Chapter 6 #2
Blinking back, I mull it over, only to realize some unconscious part of me has already decided.
A moment later, I must’ve nodded because the next thing I know, he’s helping me stand and we’re walking.
Paving our way through the abandoned house, drab, soiled walls crowd closer once we reach the dim corridor.
My feet won’t coordinate, though, stumbling all over each other, and eventually, he draws me closer into the crook of his arm.
Something isn’t sitting right with me, though, like a slick of oil floating atop water, stubbornly separate from everything around it.
Mouth dry, I try to sound my concern, but it crumbles almost instantly, the remnants clogging my throat at the sound of Blair’s voice cutting across the hall. The last thread of fragile comfort slips away.
Eclipsed by a sense of dread growing subtly in my gut, but despite it, I follow him on shaky legs, unable to stop.
I don’t know what else to do, or if there’s even a way forward from all this.
All I know is once we’re close to the doorway, my skin curdles as Manson inches us through the sliver of opening, guiding me inside.
Immediately, I seek out Dax, finding him standing rigidly in front of Blair, whose lips are pursed tight, arms locked across her chest as she glares back at him.
Careful on my feet, I still manage to graze the side of the door enough to make it creak, and Blair blows out a choppy breath, eyes panning toward us.
Some part of me still expects her to see me.
But she doesn’t.
“What was that?” she snaps, her voice cinched tight, facing the doorway.
“It’s an old house in the middle of nowhere,” he tells her, irritation threaded through his tone. “It’s going to make weird noises. Who cares?”
A pulse kicks in Blair’s throat. Her composure slips for a fraction of a second before she flattens her lips into a thin line. “I don’t care. I still don’t like it here.”
Without a word, he cranes his neck, glancing toward the room’s entrance before blowing out a breath and stepping around her to cross the empty room. He reaches back to pat his jean pocket, slipping a lighter and a pack of cigarettes out before wedging one between his lips and tucking the rest away.
“Are you okay?” Manson asks to my right, eyeing me curiously before allowing me some space, breaking away our tether.
Nodding, still hovering by the doorway, I shuffle in place, managing to mask the tremors running along my body with a small smile. But the unease from earlier refuses to fade, gnawing at me, more insistent this time. I’m not entirely sure what I’m doing, or if I should just turn around.
But something keeps me glued in place.
Curiosity, maybe.
Or maybe it’s the obstinate belief that if I leave now, I’ll miss something important. Something that’ll make sense of all of this.
I know how ridiculous this sounds.
Yet I don’t leave.
Manson steps ahead of me, weaving his way further inside.
Unable to look away from his back, pressure gathers in the pit of my stomach as I fall into step behind him.
Holding my fists at my sides, I grind my teeth as my gaze drifts to Dax, forcing every bitter accusation back behind lips thinned with rage. Hurt. It’s all the same.
They can’t hear anything I say anyway.
The realization fills my mouth with a sour, tainted flavor so potent I nearly feel it corroding the lining of my throat, searing a path downward.
Near one of the rusted windows at the far end of the room, Blair stands facing him, arms drawn tight over her chest, glaring at Dax as he crosses to the fireplace, cheeks tear-streaked with ruinous salt and mascara flakes.
Instead of diminishing her, it somehow manages to make her appear even more striking.
Jealousy worms its way inside of me, instantly licking up the moisture from my eyes. I might’ve found a smidge of sympathy for her under another circumstance, but I can’t even look her square in the face without finding her inextricably bound to Dax’s betrayal.
Part of me wonders if he’s dismissed her like this before, if they’ve had their fair share of arguments the way he and I had.
If the vitriol in his voice ever got damning enough to have her reconsider her life choices, only to watch herself stay when every shred of pride demanded otherwise.
Judging by the look of it, I'd say this wasn’t her first time.
They’d been at this for a while.
Anguish cracks open inside me, the pain inconsolable. How could he have done this? How have I been so stupid? So blind.
Thumbing down his lighter like he so often did when under stress, he lights the cigarette between his lips, the brief flare casting long shadows across the walls before fading as he takes a drag, letting the smoke sit in his lungs for a moment before exhaling.
The air turns heavy, even more suffocating as it fills with smoke and ash and inevitable heartbreak that I’ve carried with me for years.