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I squeeze my eyes shut. “Stop saying that. Please just stop saying that. It is my fault. I shouldn’t have even applied for this fucking scholarship in the first place. I should have just sucked it up and taken a year off school.”

She grinds the car to a halt just in time to pull up behind a line of cars backed up at a red light. The brakes squeal, and my chest presses against my seatbelt as I’m jerked forward.

“You have to take a whole year off school if you don’t win?”

I don’t answer. I can’t even look at her. I’m sweating now, and I can taste bile in the back of my throat.

If we had time, I’d tell her to pull over so I can be sick.

“Kenzie, why didn’t you say that? I thought it was just another one of our dumb competitions with some money thrown into the mix. I don’t even care about it anymore. I’ll drop out. I—”

“No.”

The word explodes out of me like a missile, and I hunch my shoulders as I all but sneer at her.

Everything I’ve learned from Catherine springs to the front of my mind, everything she’s ever told me about ‘rising above’ and keeping the ‘unsightly’ parts of your life locked away. I’ve spent the past few weeks trying to ignore the instincts she’s drilled into me for years, but they ring out loud and undeniable now.

Control is the only thing that’s going to get me through this. Anything else is weakness.

“I’m not a charity case,” I say through my clenched jaw. “I didn’t say all that as a way to beg for help. I can handle my shit—or at least I could have, if I’d actually been there tonight like I should have been.”

“I never said you were a charity case,” she mutters.

I plow on like I haven’t heard her. Everything hurts, like a broken rib that makes every breath a pained gasp, and my brain and body are both telling me I need to defend myself. I can’t let anyone see me be weak.

I can’t give anyone a chance to hurt me more.

“I told you all that so you’ll know why I can’t do it anymore.”

We’re almost at my street now. My heart is clanging against my sternum, and Chris’s white face and closed eyes flicker in and out of my vision every time I blink.

“Do what?” Moira asks, her voice cracking.

“This.”

I don’t have to elaborate. The low moan she utters makes it clear she knows exactly what I meant by this.

She turns the car onto my street, pressing on the gas to get us up the small hill before my apartment complex comes into view. We enter the maze of parking lots, and I see it: the bright yellow ambulance idling in front of my building, its flashing red and blue lights painting the pavement in macabre disco hues.

I squeeze the edge of the seat to keep from gagging on the bile in my throat as my vision swims.

“I should have been there.” The words sound like they’re coming from someone else. I don’t even feel my lips move.

“Kenzie, please.” Moira’s voice is ragged as she brings the car to a stop a few feet away from the ambulance. “Let me help. I want to help you. Please, Kenzie. I...I...Please.”

I ignore her.

I ignore the beeping sound the car makes when I unclick my seat belt before she’s even shifted into park. I climb out of my seat and ignore the shouts of recognition from the building staff gathered outside.

I ignore the sound of Moira calling my name, again and again, as I slam the car door shut.

I ignore my own heart as it screams out in protest when I sprint away from her.

CHAPTER 19

MOIRA

I get one text from Kenzie.