Page 34 of Vying Girls (Girls of Hazelhurst #2)

‘Anyway, it wasn’t so bad all the time. They were out most nights and slept it off during the day.

I was basically a housecat. I went out for school but that was it.

They’d barely let me in the garden. Think they were embarrassed or ashamed or something.

Like I was evidence of their fuck up, like they weren’t as fancy-free anymore.

The neighbours used to make jokes. About me joining the parties when I was older. ’

I hear Tilda gasp, but I don’t take my eyes off the pole, the mottled metal blurring in my vision.

‘Good job they fucking conked before then, hey? The night it happened, it was my dad’s birthday.

They’d arranged some massive do with the neighbours over the road, the only thing they’d talked about all week.

It was around one in the morning when the pain started.

’ I put a hand on the side of my stomach, still able to recall the agony.

‘Didn’t know what it was. Thought maybe periods, you know?

I hadn’t started yet. But it only got worse.

Like, so much fucking worse. I never once bothered them, not for anything, but I was panicking so fucking bad that night.

I rang them a billion time but they never picked up.

In the end, I had to go find them.’ I grin, remembering the venom in their eyes as I staggered into the party, clothes and body parts and drugs everywhere.

‘They were pissed. But I was crying and whining on and they finally left and took me back to the house.

‘I think my mum started to get a bit worried when I started screaming. Dunno, maybe the pain was that bad or I was just getting them to take it seriously. They called an ambulance anyway, but they said it would take around an hour to get there because of how far out we are and the weather. They thought they could get there quicker despite how fucked they were. I didn’t care; I just wanted the pain to stop.

So they threw me in the car and throttled it down here.

Wasn’t icy on the estate but it was here. ’

I toe my shoe into the ground, remembering the sensation of the car slipping as my father steered it.

‘My dad was speeding. My mum kept looking back at me and saying shit in this weird hysterical voice. Like she cared. I was just lying there feeling like I was going to be sick or explode or something. Then they turned along this bit.’ I toss a hand at the road.

‘I don’t know how they were going that fast, but they were, and the car slipped and slammed into the pole and then’—I laugh again, the flames dancing before my eyes—‘the whole thing just fucking lit up. In seconds, just fuck, flames everywhere. I remember there was silence and then screaming and then just this fucking roaring. The fire, I think. I don’t even remember it being hot.

I just remember passing out and waking up in a hospital with no appendix and no parents.

And get this, Tilda.’ I lean in her face, grinning when she flinches.

‘No burns. Nothing. Not even a fucking scratch.’ I fling up a hand.

‘How can that be, man? The fire was in the car, it killed them, the car was burnt to a fucking crisp, just completely devoured. But for me, nada.’

Tilda clears her throat. ‘How did you get to the hospital?’

‘That’s just it, how did I? No ambulance was called in the end, barely anyone used to come down this road, especially not at two in the fucking morning.

’ I turn to Tilda, grabbing her to me roughly.

‘Do you know how? Because I do.’ I put my mouth to her ear, biting the lobe before whispering, ‘Because I’m the fucking antichrist, baby. ’

She disentangles from me. ‘You don’t believe that.’

‘Proof’s in the pudding, don’t you think? Whole life I was their black little miracle. In death too. Kinda poetic if you think about it.’ I grab her hips again. ‘You stick around me, Tilda, and I’ll be your black miracle too.’

‘You’re my miracle, Haz, but there’s nothing black about you. And your parents’ crash was not your fault. Them driving high was. Them neglecting you your whole life was.’

I don’t know what kind of expression I’ve got on my face, but I see Tilda swallow, eyes growing uneasy. I breathe against my anger, those words from her mouth subverting the narrative I’ve carried since birth.

‘Either way my brain’s fucked . All the drugs—she never stopped, you know, when she was pregnant.

Think she was hoping to smoke me out. How I didn’t come out with two heads is anyone’s fucking guess.

For eleven years, I was the curse in her life.

Both of theirs. She didn’t understand why I never fought back, why I was so fucking quiet and amenable.

She said I had no feelings, I was a demon.

And it’s fucking true, man. I can’t be loved, can’t feel love—’

‘Stop.’ Tilda releases a breath, getting right up in my space again. ‘You’re wrong. Oh my god, you are so wrong.’ She cups my cheeks with firm hands. ‘I care for you so much, you have no idea.’

‘Then you’re a fool.’

