Page 18 of Endless Anger (Monsters Within #1)

ASHER

TWENTY YEARS OLD

Lucy doesn’t unblock me. I’m not surprised.

Another year passes in which I don’t speak to her on her birthday. She doesn’t reach out, and no one says she’s missing me.

Noelle doesn’t try to mend things for me anymore, preoccupied with her own bullshit, and our parents seem to have accepted the rift. They lament in private, if at all.

Quincy finishes grad school and gets a job at the Aplana Island city archives with Alistair’s assistance. She seems restless and bothered, just like Noelle, but nobody questions it.

I go on with my life. Sort of.

Foxe says I’m becoming unhinged—barely sleeping, spending all my time drawing the same things over and over, holing up in whatever hotel room we’re staying in at the moment. Rich coming from him, but I never say that.

I can’t help feeling like I fucked up majorly with Lucy, and now I’m not sure how to fix it. I can’t extract her from the school, can’t convince her to transfer without any reason, and she probably wouldn’t believe me now anyway.

Dad says I should tell her what happened, but I can’t fucking make myself do it. Every time I contemplate driving up there and spilling my guts, I break out in hives like a goddamn pussy.

I don’t want her to look at me differently. In fact, I just want her to look at me the way she used to.

Or look at me at all.