Chapter 20
Dakota
The polymers lab report had been due over the weekend, and my group had turned it in just in time—huge thanks to me, obviously. I was irritated about it, but I didn’t have any reason to be surprised by it. Having to do more than my fair share of the work was something I’d gotten used to.
I wasn’t the type of person who could let something important sit unfinished and waiting to be completed, and I didn’t have enough of a voice to tell other people to do it, even when it was really their job.
Sometimes I wondered what it would be like if I didn’t feel that pressure, that stress looming over my head.
Some people didn’t seem to have that. Maybe I envied them.
Lecture was feeling especially long today, mostly because I couldn’t stop thinking about the last time I’d seen Dr. Killshaw.
Late at night. Totally isolated. His eyes on me. Only on me.
My gaze lingered on him more than his lecture slides; my mind thought about him more than differential pressure flow meters.
Do you ever think about me, too?
I was lightly tapping the capped end of my pen against my notebook, working up my courage. After class, I planned to go talk to him at his desk.
I actually did have a question for him this time, but that wasn’t the only reason I was planning to go up there.
I needed more proof, more security. Something normal and steady and stable to slot into my mind, to stop it spiraling.
The time when he’d ignored me in lab was either a misinterpretation or a one-off event.
At least, that was what I hoped.
My eyes wandered over to the window, catching sight of the tree branches swaying together.
A squirrel darted across the grass, then over the dead pine needles under the tree, disappearing up the trunk, fluffy gray tail twitching.
I reached for my locket, running it along the chain on my neck, warming the metal between my fingers.
Class ended a few minutes later, and I took my time packing my bag, making my way up to the front of the room where Dr. Killshaw’s desk sat. He saw me approaching, but I couldn’t read his expression.
“Dr. Killshaw,” I started, coming to a stop right in front of his desk. Close enough to see the dark ring surrounding his blue-gray irises when his stare locked to mine.
“I have office hours tomorrow morning. If you have questions, ask them then.” There was an edge in his voice, like I’d just pissed him off. It caught me off-guard.
“I was just hoping—”
“Office hours. I’m busy.”
My mouth fell slightly open, my lungs strangled by his firm rejection.
He turned his focus on his desk, his hands busy gathering up papers, unplugging his laptop from the projector.
From the side, I could see a different girl approaching.
I couldn’t remember her name but I recognized her from previous engineering classes.
“Dr. Killshaw, do you have a second? My group had a question about the experiment summary.”
He stopped what he was doing, looked up at her. Anticipation made my heartbeat pound hard in my ears.
“Sure. What’s your question?” he said to her.
Embarrassment stung on my cheek like he’d slapped me.
Pure disbelief wrapped around my throat like a vise, stealing my air and making me dizzy. I wanted to do something rash, like slam my textbook on the desk, or scream, or hit him.
But I couldn’t do any of those things.
It wasn’t acceptable for me to publicly explode on my professor when he ignored me.
Even if it felt like he was purposefully trying to make me think I was insane.
Am I making all of this up?
Am I truly losing it?
I shoved every single one of my feelings down, deep inside of me, locking them up tight in a box where they’d stay to rot.
I walked out of the classroom, focusing on making my steps even, focusing on breathing through the knife in my chest. I sealed my mouth shut tight, pressed my lips together, angry sobs making a lump swell in my throat.
The thought that I might be imagining everything somehow hurt more than believing he was willfully ignoring me just to be cruel.
Because at least in this scenario, he was being cruel to me.
If I was wrong though, and he was being nothing to me, if I was riding this emotional roller coaster by myself, convincing myself of things that weren’t true, letting him shred my confidence for no reason…
My mood was a black stormcloud, thunder and lightning and endless downpour.
I couldn’t bring myself out of it.
So I decided to find the one person who could match it, choosing my own further self-destruction over anything else.
Me : Are you busy?
Mason : Where are you?
Me : Come find me
Mason : I will. And then I’m installing a tracker on your phone
I walked across campus in long, angry strides, feeling almost sick to my stomach. This was the wrong decision, meeting up with Mason now. I was aware of that. I just didn’t care.
At least I knew he wanted to hurt me. At least the pain he inflicted on me was visible.
