Year Four/Week Seventeen – Present
I hadn’t heard from Blu since Winter’s Lodge.
After Bryce talked to Fawn, she said it would be in my best interest to leave the following morning. Her and Blu got a ride back somehow. I didn’t know how. I couldn’t ask.
She was safe, Bryce told me. She was doing better since that night. That’s all that mattered.
Christmas came and went, the first snowfall and the tiresome nights.
Nothing could shake me from the guilt, the utter torment I’d felt day-in, day-out since Blu opened up to me.
There were scars beneath those tattoos that I could’ve asked about, could’ve cared for.
There were questions I wanted to know about her father, about her mother, about her childhood.
There were things I should’ve done.
Things I didn’t do.
Baxter bought me a camera, hoping I’d leap on to his photography business and rethink modelling.
I didn’t touch it.
Will bought me a new cologne, Dior Sauvage, and instructed me to wear it on dates.
I never went on one.
And Scott, he asked me to stay the weekend at his place while Sab was visiting her parents in Florida. He was the only brother who saw that I needed someone.
That was the only Christmas gift I appreciated.
We were on his couch watching some stupid horror movie when he asked, “School start back up next week?”
I simply nodded, staring at the mediocre gore FX.
“Excited to be done? It’s your last semester of university ever.”
Yeah.
And then what?
What would I do with my life?
Who would I amount to?
I’d hurt enough people, been wrecked and scrambled. I wasn’t good enough for the only dream I’d ever chased, I wasn’t good enough to be sought after and I couldn’t even help my damn friend – Couldn’t even text her because I’d been a fucking coward and a self-invested prick.
I only lost.
With all the trouble I’d put myself through…
I only lost.
“Jace?” Scott’s voice was concerned. I didn’t deserve it.
“Sorry,” was all I could muster up.
Sorry.
The words that rang through my head on a constant loop.
Blu was sorry that she opened up to me, sorry that she burdened me, when all I could see when I looked into those brown eyes was a girl who wanted to be loved.
I couldn’t love her.
I didn’t know how to love myself.
“She’s better off,” I said aloud. I needed to. Even if Scott had no idea what the fuck I was talking about.
But he did, and more surprising he asked, “What happened at Winter’s Lodge?”
My walls were down; I felt no need to lie to him. “I asked her to open up and had no idea how to handle it when she did.”
Scott didn’t know the her I was referring to, didn’t know her name, knew nothing. But even still, he tried and said, “Do you want to talk about it?”
I did.
I really fucking did.
And so I spent the next thirty minutes detailing the events that transpired that night, minus a few intimate details that required no spotlight.
He stared at me for a long while, as if assessing me. Then finally, he let out, “You care about her but you don’t know how to.”
I nodded, swallowing the defeat. “I thought I had everything under control. I thought,” Goddamn fucking idiot, “I thought that if I held her or kissed her she’d be okay. And she just broke even more and I didn’t want her to latch on to me when I knew I couldn’t –”
I stopped to take a breath, burying my face in my palms. “When I couldn’t be what she needed.”
Maybe what she wanted.
Not what she deserved.
“Jace, if you’re this confused, take yourself out of the equation. Quit going back, hurting this poor girl and fucking up again.”
“You’re saying I fucked up.”
His jaw hardened. “You said it yourself.”
I couldn’t even be offended that someone recognized the fault. Honestly, what was I expecting? That Scott would side with me when I didn’t even side with my own actions?
I was in the wrong.
Jace, my brain hammered, You’re in the wrong.
But that singular thought, the idea of me not speaking to Blu anymore, avoiding her because I wasn’t right for her… It pained me.
Somehow, I got used to her company, used to her pursuits. I wanted her around. I craved that attention. It made me feel worth it, desired –
Lovable.
Mel’s words banged against my skull. “You two seem so similar but don’t want to admit it. That maybe, you both orbit around each other – a hue of something.”
Was that possible? Could she be a hue of me? Was I a hue of Blu?
Did we compliment each other? Or tear each other apart?
The latter. It had to be the latter.
And yet, I couldn’t let it go. I couldn’t let her go.
“You’ve known this girl how long?” Scott asked.
“About four months.” Felt like eternity and seconds all at once.
“That’s not a long time, Jace.” He leaned back, analyzing me with a narrow stare. “Have I ever told you about Delilah?”
I furrowed my brows, shaking my head. There was a lot I didn’t know about my brothers, a lot they hadn’t told me.
Probably because I was too young and naïve; a product of Will’s beliefs.
“Delilah and I met when I was around your age. I was walking downtown after a night out and we crossed paths,” he let out a laugh, “man, I thought she was the most gorgeous thing I’d ever seen.
“We instantly clicked, texted every single day, hung out constantly. It’s like we existed because of each other, you know? That type of connection. And as the days progressed, I realized we’d only known each other for two months before I felt this urge to make her my fucking wife.”
I opened my mouth to interject but he cut me off.
“What I’m saying is, Jace sometimes you meet someone and you don’t understand the tie you two have. Sometimes you fall for the wrong reasons and sometimes the right ones. In this case, I think you saw a girl who needed saving… And you wanted to fix her broken heart so you didn’t need to mend your own.
“I can’t speak for her, but you’re my brother. And if you want to know the truth, I think you guys have passion but not stability. And that passion always dies out as quickly as it comes in.”
I eyed Scott for a long while, as if staring at his face was the only thing that kept me centred and alive.
He was right. Everything he said was right.
When I met Blu at the beginning of term, I didn’t know how to feel. And now, months later, I remained stuck in the same position.
The only thing I was sure of was that I was wrong. That I had hurt her. That I had acted on a prior instinct to win and receive over being a decent human being. If I didn’t let go of her, if I didn’t sever this connection between us, what would become of her? What would become of me?
Karma was a mirror, not a bitch. It reflected the mistakes within me, the mistakes I draped over Blu. I’d led her to believe there was something.
I fucking kissed her.
Why had I kissed her?
Because I was fucking horny.
I was fucking horny and she looked fantastic and the primal part of me wanted to shove it in that bastard Derek’s face before he could be inches from hers.
I hated the thought of it, I couldn’t stomach it. I hated what had happened to her in the past, and hated that I was too fucked up to be the one to heal her.
She deserved something good, someone good, and I couldn’t be that. I couldn’t.
But the way she made me feel… The way she lifted me up, showered me in the attention Riley hadn’t, Morris, or Danny or Connor. My own brothers made me feel pathetic.
My own fucking brothers.
Blu, she was the only one who saw me. Who saw me and cared. I couldn’t give that up. She mattered too much. Her presence, anyway.
“What are you thinking about?” Scott asked.
I lifted my chin. “That I’m going to right a wrong.”
He tapped my shoulder and resumed the movie, blissfully unaware of the fact I lied to his face.
I lied to my brother, who for the first time, tried to be there for me.
That was all I ever wanted for years, and I lied to him.
Because Karma would come after me, that much I knew –
Whether I let her go of her or not, she’d always be my Blu.
