Chapter 21 Rex #2
His cheeks blanched.
“Once you take this step, that’s it, Drew. No going back. Ten years of therapy is better than ten years of jail.”
“What if they put me in a mental institution?”
“Well, you won’t have to deal with Brandon, will you?” I countered flatly.
“N-No,” he agreed.
“There’s no one-size-fits-all solution, Drew. But the best way forward is not to kill people. Can we both agree on that?”
“You said you killed people,” he whispered.
“I have.”
“Why?”
“Vengeance. For my mother.” My eyes were cold as I explained, “In the end, they weren’t even the ones who’d killed my mom. I know what it’s like to take lives, and I know that it leaves a mark on you.”
“You’re a hypocrite!” he cried. “Preaching at me like you’re perfect when you don’t know what I’ve been through.” He shuddered, revulsion twisting his face into a maw that’d haunt me until the day I died. “You don’t know what they’ve done to me!”
“Never said I was perfect,” I told him, as calmly as I could.
“I’m the opposite in fact. And I’m not a hypocrite.
If anything, I’m perfectly placed to tell you that you’re about to land yourself in a world of hurt and there’s no turning back.
” I leaned down and picked up the gun. “I’m going to take this with me because I don’t trust you, Drew.
"Unfortunately for you, whichever path you take, I don’t trust you to not hurt innocent kids. Brandon might be a piece of shit, but that doesn’t mean they all are.”
Slowly, he shook his head. “You’re saying I should just kill Brandon?”
My lips almost twitched.
I remembered a long time ago, dealing with Nyx. Homicidal and hurting, grief-stricken and enraged. His fury hadn’t died. His righteous need to avenge his sister hadn’t abated.
Maybe I was a hypocrite.
Not only had I killed out of vengeance, I hadn’t been punished for it.
But this was different, no?
These were kids, for Christ’s sake.
I scraped a hand over my jaw again and slowly articulated, “I think you’re the kind of person the world would be better off having in it.”
That had him gaping at me. “Me? Why would you say that?”
“Had a nose around your things, Drew. Saw the stuff you’re studying. Read a couple of your assignment essays while I waited on you to have dinner. Your critical thinking skills should be better than this, kid. You know that two wrongs don’t make a right.
“Here and now, it’s the desperation talking.
The need to escape. And I get that. I really fucking do.
That’s why I’m here. Because I needed to escape.
I needed to get away, and I’m an adult, so that’s okay.
I’m not a kid who’s tied to this house or school.
You can’t escape. That’s why this whacked reaction seems like your only solution, but if you were sitting in my shoes, talking to a kid like you, what would you say?
What would you tell him about this permanent solution to what’s, essentially, a very temporary problem? ”
His mouth worked again as I felt my words hit home. “I-I don’t know,” he whispered.
“You do. You just don’t want to admit it. You’re filled with rage and confusion and sorrow and hurt. You’ve been humiliated and belittled…
"You’re desperate, Drew. You’re trying to escape. Well, I’m telling you, this ain’t the way forward.”
His fists clenched again, but his answer wasn’t angry, just lost. “What should I do?”
“Tell your mom. Make her listen. Tell her that your dad calling you a pussy is making this worse. Tell her that you were thinking of buying a gun and taking it to school. That you were going to make them listen that way. Tell her that if she doesn’t do something, that’s what’ll happen.”
“And what do I do if she doesn’t listen?”
I blinked at him, stunned that, in his mind, that might be an option. What kind of fucking mother would ignore a cry for help like that?
“You email me.” I dropped a card on his nightstand, one that I’d annotated with an untraceable email address Maverick had told me he’d monitor. “And we’ll figure it out.”
He frowned. “Why would you do that? Why do you even care?”
“Because we all hit crossroads in this life, kid. Thinking shit, planning shit, it don’t make you a bad person. Doing it does. You make a decision that ends your life, that’s on you. But the minute I heard about you, what you were planning, I wasn’t about to let that be on my conscience.”
“Why would that matter? If you’ve taken lives—”
“I still know what’s right and what’s wrong even if I don’t lead my life how regular folk do.
"You’re sixteen, Drew. You got a bright future ahead of you if you don’t fuck things up.
If I can help, I will. If I can’t, I can’t.
I tried. You’re going to do what you’re going to do.
I can’t report you for a crime you ain’t committed.
I can slip a note to them, maybe show them footage of you buying a gun which, just FYI, I have—” He blanched.
“I can make them see how dangerous you are and, all of a sudden, things have escalated.
The authorities will get involved instead of this being dealt with by your family.
“I’m giving you a choice, Drew. That’s what it boils down to. A choice. You’re about to decide what you want to do with the rest of your life, because I can promise you this: you choose the wrong path, I won’t let you hurt those kids. I will stop you from doing something stupid.
“But you’re not alone anymore, and this warning ain’t to say that I won’t make your boy Brandon suffer for what he’s done to you.”
For the first time, an interested gleam appeared in his eyes. The desperation faded somewhat, replaced by a hunger for payback.
“What’ll you do?”
“Plant a couple baggies of coke on him.” I shrugged. “Enough for a possession charge.”
“He’s underage.”
I smiled. “It’ll still get him off your back.”
A breath gusted from his lungs. “You’ll really do that?”
“Ain’t just you who’d get those kids killed,” I reasoned.
He swallowed. “No.”
“If he left you alone, would school be better?”
“Yes. He’s the ringleader. H-He… he has friends. They’re bullies, too, but they’re idiots. He encourages it.”
Nodding, I said, “Consider it done.”
“Thank you,” he whispered.
“The way to thank me is to make the right choice, Drew. You’re messed up, kid, so let’s try to fix shit before it’s unfixable. I don’t want to come back here. I don’t want to see you again, and I don’t think you want to see me, either, do you?”
His head whipped from side to side, a squeak escaping him as I took a step closer, the threat clear.
“You think Brandon’s bad, Drew? You’ve met someone a thousand times worse.”