Shattered: An Extreme Risk Novel (29 page)

It must work because he grabs on tighter to my leg, even as he laughs his head off. On my next line, I add a fakie ollie, then carve swiftly into another line where I pull an alley-oop. We’re three quarters of the way down the pipe and booking it now and I’ve got good control, so I figure what the fuck. I carve up the transition at a forty-five degree angle and when we hit the top of the vert, I jump us into what I think is going to be a 360 but ends up being a 720.

It’s not inverted, not corked, it’s just a plain spin, but from the way Timmy whoops you’d think I’d just pulled a YOLO flip or something. We carve the last line while everyone cheers, and I’m not sure who’s grinning wider when I sideslip through the end of the pipe, Timmy or me.

“That was amazing!” Tansy yells as she comes running up to us. I open my arms for a hug, but she flings herself onto Timmy, who returns her hug enthusiastically. Then he’s laughing and talking about a million miles a minute as he climbs to his feet, telling her and his parents everything that happened—like they didn’t see it for themselves.

Then Z’s there and Cam and Luc and they’re all talking about the alley-oop and the 720 like they’re the most amazing tricks they’ve ever seen and I can’t help grinning along with them—right up until I glance down to the other end of the pipe and see Logan sitting there, watching all of us. He’s not alone, Victor’s with him, but I can tell he’s upset by the dejected slope of his shoulders.

Fuck.

I unstrap from my board, then start toward my brother as quickly as I can—without making it look obvious. He has more pride than three people.

“Ash!” Timmy calls after me. “Thank you!”

I give him a thumbs-up. “No problem, man.”

The last thing I hear as I walk away is Z asking Timmy if he wants to go again—this time with him.

When I get closer to Logan, I can tell he’s trying to smile when he talks to Victor, but even a few yards away I can see that there are tears in his eyes. The knowledge guts me and I feel like a total ass. I’m not sure what I did—Logan’s not the kind of kid to be upset because I tried to make another kid happy—but something’s not right. And since I’m the biggest asshole out here in Logan’s opinion, it’s no stretch to think that I’m the one responsible.

“Hey, man. How’s it going?” I ask when I get closer, pretending not to see his tears though doing it rips me apart. But again, the last thing I want to do is hurt his pride and start a fight.

Victor raises his brows at me, gestures with his head. I nod to indicate that I’ve got Logan, so, after a quick word to my brother, he turns away and starts the snowy hike back to the hotel.

“Hey! Victor!” Logan calls after him, once he realizes the aide is leaving. “Wait up! I want to go back, too.”

“I’ll take you back,” I tell him.

“I can take myself back, thanks.” He turns his chair, deliberately turning his back on me, and starts to glide away. Months ago—when he first came home from the hospital—Cam found him a couple sets of Wheelblades online; they’re like mini-skis that attach to the front wheels of his chair and make it about a million times easier for him to move in snow. He didn’t have much of a chance to use them this winter, because he didn’t get out of the hospital until the major snowfalls were done. But we’ve used them every day since landing in Chile, and up until now, I’ve considered them a total blessing.

At the moment, though, they’re pretty much the bane of my existence. I want Logan to sit still and talk to me and it couldn’t be more obvious that that’s the last thing he wants—and the last thing he plans to do.

After waving Victor on, I walk beside Logan the whole way back to the resort. More than once he gets stuck on a block of ice or a particularly big rock just barely covered by the snow, and it takes every ounce of willpower that I’ve got not to offer to help him. Experience has taught me that doing so will only piss him off more.

I try to talk to him a few times, but he just shuts me down. So rudely and completely that I’m a little pissed off myself by the time we make it back to the hotel. Which is, of course, exactly what Logan is going for, the little shit.

Once we’re in our room, I strip off my boarding gear, then watch silently as Logan does the same. I want him to say something, even if it’s to yell at me for whatever I’ve done that’s hurt him. If he does that, then I can apologize and maybe we can move on. The last thing I ever want to do is hurt this kid. All I really want to do is make everything as easy for him as possible.

I feel so guilty and I love him so much.

Long, silent minutes pass as I wait for him to get his thoughts together and talk to me. Logan has a temper—there’s no denying that—but he’s also pretty reasonable and articulate. Once he gets over his mad enough to think, he’ll talk. He always does.

