley is a fucking lesbian, okay? And second of all, she tried to help me study for a test I ended up failing anyway. I thought I had told you that. And third of all, what the fuck are you going on about, you covered for me? Mom and Dad knew where I was going. In fact, I think Dad dropped me off one time."

Nate was quiet for a moment, and I turned to see his look of stupefied confusion.

"Well, fuck. I thought you were hooking up with her. I told your parents you were at the library."

"I wasn't hooking up with anyone," I said with a snort, then faced the TV again. "And I can't believe you lied to my parents when they knew where I was."

He burst into a string of chuckles, and I easily joined along. Man, it was crazy to think about where we'd been just a few short years ago. Shit had changed so much, and now, we were here, in our own place, gainfully employed and actually enjoying life. Who would've thought?

Man, I was content. Genuinely good with how things were.

"So, what's the policy on smoking in this place?" Nate asked, standing up and walking toward the window.

"Outside only," I said, settling on a Mad Max movie. "Either on the balcony or in the parking lot. Not on the sidewalk."

"Lame."

"Yeah, well, I guess other people give a fuck about their lungs."

"Not us though," he quipped, opening the window.

"Nope," I muttered when, actually, I did give a fuck. I would've quit. But it was hard to give something up when the only person you hung out with was doing that very thing you wanted to quit. It was like waving a steak in front of a starving dog.

There are worse things , I figured. Drugs. Booze. A myriad of other shit I was sure Nate thought about, but hadn't gotten into. And I assumed it was my good—or at least decent—influence that had kept him from getting into them.

So, yeah, there were always worse things.

Way worse things than cigarettes.

***

Roy Warner was a good guy. He and my dad had grown up together, so I'd known him on and off since I had been born. He was one of the few people who never treated me differently after the accident when everyone else either handled me with kid gloves or like I was something to avoid.

He wasn't under any sort of obligation to give me or my friend a job right out of school, but he had, and I never took that for granted. Even if the work he gave us was stupid, grunt shit. Janitorial stuff, oil changes, making sure the crappy closet of a break room was stocked with instant coffee and bottles of water … that sorta crap.

Nate hated it, but I understood. We were earning our keep; we were proving ourselves to the boss. I figured, as soon as Roy trusted we could do the big jobs, he'd give them to us. No biggie. As it was, together, we made enough money to pay our rent, my parents kept our fridge stocked, and anything else we wanted, we either had the money or we had to save up for it.

Honestly, there wasn't much to complain about. I mean, especially considering how cool my parents were about keeping us supplied with the necessities. Shit, compared to a lot of young guys right out of school, we had it fucking made .

But Nate didn't agree. Nate was greedy.

I guessed, sometimes, when you came from nothing, there was no such thing as too much of a good thing. And when you got an idea on how to get more …

I guessed it was hard to turn that off.

***

"Nathan! You busy?" Roy called from the front desk.

Nate looked up from his crudely made turkey sandwich, mouth full, and eyed me with a threat. He had been Roy's gopher all morning, running errands and mopping the floor and changing spark plugs on two different cars. To give him a break, I would've answered Roy’s call had I not presently had my hands drenched in oil from a leak that wouldn't stop.

"Sorry, man," I said, gesturing toward the puddle at my feet.

"Son of a bitch. Why can’t Donny do some of this shit?" he grumbled, tossing his sandwich onto the flimsy card table we kept in the break room.

“Because Donny’s been working here since he was, like, four,” I replied, referring to Roy’s son—a guy about our age, give or take a year or two.

Nate huffed with bitter resentment. “Yeah, too bad he fuckin’ sucks at what he does.” He brushed his hands off on his dirty coveralls—Roy's logo emblazoned on the back—and headed up front.

The oil leak had been fixed, but the puddle spreading across the floor was slowly taking over the back corner of the shop. I quickly began moving some old tires to avoid them getting covered as I listened to Nate's conversation up front.

"Miss McLaughlin here has a flat," Roy said. "You got a minute to take care of her?"

"Yeah," Nate said, albeit begrudgingly. "Come on. Where's your car?"

“She’s a valued customer around here, Manning. You take care of her!” Roy called after him.

