Page 57 of Make Me Bleed

“Shut up, Abel,” Peris says, and I snap my mouth closed, pinching my lips together.

“I’m just worried because?—”

“I don’t need you to be. I know what I’m doing,” Peris cuts him off quickly, and my curiosity peaks. Why is Gabe worried? It seems like there’s something specific he’s got to be worried about, but Peris won’t ever tell me.

“What are you two talking about?”

“None of your business,” they both say at the same time, and I nod my concession.

“Fair enough,” I mutter as I cross my arms over my chest, goosebumps break out over my skin, and I shiver. They’re painful, to the point of pricking my skin the longer they stay, and I shift on my feet as Gabe and Peris continue to stare at each other in the shadow-lit hallway.

“Okay, are you guys gonna kiss now, or what?” I ask, because the air is charged with their tension, and that’s probably what’s causing my goosebumps.

Gabe snorts loudly, and it snaps, just like that. Peris pulls back, almost imperceptibly into me, and I brush my knuckles along the ridges of his spine.

He glances back, catches my eyes for the briefest of moments, and I seeeverything.And ithurts.His eyes are haunted, bloodshot and dry, pulled into a grimace of pain. Pain I caused him. Because I left him.

But I don’t think he understands I didn’t have a choice.

I never have.

But before I can say anything, Peris shutters his expression back into a blank mask, and I feel the loss achingly deep.

I miss him in a way I never thought I could.

“Go back to bed, Gabe,” Peris says, pulling me from my musings, and I blink up at him, taking in the way the muscles are bunched in his neck and shoulders.

“As long as you promise we’ll talk about this later.”

“Yeah, sure. Whatever.” And with that, Peris turns around and right into me. I grunt at the impact as I stumble backward. He reaches out and catches me before I can sprawl across the floor. My chest is heaving at the unexpected impact. His arm is steel around my waist, and I breathe in his smokey scent as I’m hauled against his chest.

He dips his head down and brushes his lips across my forehead, almost thoughtlessly, as he says, “Let’s get you to bed. You look like shit.”

I snort loudly, right in his face. “Thanks.”

He pulls back, but he’s smiling, andit’s beautiful.“You’re welcome.”

When he opens the door to his room, I’m not surprised to find that it’s a bit of a mess, similar to how it always was back home…fuck.

Home.

Haven’t thought about that in a while.

Still hurts like a bitch.

I rub against the ache in my chest with the heel of my palm.

“What are you doing?” Peris asks from where he’s dropped down onto his bed to pull his shoes off. I look down at my hand, back up at his face, then drop my arm.

“Nothing.”

His eyes narrow. “Don’t fucking lie to me.”

“I’ll do whatever I want, thank you,” I tell him easily, and only slur my words slightly, so I’m pretty proud of that.

He scoffs loudly, then tosses his head back with a bark of a laugh. “No shit.”

Defensiveness crawls along my skin, and I cross my arms over my chest from where I stand in the middle of his room. His bed is in the center, against the wall, with a stand and a dresser on one side and a desk on the other with the pinkish-red glow of his alarm clock coming from his nightstand. Simple.