‘Yeah, but not when it comes to this. Not when it comes to you.’ She shakes her head.

‘I’ve known you less than a year and can give you ten million examples of how you’ve cared.

The first night we met, you saving me from Ryan, sticking up for me.

Letting me live with you when Portia House got too much.

Protecting me every chance you get. Giving me the option of fucking safe words!

’ She strokes my cheeks, voice gentling.

‘The fact you won’t sleep with me because you’re so scared of me leaving you.

Can you really say that’s the actions of someone who doesn’t have feelings? ’

The headlights have her rimmed in light like some fucking angel. My fingers still grip her, thumbs finding the skin between her jeans and top.

‘I’ll ruin you,’ I say sombrely. ‘Maybe not today, but someday. It’s just what happens, what I’ve done to every fucking girlfriend I’ve ever had.’

‘They just weren’t right for you. Maybe you really believe all that, and maybe it became a self-fulfilling prophecy, but that’s not going to happen anymore, and do you know why?

Because our souls are the same colour. They match, Haz.

I mean, shit, look at me. I’m hardly into that love and light bullshit.

My mind’s a dark fucking place. I doubt my lovability all the time.

I’ve seen evidence to the contrary too. Plenty of.

’ She gives a breathless chuckle. ‘Nic still dishes that out on the daily. We’re way more similar than you think, you’d soon see that if you gave this a chance.

And yeah, maybe it sounds toxic, two broken people coming together to make some kind of a whole or something, but everything about us is just right.

I know it is, even if you don’t just yet.

’ She smiles, giving my head a little shake. ‘You don’t scare me, Harriet.’

‘No? I should. I’m the fucking devil.’

‘No. You’re not. You’re just someone who needs lots and lots of love. And honestly, so am I, so maybe we can be that for each other. Undo my top.’

‘What?’

‘Just undo it.’

She curls her hands around the pole behind her, giving herself over to me. The buttons on her top are tiny. I fumble with them for a moment before yanking the fabric down with an impatient grunt. Tilda gasps.

I look at her for guidance.

She nods downwards. ‘Look at it. Take off the film.’

I get my blunt nail under a corner and pull it down. Then I stare, dumbly, unable to believe what I’m fucking seeing.

It’s my name on her tit. Big, block letters, a spindly serpent coiled around them, its tongue licking right where I want to put my own.

‘I’m not going anywhere, Haz. Not anywhere. Not unless you’re going too.’

I stare at the letters until they blur, the black soup in my mind clearing for just a second. Tilda’s chest rises and falls steadily, giving the snake the illusion of movement.

‘Show me,’ I rasp roughly, fingers tightening on her hips. ‘Show me how you love.’

‘No. You show me.’

I raise my eyes, spotting a goading, irresistible, wholly tender smirk in her own. In the next breath, I have her slammed against the sign pole, a palm cushioning her head from the cold metal, kissing her without mercy.

She whimpers against my lips, her breath stuttering with the force of me on her. I can’t ease up, don’t care if she can’t breathe. Because I can’t either. I bite her lips, my chest feeling hollow like there’s no air in there at all.

She puts her arms around me, but I seize her wrists, twining her fingers back around the pole. Her chest juts out with the position, my eyes drawn back to the bandage on her chest. I want to peel it back, trace the design with my tongue, my teeth, tasting the metallic tang of her maimed flesh.

Instead, I apply the same to her throat, the lobes of her ears, her collarbones. She’s slack against the pole, only her hips pushing forward. She wants me so fucking bad, her wordless begging making me feral.

Taking a step back, I undo my belt. She follows the movement with her eyes, a keenness wicking away the glaze in them.

I gather the leather so it forms a loop.

She thinks I’m going to hit her with it.

I toy with it, going along with the pretence until I’m too impatient.

Getting the belt around her and the pole, I tighten it until she grunts, threading the eyelet.

She’s trapped now. A witch at the stake, taking the punishment for my sins.

She looks up and down the road uneasily. Yeah, she’d be fucked if I left her here. Not sure what would be worse, someone finding her or someone never finding her.

Calmer now, I undo the button on her jeans, the zip lowering with a snick in the still air.

‘You’ve got to stop with the fucking skinny jeans,’ I grunt, struggling to pull them down.

‘They’re stretchy,’ she protests weakly.

‘They’re fucking vile.’

‘Elly never has a problem.’