Page 64

Calling Marcus means I have to tell him about my past. He’ll want nothing to do with me. It’s too much. I can’t… I can’t risk it.
Wiping a tear from my cheek, I scroll back to the top and see Angela’s name. I glance at the time. 1:25 AM.
Please be awake, I pray as I tap my best friend’s name.
The phone rings twice, then the sound of a click on the other end.
“Lila?” Angela’s voice is sleepy, but she’s there.Thank God.“Everything okay, babe?”
Tears fall freely from my eyes as I drop down to sit on the bed. “No,” I sputter between sobs. “Can you… come over?” I gasp for air, my lungs threatening to close in on me.
“Yea, yea, of course,” she says, suddenly sounding a lot more awake. “Are you home?”
I nod for a moment before finding the strength to whisper, “Yes.”
“I’m on my way!”
I keep nodding, the full force of every emotion of the past several days pouring out of me, large teardrops landing on the soft fabric of Marcus’s sweatpants.
“Thank you,” I whimper before dropping the phone in my lap and collapsing down onto the mattress.
***
Several minutes later, I’ve managed to pull back my torrent of tears and make my way back to the living room, where I’m pacing anxiously by the door, biting my nails. One nail is already bleeding, and another is chipped threateningly close to the nailbed.
A sudden urgent knock on the door makes me nearly jump out of my skin.
“Lila! It’s Angela! Open up!”
I throw the bolt open and unlock the door, throwing my arms around her as I break down all over again.
Angela strokes my hair and leads me over to the couch, a warm comforting arm wrapped around my shoulder.
Once I’ve calmed down enough to be able to speak, I tell her everything. About bumping into Marcus at lunch on Monday, about the date tonight, what we had witnessed, and then the visit from Chris.
Angela’s face is stunned in a frozen expression of horror.
She hasn’t said a word the entire time I’ve been talking.
“Holy. Fucking. Shit,” she says slowly.
“I know.”
We sit in silence for a long moment.
“What are you going to do?”
I shake my head. “I don’t know. I should tell him, right?”
“Yea. But… what if he tells the cops?”
I drop my head in my hands. “I don’t know, Ange. I’m so fucking scared.”
She stands up and walks over to the small kitchen area, separated from the living room space by a waist-high countertop. She fills the kettle and prepares two mugs of tea, the bubbling of the water and the clink of the spoon against the porcelain the only sounds that fill the silence.
“I can’t believe you didn’t tell me about Marcus all fucking week!” she finally says, carrying two mugs of tea back into the living room and setting them down in front of us.
I laugh, thankful for the way it helps me let go of my fear, if only for a moment.