Except the creeping minutes turn into half an hour and then an hour and he still hasn’t so much as acknowledged my existence. The tension in the room—and in my body—is stretched to the breaking point and even though I know it’s the wrong move, I crack first. I can’t take it any longer.

“Logan, I’m sorry—”

“No, you’re not.”

“Yes,” I tell him, getting off my bed and walking over to sit next to him on his. “I really am.”

“Oh, yeah?” He lifts his chin, stares at me challengingly out of gray eyes that look so much like my mother’s that it nearly guts me all over again. “What are you sorry for then?”

“Whatever I’ve done to hurt you—”

“That’s not good enough.”

“I know it isn’t. But I’m trying—”

“No, I meant a blanket apology isn’t good enough. You don’t just get to say you’re sorry when you haven’t even figured out what you did to piss me off in the first place.”

Fuck. So he caught that. I rub the back of my neck, hoping to dispel a little bit of the tension that’s settled there. No such luck. “So why don’t you tell me why you’re angry and then we’ll talk about it. Make sure it doesn’t happen again.”

“Yeah, right. I’ve heard that before.” He makes a disgusted sound in the back of his throat.

It scrapes along my nerve endings, starts to tick me off. I’m trying here and if he would
meet me at just a quarter of the way, everything would be so much easier.

“What do you want from me?” I demand suddenly. “I know I’m fucking up here, but I’m trying. Doesn’t that count for something?”

“Not really, no,” he says with a sneer.

That really pisses me off. “Goddamnit, Logan. You’re not being fair. How can I—”

“I’m not being fair?” The words come out choked and bitter and angry, so angry. “I’m not being fair? Screw you, Ash!”

He’s as frustrated as I am now, and he reaches out, pulls his chair a little closer, then goes to swing himself into it. It’s an awkward angle, especially with me sitting next to him on the bed, and I leap up. “Here, let me help.”

He knocks my hand away, moves to the chair. But he must have forgotten to lock the wheels when he got out, because it slides out from under him and he ends up on the floor at my feet before I can catch him.

“Fuck. Are you all right?” I bend down, try to pick him up, but he bats my hands away a second time.

“Don’t touch me! Don’t fucking touch me!”

“Logan. Damn it. Let me help—”

“I don’t want your help!” he screams, and the words cut right through me. As do the unshed tears I hear in his voice. “Can’t you see that? Just leave me alone!”

Goddamnit.

Teeth gritted and hands clenched, I force myself to step back and watch as my brother struggles to pull himself up from the floor. But he still is only fourteen and he’s only been going to PT for a few months. He’s got good upper body strength but—

“Shit!” He punches out at the chair, sends it flying back into the wall. “Shit, shit, shit.” Harsh sobs are pouring out of him, loud and rough and so fucking painful that they have tears burning in my own eyes.

Knowing the last thing he wants from me is sympathy right now, I blink them back. And though I want nothing more than to go to him, to hug him and help him, I stay where I am. Watching. Waiting.

I swear it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done. Harder than walking away from my Olympic dream. Harder even than burying my parents.

When his sobs finally quiet, and he’s wiping his face on the sleeve of his hoodie—more proof that he’s just a sad, scared little kid, in case I needed it—I crouch down next to him. “Can I help you—”

“No!” He plants his hands on my chest and shoves me away from him, hard.

I’m so shocked that I nearly end up falling on my ass, probably would have if I hadn’t
managed to tangle my fingers in the bedcovers.

“Victor will help me.” He reaches for his phone with fumbling fingers.

“But I’m right here. There’s no reason to bother Victor—”

“No!”

“Damn it,” I tell him as the last string I’ve got on my temper snaps. “You’re acting like a spoiled brat!” Before I think better of it, I grab him. Haul him up. Then settle him in his chair.

“You asshole!” He swings out with his fists, punches me in the face and the ribs. He keeps it up, punching and screaming and swearing at me with every ounce of strength he’s got.

“What the hell!” I stumble back, shocked at the attack. More shocked at the look on his face and the words spewing from his mouth. It’s like he hates me. Like he actually hates me.

I’m not sure how long this goes on. It feels like a million years but probably isn’t more than three or four minutes. Logan finally winds down, ends up sitting in his chair with his arms wrapped protectively around his body while he glares at me.

