Gym Junkie

“How was your trip?” I ask.

Meredith shrugs. “My gran’s dead. Buried in the ground, worms in her head.”

I frown. Gross, for fuck’s sake.

“It’s all natural,” she assures me. “Everything dies.”

“Oh, I see,” I murmur as I lick my own ice-cream.

Hmm.

“Have you seen your friends lately?” I ask.

She frowns. “Tully is away with Simon.” She licks her ice-cream again. “But she doesn’t want to have a threesome with you and Simon.”

My head just about explodes. “Why the fuck would you say that?”

She rolls her eyes. “Duh. I asked Tully.”

I bite into my ice-cream cone, and it crunches between my furious teeth. “Whatever,” I snap angrily. “What about Wendy Woo?”

Meredith’s face falls. “You know Wendy?” she asks, as if surprised.

“Yes, I know Wendy. She’s my friend,” I reply casually.

“She came to Queensland with my mother and me.”

What?

“Oh, yeah, I know.” I act as if I already know. “She had to get out of here before they found her,” I tell Meredith.

Meredith nods as she licks her ice-cream. “Because they killed her friend. Now they want to kill her.”

I watch her sharply. Fuck, don’t blow this now, Brock.

“Because she did that thing, didn’t she?” I say as I try to act as casual as casual.

“Yeah, she hid it now but...”

“That’s right,” I reply. “How many were there?” Fuck, I have no idea what I’m asking about here but hopefully she’s falling for this act I’m putting on.

“Memory sticks are easy to hide.”

I stare at her as my mind races. Memory stick. Memory stick. What the fuck is on a memory stick? Hmm. I’m just going to throw something random out there.

“Her friend who knows computers did that for her, didn’t he?”

She nods. “But he’s dead now. In the ground, worms in his head.”

Fuck, did Chancellor make the memory stick? Was he trying to help Wendy Woo?

“What happened to Peachy Sue, Meredith?” I ask.

Her eyes snap to mine. “I didn’t see anything,” she blurts out in a rush.

“I know you didn’t,” I reply calmly.

She begins to shake her head. “Act calm and nothing happens to you,” she says.

I frown as I watch her. “Who told you to act calm?”

She stands suddenly. “We need to go home now.”

“Why?”

“I’m tired, very tired. I need to go to bed.” She begins to get agitated.

“It’s okay,” I tell her as I stand, too. “We can go home now.”

She puts her head down and rushes to my car. She’s fidgeting with her hands in front of her, clearly rattled as soon as I mentioned Peachy Sue. Fuck, I need to get more information from her. She knows what happened to Sue, I’ll bet my life on it.

We drive back to her apartment as I try to think of a plan. I can’t ask her outright or she freaks out. The only way I am going to get more information from her is if I spend more time with her.

Fuck’s sake.

We pull up outside her apartment. “Do you want to have ice-cream tomorrow?” I ask.

She thinks for a moment. “Can’t we go dancing instead?”

I wince. “Sure.” I fake a smile. “I might get the guys to come, too. Is that all right?”

She smiles broadly. “Can Callie come, too?”

Fuck, it gets worse. I don’t want to hang out with Tully’s friends like a fucking loser.

“No, Callie can’t come.”

Her face falls. “Oh, okay then.”

“I’ll call you?”

“Do you have my phone number?” She frowns.

“Actually, no. What is it?” I already have all of her details, but I can’t tell her that.

Tully

I lie on the small sofa in Simon’s hospital room. It’s been three weeks since I lost my love. Twenty-one days since Brock left, and I haven’t heard from his since. I know I won’t. He’s too proud to ever contact me or take me back.

Every night I cry myself to sleep. Every day I just about make it through without falling apart. Why did this happen? Why did it have to be Simon? Why do bad things happen to good people? Simon didn’t deserve this sickness.

Brock didn’t deserve this.

I’m a bad person. No matter what I was going to do, someone was going to be hurt. It couldn’t be the man who is already sick.

I just want to know if Brock’s okay. I can’t bear the thought that I’ve hurt him. I called Callie and Meredith, as they’ve both seen him when he interviewed them over Peachy Sue’s death. They said he’s normal, that he seems fine.

I, however, am not.

I feel like I’m being punished for leaving Simon. It’s as if God wants me to know how much a broken heart hurts.

A punishment for my crime.

I’m carrying on as normal on the outside, but inside I’m dying a little every day without Brock in my life. I’m suffocating in grief. I don’t feel like a whole person anymore. It’s like the shell of me is here with Simon… but my heart left with Brock. Now it’s smashed into pieces and buried in the depths of Hell.