Unbearable (the TORQUED trilogy Book 2) (33 page)

The pain in his voice ripples through me. I can’t do it.

He leans forward and buries his face in his hands. He’s shaking his head, as if he can’t process what’s happening to us. “If you don’t want me, end it. I can’t take it anymore. I can’t end it. You have to do it.” His head hangs, his body nearly giving out.

I say nothing.

I can’t do it either. The last thing I want is to end it.

His voice evens out but still holds tension. He regards me silently for a moment and I can see there’s so much hurt inside his eyes I haven’t even seen the half of it. “Raven… just put me out of my fucking misery.”

I know exactly what I need to say to him. “We were never together, remember?”

Oh my God, why did I just say that?

He stares up at me for the longest time, like he’s trying to diagnose a misfire. Or he can’t believe I just said that to him. Sadness rolls through his shoulders, hunching on the onset as he nods, once. Agony floods his eyes.

Sighing heavily, he struggles to stand, leaning heavily against the wall. He runs a hand through his hair and opens his mouth to speak but then clamps it shut again, as if he can’t believe my words. It takes him a second to get around his breaking words. He swallows and drops his eyes to the floor. He looks at the door momentarily as if he’s trying to decide to leave or speak. I can see the twitch in his jaw right before he locks eyes with me. “You’re right.” As he passes me, his voice hits my heart with each word. He pauses and leans in so his warmth radiates into me, and I know what I’m going to miss it. With his chest against mine, I can almost feel the beat in his chest and his breath on my face. “Just do me one last favor, Raven. If I text you…
don’t
answer it and if you see me walking toward you, turn and walk the other way.”

I’m taken aback by his words, and then he’s gone.

I stare at the door as it closes, wondering if I should stop him because he’s been drinking and I shouldn’t let him leave like this. There’s something incredibly off about him and his demeanor but I don’t have the energy to figure out what it is. I let him go even though every fiber of my being is yelling at me to stop him.

I fucking stare at the door once more because there goes the rest of my heart and I know if he stays, I won’t push him away.

Unable to control the sob that leaves my throat, I collapse on the floor next to my broken laptop.

“If you don’t want me, end it. I can’t take it anymore. I can’t end it. You have to do it.”

My heart is frantic as I walk down the hall, everything we said to one another rushing through me like a tidal wave.

“We were never together, remember?”

How could she have said that?

Easily, it’s what you were telling her
for so long. You never gave her a reason to think otherwise.

My body shakes from my actions, an all-encompassing tremor from head to toe like I’ve spent the night in the freezing cold. It rakes through my bones and I shake harder, almost to the point my teeth are chattering. Every step takes an effort I don’t have, but make anyway.

Stumbling through the parking lot, I open the door to my truck and sit in silence, the rumble of the big block vibrating my chest. I put my hands on the steering wheel, both of them gripping so hard my knuckles turn white.

Why couldn’t she have just put me out of my misery? Why did she have to constantly leave me hanging?

Probably because you did it to her for months.

“You made me move on. You told me not to love you. What was I supposed to think? Apparently what we had didn’t matter enough to you.”

A pressure in the back of my head swirls like a breeze, but I’m inside my truck. I check the door thinking I left it open but I didn’t. There’s no breeze, just me and the sound of my truck. With each breath, the intensity increases like a building pressure needing release.

Blinking several times, my eyes shift from the windshield that’s scattered with fat drops of bone-chilling cold rain, to my radio. The blue and purple lines dancing across the display light up with the change in the song.

It’s a Chris Stapleton song. Taking my right hand off the steering wheel, I punch the display to end the fucking song. I don’t want the reminder.

I don’t want anything.

My head buzzes, a throbbing sensation in my ears and a rush of blood. I’m in trouble. I know that much, but I put the truck in drive. I stare at my hands again, maybe because they’re my only indication of how far out of control this is.

If I saw my face, my eyes might be an indication too. They’d be pitch-black, pupils so wide you’d think I was high. I’d stare at you and you’d know, inside, I was gone.

As I pull onto the freeway, I know what’s coming. I usually do. I couldn’t tell you afterwards that I know, but when it’s happening, in those final seconds leading up to the nothingness that can consume me, I know.

I just wish she believed me enough to know I love her, and that’s really all that matters in this world. It’s not these arguments and our lack of words. It’s love in its purest form. Loving innocently with no consequences. The way
she
taught me, only she was wrong. There are consequences.

It’s not until the pressure finally becomes too much, maybe minutes later, maybe longer, that I feel the only relief I’ve felt in months.

It’s not her fault. It really isn’t. But it’s not like I can tell her that now. Maybe never.

If I text you, don’t answer.

I’m at a loss. How exactly did we end up here? Tyler and I of all people, someone I’ve known for over half my life. I didn’t understand most of what he said when he was here, or why he said it. I’m still in a spin going over and over his words and actions.

Staring at the mess that is my room, I pick up my bookshelf first and then my destroyed laptop, placing it on my desk. Stupid jerk. Why did I let him leave? The look in his eyes, the unsteady darkness in them haunts me. I shouldn’t have let him. I know he wasn’t drunk but something wasn’t right.

It’s hours later and I’m drifting to sleep when my phone buzzes on my desk and I jump, my hands scrambling to pick it up, thinking it’s Tyler.

It’s not. It’s Rawley. Fucking Rawley of all people after a month of not hearing from him. The last time he called me was a few days after Christmas, apologizing for not coming and then I saw him on New Year’s at the bar. But not since then. He’s starting to remind me of Tyler.

