Chapter 12
12
GAVIN
G ood riddance.
Good riddance .
Yeah.
Fuck, I had to get out of here.
I lay flat on my back, staring up at the ceiling, breathing hard and willing the pain to fade. If I didn’t move, it started to get better.
So I didn’t move. Just breathed through it. Fighting with Beck had only made everything worse, and whatever was wrong with my foot had gotten even more fucked up.
And it was all my fault.
God, I hated myself. I couldn’t control the intense surges of anger that exploded through me around him. I hadn’t been this fucking unhinged in a long, long time, and for a good while, I really thought it’d left me.
Guess all it took was being close to Beck. Close enough to touch. Close enough to see the disgust in his eyes when he set them on me.
I’d never been very good at controlling my anger, and ironically, it was always Beck that calmed me down when we were kids. All he had to do was say, “What’s the matter?” and look at me with love and concern and poof!
Gone. Just like that.
Now when he looked at me, it had the opposite effect. There was no love and concern anymore. Only scorn.
Beck was right. I hadn’t learned a thing. I was still the same asshole I’d always been.
There was a part of me that relished Beck’s hatred. I wanted him to hate me— needed him to hate me, because it was the only thing I was deserving of anymore. I wanted him to hurt me, too, for the things I’d done.
I wanted more than anything to blame my behavior on my dad, wanted to say that everything I’d done, everything I’d become was his fault. He was the reason for all of it.
But that wouldn’t be entirely true, would it? And despite the things he’d done to me, I let him do those things. I let myself be controlled by him.
Because I was weak. I always had been.
Even after he told me he never wanted to see me again, I tried crawling back to him.
Fucking pathetic.
When I was let out of jail, I tried to call him even though he’d told me not to. It went to voicemail, so I left him one. Told him they were putting me in the homeless shelter, and could he please pick me up?
He never came to pick me up, and it took three months of waiting to realize that I really had been abandoned.
The past few years away from him had been like coming out of a fog, waking from a dream, slowly having the hazy, gauzy black and white film of his hate dissipate until everything stood before me in jarring colors. Except once the hate had slithered away, nothing else had come to replace it. There was just this vast emptiness inside of me, and I wasn’t sure how to fill it.
Even without him, I was still me . And I didn’t know who I was anymore.
“Becky,” I whispered, staring at the ceiling. What were the chances that he’d somehow found me?
I knew I’d been drinking at Shelby’s last night, not wanting to go back to the homeless shelter until I was blackout drunk. I fucking hated it there. It smelled like piss and shit and vomit. The rooms didn’t even have locks on their doors. I didn’t have anything worth stealing, though.
I was worthless through and through.
I didn’t remember anything after sitting down at the bar, and now I was here.
Poof.
Who was that girl? Beck’s sister? She didn’t look anything like him. Was too old to be his real sister. Too young for him to be seeing her.
Besides, he was gay as fuck.
Anya. That’s what he’d called her.
Were they just roommates?
“I don’t give a fuck,” I said.
I needed to figure out how I was getting out of here. How I’d get back to the homeless shelter.
The thought made me want to curl up and die.
Most thoughts did.
Fine. All of them.
I didn’t know how Beck could stand to look at me. Not with all the vile things I’d said to him over the years. All the awful words I’d used to hurt him. He acted like it didn’t bother him, but it did. I knew his tells. I knew when I hit a nerve. I knew, and I used it against him.
I turned my face into the blanket as much as I could, inhaling deeply. It smelled good. Clean. Fresh and natural, like a breeze on the ocean. Or a sunset in summer.
Christ, I needed a fucking drink if I was thinking his bed smelled like sunsets.
I didn’t want Beck to take me to the hospital. I had no insurance, no money. They’d laugh me out of the waiting room.
But I knew Beck wouldn’t let it go. He was still the do-good hero he was when we were younger. Always wanting to help if he could. Bugs, animals, plants, people. It didn’t matter who or what needed it, he had this…this drive to fix everything around him.
Is that what he saw me as? Something to fix? Even though he hated me?
