Page 24 of Vying Girls (Girls of Hazelhurst #2)

I look out into the club. It’s a different vibe tonight with the band playing. There’s less frenetic dancing. It’s more uniformed, everyone facing forward and jumping in place. Nobody facing our way, even if they can’t see what we’re doing.

I can’t help scanning over everyone, seeking a face I’ve never even see.

‘Is this to be my lot then? Tethered to one of you three for eternity.’

‘You know, you’ve really got maudlin in your old age.’

I know that’s definitely the drugs talking, that teasing.

‘You should loosen up,’ she says into my ear. I hadn’t heard her creep up. I bunch my neck as it tingles.

‘Kinda hard to when I know someone’s after me.’

‘Don’t forget, it’s me he really wants. Always fucking me.’

She wanders to the cubbies at the back, sticking her hand into one and pulling out an obscenely large dildo.

‘That is literally rank,’ I say, stepping back.

She wafts it my way, a smile trying to emerge on her lips. ‘Clean. Dirty ones in there.’ She points to a bin in the corner.

I shake my head. ‘So unhygienic.’

‘I agree. That’s why I always bring my own. BYOD.’

She laughs at herself as I fight the vision of her fucking in this very room.

Has she done that? And with whom? Skylar?

I’ve not known her to be involved with anyone else.

If you can even call what she has with Skylar involved.

It’s definitely not a romantic arrangement, and it might be over by the looks of things.

Good. Skylar’s clearly a bad influence.

‘Can we go back out now?’

‘Not ready yet.’

She stands at the stone wall, pressing her fingers into the depressions. Whatever this drug is, it’s clearly an upper. She’s never this fidgety. I don’t like it. It’s like something else has taken possession of her, her soul drifting somewhere in the ether. It doesn’t make me feel safe.

‘Nic, can we just go home?’

‘Home? You and me?’ She turns to face me, eyes so fucking black. ‘You destroyed that, remember.’

‘How?’

‘With your fucking lies, Tilda.’

‘What lies?’

I’m not surprised when she doesn’t answer, instead coming to peer at the crowd with me.

She watches a girl dancing near to us, dressed in an embroidered bralette and a long skirt.

It’s not like she’s perving but there’s definitely something more in that look than simply a girl admiring another girl.

‘So, are you a lesbian?’

She swings her head to me, her expression saying everything.

‘I just…never saw it. Back then.’

Her eyes drift over my body, something so open in them it makes me hold my breath. ‘Neither did I.’

‘No, well, that was more recent.’ I draw in a breath, oddly flustered. ‘For me.’

She grunts, returning her gaze to the dance floor. ‘Picked a pair for it.’

‘The perfect pair.’

‘So perfect they ditched you an hour after I told them fucking not to.’

‘They were close. I was fine. Anyway, I don’t get why you’re trying to protect me if you hate me so much.’

‘You have no idea what he’s capable of.’ She lets her forehead rest on the glass, fogging it up. ‘I do.’

‘I’m not exactly a stranger to men like Damien, Nic.’

‘Don’t.’

‘Well, we might as well talk about it. I’m sick of this weirdness. How are we ever going to move past this if we don’t communicate?’

‘There is no moving past this. That much has become clear to me.’

She’s not talking about us anymore. I can tell by the way her face closes off.

‘Do you have any pictures of him? Just so I know what I’m dealing with.’

She doesn’t answer for a long time. It’s not like I expect her to have any on her phone or anything, but maybe a social media profile.

‘No,’ she finally says. ‘But I’ve got this if you really want to know what you’re dealing with.’

Standing before the table, she slowly starts unbuckling her belt.

Her eyes face the wall, like her hands are working outside of herself.

With her jeans loosened, she bends over, her top riding up to bare her lower back.

She pulls the waistband down, revealing a discolouration I can’t see clearly from here.

I drift over, startled she’d be so vulnerable. It’s just the drugs, I tell myself. She’s not herself right now.

She’s got her face buried in her arms, like she can’t bear to see me looking. The discolouration is a scar, a botched attempt at initials.

‘DV?’

‘Damien Vore.’

My hand reaches out, tracing the savagery with a featherlight touch. Nic doesn’t react. Not sure she can even feel it. She doesn’t need me to say how ironic those initials are.

‘He did this?’

It’s not a question that requires an answer. Only a monster would do this, and it’s clear that’s what this bastard is.

‘He doesn’t let go, Tilda. Not once he’s got you.’

Those words fucking break me. As soon as she straightens up, I throw my arms around her, as hard as I had on that godforsaken ledge. She acts like she can’t even feel me, rightening her jeans and buckling her belt.

