The Line That Binds Series Box Set (69 page)

“I wish I had the guts to quit this job,”
a different girl’s voice said.

“I wish I could remember that one girl’s name,”
another guy said.

So many voices.

So many wishes.

Ben told me I had to stop. He was probably right. Look at what I’d done today. One guy’s happiness snuffed out in the blink of an eye.

“I wish I had the balls to move out west,”
a different guy’s voice said.

Maybe it was best that their relationship ended sooner rather than later. Like ripping off a Band-Aid. It stung like hell, but it was better to do it fast than prolong the inevitable.

Exactly like the curse. Exactly my point. Ben wanted me to stop the progression. Maybe Janine had done the same, attempting to find answers she never could. For me, though, there was no reason to wait. I was already damned. I was ready to rip off the Band-Aid.

I made my way over to a group of people by the kitchen, grabbing new tissues from a hallway table along the way.

“Hi,” I said, extending my hand as they all looked me over.

“Is this how it’s going to be?” Pop’s voice broke through my clouded thoughts, mid drink.

I tipped the bottle down away from my lips, already too drunk to try and hide it. “What do you mean?” I asked, not bothering to sit up. The basement’s bed had pretty much become my home this last week. It was already Saturday. The darkness down here had a special way of hiding the time and blending the days. It was perfect.

“You know exactly what I’m talking about,” he said with a voice split between concern and frustration. He stepped off the final stair and placed his hands on his hips while his eyes bored holes into the side of my careless face.

I knew what he meant. The beer. In my hand.

I swirled the bottle around beside my bent leg, watching the liquid funnel inside, not wanting to have a conversation with him right now. It had been a week since I’d talked to LJ. I hadn’t disclosed everything about our last meeting to Pop, but I did let him know that she was no longer concerned with looking for the last well stone, or anything else. He’d said it was her stage of denial, a way for her to control a situation that she had no control over. He’d also said that she would move past it eventually, we just needed to continue to help her.

I wasn’t sure I agreed with him. She’d sounded pretty solid on the not wanting me to help part. She wouldn’t even look at me the few times I’d seen her at school. Thankfully, I had started my new Co-op schedule. As much as I loved Iz and Spaz, I was glad I no longer had to sit through lunch with them. I was tired of getting drilled with questions from Spaz, and slapped with advice from Iz. When they noticed my shaved head Monday, they both freaked. It was almost as if I had brought a gun to school or something.
Can’t a guy get a damn haircut?
They assumed my next step was suicide. They should know the only chance of that happening was if I drowned in beer.

I took another sip. I guess it was possible if LJ didn’t “move past it” as Pop said.

Pop walked closer when I didn’t answer him. I didn’t want to look at him.
What am I more afraid to see? My shame or his pity?

His thick hand snatched the beer out of my grip and chucked the bottle across the room. It didn’t register with me until the glass broke like all the others had last week. “Get the hell up!” he yelled.

I kept my position and finally looked in his eyes. There was no pity there, only anger. It burnt right through my skin and dug up every mistake I’d ever made. He’d never looked at me this way before. It was almost like I was looking into my father’s eyes instead of his.

“This,” he said harshly, swiping his hand through the air over my body, “stops now. I’ve waited long enough for you to pull your head out of your ass. I won’t sit here and watch anymore. It’s all a little too familiar.” His eyes continued to assess me.

His reference to my father stung a bit. And it stung because he was right. I was sliding down a mountain of misery with no wall to crash into. I opened my dry mouth to say something, anything, but he leaned in a little closer before I could speak, scrambling my thoughts with a pinch of his brow.

“This is not about you.” His mustache barely moved as he forced the words through his teeth. “It’s about her, Benjamin. It doesn’t matter what she said to you. It doesn’t even matter that you love her. But if you truly do love her, you’ll step up, shake the self-absorbed shit off your stinkin’ clothes, and find a way to save her.”

“I’ve been helping,” I slurred.

“Going through boxes with me isn’t exactly thinking outside of one. That door is closed now anyway. I just brought the last one over from the event house.” His voice lowered as he scanned the basement.

I scowled at what that meant. “There’s nothing else,” I admitted weakly. “She won’t let me in the house. She won’t even look at me.” Even if I was able to get inside by hanging out with Gavin, I still would be stuck. He’d get suspicious if I started snooping around.

Pop sighed. “I’m realizing now Genie kept me at a distance on purpose. She told me some details, but she didn’t want me intervening. It saddens me to think that she would do this to LJ without a warning or reason. Maybe it all slipped away before she could explain.” He moved toward the cluttered portion of our basement, surveying our own boxes. “There has to be something that we are missing.”

We were missing a lot. And I was missing LJ.

Pop turned back to me and placed his hands on his hips again. “You said she was choosing to accept it. Did she give a reason?”

“Nothing specific,” I replied, thinking about our last kiss. I told her I’d do whatever it took to help her, but she didn’t want me to. “She’s definitely granting wishes more often than Janine had. She said it felt good to help people instead of hurting them. Maybe she thinks she needs to repent for being mean or some shit. Like being mean deserves that kind of punishment.” My chest tightened.

Pop rubbed a hand over his bald head with a sigh. “Is she starting to slip?”

I stared at my bent leg in front of me, picturing her straddling my lap last week. “Yeah,” I replied solemnly. “She jumped back a week. It shocked her. She told me it was the longest gap.” I finally sat upright, head spinning from the blood and alcohol rush, and rubbed my hands on my thighs to wake my legs. “I told her she needed to stop. She’s had a lot of nosebleeds…” I shook my head while a lump settled in my throat.

