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“I can’t do this anymore, Val. I’ve tried to be there for you, tried to give you what you need, but it’s slowly eating me alive.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Jesus, Val! Can’t you see? This,” he points at the rest of us, “isn’t normal. We aren’t normal, and what we are doing sure as shit isn’t normal.”
“And since when have you been concerned about what’s normal?” Logan curses back at him. “Stop being a prick and keep your mouth shut.”
“No,” Carter suddenly adds in from behind me, breaking the uneasy silence in the room. “Let Quaid say his piece.”
“Carter,” Logan starts to hiss, running his fingers frustratingly through his blond hair. “Don’t you start this shit now, too.”
The whistle of the kettle begins to blow, and I walk over to it to turn the burner off, since Carter and Logan have decided to have a staring contest. Once that is dealt with, I turn around and face the bitter resentment on all of their faces.
“Will someone please tell me what’s going on?”
“Should I tell her, or do you want to do the honors?” Carter clips back at Logan.
An eerie pregnant pause ensues as they stare daggers at each other.
“What happened this weekend was a mistake,” Quaid announces suddenly, his low mumbled words slicing through the silence.
“W-What?” I stutter, needing to hold on to a kitchen chair to keep my balance.
“Jesus, Quaid! Just shut the fuck up and let me talk to her!” Logan castigates, fury in his eyes. He then turns to face me from across the kitchen table, trying hard to hide the bubbling rage inside him, but it’s no use. It’s such a living breathing thing, that I can almost taste its acid bile on the tip of my tongue. “When you left this morning, we got to talking. We haven’t exactly had a moment to be alone with each other all weekend, so when you left to see your mother, we finally laid out what we were all thinking. Feeling.”
“What do you mean?”
The light in Logan’s blue eyes dim, right before he bows his head away from me.
“Have a seat, Valentina,” Carter orders.
“No, I’m fine right here,” I reply defiantly.
“Suit yourself,” he retorts, grabbing a chair and sitting down, his long legs stretched out to the other chair at his side.
He puts his hands behind his head and looks over at Quaid, since Logan seems to be struggling to continue.
“You started this, now you finish it,” he announces cryptically.
There is a sinister smile on Quaid’s face, one I have only seen him use on the football field. It’s the same glower he uses against his adversaries to get them to falter. Why he’s using it now against his best friends—his family—is beyond me, and frankly, just as unsettling as this whole conversation.
“Val, it’s time,” he deadpans.
“Time for what?”
“To choose. You have to choose, Valentina,” Carter adds, his eyes still locked with Quaid’s.
“Where is this coming from?” My heart leaps up to my throat at what they are suggesting.
“Don’t act like this is something you weren’t expecting to happen. Sooner or later, we would all end up here. Whether you want it or not,” Carter snaps cruelly.
“Enough! This is not the time for this shit. We shouldn’t even be having this conversation. Not now.”
“Then when, Logan?!” Carter exclaims, slamming his fists on my kitchen table, making the wooden legs scrape on the tile floor.
“Carter’s right. It’s now or never,” Quaid defends.
Logan sends them both such a hateful stare, I cringe inside.