A laugh bubbled out of me. There was nothing and no one on this earth that could help me. I was beyond repair.
I wanted to curl up on my side, but I didn’t want to jostle my foot. The pain had finally become manageable.
I heard a squeal of laughter from somewhere in the house, then a giddy shriek. How many fucking people lived here?
There were multiple pairs of feet stampeding down the hall, and then it stopped. Loud whispers sounded right outside the door.
What the fuck now ?
The knob turned, then it opened silently.
A head popped in.
Anya.
Curious brown eyes darted quickly all over me. Then she smiled and walked fully into the room.
Another girl came in behind her. She looked like she wanted to be anywhere but here.
“Get out,” I said.
“Hi,” Anya said. “We thought maybe you were thirsty.”
I finally noticed the bottle of water in her hand, and I swallowed.
Yeah. I was fucking thirsty.
When I didn’t say anything, she moved around the bed to the side I was on and watched me closely, like I’d jump up and attack her at any second.
I wouldn’t. It was Beck who was the threat. She was just…some scrawny teenager. A kid.
“Here,” she said, setting it down near my arm. She gave me another bright smile, and I hated it. What the fuck was there to smile about?
The other girl was doing something on her phone, not paying any attention to us.
“So, anyway,” Anya said, tucking her hair behind her ear. “Your foot looks really bad and you could get an infection and die, right?”
“Wrong,” her friend said without looking up from her phone.
Anya kept talking. “I’m not really trying to see my first dead body yet so could you just let Beck take you to the hospital? We can come with you, if you want.”
Jesus Christ. God, I wanted to roll over and ignore her so bad. Shut everything out.
I looked away, choosing to stare up at the ceiling again. “No.”
“Okay. Beck went out to get some crutches from an old teammate. So at least you can hobble away and die somewhere else.”
She was being funny, but she had no idea how accurate her words were. How much I wanted them to come true.
So I laughed.
And then she laughed, and then my laugh turned into a sob.
Fuck my foot.
I rolled over, burying my face in the covers and screaming when the pain shot through me in a flash of agony. I felt like throwing up. My stomach clenched, tightened, and I gagged.
I heard panicked voices behind me, around me, but just kept my face down. I wanted to smother myself.
At least they couldn’t hear the crying through all the screaming.
“Hey,” someone said.
“I brought you painkillers,” they said.
That got my attention. I turned my face toward the voice. Anya was still there, concern etched in her features. She was holding out her hand, two white pills in the center of her palm.
“It’s Tylenol,” she said. She moved her hand closer.
I let go of the blanket I’d been clutching and reached for the pills. She smiled.
“Can you open the water?” she asked.
“Fuck you,” I said. “I’m not an invalid.”
“Wait, you’re not?”
I glared at her. Did she seriously think she was funny?
“Fuck off,” I said, pushing myself up on my forearms. I threw the pills in my mouth and grabbed the water bottle, twisted the cap off, and chugged three quarters of it in one go.
“I’ll get you another one,” Anya said, almost excitedly. Like I was some injured squirrel she’d rescued from her backyard.
Anya raced out of the room, the other girl following after her with her eyes glued to her phone.
I rested my head on my arms and closed my eyes.
“Gavin.”
Beck.
Did I fall asleep again?
I could feel his hand on my back, heavy and broad. I wanted him to stroke my back, maybe run his fingers through my hair.
“Get off me,” I croaked.
“Let’s go. We’re going to the hospital.”
I cracked my eyes open. Beck was crouching at the edge of the bed, staring at me. Hard.
“No. I’m leaving,” I said.
He scoffed. Rubbed his fingers into his temple, like I was giving him a headache. “This is utterly ridiculous. All day—all fucking day—the only thing you’ve done is fight me at every turn. If you want to suffer that badly, then who am I to stop you?”
He was Beck. That’s who.
He stood up, and my eyes were level with his crotch now. He’d changed into jeans at some point. I felt my cheeks start to heat.
“I got you crutches.” He pointed to a set of crutches leaning against the nightstand. “Feel free to leave any time.”
