Page 68

I tell myself I’m going to be strong but of course I fail miserably. All three of them are leaving.

It made sense for them to hire a van and have someone take all of their stuff together, and for Axel’s father to drive them up to campus but I still wasn’t quite prepared to say goodbye to all three of them at once.

Especially with them leaving so soon. School doesn’t start for them for another three weeks at least, but they’re still going up there early, abandoning me sooner than they need to.

It isn’t fair. If they keep saying that they don’t want to leave me, why are they going prematurely?

We’re standing on my driveway, Axel’s dad waiting impatiently for us to say our farewells, and I can’t stop sobbing. I wish my mum were here but she’s working, so in a few minutes I’ll truly be alone.

“It’s only for a couple of years,” Axel says coldly. It makes me cry even harder. “C’mon don’t spoil my birthday, Peony.”

He alienated every friend and boyfriend I tried to have. Made me solely dependent on them. And now he’s leaving and I have no one. Worst of all, he doesn’t seem to have a shred of remorse about it and he thinks I’m ruining his day.

“Fuck you, Axel Abbott,” I hiss as Zie pulls me into a hug. I feel like discarded rubbish. I can’t believe the boy standing before me right now, speaking so carelessly to me, is the same guy who kissed me like I was the air he needed to breathe.

And now I want to kiss Zie goodbye but things are still weird between us. Are we together or not? Plus the others still don’t know and I’m not sure how they’d take it, or what Axel would say. What if they figure out I’ve been kissing all of them?

“We have to go, Peony,” Kaiden says softly, pulling me from Zie’s arms and into his own enormous bear hug. I cling to him. We’ve been so close since he…well, since the event. We share secrets that the others don’t know about. He’s become my biggest protector, and I’m not ready to lose him.

They let me go and race towards Mr Abbott’s car like they can’t wait to be rid of me and off on their new adventure. Their exciting new life. Axel gets into the front next to his dad, and Kaiden and Zie climb into the back. The back door is just about to slam close when a hand reaches out and stops it, and Zie reappears.

He rushes over to me and sweeps me into his arms once more, crushing my lips in a bruising, passionate kiss. I hold on for dear life, terrified of what will happen next. Too scared to enjoy what might be my last ever kiss from Zie.

All too soon he pulls away and jogs back to the car. Axel has exited the vehicle and is standing with his arms crossed, his face like thunder. Kaiden has rolled the window down and is staring at us, slack jawed.

“What the fuck was all that about?” Axel demands.

“What? She’s sixteen. I couldn’t let her go unkissed any longer, it’s fucking pathetic!”

They all laugh, unkindly, and climb back into the car. And then they’re gone, without so much as a backward glance.

Shame heats me and keeps me frozen to the spot. I’m embarrassed to admit I stand there way too long. Hoping for…what? Their return? A miracle?

At the very least a message from Zie apologising for having to be so cruel to keep up the ruse of our ‘friendship’.

But I get nothing.

Even after I go inside and watch a film, even after I take a long bath and go to bed, even after I wake the next morning to an empty, lonely house…I don’t hear from him.

From any of them.