Victoriously Yours

My mind had now gone back to the roof, and the pain I had felt then was only amplified by the existing kind I felt now. “How could you record me... Us... and show the entire school?”

His shoulders sagged slightly at my question, and he turned away from me so I couldn’t see his face. Was he smirking? Laughing? Upset? Angry? I realized it didn’t even fucking matter. Eventually, he did turn to me. “I’m sorry. That tape was never meant to be seen like that.”

I let out another sarcastic laugh. “Oh, so it was an oopsie?” I wasn’t buying that at all. He looked remorseful enough, or at least as much as he was capable of looking, but I also knew what a great actor he was. He had played me like a fiddle by making me believe he was truly interested in me. It’d all been part of his game. He never liked me and only spent time with me because of a bet. I was never the prize, but simply some irrelevant pawn in the sick and twisted games he played with his friends. “You made me trust you only so you could turn around and betray me.”

“I’m sorrier than you will ever know for what I did to you all those years ago. I thought we had put that in the past a few days ago, but now I see we—”

“Put it in the past? After what I lost, you expect me to see your fucking dimples and offer forgiveness?” Growing more agitated, my underlying condition didn’t help. I was so fearful of the manic part of my bipolar disease, and that only stressed me out more. “I lost the love and respect of my parents and siblings... I was labeled crazy and sent to a psychiatric ward for over a year. Instead of walking down the aisle and accepting my diploma, I was being poked and prodded, and force-fed medicine. I—”

“I’m so sorry. It was never supposed to go that far. I was supposed to have just recorded the two of us and that was it. Fuck, none of it matters now. What’s done is done.”

“What’s done is done?” I asked in disbelief. “I spent months in hell, but we’re supposed to let bygones be bygones? Fuck you, Jonas Courtland.” My anger had truly reached its boiling point and I threw the phone which just narrowly missed his head.

I was looking for something else to throw when he grabbed me and my bag, then dragged me to the door. I spun on him in that moment, and smirked. “What’s ironic is that I was supposed to have been the one to have played you this time around. You might’ve succeeded in destroying me again, but you still lost because you didn’t know that there’d been another player all along.”

“You’re talking crazy,” he told me, then stopped when he realized what he said. I still grinned at him. He might think I was certifiable. In fact, I had earlier warned him of it, but he’d been played and had never even realized it.

“Am I?”

“What are you talking about. Who is this other player?” he asked, then shook his head. “On second thought, I don’t even want to know. Just leave and don’t come back here, Kenzie.”

“Leeann has been fucking Oliver all week so that he would give her the nod when it came to the contract. I desperately needed this, but even I wouldn’t sink that low. You’ve been played because you’ve already eaten out of her hand and she didn’t even have to fuck you to do it.”

With that, I turned and walked out of his room. My limbs were weak, and I was shaking like a leaf, but I did manage to make it to the elevator. Descending to my floor, my thoughts spiraled to my bestie. Reece. Fuck, I had not only ruined everything in New York for myself, but I had for her, too.

I dropped my head back and allowed what I knew would be the first of many tears to fall from my eyes. This contest had been my last resort here in the city, and I had no idea where I would go next, or even what I would do. The elevator stopped and as I went to step out, a wave of nausea washed over me, and I tumbled forward. My bag was still open so everything fell onto the carpet. I dropped to my knees and crawled around as I started to pick up the belongings from my bag. That was when I noticed the bottle of Lithium. I kept it out and scrambled back onto my feet. After staggering to my room, I got inside and managed to get my dosage down just as Reece walked into the room.