Page 105 of Fireworks

Raising his fist again I was able to avoid a full hit as his fist grazed my chin. Verbally defending myself was all I could do right now. I wasn’t going to hit him back.

“It just sort of happened. I didn’t mean for it to, I promise it wasn’t like what you’re thinking.”

His knuckles were white as his hands clenched into tighter fists, his arms shaking.

“Are you seriously going to sit there and try to justify fucking my sister?”

Katie pushed herself between us in an attempt to keep Asher from getting another punch in. Her hands were flat against his chest as she pushed him a foot back from me. I didn’t need her to defend me.

“Asher, I'm not a child anymore. Stop acting like I don’t know what the hell I’m doing with my life. I wanted to, he didn’t make me do anything. I didn’t tell you what I just said so you could punch him.”

His face contorted into disgust.

“Oh, that makes it so much fucking better Katie, that my little sisterwantedto fuck my best friend. You were a brother to me. Bro code man. She was off limits. I told you that asshole.”

Asher stomped toward the door before turning around one last time. His head hung down before he looked back at me. His eyes, full of deceit and anger.

“What the fuck? You’re dead to me Nate.”

I almost wished he had thrown another punch instead of storming out the front door. The sound of my blood pumping rapidly through my veins made it difficult to hear anything. Her voice was barely audible as she meekly spoke.

“He deserved to know.”

Turning to face her I couldn’t believe she would just come out and tell her brother like that.

I knew she was hurting, but this was beyond what I ever thought she could do. She knew that telling him would destroy our friendship. Take away the only brother and family I had. I had never yelled at her before, but my voice came out harsh and loud.

“Not like that he didn’t.”

Katie spent so much time with her nose in books she didn’t realize that you can’t just fast forward a few pages to get to the happy parts. Sometimes words can cause damage that is irreversible.

He certainly couldn’t mean it, that I was dead to him. I could fix this, I just needed to get away and think. There was no better place to clear my mind than a few thousand feet up. Everything would be fine right? Being up in the air I would be able to clear my head enough to think about how the hell I was going to fix this shit load of a mess I got myself into. Pushing past Katie I slammed the front door behind me. I couldn't even look at her right now. This was the most irresponsible thing she had ever done. Hopefully she had enough sense to not be there when I got back.

She wanted me to not talk to her again?

Dare accepted.