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So I plop down on my ass, and just…watch him as he falls apart, waiting for my own tears to come, except they never do.
I just feel empty.
Numb.
Drained.
My sister’s dead. She’s really fucking gone.
Mason’s lost to me, once and for all. There’s no coming back from this.
Waylon’s…I don’t even fucking know what Waylon is, but it’s a mess.
Will’s splitting at the seams.
And I just feel…
Nothing?
Everything?
It’s like I’m right back where I started, four years ago—caught up in some vicious cycle I thought I had finally escaped—and I’m just…
Done.
A bell rings out when I push through the entrance to Chickie’s diner, announcing my arrival.
I fight the urge to cringe and duck my head, and instead busy myself with fixing my hair.
Not that it needs any fixing.
It’s a Wednesday night, but a quick peek over the divider shows it’s packed, thanks to the crowd of familiar faces gathered in the back corner among a sea of balloons and what look to be rocket ships and planets tied around streamers strung up over the windows and light fixtures.
Space party.
Of all themes for Shawn’s birthday party this year, Phoebe went with space.
Why I’m here, for a party to celebrate a guy I’m pretty sure hates me, I have no idea.
Okaayyyy, so he probably doesn’t hate me.
But I still feel like he blames me for Mason’s little bender last month.
As he should…
Grinding my teeth at the thought, I shake my head, immediately taking shears to that thread. I’ve worked my damn ass off this last month to deconstruct every last remaining stitch my mind created that night. That weekend. The last four years…
I was a casualty.
I’ve been a casualty.
A scapegoat. An excuse. A crutch.
Nothing more.
And with that reminder, I steel myself, and round the corner, and start making my way across the diner.
From the speakers surrounding the old, ’50s-style diner, “In The Still of the Night” is playing, mingling with the hum of chatter and clang of dishware.
