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“You wanna talk about it?” I ask her quietly as I scoot across the bed to sit beside her.
She’s silent for a moment. “I wanna get high.”
My stomach sinks and the familiar dread fills me. Wrapping my arm around her shoulders, I pull her close. “I know, girl, but you know that that’s not an option anymore. Look at how far you’ve come already. You just have to let yourself feel it and work through it.”
“I don’t know if I know how to.” She pauses. “When I was in Shadow Bay, they had me on so many different psych meds, that it never affected me. This is the first time that I’ve had to deal with the memories of that night without having anything in my system.”
“I know,” I say quietly, sympathetically. “If you want to talk about it, I’m here for you.”
Cartier takes a deep breath, nodding as she hangs her head in defeat. “It’s not something that I like to talk about. Honestly, I’ve never really talked about it except in therapy while I was in Shadow Bay, and that didn’t do shit. They didn’t give a fuck, so I just stopped talking about it because no one really cared.”
I stay silent, not sure what to say. I don’t think anything that I could possibly say to her right now would make much of a difference. She has her own demons that she’s been fighting for a long fucking time. I wish that I could help her because I really do feel for her.
“My family was honestly the picture perfect family. My dad had an amazing business and we never wanted for anything. My parents always seemed so happy too. At least those are the only memories that I really have. My mom’s energy was addicting. She was always so positive and nothing ever got her down. I was the second oldest of four kids. My twin brother was a few minutes older than me, so he prided himself in being the oldest.”
Cartier pauses, smiling as she’s lost in the happy memories of her childhood. “I had two little sisters. Danielle was five years younger than us and Estelle was two years younger than her.”
I squeeze her shoulder lightly before releasing her as her body grows rigid. She’s struggling to hold her emotions in and as badly as I want to hold her together, I know that I can’t. We’ve never been the hugging type of friends, so I don’t want to make her feel even more uncomfortable than she already does by going down memory lane right now.
“They were still so fucking young when it happened,” she whispers, her voice cracking. “They barely even got to experience life before my father took it all away from them.”
“It’s okay,” I tell her quietly, still sitting directly beside her. “I know that it hurts, Cartier. I can’t even imagine.”
She nods her head, taking a deep breath before she starts again. “Things between my parents got rocky. They started to fight a lot. At first, they kept it behind closed doors so we didn’t know what was going on. Until that night. The night that everything fucking fell apart.”
“My dad came home from work. My mom already had dinner made and we were sitting at the table waiting for him. He came and sat down at his seat at the table and started talking some crazy shit that wasn’t really making sense. Talking about how corrupt the world was and how there has to be something more. I had overheard my parents talking before about my father’s depression, but we never saw how he dealt with it.”
I swallow hard, my jaw clenching as I wait for her to spill everything that she’s been holding in. She refers to that night as the massacre. My heart hurts for her from where this story is going and for how I envision it ending.
“He became erratic throughout the evening. He was unhinged and his talking became even more troublesome, talking about ending it all.” She pauses, taking another ragged breath. “I could tell that my mom was getting worried, so she sent us all to bed early, making sure that we were safely tucked away in our beds for the night.
“It didn’t matter though. Even though we were tucked away in our beds, we were far from fucking safe.”
I reach over, grabbing her hand from her lap and squeeze lightly, letting her know that I’m here. Jesus Christ, I am fucking here for her more than I ever had been and regretting not realizing how deep her trauma runs.
“I heard the first gunshot. It woke me from my sleep, so I didn’t get out of bed right away because I didn’t know what the fuck was going on. Two more shots rang out through the house not long after the first. That’s when I knew that something wasn’t right. I crept out of bed and slowly opened my door. I should have fucking gone out there, but when I saw my dad walking across the hall into Damon’s room with a gun, I climbed back into my bed like a fucking coward.”
My heart breaks for her. I literally have no words that will come close to touching the pain that she’s feeling right now. Instead, I squeeze her hand again, silently letting her know that it’s okay, even though it will never truly be okay.
“Another shot rang out through the house before I heard his footsteps coming down the hall. I knew that it was the moment that I was going to die. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t stop the tears from fucking falling down my face. I was paralyzed in my bed, knowing he was coming for me next. My blanket was pulled up over my head when he came into my room. He didn’t have a clear shot but he fired blindly at my bed. I guess figuring he would kill me regardless. He was fucking wrong.”
Cartier pauses, wiping the tears from her face. “He shot me in the stomach, somehow missing any vital organs. Initially, I passed out from the shock that it sent my body into. When I came to, I rolled out of my bed, landing on the floor next to his dead body. His eyes were still open, his brains splattered across my bedroom floor and on the wall.”
I close my eyes, feeling her pain. “I know it doesn’t mean anything, but I’m so fucking sorry.”
“He killed them all before killing himself. After everything, sometimes I wish he would have killed me too that night.”
“I can’t even imagine going through that, but you’re here for a reason, Cartier. And I’m glad that he didn’t take your life that night too.”
She turns her head to look at me, her crystal blue eyes bloodshot from the tears. “What the fuck’s the reason though? Look at me, I’m a fucking mess.”
“I don’t know, but that’s what we’re going to figure out.” I wrap my arms around her, pulling her in for a hug. “There’s a reason we’re all here. It’s just up to us to figure it out. This is your chance to finally do that.”
“I fucking hope so,” she mumbles, clinging to me as she sniffles. Abruptly, she lets me go, sitting back. “Okay, you’re gonna suffocate me. Enough of this mushy shit.”
I stare at her, searching her bright blue eyes. “I’m proud of you for finally talking about it. I won’t bother asking you if you feel any better or if you’re okay.”
Cartier smiles and shrugs. “I’m not, but I will be, right?”
