32. Preston
PRESTON
Kane
Is it true you burned your dad’s car last night, Pres?
Me
Maybe.
Jude
What’s going on?
Daddy issues acting up again. And, wow, you’re actually alive, big man? I thought you were busy moping after we lost our last game because of you.
Jude
You’re not changing the subject. You’ve been off lately.
You’ve also been off, but you don’t see me bitching about it.
Kane
Do you need a venting outlet, Pres? I can arrange something.
Nah. Don’t want to dirty my manicured hands.
Jude
You’re refusing a hunt? Seriously, what the hell is going on?
I thought you bitches didn’t like it when I go on bloodlust sprees. Now, you’re mad I’m doing what you want? Assholes AND indecisive? Pick a struggle bench.
Kane
It’s just not like you to refuse a hunt.
Jude
I’m not mad, Pres. I’m worried about you.
Gag. Don’t ever say that mushy stuff again, big man. Just gave me nausea I need to take more meds for. Anyway, I’m totally fine. See you later today.
So I lied.
I’m totally not fine.
And I probably won’t be seeing them later today. I mean, I could before my trip to the loony bin, but they’d figure out something is wrong. Jude would also try to fight my dad to keep me out, which would get him in trouble with his own dad, and nobody wants that drama.
Besides, I can’t really tell them.
The words are stuck in my throat like stacked rocks, unwilling to budge.
Just like that time—if I try to speak, I can’t breathe.
If I can’t breathe, I feel everything.
And I hated it—feeling everything. I preferred the numbness, the lack of emotions…the endless floating.
I think I’m getting there, to the floating stage where I don’t exist for a while.
Become part of the stars for a while.
But for now, I have to keep my feet on the ground.
Because there’s something I loathe more than feeling everything—being pitied.
Or being seen as a hopeless case. Dad already does, and I don’t want to add Jude and Kane to the list.
I was out here for a good time. You know, before Dad handed me to his favorite Dr. Fenwick so he could dissect my brain again.
Probe my mind again.
Strap me to a bed, poke me with needles, extract my blood, and give me puzzles.
Will I get those again? The last time they studied me extensively, I was a kid, so maybe they’ll quit the LEGO-like nonsense?
Guess I have to wait and find out.
Though maybe that’s not a bad idea. I’d take LEGO over Dr. Fenwick’s dull personality any day.
I wonder if Dr. Duret will finally come to her senses and tell her boss, Fenwick, that I’m totally fine.
Okay, I’m not, but I’m not dangerous.
Fine, I am.
I’ve been sensing the disintegration of my mind slowly but surely over these last couple of days. The sounds are starting to drown out my thoughts; I can barely hear myself.
This morning, I stared in the mirror, and I don’t know who the fuck stared back at me. He had hollow eyes and snot running from his nose as silent tears streamed down his face.
“You never helped me,” he whispered, and I had to look away before I drove my head straight into him.
He should’ve died. Why the hell is he still alive?
Anyway, my brain has been in a bit of a state for some time, but it’s spiked since the night I hurt Marcus and he pretended nothing happened.
My mind rippled, spanned the fuck out, and finally broke.
Then it was shattered into pieces last night after Dad apologized for his cutthroat intentions.
So what did I do? Killing some desolate souls or slicing some throats normally would’ve been my go-to solutions. Or maybe provoking Dad so he’d send Lenin to beat me the hell up.
But nah, none of those would’ve helped in this state of complete desperation.
Instead, I’ve done something uncharacteristic.
I spent the entire night writing a letter.
Yes. I was writing a letter. Blasphemous under any form of circumstances, and no, Dr. Duret won’t get the credit, because she’s a fucking liar.
It wasn’t helpful or cathartic like she preached. If anything, I found myself hitting the back of my head on the wall so hard, I was sure I’d bleed out.
Or pass out.
Unfortunately, neither of those options happened.
What did happen, however, was lots of shaking and a flood of water that wouldn’t stop coming out of my eyes. Maybe Dr. Fenwick will find a goddamn cure for that.
But I did finish the fucking letter and handed it to Hayes this morning with clear instructions to deliver it personally later today.
After I’m trapped in Dr. Fenwick’s dungeon—sorry, office.
But maybe that wasn’t a good idea, maybe I should ask Hayes to burn it, because I’ll be gone by then, and…what’s the point of it after that?
Just a last hurrah? Me being selfish again with the man who’s only ever been patient with me?
And he has been patient. I know he has. I’m such a clusterfuck, I wouldn’t wish me on my worst enemy. The most nightmarish lover anyone could want.