All I can see is that out of place eight-year-old. Pudgy, long hair always in her face. Wary brown eyes. So young yet so mistrusting. I have no idea of her life before us. You don’t care as a kid. The past doesn’t exist, only the now. And the future we baked up in our minds.

I’m wondering about it now. I hope it was okay. Because apart from the two years we had, the rest of it’s been hell for her.

Fuck, she was just a kid.

Turning around, she gently pushes me away to retrieve her baggie.

‘No more, Nic.’

She tips it all out with shaking hands, flicking the bag for every last mote. She fiddles with a scrap of paper, clumsily fashioning it into another straw. Gritting my teeth, I storm over and whack it out of her hands, sending the blue shit sailing to the floor.

‘Fucking hell, Tilda,’ she hisses, dropping to the ground to gather it back up.

‘Why are you still doing that shit? Do you actually like it? I know it was Damien who got you hooked on it.’

She glares. ‘Stop saying that fucker’s name.’

Crouching down with her, I gentle my voice. ‘Nic, I’m serious. What about hockey? Varsity’s in a few months. Aren’t drugs what messed it up for you last time?’

She groans as she stands up, kicking the useless dirtied powder. ‘Well, if life would just give me a fucking break!’

‘Then let me help you! I’m on your side here. I’ve always been on your side. Since day one.’

Tipping her head back, she laughs. ‘That’s fucking rich. Can you say that again? That was funny.’

‘Nic.’ I shake my head. ‘Are we remembering things differently or something? We were best friends.’

‘I’m remembering things exactly how they were.’

‘Then I’m even more confused. I just don’t understand, how all that could have happened to you, with him, and yet—what?—you don’t believe what your dad did to me? Is that it? Is it some kind of cognitive dissonance thing? Did you ever get help for—?’

She gets in my face, all but spitting with rage. ‘Keep fucking talking, Tilda, I dare you.’

I tilt my head, barely blinking even with her mere millimetres away. A few weeks ago, this would have intimidated me, but it’s Nic, my Nicole, and there’s nothing about her that scares me.

‘Calm down, Nic, and just talk to me. Or let’s just go home. What are we even doing here? We never should have come out.’

‘I don’t want to talk to you, Tilda. I fucking can’t! I can’t even bear you being near me. Fuck!’

‘You’re the one who dragged me here!’

She just stares, eyes impossibly wide. She’s like an angry cat in a cage. Nowhere to run. Fear showing as fury.

‘Nic.’ I risk putting my hand on her arm. ‘It’s just me. You don’t need to keep running.’

She removes her arm, stepping to the back of the room and running agitated hands through her hair. ‘You don’t have a fucking clue.’

I close my eyes and breathe through my nose. ‘Maybe because you don’t talk to me. What the fuck, Nic? Of course I don’t have a clue. That’s why I’m begging you to talk to me! Do you blame me for it all or something? Do you think the reason your dad hanged himself was because I—?’

Nic growls, spinning around with an empty bottle in her hands. I duck when she throws it, but it’s not aimed at me. It hits the ceiling instead, the entirety of it shattering like a vicious hailstorm.

Crying out, I cover my head with my arms. Nic gasps, then her arms are around me, shielding me from the falling shards.

‘Don’t move. Don’t move.’

‘I can feel it all over me,’ I breathe.

‘I know. Don’t move.’

The sound of the band is crisper now. They don’t let up, even when there must be glass all over the dance floor. I hear people cheering obnoxiously. They’re probably all staring but I can’t tell with Nic wrapped around me. Every time I try raising my head, she pushes it back down.

‘It’s still falling.’

Eventually I hear the scuff of other footsteps. Nic releases me. Her bare skin glitters with both blood and glass. I’m sure mine does too, but I’m not feeling any pain.

A couple of very ticked-off workers are doing their best to brush all the glass to one side. They don’t reprimand us, barely even look. I’m sure they’re used to rich kids wrecking things down here.

‘We need to get this glass out of you.’ Nic runs regretful eyes over my wounds. Not just regretful, devastated.

I take her hand, leading her away from the mess. ‘You too.’

‘I’m sorry,’ she breathes shakily.

I squeeze her fingers. ‘You didn’t mean it.’

Despite a couple of irate messages from Haz, and a concerned one from Elly, they’re still out when we arrive back at the lodge.

In silence, we head to the bathroom, the walk back having dampened my adrenaline. I feel every tiny cut now, itching and biting in equal measure. There’s glass even in my hair. I shake it out, watching it skitter over the tiles.

Nic points to the bath. ‘Sit.’

‘I think we should do you first. You’ve got more—’

‘Sit the fuck down.’

I collapse onto the rim of the bath, uninterested in fighting. Nic shuffles around in her shoes, something she wouldn’t normally allow, and picks out some cotton pads, tweezers and antiseptic.