“You know why I don’t want your help?” he screams at me. “Because you don’t understand. You don’t see me.”

“What are you talking about? All I see is you!”

“No! You see a kid in a wheelchair. You see your little brother, who you’re in charge of, who you’ve had to change your whole life for. You see your own stupid, stupid guilt. But you don’t see me. Logan. You haven’t seen
me
since the accident.”

“That’s not true.” I crouch down in front of him so that we’re eye to eye. I’m sick at what he’s saying, sick that he believes it. Even more sick at the idea that it might be true. “I love you, Logan.”

“You love who I used to be. You don’t love me. How can you, when you never listen? You’re too busy telling me what I should do or how I should do it or why I can’t do something to listen to what
I
want. To hear what
I’m
saying.”

“I don’t—” I break off, unsure of what I’m supposed to say. Of what he needs me to say.

“You do. I asked you to let me try out a monoski—”

“Is that what this is about?” I run a frustrated hand over the back of my neck. “Logan, they’re dangerous—”

“No more dangerous than outrunning an avalanche! No more dangerous than sitting a sick kid on your snowboard and taking him down a fucking half-pipe. How come you listen to Timmy, you give him what he wants, but I can’t even get you to think about what I want?”

“Jesus, Logan, Timmy’s going to die soon—”

“I could have died! Seven months ago I could have died in that car crash with Mom and Dad.”

“But you didn’t!”

“No, I didn’t! I’m still here. I’m
right
here, but you keep treating me like I’m not. You keep treating me like I’m just as gone as they are.”

“No, Logan. No—”

“See. You’re not even listening!”

Fuck. Shit. Goddamnit. “What do you want me to say? That I worry about you? That I’m terrified something is going to happen to you? That I don’t know what I’d do if you got hurt—”

“News flash, Ash. I’m already hurt! I’m paralyzed.”

Guilt twists sickly in my stomach. “Believe me, I know that—”

“See! There it is again. Right there. On your face. Right now!”

“What?!”

“You feel sorry for me!”

“Jesus, Logan, of course I feel sorry about what happened to you—”

“No! No! That’s not what I’m talking about. That’s fine. You can be upset about what happened. You can feel bad that Mom and Dad died, that I nearly did. But that’s not what you’re feeling. That’s not how you look at me. You pity me. You feel
sorry
for me.

“How do you think that feels? I wake up every day, knowing I’m going to see that look on your face. Knowing I’m going to have to spend the day pretending that I don’t hate the way you look at me. Don’t hate the way you feel about me. You know, I have to face that from everybody else every damn day of my life. I have to see it on the faces of people everywhere I go. Do you think that’s easy? Do you think it makes me feel good to know that they’re all wondering what happened to me? That they’re all feeling sorry for me?

“I take it from them because I don’t have a choice. I put up with it at school because it doesn’t matter what they think. But you’re my brother. You’re supposed to see more than that—”

“I do.”

“No!” He dashes at the tears making tracks down his cheeks. “No, you don’t! That’s what I’m trying to tell you. You think you see more. You think you’re helping me. But you’re not, Ash. You’re not.”

I don’t know what to say to him, don’t have a clue what I’m supposed to do here. Everything sounds wrong in my head, and I’m terrified that I’m just going to make things worse between us. God knows, that’s the last thing I want to do. So in the end, I just stand here, looking at him. Waiting for some clue that he has no interest in giving me.

Silence stretches between us, until Logan figures out that I’ve got nothing to say. Not that that’s true—I have a million things to say. I just don’t know how to say them. How to get him to understand them.

“Whatever,” Logan finally says, wheeling his chair around me and toward the door of our
hotel room.

“Where are you going?”

“To find Z.”

It hurts that he’d rather be with my best friend than me, but I don’t stop him. It’s almost dark, so the others should be back now. And if it hurts a little that my brother would rather spend time with him than me, well … I’m just not going to think about it.

I grab my phone, fire off a quick text to Z to let him know Logan’s looking for him, then realize I’ve missed a text from Tansy. I start to answer her—she’s in her room, trying to warm up after spending almost the whole day outside—then decide fuck it. I’d rather just walk down there than waste time texting back and forth.