Trust Me (See Me #2)

Chapter 1

I didn’t want to be here.

I didn’t want to be here at all. I could feel the grimace tightening my face as I looked around this shit-hole of a house.

The walls were peeled and cracked, riddled with holes.

Garbage littered the floor. The sink overflowed with dishes, food caked and crusted on them like they’d been sitting there for days.

The air was thick and musty, sweat clinging to the dust in every room.

And the people weren’t any better. I knew the look in their eyes—glazed over, heads drooping, nodding off in slow motion.

I knew the kind of people they were. Addicts, and not the kind that just needed an escape.

Not the kind you could still find some hope inside.

These weren’t casual weed smokers. Hell, they weren’t even heavy smokers.

They weren’t party kids getting blackout drunk on a Friday night and waking up with regret.

I’d stopped fearing those people a long time ago.

Those people were sad. But sometimes, sad people still had a light. Sometimes, it was buried deep inside, but it was there, dimmed by weed or booze or heartbreak. Sometimes, they just needed time to remember it was still flickering. My best friend was proof of that. Wasn’t she?

But these people, they didn’t have light anymore.

If they ever did, it was gone now. What they had left was a hunger.

Not even for life, just for the next pill.

They were empty. Shells. The only thing that filled them now was the thing that would eventually kill them.

I let my hand brush my pocket, feeling the exact thing I hated inside of it.

The baggie. Pills stacked inside it like candy, painkillers that were really just killers.

Tiny, deadly things. Waiting to take another life.

“I’m fucking done with this shit, Levi,” I said, keeping my voice low but sharp. He was standing beside me, scanning the dozen or so bodies scattered around the house. From the look in his eyes, I knew he was thinking the same thing I was.

“It’s not up to me, Austin. You know that,” he said, not even looking at me.

“I don’t give a shit whether it’s up to you or not. I’m not fucking dealing these things again. We shouldn’t have done it in the first place,” I gritted out. My voice dropped toward the end, like the weight of the sentence was pushing it down.

“I know that, man. It’s your fault we’re in this situation in the first place,” he muttered, and the anger flared in my chest like a match against dry grass. But I didn’t have the right to be mad. He was right.

“Where is this asshole, anyway?” I asked, glancing around the filthy room, hoping Brad had OD’d somewhere in the back so we could leave.

Brad was as scummy as they came. A middle-aged creep with a robe and a beer belly, the kind of guy who bought pills just to pass them out like candy to whatever poor soul wandered into his orbit.

Calling them friends would be generous. They were victims. Strays.

People who didn’t realize they were walking into a trap until it had already snapped shut.

“My friends,” came a slurred voice. Brad. Speak of the devil.

He stumbled out of one of the back bedrooms, his robe hanging open, his body swaying like he was being carried by the narcotics running through his blood. His eyes were glass. Empty windows.

“We’ve been waiting for almost half an hour, Brad,” I snapped, not bothering to hide the disgust in my voice.

“I had business to take care of, son,” he slurred as he wobbled closer. “Did you bring it?”

“Would we be in this piece of shit house if we didn’t? What, you think we dropped by to say hello?” I said, scowling.

“You shouldn’t insult your customers,” Brad warned, but it didn’t sound like a threat. More like a joke. His eyes dropped to my pocket, pupils narrowing. His hand rose, fist full of crumpled bills.

Levi took the cash, shoved it in his jacket like it meant nothing.

Brad looked at me then, his hand still out, palm open.

Waiting. I sighed and pulled the bag from my pocket, hating myself with every movement.

I dropped it into his hand. He closed his fingers around it like it was gold.

Like it was breath. Maybe for him, it was.

His body was so dependent on it, it probably thought it needed the pills to survive.

“Try not to let anyone overdose,” I said, knowing full well it was pointless. No one in this house was careful. No one was lucid enough to know how close they were to death.

“I’ll be speaking to Roger about your attitude, boy. Don’t think I won’t,” Brad said, and that name, Roger, hit me like a slap. My fists curled at my sides.

Neither Levi nor I answered. We turned and walked out, eager to leave the house, to leave behind the zombie-like bodies that haunted it.

I pushed through the broken screen door, the rusted hinge screeching as it opened.

The outside air hit me like a wave. Clean, crisp, almost holy.

I walked faster, hoping it could purge the rot out of my lungs.

“Woah.”

I heard her voice before I felt her body.

Just a second of contact, and she stumbled backward.

My hands shot out on instinct, gripping her waist, pulling her back toward me.

Her body jerked the other way, her hands landing on my chest like a barrier or an anchor.

I couldn’t tell which. She blew her blonde hair from her face.

I shook my head, already annoyed. Another strung-out idiot who didn’t know where the hell she was going.

But then I looked at her. Her eyes were the first thing I saw.

Deep brown. The color of coffee before it’s ruined with cream.

They weren’t glazed. They weren’t empty.

I scanned her quickly. Her clothes were clean, freshly laundered.

Her hair was glossy, styled. Her skin was clear, her makeup soft and intentional.

This girl didn’t belong here.

She didn’t belong here at all.