Now. I would leave right fucking now.
I pushed myself up, gritting my teeth when my foot began to throb and pulse with fresh pain. I felt so weak, couldn’t even handle a little discomfort. I’d been through worse than this. Much worse.
When I dragged my legs over the side of the bed, setting my good foot on the floor, the pain that came with the movement had me making an embarrassing sound that was so pathetic I wanted to die.
I could do this. I just needed to get away from Beck, get out of here, and then I could go find a small space to curl up in. Just stay there.
Do nothing.
Be nothing.
Yeah.
That motivated me enough to grab the crutches and use them to pull myself up to a standing position. And when I did that, the agony that exploded through me completely blacked out my vision and robbed me of my balance. I teetered forward, my face crashing into the window, then dropped to the floor.
There was a string of curses, and then hands were on my head. I felt like I was dying, honestly.
I leaned into that feeling.
Leaned into it hard.
“Gavin!” Beck said harshly, lifting my head up. He set it on a rock. His thigh? It was not a good pillow.
There was a wetness on the side of my face. Was I crying again? Fuck, I sucked.
“Gavin, come on, stop fucking around. Open your damn eyes.”
“No,” I murmured. I was busy dying, and I wished he would shut up and let me.
“You’re not dying, you little drama queen. You’re just a fucking idiot,” he said, exasperation heavy in his tone.
Fuck, I said that out loud. Something soft brushed against the corner of my eye.
“You’re a fucking idiot,” I said, opening my eyes. His face was upside down. He was dabbing a cloth on my temple, and I brought my hand up to shove it away. There was red on it.
“You stupid fuck. Do I need to call a fucking ambulance?”
I reached up and grabbed his arm. Squeezed. “No,” I said vehemently. “No fucking hospital. How many times do I have to say it?”
“Why?” he asked, frustrated.
I kept my mouth shut. I was so, so tired of this man trying to take everything from me. Didn’t he know he’d already taken it all, years ago?
“If you can’t give me a reason, I’m calling an ambulance. Then they’ll just take you away and you won’t have any say in it.”
This motherfucking bastard. I wanted to spit in his face. I had no idea if that was true or not, if they’d just force me to go to the hospital, but I wasn’t about to test it.
“Why?” he asked again, the persistent asshole.
“Because I don’t have any money or insurance! I don’t have anything !” I shouted, trying to shove him away from me. “Get off, get off, get off me! I don’t want your fucking help, I don’t want your fucking pity, I don’t want your stupid fucking hands on me, you fucking freak ! Stop touching me!”
He moved back and my head fell to the ground with a solid thump, despite the carpet. I grunted and closed my eyes.
There was a long, blissful, moment of silence. I couldn’t even hear him moving or breathing.
Then he said, “Don’t worry about the cost. I’ll take care of it. Let’s go, Gavin, before I drag you out of here.”
“Oh my god, fuck you ! Do you even know how you sound right now?”
“No, but I know you sound like an ungrateful piece of shit! I know you’ve been nothing but a fucking burden since the second I picked you up yesterday! I know it would literally kill you to have anything nice come out of your fucking mouth!”
I could hear him breathing now. Heavily.
He was right. I was a burden. Just dead weight dragging everyone around me down.
“Just put me out with the trash,” I said. I was tired now. Everywhere hurt, and I wanted it all to just go away . Beck was seeing me at my lowest low, and I couldn’t handle it.
“What?” he said incredulously.
“Just put me out with the garbage, Beck. Or better yet, lay me down in the middle of the street. Hopefully a car will just roll over me. Problem solved.”
It was quiet for about twenty seconds, and then he said, “Gavin. Are you being serious right now? You’re joking, right? Because that’s not fucking funny.”
There was fear in his voice now. I put that there.
“No. I’m not joking. I’m not trying to be funny. Just throw me in the reservoir.” No, wasn’t that drinking water? “Or find a quarry and toss me in it. Anything, I don’t give a shit at this point. Just make it stop. I don’t want to be here anymore.” My last words ended on a broken whisper, and I put my arm over my face.