Rawley: Let me in.

I never heard a knock but I open the door and see my brother, looking like hell. His hat’s pulled down low, with hair sticking out erratically around the edges and his dark brown eyes are sunken in by nights of sleeplessness.

“You look like shit.”

He chuckles, removing his jacket and setting his guitar on the floor. He then flops down on my bed on his back, his shirt pulling up over his stomach to reveal he certainly hasn’t been eating either. “Yeah, well, I feel worse than I look if you can believe that.”

“I can.” Sitting on the floor beside the bed, I lay my head back against the mattress. His hand flops over, rubbing the top of my head.

His breathing is light when he asks, “Why is your room such a mess?”

Rawley knows me and to have a messy room is like the world ending for me. I hate anything out of place. “Tyler. Why are you here? It’s like four in the morning.”

He sighs, rolling over so he’s in a curled position. He smells like a bar: stale beer, cheap perfume and cigarettes. “It’s five… or something… but I was playing at a bar just off campus, went home with some chick who lives in this dorm and thought I’d come say hi.”

I turn and look at him, my chin on the mattress giving him a disapproving glare only a sister can give. “Or you wanted some place to crash for a little while and didn’t want to stay in her room?”

“There’s that too.”

Patting the pockets of his jeans, he pulls out a joint and raises an eyebrow. I wouldn’t say we do this often, but Rawley was the first person I got high with in high school.

I nod. “Sure, why not. I don’t have class tomorrow.”

Sitting up, he backs up so he’s propped against the wall and I sit beside him. His lighter flicks, the joint glowing red and orange for a moment. He hands it to me.

Staring at him, I wonder what the fuck is going on in his head since his outburst at the shop, and then New Year’s.

“What the hell is going on with you?”

Shaking his head, Rawley takes a hit off the joint and then reaches for his guitar. “Nothing.” He says this as if it’s no big deal but I know it is. “Seriously though, what’s going on here?” He motions around the room.

“I don’t even know. Tyler had a bit of a temper tantrum. I wanted him to love me, and he wouldn’t… and then I found out why and then he wanted me and I said no.”

My gaze moves to his, the early morning sun starting to peek into my room lighting the side of his face. He hasn’t shaved in weeks and has a busted-up lip, and a hickey on his neck. I want to ask, but I don’t because it’s probably something stupid like a bar fight.

He’s nodding, seeming to be listening to me, but then focusing his attention on his guitar. It’s then he begins to play the opening notes of “Crazy Bitch” and then turns to me smiling and bobbing his head. He thinks he’s being funny but I want to punch him in his face.

“Why would you play that fucking song?”

Rawley smiles and I kind of hate him for it. Raising his hand, he scratches the back of his head and pushes his guitar away. “You’re being a crazy bitch.”

I don’t even crack a smile. “I am not, Rawley.”

When he laughs, I don’t. I can’t. I’m on the verge of tears and I can’t believe I’m sitting here smoking a joint with him.

“Hey, I’m just trying to make you laugh.” He bumps my shoulder when he passes the joint. “It’s what twins are for.”

I take the joint next and do the same, only it doesn’t offer me the relief I’m hoping it will. “I screwed up with Tyler. I told him I didn’t want to be with him when I really do.”

“Hey, it could be worse.” Rawley laughs, his shoulders shaking. “You could be me.” I don’t agree with him; though he’s probably right.

When I don’t say anything, Rawley stares at me. “Did you call him after he left?”

If I text you, don’t answer.

I sigh because it’s all I can do. The thought of him breaks my heart and sends a sharp pain through my veins. “No. I let him leave. What would I even say?”

Rawley shrugs and though he’s making conversation with me, he doesn’t seem like himself tonight. His attention seeming to be on something else. “Tell him you love him and you want to be with him.”

I side-eye him. “Oh really? Well, maybe you should take your own advice here and tell Sophie that.”

His eyes narrow, the deepest hurt just below the surface. “It wouldn’t make a goddamn bit of difference if I did.”

In many ways, Tyler and Rawley are very similar, hurt in the same ways, which is why the two of them are at it so often. They’re both trying to get the attention off of them by taking out their frustrations on one another.

“Rawley, seriously, what’s going on with you?” The only reason I ask is because while he’s high, he might actually answer me truthfully. “You’re treating Sophie like shit and pushing everyone away from you.”

He’s quiet for about a minute and staring at his hands. He doesn’t look at me when he begins to speak. “Did you know the last conversation I had with Dad, I told him to fuck off and stop trying to make me into Red? Just before he died, I told him to fuck off. My last two words to our dad were
fuck off
.” He takes the joint from my hand when I open my window, attempting to push some of the haze out of my room. “My entire life I feel like he tried so fucking hard to make me like him,” he says, continuing but staring at his hands. “He didn’t do it on purpose, but deep down, he wanted his boys running his shop. I fuckin’ get it. I do. It makes sense. I’ve never wanted it though, but in his eyes, my career choice was the wrong choice. He didn’t come out and say it, but I could tell. So I stayed at the shop after he died. You know, make him happy when I couldn’t before. But shit, Raven, it’s fucking torture. I
hate
working on cars. Nothing gives me the feeling music does. The satisfaction and adrenaline I feel when I’m performing, that’s what makes me happy. That shop is Red’s. I’m not a part of it and I don’t want to be. All I want is music and a stage.”