The tinny bell above the door jingled. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers played over Roy's crackly stereo as I dumped water and degreaser over the puddle, then grabbed the mop. Ten minutes ticked by before the bell tinkled again, and my ears perked up.

"All right. So, that's gonna be sixty bucks. You paying with cash or credit?"

"Um … credit, I guess," a soft feminine voice said, almost reluctantly. Like she wasn't sure if it was the right answer. “This is my dad’s card—is that okay? My wallet’s in the car.”

“It’s all good,” Nate grunted.

A few more seconds went by. Then, the register's drawer dinged open before closing again.

"All right. You're all set."

"Thanks so much."

"Yeah, no prob."

"Have a nice day."

"Yep, you too."

The bell tinkled, and Nate came back from up front. On his face was the biggest, shit-eating smirk I'd ever seen.

As he entered the break room and dropped down into his chair, he turned to me and grabbed his sandwich. "You missed it."

"What? Another tire change?" I snorted a sardonic laugh. "Oh, man, definitely gonna cry myself to sleep tonight over that one."

"Nope." He took a bite of his sandwich, then let it fall back onto the paper bag he'd brought it in. "You should've seen this chick." He held his hands out over his chest, imitating a pair of big tits. " Beautiful . Oh my fucking God. Dude, I wanted to bury my face between those things."

I forced a laugh, shaking my head, feeling my face grow hot. "Nice."

"They were ." He threw his head back and groaned like he was in pain. "Fuck, I need to get laid."

I focused on mopping up the solution of water, degreaser, and broken-down oil. The embarrassing truth was that I was a twenty-one-year-old virgin. Never even been kissed.

Nate though? Nate didn't seem to have an issue. Who the fuck knew how he managed to convince girls to hook up with him? I never paid close enough attention to his methods to learn, and really, I wasn't sure I wanted to.

The thought of screwing random girls without any sort of attachment to them didn't appeal to me. And maybe that had come from growing up with loving parents who were still, all these years later, together and seemingly happy. I understood that Nate hadn’t had that. I understood his mom hadn't given much of a fuck about him, and her strange relationship with her boyfriend had been … well, I wasn’t really sure what it had been, to be honest, because Nate never really talked much about it.

Anyway, my point was, I understood that our contrasting attitudes toward sex and women had likely stemmed from our differences in upbringing. I didn't hold it against him. It was just difficult to imagine wanting less than commitment and meaning . As fuckin’ lame as that probably sounded.

"You wanna go out tonight?" Nate asked, lifting his head.

"I dunno," I replied, pushing the mop through the mess. "I gotta buy smokes. I don't have money to drop on booze."

"I'll buy," he taunted.

Then, I turned to look at him, flashing him a grin over my shoulder. "Well, shit, if you're buying, who the hell am I to say no?”

***

We were going to grab some Taco Bell for dinner, hit up one of the bars on Main Street, and then walk back home with or without a chick or two in tow. It was a good plan. A safe one for a Friday night, the start of the weekend. I was already looking forward to sleeping in on Saturday before my afternoon shift at the shop, and I was excited to head over to my parents’ place for dinner on Sunday.

God, shit felt great, like everything was comfortable and right. I was content, minus that little nagging voice in my head, wishing I had a girlfriend to spend my days with. But there was time for that; I was still young.

It was fine. It was excellent, even, and I was looking forward to starting the night after work.

Then, Nate took a different route.

“I thought we were going to Taco Bell,” I said, thinking that maybe he wanted to stop by a store or something. Grab a six pack for the apartment. Buy those smokes I desperately needed.

But Nate glanced at me, a wild, mischievous look in his eyes. “I have an idea.”

I sank into my seat, a heavy ball of dread sitting inside my stomach. “What’s your idea?”

Nate’s ideas were very rarely good ones. His ideas usually involved someone getting into trouble or hurt. I suspected this one wouldn’t be much different, and I wished we weren’t sharing a car.

“You’ll see.”

We drove in silence for a while with my gut churning and my mind telling me to say something to make him turn around. But I didn’t say anything because, well, I was curious. And wasn’t there always a chance that, for once, his idea could be a decent one?