“You…you’re not serious. You’re not.” There was a strain in his voice I’d never heard before, a thinness that sounded like it would shatter at any moment.
I didn’t say anything to that.
“Gavin…”
“Beck, I swear to god,” I said, voice thick and rough, “If you still care about me at all, you’ll do this for me. Please. Please . Just do this for me. Just get rid of me.”
There was a loud thump, like he’d hit something. “You selfish fucking prick ,” he snarled. “You goddamn asshole ! You—you fucking know what my dad did and you say that shit to me?” He laughed, and there was only disgust in the sound. “Fuck. Fuck me. Oh, man. I knew you were—I knew you were a fucking bastard, you’ve done some fucked up shit these past few years, but fuck . You literally don’t have a heart. You seriously don’t care about anyone but yourself. Fuck. You.”
He thought I was just being a dick. That I didn’t actually mean it.
There were footsteps, and then the door slammed.
The tears started not long after.
“Get up. Get the fuck up, we’re going to the hospital. So help me god, if you fight me or argue with me, I will Misery your ass and break your other foot,” Beck said, and once again, there was only contempt in his voice. All for me.
I didn’t fight him. Didn’t argue. I was tired, I was in pain, and the apathy had kicked into full gear.
I tried to sit up but was too slow for Beck, so he shoved me up, then grabbed me roughly under the arms, hauling me to my feet. I cried out when the pain intensified. Tried to breathe through it. He grabbed my arm and looped it around his neck, wrapping his other arm around my waist.
I pretended he was holding me because he wanted to.
He basically dragged me to the car because I wasn’t hopping fast enough. The pain was so all-encompassing now I thought I might pass out. There was no relief when he set me in the passenger seat. He buckled my seatbelt, like he thought I was incapable of doing even that, and his hair tickled my cheek.
It smelled like his bed.
He slammed my door and got in the driver’s seat, didn’t say a word until we got to the hospital. It was dusk now, and the sky was painted in a delicate array of blues and purples and pinks.
It didn’t look real.
None of this felt real. I could almost convince myself this was some fucked up dream. That my subconscious had plucked out my deepest want, and then twisted it into something ugly.
That was as much as I deserved.
When Beck turned the car off, he said, “I’m staying with you. I don’t know how long this will take, but fuck, at this point, who fucking cares.” He reached into the back and pulled something out. Threw it on my lap. “Put these on. And take off the ice pack.”
It was a shirt and a pair of socks. I unbuckled my seatbelt and put the shirt on. It smelled like him. I put one sock on my good foot, and taking off the ice pack made me cry like a fucking bitch.
He walked me in the same way, basically dragging me, and sat me in a hard plastic chair while he went to the desk. The young woman behind it kept glancing at me, and I didn’t like the way she was looking at me.
I didn’t like it at all.
I would have gotten up and walked out if I could.
Beck walked back over to me, lips drawn in a tight line, and sat down heavily in the chair next to mine. It creaked so loudly I thought the plastic was splintering beneath his weight.
“She said it’ll probably be an hour. Maybe two. Depends.”
I said nothing and closed my eyes.
“Gavin.”
Beck.
My eyes flew open, and he was hovering in front of me, hands on my shoulders.
“Let’s go. They’re ready.”
He stepped to the side and I saw a young male nurse with a pleasant smile standing behind a wheelchair.
“Why can’t you push me?” I said, looking up at Beck.
“It’s protocol. It’ll be fine, I’ll be right next to you,” he said. “Come on, I’ll help you into the wheelchair.”
Because I just wanted some real painkillers, I let him get me up, let him pull my arm around his neck, let him put his arm around my waist. He was so fucking warm. Uncomfortably warm. It was making my entire side prickle.
The pain was awful, but I kept telling myself I’d had worse. This was nothing.
It didn’t feel like nothing.
Beck sat me carefully in the chair, and then we were off. He stayed by my side like he told me he would. We followed a short, plump nurse to the back, down one hallway, then another, and then she pointed at a curtain and said, “This is you.”
“Thanks,” Beck said.