Thankfully, there was a bus stop at the edge of campus along the route that would bring me closest to the beach. I leaned against the metal sign pole, arms crossed, until the bus pulled up a few minutes later. The door whooshed open and I climbed on, taking a window seat in an empty row.
By the time we arrived at the stop I needed to get off at, my mood hadn’t improved one bit. It’d worsened.
I stepped off the bus, then walked down the sidewalk-less shoulder of the road until the gravel pull-off came into my sight. Mason’s car wasn’t there yet, but I trusted it would be soon. He knew where I was, even though it’d been almost two weeks since we’d seen each other.
The sky was getting dark, like it was about to rain. Good. I hope it does.
I jogged across the street, making my way around the rope fence blocking the cliffs, then carefully climbing down the rocks in my boots until I reached the beach. The tide was higher than usual, water swooping high up the sand, leaving behind wisps of seafoam like embroidery.
My hair whipped around my face, the wind funneling wildly against the cliffside as it blew off the tumultuous sea.
I lifted my eyes to the sky, watching the storm brewing, clouds colliding and darkening, rolling over each other like the waves below them.
I stomped across the beach, then laid flat on my back on my favorite large rock.
This was where I was sitting when I first saw him.
This was where I was sitting when he found me the second time.
And now he would find me here again.
I could feel my pulse in each one of my fingertips, pressed against the rough surface, my head tilted back and my face turned to the sky. Allowing my eyes to slide shut, I took deep inhales, breathing salt-scented air into the bottoms of my lungs while tears stung below my eyelids.
Footsteps approached after a little while. I felt Mason lean over me, still keeping my eyes closed.
“I found you,” he said.
“I knew you would.”
“Why have you been distant?” he asked, gripping my jaw hard. It felt horrible. My eyes popped open.
“Because you’re fucking crazy and you tried to drown me.”
“And how crazy are you for liking it?”
“Fuck off.”
He bent down, pressing his lips to mine so viciously I couldn’t think of anything other than how good this violence tasted. The first raindrop hit my forehead and I twisted away from Mason, looking up at the sky as it began to open over us.
“I don’t like not seeing you,” he said. “I fucking hate it, actually.”
With the clouds swirling behind him and the rain falling, darkening the sand on the beach around us, with the promise of thunder and lightning sizzling in the atmosphere, those words felt a lot like care. And I needed it. I needed it so bad.
Raindrops pattered down onto my face, wetting my cheeks and hair, leaving dark spots on my clothes.
“How do you feel about it?” he asked.
“I love not seeing you,” I lied.
“It makes me hard when you lie to me, baby.”
Mason laid his body over mine, covering me with his weight. I spread my legs, allowing his hips to come between them, my heels digging into his ass. His palm slipped under my head so my skull was no longer on the rock.
I kissed him, the rain cold and slick between us, his tongue hot in my mouth.
My hand slid around the back of his neck, up into his damp hair, dark and thick against my fingers. Heat blossomed low in my stomach.
“Do you want me to fuck you right here?” he gritted out, pushing his hips against my center, the rough surface of the rock aching on my spine. One of his hands slid up to palm my breast.
I wanted it. Ruin me. Fuck me up.
Make me regret ever meeting you.
Make me feel something other than rejection and shame.
Hurt me.
Force me.
Show me how you care so much about me, how you want me so badly, that you’ll take me, even if I don’t want you to.
He was the tide, and I was begging to drown. Hurting myself with Mason was the realest thing in my life.
“Does it matter what I want?” I panted.
Mason bracketed my throat with his hand, thumb pressed to my windpipe. My mouth fell open, eyes rolling back, choked gasps tumbling past my lips.
“I already know what you want, because you told me. But I know you didn’t tell me the whole truth, the worst of it. Quit letting yourself believe I won’t understand you if you open up to me, when you know I will. You know I’m like you, so show me your darkness.”
Opening up to Mason didn’t feel like a choice. He’d find a way to tear me open if I didn’t do it myself, reach his hands through my ribs and take out everything I hid from him there.
I just didn’t know how much longer I had until that happened.
You’re going to rip me apart and apart and apart. Until there’s nothing left of me. I don’t know how to stop you.
He loosened his grip just enough for me to speak, my head still fuzzy with the lack of blood flow to my brain.