The second we left the lecture hall, emerging into the hallway, I slammed a hand on his shoulder as hard as I could. “Hey, man. Long time no see,” I muttered, my voice dripping venom and hatred. No one else in the hall paid attention to us, mostly because they all knew who I was. Still holding onto his shoulder, I pushed him to the wall closest to us, slamming his back and his backpack against it hard.
Declan winced, but said nothing.
Good, I hope his fucking laptop got cracked.
“Why the fuck won’t you look at me, Declan?” I hissed, noticing the way his brown eyes remained on the floor. My free hand curled at my side. I wanted to hit him. I’d wanted to beat the shit out of him ever since learning about Sabrina. My fist connecting with his face, breaking his nose? My foot meeting with his stomach after a harsh kick? Two of the best things I could imagine.
My vengeance was what got me through the day. It’s what I lived for now. Sometimes even the girls didn’t help.
“Let go of me,” Declan muttered, finally meeting my gaze. His lips were drawn out into a frown, and I gave him one final squeeze on his shoulder—a bit hard, if his wincing meant anything—before releasing him.
“Fine. Besides,” I lowered my voice to a deadly whisper, “when I come at you, you won’t know it. You won’t expect it. You’ll be on the ground before you realize it.” Declan on the ground, curled into himself, bleeding and in pain—now that was an image I would pay to see. Until now, beating him up just felt so juvenile.
I mean, what were physical injuries when my loss was eternal? There was no getting Sabrina back. Declan deserved more than a few punches and kicks. He deserved all the torture I could give him, and all the hatred I could get the student body to give him.
How long would he last? Would he make it until graduation? I doubted it. He was thinner than he used to be. Paler, too. His hair was a bit long, like he didn’t care enough to get it cut. Declan was alive, but he wasn’t doing so well. I didn’t realize it before, not when I’d been sitting so far back. Realizing he looked like shit made me feel all different kinds of good.
I started to walk away, but I spun on my heel and returned to him, meeting his dark stare once again. “Oh, and by the way, that new roomie of yours? She’s cute. Might have to make her one of mine.” One of mine, like I had a collection of girls. I did, in a way, but those other girls didn’t matter.
Right now, the only girl that mattered was Sabrina, and getting her memory the payback she deserved.
Chapter Seven – Ash
When Declan came back to the room, once the day’s classes were over, I was prepared to talk to him about the whole Sabrina thing. I also planned on asking him about Sawyer, because try as I might—and I tried pretty frigging hard—I couldn’t get his lazy smirk out of my mind. There was something I didn’t like about Sawyer, something I couldn’t put my finger on. I hoped Declan’s testimony could help me make up my mind.
Two boys pitted against each other. One girl stuck in between. Kind of sounded like the plotline of a romantic comedy, except this rom-com involved a helping of suicide-slash-possible-murder. Honestly, with the whole Sabrina thing thrown in, I didn’t want to be the star of this particular rom-com.
I was sitting on my bed, the noose Sawyer had given me on my lap. I’d been staring at it for what felt like hours—ever since getting out of my last class of the day—hoping its length would give me answers.
It didn’t.
I was so lost in the noose that I didn’t hear a key slide into the lock, and when Declan walked in, I might’ve freaked and jumped to my feet, causing the noose to fall to the carpeted floor. “Declan,” I said his name in the most awkward way imaginable.
His eyes fell to the noose near my feet as he closed the door behind him. Even though it was warm outside, he still wore long sleeves. I’d be sweating up a storm if I was him. He said nothing, going to place his bag on his desk and unpacking his laptop. He’d probably be content to let this whole year fly by without saying a single word to me, but that wasn’t how we were going to play this.
No, he was my roommate. We couldn’t spend the entire year ignoring each other, pretending the other didn’t exist. Plus, I liked Dean Briggs. He was nice, and I couldn’t see his son being a killer.
Declan…he just looked broken, like he lost the one thing he cared about most in this world.
“We need to talk,” I whispered, slowly bending to pick up the noose and set it on the edge of my bed. I’d have to toss it in the trash once this talk was over. Was I going to come back from class each day and find something new taped to the door or dropped right in front of it? It was going to be a long year if that was the case.
Though he clearly didn’t want to speak to me, Declan muttered a dejected, “Okay.” He pulled out his desk chair, flipping it around. When he sat on it, his back hunched, his shoulders drooping. He was cute, even when he was sad. Not once in my life had I ever seen such a cute face look so morose, like he didn’t want to be here.
Like he didn’t want to be alive.
His dark eyes were on my feet as he said, “I figured we’d need to talk sooner or later. I was just hoping…” He trailed off, heaving a sigh. “I hoped this year would be different. I hoped he’d let it go. As much as anyone could let what happened go.” He rubbed his shoulder, and I stared at him, wondering who the he was that Declan was talking about. Sawyer?
“Start from the beginning,” I said. Just because I knew most of the story didn’t mean I didn’t want to hear Declan’s side of it.
“Senior year of high school I started dating my best friend’s sister. Things were going great, I thought. I was happy. But apparently she wasn’t.” Declan’s jaw clamped shut, and I let him sit in silence as he thought of what to say next. “It was just after second semester started last year that she killed herself. She’d told me she was hanging out with her friends that weekend, so I didn’t think anything was wrong when she didn’t text me back. I was studying for an exam anyway, so I didn’t think twice about it. Sawyer is her brother, and needless to say we aren’t friends anymore.”
That was a name I knew already. “Sawyer was the one who brought that to me,” I told him, gesturing to the noose on my bed, and he didn’t look surprised.
“Of course he did. He wanted to see you.”
“Why would he want to see me?” Really, what did I have to do with any of this? Yes, I was the test subject, the only girl in a private, all-male school, but that didn’t mean I wanted to be dropped in the middle of a feud like this.
“Normally I’d say because he wants to sleep with you, but in this case, I think it’s because he wants to turn you against me, just like he turned everyone else.” Declan fiddled with the sleeve on his right wrist, meeting my gaze. The sadness lingering there hurt to see. I didn’t know Declan well, but I didn’t like seeing him in so much pain.
Plus, in the grand scheme of things, I think I would trust Declan over a guy like Sawyer. Sawyer radiated trouble. Trouble and sex were his middle name. I’d be stupid to trust a single word that came out of Sawyer’s mouth.