Eventually, he parked the car and muttered his way through whether it was a good place or not while I watched him with suspicion. Then, he got out and gestured for me to follow. I did as he’d asked and surveyed the area. We were down the block from what looked like a gated community of townhomes or condos or something. The place was nicely landscaped, guarded by a stone wall, a boom barrier gate, and a keypad, and Nate nodded his approval, as if it mattered. I looked from him to the community as we approached the gate.

“Stop looking like that,” Nate ordered as he casually walked around the barrier.

My heart sped up as I hesitated, watching as he strolled along the sidewalk like he belonged there. My poor stomach regretted every single thing I’d eaten that day as I quickly hurried to catch up to him.

“Like what?” I asked, trying to figure out what the hell we were doing without asking.

“Like we shouldn’t be here.”

He casually waved and smiled at an older woman walking her dog. She smiled before shifting her eyes toward me, and her smile dropped.

Nate glanced back at me. “You should’ve left the eyepatch in the car.”

I frowned. “Why?”

“Because you look like we’re up to some shit,” he muttered in a low voice, barely moving his mouth as he spoke.

I leaned closer to his ear. “ Are we up to some shit?”

He shrugged as an innocent smile tugged at his lips. “Maybe.”

I squeezed my eye shut. Fuck . “What the hell are we doing, Nate? Why are we here?”

He took something out of his pocket. I dropped my gaze to zero in on the object in his hand. A wallet. One I had never seen before, and it sure as hell wasn’t his. I mean, first of all, it was pink.

My heart ricocheted off the walls of my chest as I hissed loudly, “Where the fuck did you get that?”

“Tits McGee.”

“Who?!”

“That chick who came to the shop today.”

“Oh, so she gave you her wallet?”

He snorted. He found this amusing. “She didn’t give me shit.”

I tripped on my own feet and stumbled along the sidewalk, never tearing my widened gaze away from him. "Wait, so you … what?! You … you—"

"Stole it? Yeah."

He unsnapped the pink canvas and flipped it open to flash me the driver’s license, showcased in the clear plastic window. I snatched the damn thing from him, holding the wallet up to study the face of a pretty blonde. Kathleen McLaughlin. Twenty. Five foot six.

"Picture must be old," Nate said like he didn’t have a care in the world.

I lowered the wallet to spear him with my rage-filled glare.

"She has red hair now." He spoke so casually, so nonchalantly. Like he hadn't stolen someone's property.

No, not just someone . A fucking client . Forget getting himself— us —in trouble. Roy could lose his business. Roy, who had been nice to me my entire fucking life. Roy, who had given us both jobs without knowing jack shit about either of our work ethic. I could safely say mine was still intact, but Nate's? I wasn't sure he’d ever had any, but now? It was nonexistent.

I stepped closer to him, so close that the toes of my dirty boots touched his. "How the fuck did you steal her wallet?" I hissed, seething and two seconds away from killing him on this fucking sidewalk.

Nate took a step back and swept his eyes across the surrounding area. "Can you keep your voice down, please?"

"Can you answer my goddamn question?"

He turned and began to walk. I followed.

"It was in her car," he said, shrugging like it was nothing. No biggie.

"So, you just, what? Thought it was up for grabs? Jesus fucking Christ, Nate." I raked my hand through my hair to cup the back of my neck, and as I squeezed, I groaned. "So, what the hell are we doing here?"

"Returning it."

He glanced at a mailbox, then veered off the sidewalk to head toward one brick unit with white trim and a whole bunch of daisies in the yard—identical to all the rest. I looked at the marked parking spots in front of the house, noticed they were empty, then hurried after Nate.

"What, you're just gonna drop it in the mailbox?"

"I mean, I could …" He glanced over his shoulder toward the street, then removed a hammer from his pocket.

I watched with horrified bewilderment as he shattered the glass in one of the door's windowpanes. He pushed his arm through the empty window, brushing the glass aside with his jacket sleeve, and unlocked the door from the inside. The door swung open as he smirked at me.

" Or we could leave it on the kitchen counter."

I remained on the front stoop as he confidently walked into what looked like a living room. He acted like he’d been there forever, like he owned the place. He glanced around, nodding with approval.

"Nice," he complimented. "Not sure I would’ve chosen this carpet color, but hey, what can you do? Think she'd mind if I took a couple of things?"

I threw a terrified glance over my shoulder, sweeping my gaze over the quiet road.

