28. Wren
My day has been a rollercoaster, from waking up this morning with Julian and Gavin arguing to spending the afternoon with Dimitri.
My professor, who I’ve now not only kissed, but spent the afternoon in his lap talking about not just school, but Jordan.
Talking about Jordan is almost crazier than our shared kisses and those smiles of his that make me feel like I’m looking at the sun.
I hadn’t really let myself linger on thoughts of him since before; it hurt too bad to face alone, and nobody understood.
How could they? Jordan wasn’t just my brother but my twin, my other half, and the only family I had left.
I don’t know if Dimitri understood, but he’s sure good at listening, and something about being in his arms gave me the push I needed.
Actually, now that I think about it, there isn’t much I know about Dimitri. I’ll have to fix that.
By the time dinner rolled around, I felt so much better, which is how I ended up here, in the library with all my photos. I’d gone and grabbed a small tray of food from the cafeteria and, by some miracle, hadn’t seen any of the guys.
Julian had texted me a few times earlier, asking where I was and if I was okay. I let him know I was fine after my initial freak-out, but I didn’t exactly feel like telling him where I’d been was a good idea.
I’d been tempted to tell him where I was going, but I knew doing that was as good as inviting him to come here, and while I usually loved his company, right now I just needed a minute to breathe.
I’ve taken a lot of photos since he got me the camera, but I hadn’t done anything with them. On a whim, I print one hundred of them at random, heading to my table the second they are done, a grin tugging at my lips and excitement filling me.
Thankfully, the table I’ve dubbed my own is huge, and in just a few minutes, or maybe hours—I’m not really keeping track—I have all the pictures spread along the table.
I’m just missing one thing.
I reach into my bag, digging around for the stow-away zipper compartment, and pull out the only photo I have left of Jordan.
It’s the two of us, about six years ago. We were at one of his games; he’d been facing off against Titus’s team, actually. They won by one goal, scored by my brother in the last ten seconds.
Funny how they never hated him, though. But I think that says more about Jordan than anything else; he was always the center of attention, able to draw anyone in.
We always joked that he got all the charm, and I got all the brains.
I wipe the tear that rolls down my cheek as I open the binder I intend to work on. It’s going to be my time at Meadow Ridge Academy, all the things I would have shared with Jordan.
“You have a brother?” I nearly jump out of my skin, whipping around to find Felix standing behind me with two to-go cups, one in each gloved hand. He holds one out to me, and I take it, holding it close to my chest as I turn back to the sea of pictures that cover the table.
The urge to hide the pictures vanishes the second I register it’s him, which is strange but not unpleasant.
“Had.” I force the word out, turning back to look at that picture, one of my most prized possessions.
We were so young, and while life was still hard, at least we had each other, and that was more than I ever needed.
Never did I think I could survive in this world alone. Some days I still didn’t want to, but I knew he wouldn’t want that.
I’m not sure what I expect, maybe for him to leave. It’s a heavy topic after all, but instead, I feel him move closer, and when I look back, I find him standing right behind me. His gloved hand is braced on the back of my chair, and I swear I can almost feel his touch.
It’s strange the way he feels as though he grounds me. I hadn’t realized I’d missed his presence so much until he appeared, as if answering a call I didn’t know I put out.
“A twin?” he asks, and he’s close enough that I feel the hairs on the back of my neck stand at attention, and my heart rate doubles in speed.
“Yes,” I say, and my voice sounds breathless. I’m shocked to realize that it has nothing to do with my sadness and everything to do with Felix’s proximity.
It doesn’t escape me how very inappropriate this is, considering I just spent my afternoon in Dimitri’s arms, but I can’t seem to get a grip on myself. There’s just something about him. As if I’m drawn to him beyond my own control.
Desperate to distract myself, I turn my attention back to the pictures, quickly sticking photos into sleeves and…
“Shit!” The picture slips through my fingers. It’s a picture of the tree, the first one I’d taken with my new camera, the very one that Felix took me to.
A drop of blood wells on my finger, and my stomach turns as the metallic scent registers in my nose and memories hit me like? I’m back in that car.