But Marcus did want me. Even if it was for my outer shell of a body, he still put up with my high-maintenance personality all the time.
The least I could do was let him go, but nah, I had to be selfish again.
I guess I wanted him to know the truth he’s been probing for before I fuck off to that place—where they will kill my soul.
I know I won’t be able to handle it.
For all these years, the only reason I didn’t lose my goddamn mind or get buried in the static or the black hole that’s always trying to swallow me was simply because I was free.
I had hockey and blood fests that let me purge the chaos growing in my mind. I had Miley and even Dad. I had Dr. Duret, who listened to my constant bitching without judgment. I had Kane and especially Jude, who kept me in check when the demons got too loud.
And for a while, I had Marcus.
In the loony bin, I’ll only have Dr. Fenwick’s professional, unfeeling face.
It’ll just be me and my head.
And…I’m scared of my head.
That motherfucker loathes me and will play all sorts of tricks and games to make me as miserable as possible.
Like last night.
He’ll fill my thoughts with flashbacks of pain, grating sounds, and images of sticky blood.
Lots of blood.
For the entire night, my mind was scratching, groaning, and stealing my breath.
People’s minds help them get on with life; mine sabotages me at every turn.
And if I get locked up, he’ll just torture me.
I’m tired of being tortured.
I’m just so fucking exhausted.
Of everything.
But I still managed to dress up this morning and do my hair so prettily, because I’ll be going to that place with style.
And you know what the best way to go with style is? A picnic.
That’s what I’ve been doing this morning with Violet and Dior as I pretend my problems don’t exist.
Problems? What are those? Never heard of them.
Anyway, Violet, being an excellent host, prepared sandwiches and the cutest cut-fruit plates that I’ve been devouring like a gluttonous motherfucker. All the while talking shit to Danilla.
Listen, I’m still the pettiest petty to every petty on this earth, and I’ll never be okay with the fact that she dated Marcus before me.
The thought of Marcus starts a fire in my chest and a sort of riot in my brain.
You know, I’ve always thought his intensity was uncomfortable, but that’s only because of something simple. My head comes alive around him in ways I’ve never experienced before.
Pre-Marcus, I often felt like I was lost within those stars in my childhood bedroom. Like my soul was still floating there, and my body was just a shell in the real world.
Mostly, I believed I didn’t exist.
That’s why I love pain. It means I’m here.
But Marcus’s touch changed that. It hurt even without impact play, because he touched me deeply, all the way to my soul. He touched me so intimately, it shattered the illusion and crushed my bones.
He touched me so thoroughly, I could feel myself exist in the real world, not just drifting in the unknown.
And those times were the most I’ve ever been myself.
Now, I’m scared I’ll never have that again.
I need to stop thinking about him, because fuck, my chest and eyes burn, and I’m totally not going to cry like a little bitch.
That’d be so embarrassing, and Disney over here will mock me for a lifetime.
I focus on smiling and having fun with the girls. If someone sees me joking around and trying to patch Vi’s relationship with Jude, they’ll never guess I’m running on my last breath.
The one percent battery.
Lack of sleep, emotional drainage from writing the letter, and morbid desperation about losing Dr. Duret, Marcus, and Dad at the same time are messing with my goddamn head.
Scratch.
Scratch.
Scratch.
The sound is loud, but not more deafening than the demons living rent-free in my head.
You know no one loves you, right? Even your mom, who loved you the most, killed herself to escape you.
Lilith was right. Once Miley grows up, she’ll hate you. What type of role model can you be for her? Don’t you think it’s better you fuck out of her life now?
How long can Jude and Kane put up with your shit before they’ve had enough?
It’ll make everyone’s lives easier if you’re just gone, Preston.
I swallow past the onslaught of voices, my throat flooding with nausea.
Fuck.
I’m about to consider leaving, just so I can bang my fucking head against a wall, but then I see the bracelet on Violet’s wrist. Something clicks in my head, and I don’t know whether I want to be wrong or right.
Is that what I think it is?
I might have asked her to remove it like a dick, which she does hesitantly.
A gust of air makes my hair fly back as I flip it and rotate the mechanism that holds the plate at the back until it opens.
As the two plates lay side by side, it confirms my suspicion. Inside, there’s a crescent moon and a sun, matching the symbol on my ring.
I trace the initials carved next to the symbol. W.J.A.
That old man? “Jesus fucking Christ. What the fuck is this?”
“I don’t know,” Violet whispers from her seated position next to me, her body trembling. “This is the first time I’ve seen that. I…didn’t even know it could be opened.”