“We may have to tell Carson. I’m not sure what else to do at this point.” He walked toward the refrigerator and started to pace. “I’ll try to come up with a problem to get me into the house. You guys checked the major areas. Maybe I can peek into the other rooms.”

I nodded even though he wasn’t looking at me.

“Try harder with LJ,” he continued, speaking his thoughts as he paced. “Maybe you can get her to reconsider.”

“I don’t think—”

“Benjamin.” He stopped to look me in the eye again. “We will figure this out. We just need to try
every
avenue and think outside of those boxes.”

I nodded again then remembered what LJ had told me about Rina. Why was she here now? Was it simply because she’d sobered up? “Rina’s been back for a bit. I wonder if she knows anything.”

“That’s what I’m talking about. I don’t exactly know what transpired between her and Janine. If LJ still won’t talk to you, maybe try Gavin. Rina may have talked to him.”

“Okay, I’ll try.”

He turned around, yanked the fridge open, and pulled out the latest half-empty case of beer. “There’s a wedding tomorrow. I’m sure they wouldn’t mind drinking these.”

Ugh.
I wiped a hand down my face, knowing I was in for a restless night.

Restless, but clear.

Sodium chloride. Sodium chloride.
I fluttered my legs behind me on the bed and strummed one set of fingers against my cheek while staring at my chemistry book.
What’s the bond? Covalent? Ionic?

I tapped my pen on the study sheet that was due tomorrow and flipped the book’s page again.
My retention is slipping.

“Ah!” I yelled in frustration, sweeping the books away and burying my face into the comforter.

“Hey,” Gavin’s voice came from my bedroom door.

“Hey,” I responded with my face still mashed into the bed. I could hear the door open fully and his footfalls on the wood floor.

“I just wanted to warn you that Dad’s coming up to talk after he finishes the bills.”

“Thanks for the heads up,” I replied and finally shifted my face sideways so I could see him.

“No problem,” he replied, scratching his left elbow above the black cast wrapped around his forearm. He’d been restless since the break. The doctor told him it would be a while before he could get back on a dirt bike, testing his already limited patience. At least he still had use of his fingers to play games.

I watched him look around the room uneasily. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah,” he replied with somewhat of a sigh as he walked to the window facing Ben’s house. He peered through the glass, silently staring over Stockton grounds.

Knowing his answer was a load of bull, I sat up and closed my books. “What’s up? Do you miss riding?”

“Of course there’s that,” he admitted. “It’s also… Taylor. She’s been different lately.”

Oh crap.
“Like how?”

He shook his head, still facing the window. “She hasn’t talked as much this week. She usually doesn’t shut up.”

“Have you talked since school Friday?”

He turned around with a scrutinizing look, scrunching his brow and pulling in his chin. “You dropped me off at her house yesterday. I spent the day there.”

I did?
I rubbed my palms over the top of my legs absently. “Right, I meant after that. Have you talked to her today?”

“Hey,” Dad interrupted from the hallway. He tucked his hands into his jean pockets and looked at me with heavy eyes. Gavin’s accident last week had really stressed him out. He looked more tired than ever and I was pretty sure his hair had sprouted more grays. “Can I come in?”

I glanced at Gavin. He tilted his head, knowing our talk had to wait. “Sure,” I said.

Before Gavin could shuffle past, Dad snatched him up into a relaxed head lock. “This one includes you,” he mumbled, shifting an arm over Gavin’s shoulder and directing him to the bed. Gavin took a seat at the foot while Dad remained standing. “I’ve wanted to talk to both of you about some things. I’m not sure the best way to say this so I’m just going to throw it out there.” He took a deep breath and rubbed his hands together. “I’m dating Simone.” He stared at both of us, waiting for a response.

“Okay,” Gavin replied blandly, like it was no big deal.

I just stared back, mostly in shock.
He’s dating Simone?

Dropping his hands to his side, he continued, “Things are getting a little more serious so I wanted you both to hear it from me, in case you might’ve been having some suspicions.” His eyes shifted to me. “LJ?”

“Yeah?”

“Did you know?”

“No.”

“Well…” He placed his hands on his hips and glanced down at his feet as he thought about what to say. “Simone told me that you’d hinted about it indirectly, like making little comments, and that you were acting differently at work all week.”

Had I?
I frowned. “I’m sorry if I’ve been acting differently.”

“No, no need to be sorry. Maybe she just misunderstood. But have you been feeling okay? She also said that you’d had a couple nosebleeds. Is this something that’s been happening regularly?”

“No,” I lied.

“I really want you to know that you can tell me if something’s wrong. No matter what.”

I could feel Gavin’s eyes on me, too. They were worried. I didn’t want to tell them. I didn’t want any of this to affect them, but it was going to be harder to hide than I thought. My nerves spiked, so I picked at the holes in my jeans to diffuse some of the energy. “It’s nothing. The winter air here has been an adjustment. That’s all.”

“Okay, but let me know if it happens more often,” Dad said with a sigh. “And, about your mom. I think we need to discuss some things.” When neither Gavin nor I replied, he pressed on. “Despite my own issues, I’m trying my hardest to do the right thing here, guys. I don’t believe you’d be in any danger if you were to spend a little time with her so I’m leaving the interactions up to you. As far as I can tell, she’s been clean for a while. She’s gotten a job, a place to live—”