Twenty-Two
Skye
Present
The room is heavy with silence.
I’m back at the door, pretending to know what the fuck I’m doing.
My stomach keeps grumbling, reminding me that I’m starving, but being terrified is the perfect appetite suppressant. I don’t speak for a long time, still shaken up by that screaming man who must have come out of a room nearby.
Another prisoner then.
There are more people here.
I wonder if I should shout and see if any poor soul will answer back. But I don’t because that’s a stupid thing to do, and I’m terrified.
I really need to talk.
I need to comfort these girls because Britney is still losing her shit, and Fay is detaching the way I did a long time ago.
I’m good at this, though. I comforted my two guys for years, and they went through some mad shit. This should be a walk in the fucking park.
I talk and tell them about what happened at the fish and chip shop that day.
Sighing, I say, “There was a lot of bloodshed after that shooting.”
Fay clears her throat, her voice flat when she asks, “Did you know that it was Leo’s dad that orchestrated it?”
“Sort of,” I admit on a fake laugh. “I don’t really know. It was so long ago, and I was pretty thick.”
She lets out a fake laugh, too. “I’ll say.”
“We’re going to die,” Britney whispers.
I ignore her. Plodding along with my story as a way to distract her from those morbid—possibly accurate—thoughts. “Kurt blamed Hunter.”
“Did he?” Fay asks, also ignoring Britney. “But you were with Leo.”
I shrug. “When he showed up at the scene, I was in Hunter’s arms, and Leo was sort of on his own. He blamed Hunter right then and there.”
“That’s fucked up.”
“It got tense between Kurt and me. I think…it sort of ruined our relationship. He was just so fixated on hating Hunter—”
“Buying into everyone’s stereotype of him.”
“Yeah, he thought Hunt was a violent thug.”
“Wasn’t he, though?”
I shake my head. “No.”
While Shane had showed up to be at Leo’s side, standing next to him like some unnerving guard as he spoke to the police, it was Hunter that wound up calling Kurt for me.
“What was it like when you were under the table?” Fay asks. “Did you think you were going to die?”
I think for a moment, trying to remember what went through my head. I shut my eyes, and I can almost feel Leo’s warmth as he wrapped his arms around me, shielding me from harm. “No,” I reply. “I didn’t think I was going to die because…I don’t know…I trusted that Leo would protect me, that he’d find a way out of it.”