"You wanna not look like you're doing something illegal?"

I swiveled my head wildly, looking back at him with more fear than I remembered feeling in my entire life. Fuck, not even having my face blown up had felt like this. I’d had little comprehension of what happened then. But this? I knew what we were doing. I knew what was happening. And I knew that, if we were caught, it would be my ass in the back of a cop car and my parents bailing me out of jail.

"Are you fucking serious right now? Drop the wallet, and let's go. Before someone sees us."

Nate pursed his lips as he raised his eyes to the ceiling. Then, he shook his head. "Nah, I think I'm gonna take a look around for a few minutes. You're free to join me, but can you close the door? Don't wanna make the neighbors suspicious."

He turned and walked farther into the unit, swinging a right and heading up the carpeted stairs.

I had a choice to make. I could leave, call the cops, and tell my parents to come get me. It was probably the smartest thing to do—the safest thing—but then what? Nate would be on his own, and who the fuck knew what he would do when left to his own devices?

He had never ditched me before, not even under the worst of circumstances, and what kind of friend would I be if I ditched him at a time when he desperately needed me to talk him out of doing something completely fucking reckless—even more so than what he was doing right now?

So, I stepped inside, closed the door, and hurried up the stairs, keeping my gaze on the floor, as if that made this situation better.

I found Nate in a bedroom full of white and lace. He snorted when I entered, still keeping my eye on the floor.

"Girl wants Mommy and Daddy to think she's Little Miss Priss, but look at the size of this fucking thing."

I quickly glanced up to catch him holding up a dildo, roughly the size of my forearm.

"Bitch has her standards way too high if she thinks any dude's gonna live up to this monster—holy fuck."

I shielded my face with my palm. "Put it away, and let's get out of here. Before they come home."

"Okay, okay, I'll put it back. God ," he muttered, like I was ruining all his fun.

Then, I listened as he rifled through another drawer and moaned lewdly.

"Dude, her panties are next fuckin' level. Hot damn."

He was looking through her underwear, and some perverse, curious part of me wanted to look too. But I didn't allow my hand to drop, didn't allow even the tiniest peek at little scraps of silk or lace or whatever he was finding. It wasn't my business, and it wasn't his either.

"I swear to God, if we don't get out of here right now, I'm going to leave your ass, and I'm going to—"

"You're gonna what ?" His voice changed, a dark rage tainting his words. He barreled toward me, thrusting my body against the door and pinning me there with his. "You're gonna, what, Rev? Huh? You're gonna call Mommy and Daddy? You're gonna call the cops ? And what are you gonna tell them, huh? That I broke into some bitch's house? And you know what I'd tell them? I'd say, He was right there with me, Officer . So, you might wanna think about what you're gonna do , all right? Because I already know what I'm gonna do if you fuckin' do it."

I tipped my head, searching his crazed eyes for that piece of my friend that went missing during these moments of chaos. "You threatening me, Nate?"

"Yeah, I'm fuckin' threatening you, asswipe," he spat into my face. "Stop thinking you're better than me with your uppity, piece-of-shit attitude. We're the same , Rev. We're the fuckin' same. You’re here too.”

He shoved against me, but I was unmoving, answerless, and he stepped away to dig through the drawers again. This time, I kept my stare pinned on him as he plucked a sliver of black satin from the drawer and stuffed it into his jacket. Then, he opened the jewelry box on the dresser and pulled out a handful of dangly, sparkly pieces and dropped them into his pocket. He threw the wallet into the open underwear drawer and barreled past me through the door and back down the stairs.

"Let's go," he barked from the door.

I swallowed at the burning, nauseating guilt rising in my throat as I swept my gaze around the girl's room.

She might've had a monster dildo in her dresser drawer, but she had Gilmore Girls posters on her walls. There was a worn, old teddy bear on the lacy comforter, waiting for her return. There were framed pictures on the nightstand and a fuzzy pink robe hanging from the post of her bed. She was just a fucking girl, man, and she didn't deserve to come home to find her shit had been violated and stolen.

But Nate was right.

I was there too.

If I turned him in, I'd have to turn myself in also, and what good would that do?

So, I left her doorway and ran down the stairs, vowing to never speak of this moment again.

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