I don’t remember much of that night, but blood always triggers something inside that holds those memories: the screaming, the metal screeching, and then the silence.
I’d been unable to hear from my right ear since that night, something that had seriously set me back when playing, but Auntie hadn’t cared; she’d only made me practice harder until nobody even questioned my hearing.
I’d earned so many scars from her, but she told everyone they were from the car accident, and they believed her.
The world tunnels around me as I watch the blood run down my finger, but just as fast as my panic starts, it’s gone. A large gloved hand wraps around mine, pulling it up and out of my line of sight before my finger is wet.
What the hell?
I look up to find him leaning over my chair, my hand still in his, my finger resting between his lips, and my brain short-circuits.
Should I stop him? Probably.
Will I? Hard pass.
Not only is the blood no longer affecting me, but there’s something so strangely sexy about this moment that it sends my heart racing for a completely different reason.
After what feels like an eternity, he pulls my finger from his plush lips with a pop, licking it clean, and all I can do is follow the path of his tongue.
Well, that and clench my thighs against the feeling of my now aching core.
I’m almost positive this isn’t a normal reaction to someone sucking blood from your finger, though I guess that’s not very normal to begin with.
“All better,” he says, and his voice is so low and rough that I have to bite back a very inappropriate whimper, sinking my teeth into my lower lip.
His lips turn up in a smile, and his eyes look like they shine as he leans in closer, making me forget how to breathe. Slowly lowering my hand, I gasp when I see it is, in fact, completely healed.
“How…” I croak, words failing me as I inspect my finger.
“It wasn’t very deep, but don’t poke at it, or it might start bleeding again.” He waves my hand away, and I let it fall ?before I look up at him and find him staring intensely down at me.
“Tell me about him.” Felix nods to the picture of me and Jordan, pulling my attention back to what I was doing before, as he drops into the chair right beside me.
“Jordan was my twin.” I take a deep breath and reach for the necklace that hangs around my neck. I haven’t taken it off since he gave it to me when we turned ten.
“He was born diabetic. Twins often have medical problems, but other than that, we were healthy, and it never stopped him.” I smile, remembering him and all the energy he had for every sport, event, and, of course, for me.
Almost every memory I have with him is a fond one, even when it was shit, because he made sure I was okay.
“He was always so worried about taking care of me and making sure I was happy. He said it was his job as my big brother.” I roll my eyes even saying the words aloud.
It was two minutes, and he never let it go.
“But he was terrible at taking care of himself. I always had to remind him to test and not to eat crap. He thought he was indestructible.”
I’d talked to Dimitri about Jordan earlier, but not about how he died. I’m sure with access to my file, he knows enough. This is harder than just talking about him, though.
“He’d had a tournament. I was supposed to be there, but I’d gotten low marks on an exam, and Auntie forbade me from going as punishment.
” That’s not exactly true. I wasn’t told I couldn’t go because of the grade, but I wasn’t allowed to be in public with a black eye or my split lip.
That punishment I earned with that grade, so it’s kind of the same thing.
“He never wanted to test after a game, said it ruined the high, and when he went to bed that night, his sugar dropped low enough that he never got up again.” My lip wobbles, but I manage to get it all out without breaking down, and that has to count for something.
“I should have been there…” I choke on the words as my throat becomes thick, and I shake away the thoughts of how I could have changed everything. I’ve relived that day so many times, thinking of all the ways I could have saved him, been there when he needed me.
It doesn’t change anything, though; the damage is done now.
I can’t look at Felix, can’t bear to see the way he will look at me now. The only person who knows it’s my fault is Auntie, and she never lets me forget it. I’m sure he won’t want to hang out with me anymore now, but I can’t deny it feels good to have told someone.
“If I’d been better, he would be alive.”
“Wren,” Felix says, my name firmly pulling my gaze back to him, where I see a grim look on his face.
I’ve never heard him say my name before; usually, he just calls me Eternity, though I’m not sure why. But Julian calls me Pookie, so I guess nicknames don’t really have to mean more than whatever comes to mind.