“Doctor will be with you soon.”
Then she was gone.
The male nurse wheeled me inside, and before he could ask if I needed help getting onto the bed, Beck had wrapped a firm hand around my arm. He helped me sit down, but I shoved him away when he tried to ease my leg onto the bed. He held his hands in the air and stepped back without a word. I gritted my teeth as I tried to bring it carefully to the mattress, and once all of me was on the bed, I turned my head away from Beck. A nurse came in thirty seconds later, asked me a bunch of questions, gave me a gown to change into. Told me they’d be taking me to the imaging room soon. She gave me a painkiller, too. Something much, much stronger than Tylenol.
It kicked in pretty quickly.
“Do you need help?” Beck asked.
I picked up the gown and ignored him. Dragged the shirt he’d given me over my head. Stuck my arms through the holes in the gown and grabbed whatever random strings I could find, tying it shut.
“You need to take the shorts off.”
I fucking knew that.
Slowly, so, so slowly, I slid the shorts down my legs. Pulled my good leg out, then tried to get the shorts over my bad foot. I could feel Beck’s eyes on me the whole time, burning into me.
The shorts snagged on my toes and, like I’d been electrocuted, my muscles locked up and I fell back onto the bed with a hoarse shout, wheezing through the agonizing fire that was licking up my leg.
There was a sigh to my left, and I didn’t care. I gave up. Beck could do whatever he wanted. I didn’t care anymore. He could have everything.
He came to the foot of the bed and gently slid the shorts the rest of the way off, folded them as he walked back to his chair, then set them on one thigh.
I just watched him, needing a distraction from the pain. It wasn’t as intense as it had been before thanks to the painkiller, but it was still immense. Beck watched me right back, dark blue eyes boring into mine. His blond hair wasn’t very long, but it was curly. Tight little ringlets that I knew were soft and springy to the touch. His ears stuck out just a little too much, and I’d teased him relentlessly about it when we were kids. He was sensitive about his ears. He’d always been sensitive. About everything.
He didn’t seem like that anymore.
His lips were perfectly shaped, his chin strong. He had a unique face, though. Eyes slightly slanted, like a cat’s. Thin eyebrows with perfect arches. High cheekbones above cheeks that were slightly concave. Everything was symmetrical and, like a drawing of perspective, all the lines were parallel and ran toward a single point.
It was a good face.
But it was making it hard to remember what he’d looked like when he was younger, and I didn’t have any pictures of him from back then. I wondered if he did. If he’d kept our photographs.
Probably not.
“What?” he said quietly.
I turned my head the other way.
“You’re just not gonna talk anymore?”
“I don’t have anything to say.” I had more to say than I thought he might ever listen to. More than I thought I’d ever be able to find the courage to say.
“You could say you’re sorry.”
I was. I was sorry for everything I’d ever done. I was sorry for existing in the first place. And most of all, I was sorry I was such a coward.
“I could,” I whispered.
Beck sighed. “But you won’t.”
I swallowed thickly. I could barely breathe, let alone speak past the lump in my throat.
“Gavin.” There was so much emotion packed into that single word—my name—that a small sound escaped from my chest.
He was hurting because of me. Again.
“ Gavin ,” he said. “Look at me.”
I didn’t want to. I couldn’t do it.
“Please,” he said softly.
“I don’t want to,” I whispered. “I can’t.”
Another sigh. “Then just listen to me.” There was a creak, like he was shifting in his chair. “I don’t know who you are anymore, and maybe I never did. I may not like you, but that doesn’t mean I want you to be gone. I don’t care how much of an asshole you are, you still matter. Back then, you were the bravest person I’d ever met. I need you to be brave again, because whatever’s going on with you, whatever this is, you can fight it. You can get help. You don’t have to feel like you’re not worth?—”
There was another creak, and then silence. The curtain swished as he left, then swished again when he put it back in place.
I didn’t want his words, anyway.
That was a lie.
To the empty room, I said, “It’s the most selfless thing I could do.”
And I believed that. I could never hurt another person again, not if I didn’t exist.