Page 32 of The Truths We Burn

I’d seen a lot of shit when I was stoned.

Sage Donahue walking out of a liquor store holding a bottle of strawberry-flavored vodka outside took the cake.

She had cleaned off her makeup in a gas station bathroom, the raccoon eyes far from sight, revealing every last one of her cinnamon-colored freckles. The glow from the artificial lights bounced off her skin.

This was an entirely new, Sage. One that, for as long as I’d lived in Ponderosa Springs, I had never seen before.

Pretty poison, Rook.

A creature made for deception. Made for killing.

Careful, I reminded myself.

The drive to her family’s lake house was quick considering she was in my ear, purring,Faster, faster, faster.

But the moments seemed to tick by because all I could focus on was the road and how she felt wrapped against me. Perched on the back of my bike, arms gripping me so tightly I could feel her nails digging into my hoodie. The tease of her force against my toned abdomen made my mouth water at the prospect of pain.

When we arrived, pulling into the gated drive of the lakefront home, I knew what was going to happen. There is a reason she brought me here. The question is, why this place? What does it mean to her?

Sage had hopped off the bike, asking me to get started, mentioning something about the bathroom before disappearing inside, leaving the door open for me to follow.

I move on autopilot. My actions are ones I’ve made many times before, the compulsion festering in my twitchy hands as I get to work. The steps are calculated; I’m a skilled surgeon at work when I unzip my bag and pull out the jug of gasoline, lighter fluid, and off-brand matches. Never my Lucky Stripes.

It’s a shame, really.The two-story mansion looks like a joy for a family vacation. All the expensive furniture, the dishware, the carefully placed photos, all are going up in smoke within the next half hour.

Burning down places with ghosts. With memories. Something with substance—those are all my Achilles’ heel,watching as all those suspended memories shoot up in a burst of orange haze, succumbing to nothing but ashes that would sink into the ground.

There’s no other way to rid yourself of the past like setting it on fire.

My phone vibrates in my hoodie pocket as I’m about to pour gasoline onto the kitchen floor.

Where are you?

It’s from Alistair. My first reaction is to say something funny, likegiving a rich girl the night of her life. But then I pause, my fingers hovering over the keyboard.

I’m assuming he’s had a shitty day at home and he’s in need of some therapy. Any other time I’d say yes, meet him in his basement where he works out, and let him pummel me into a pulp.

Most friends have things that bond them. Ours just happen to work differently than others.

Alistair needs to hurt something every once in a while, slam his fist into a body so that all the wrath can leave his for a split moment, craving vengeance for a family that always treated him as “the other.”

He needs that, and I need the pain.

That’s how we work. How we all connect to one another. We understand what the other needs, no matter how dark and tormented it may be. We’re willing to do anything for each other.

Instead of my initial answer, I shoot him back a text letting him know I’m out for a ride and won’t be back till later and that I’ll meet up with him tomorrow.

I’ve never lied to him, any of them, but this needs to be felt out before the boys know.

The truth is, I don’t trust this girl.

But I trusted the girl in front of me at the track. The one who looked broken and distraught. I trusted the girl on that stage, and until the only version of Sage Donahue I get is the real one, she’ll be my secret.

However, we aren’t starting out on the best foot, considering she’d told me she was headed to the bathroom and I’m watching her throw her shoes off in the yard as she makes her way down to the dock that juts into the water.

She’s already bending the truth she so desperately promised me.

I set the jug down on the counter, walking out of the glass sliding door to follow her. The bottle of opened vodka sits beside her on the edge of the wooden platform, her feet dangling off the edge. It’s dark, just the moon lighting the opaque lake that sits still and peaceful.