“I very highly doubt you could have done something to hurt someone. Especially not someone you clearly care so much about.”
“You don’t know that. You don’t even know me,” I argue, though it sounds pathetic even to my own ears.
He leans in, and we're so close that I can see the gold flecks in his dark eyes. I cock my head to the side as they shift and swirl before like nothing I’ve ever seen before.
“Your eyes are beautiful,” I blurt out before I can stop myself. Oh my god, I have no self-control, apparently.
I let my eyes fall closed as I take a moment to bask in my mortification before I open them again and find him still right there, his smile back and wider than before. My apology dies on my tongue as his eyes flick down to my lips, his tongue running the length of his lower lip.
He takes a deep breath as if smelling the air, or maybe simply attempting to center himself, before he huffs and sits back.
“I’m sorry about your brother, Eternity, but I know you had nothing to do with it. You couldn’t hurt a fly.” His smile turns into a smirk that makes me narrow my eyes.
Is he insulting me or…
“How would you know?”
“Because he’s well aware of what people who hurt people look like, aren’t you, Felix?”
I whip around so fast I hear my neck crack, but that’s the least of my concerns as I turn to find Titus standing not far behind us near one of the bookshelves, his arms folded over his chest and a scowl on his face.
I guess at least he’s speaking English this time.
“What are you doing?” Titus hisses, stalking toward the table as if he has any right to demand things of me.
“None of your business,” I snap, pushing to stand, but I don’t get far before I’m being pulled back down.
“He’s talking to me, Eternity, not you,” Felix tells me softly, and I turn to him even more confused.
“What?”
He looks down at me, pulling his gaze from Titus, who stands at my other side, huffing and puffing as if finding us here is somehow a terrible thing.
There’s a sadness in his eyes that wasn’t there a moment ago, and it takes everything in me not to reach for him. The urge to erase that sadness is so strong it’s as if it has a mind of its own.
Before I can, he turns his gaze back to Titus. His eyes flash with anger, making me turn my attention back to him as well, only to find him glaring at me.
Well, that’s more what I expected.
“You shouldn’t be here with him.” He tells me before he turns his attention back to Felix, his scowl deeper than I’ve ever seen it before. “You shouldn’t be here with her. Stay away from her!” he says to Felix, reaching for me as if he intends to move me away from Felix.
I pull back, moving closer to Felix and watching as Titus’s eyes go wide, shifting between Felix and me as if unsure what to do.
I’m more surprised that he’s shocked, though. What did he think was going to happen? That he was going to come in here making demands and I was just going to listen to him.
Not.
“Not every sibling relationship is as warm and loving as yours was, Eternity.”
I see the obvious confusion written on Titus’s face at Felix’s words, but he doesn’t say anything, instead keeping his mouth closed in favor of glaring at me.
I take a second to look between them and realize they have nearly the same eyes. No wonder Felix’s eyes always seemed familiar to me; I’d seen them so often with Titus, always glaring at me.
“You’re brothers?” I ask because while I hear what he’s saying and I see the similarities, it just doesn’t seem possible.
“Half-brothers,” Titus spits as if I’d just insulted him, but Felix doesn’t correct him, so I assume he’s telling the truth.
“You’d do well to stay away from him if you value your life, Wren. He knows you couldn’t hurt a fly because he’s a murderer.”
My eyes go wide, and I turn to Felix, waiting for him to deny Titus’s claim, but he doesn’t, and I sit torn.
I don’t really know Felix, but I know Titus about as well as I need to, and given the choice…
“I’ve survived this long without your help, but thanks.”
I wouldn’t have thought it possible, but Titus’s gaze darkens, his eyes almost appearing to turn black as his nostrils flare in obvious annoyance before he turns and all but stomps off.
“You didn’t have to do that.”
I turn back to Felix and find him leaning toward me again, and I can’t help but do the same as if pulled by a magnet.
“I know, but I wanted to,” I tell him, and fuck me if that smile couldn’t make me do so much worse.