Chapter 14 #2
My eyes grow wide, and I stop in my tracks.
I’d only heard about the attack on television and social media.
I had calmed down my parents over the phone, reassuring them that I was at my dorm, and then I immediately called Nataly and Aria, but luckily, they were at the other end of the city at the time.
This wasn’t the first attack of its kind in London; I remember my parents’ whispered phone calls after bombs had detonated at several tube stations in 2005.
I remember eavesdropping on conversations with their friends through closed doors.
The memory of it is enough to cover my body in a heavy blanket of goose bumps.
More recently, I remember the fear, the helplessness I felt seeing all those injured and grieving people on television after the knife attack—but it was just that: television.
No matter how close it was, it seemed far away, like a parallel universe. But Luca was there.
I glance up and notice that Luca has stopped too, a few steps ahead of me. His eyes are hard as steel, unreadable, and I wish I’d held out my hand before, because now he seems too far away.
“Are you . . .” I shake my head, starting over. “How are you handling it?”
“Physically? Quite well. I’m totally unscathed.
I had a scrape on my knee because I dropped to the ground, but that’s all.
No scars, no wounds, and I went back to uni two days later.
Then my parents forced me to spend the week at their place to make sure I was really all right.
” He says the last few words with a bitter note in his voice.
“But I was far from all right. I didn’t actually see anything, or not that I can remember, but I heard everything.
And worst of all, I didn’t do anything. I just lay there while the people around me screamed, and I didn’t move a muscle. ”
“You couldn’t . . .”
“I could have done something,” Luca interrupts me. “Some other pedestrians stopped the attacker in the end. I could have done something, just like they did. Instead, I lay there, waiting. And I can’t forgive myself for that.”
The expression in Luca’s eyes makes me gasp. I see it often enough in my mirror. Self-hatred. Only for him, it doesn’t flash angrily; instead, it envelops him like a dark fog, blocking him off until it feels like I can’t reach him at all.
“So you see, you can be down on yourself as much as you want, but unlike me, I bet you didn’t do anything wrong.”
His words make me want to shove him out from under this dark veil. How can he be so unfair to himself? “You didn’t do anything wrong either! None of that was your fault.”
“My apathy is my fault; that’s exactly why I’m creating Desolate Dread.
At the start of the game, Zach is just as passive as I was.
He lives his life without an ounce of empathy, surviving but uncaring about others’ lives and well-being—until he’s forced to care.
And only then does he get better; only then does he realize that the biggest monsters out there are his own fears.
The fact that I didn’t do anything while the people around me .
. .” He breaks off mid-sentence and hunches his shoulders.
His tone is way too casual for what is obviously going on inside him.
“I’ll never forgive myself. But I’ll do what I can to change, and maybe I’ll change others too. ”
I cross the distance between us, and Luca lets me get as close to him as I was in front of the bar earlier.
It’s like we’ve swapped roles, because now I’m the one skewering him with my gaze while his eyes rest on me, but it’s like he’s somewhere else entirely right now.
For a while, we just stand there facing each other, not even moving aside when a man and his dog try to pass us on the narrow pavement.
We just stand there, and time stops. Until Luca blinks and shrugs again.
“Now you know about my scars. So please don’t ever think yours are ugly.
” His voice is almost as rough as mine now.
“Your scars tell your story. If I’d acted, maybe I’d have some of my own—and I’d wear them proudly.
The fact that I don’t have any physical scars from that day just goes to show how weak I was then.
You’re so much stronger and more beautiful than you think. ”
Though his words still sound like lies, they make my heart flutter. They pry open a drawer in my brain, and I put Luca’s words inside, so I’ll never have to give them back. So that I can replay them to myself the next time I look in the mirror.
You’re so much stronger and more beautiful than you think.
I shake my head. To object, but also to reconcile the image of the man in front of me with my memory of him at Crow Manor.
A man radiating confidence, a captivating speaker who doesn’t let anything get to him.
How is it possible that he’s buried his insecurities so deep inside himself while I wear mine on my sleeve?
Maybe we’re like two sides of the same coin that way.
My side is on top, there for everyone to see, and Luca’s is buried. His side may be all the heavier for it.
“You’re not weak,” I reply quietly. “You’re a survivor. Please don’t be so hard on yourself.”
Our shadows move closer together. Or rather, mine moves toward his as I take one last, small step forward.
I hold out both of my hands, wrapping my arms around Luca’s neck.
I rise up onto my tiptoes and pull him in close.
It takes him a moment, but then his rigid body softens against mine, and he returns my hug.
His hand is warm on my back, the way it was when I woke in that far-too-comfortable bed, and I can feel his heartbeat. Fast. Powerful. Alive.
“Thank you,” I whisper, and there’s a yearning ache inside me as his scent envelops me again. I want to be even closer to him, but he’s already holding me so tightly that you couldn’t fit a sheet of paper between us.
“Does this mean you finally believe me?” His voice vibrates against my chest.
“Not really,” I tell him, and Luca makes a noise somewhere between a snort and a laugh. Hearing that sound is such a relief that my eyes well with tears. “I meant, thank you for telling me.”
I can feel him nod against the top of my head. He doesn’t say anything; he just keeps on holding me. And there we stand. One heartbeat, two, three. So long that I stop counting.