She hasn’t called. She didn’t approach me the rest of the day.

She’s going to fuck him this weekend, and there’s nothing I can do about it.

I don’t know when it starts to rain, but in the half hour it takes me to leave St. Carmen, cross the tracks, and walk home, I’m drenched. My hair sticks to my face, and I trudge through puddles without the energy to avoid them. I step into my house, hearing the TV going and a radio blasting upstairs.

“Liv?” Iron hops off the barstool. “Jesus, why didn’t you call for a ride?”

Water spills down my legs and drips from my clothes. I walk for the stairs.

“Hey.” He hurries over and grabs my arm. “Christ, what happened?”

He looks down at me, but I can’t look up. “I’m fine.”

I can’t stop the tears welling, I only hope he can’t tell the difference with the rain on my face.

“That fucking bitch,” Dallas says, strolling over. “She break it off with you or you with her?”

I shake my head and climb up the stairs.

“Liv?” Iron calls.

But I keep walking.

“It’s dinnertime,” he says behind me. “Come and sit down. Please.”

I hear the worry in his voice, and it reminds me of Mom. How we would watch her avoid us and disappear into her room.

But I just want to be alone.

“Liv!” Iron shouts as I reach the top of the stairs.

“That’s what they do,” Dallas bites out. “Use and abuse until they’ve had their fill. I told you! We all told you!”

I push open my door and slam it shut, dropping my bag to the floor.

“Macon!” I hear Iron shout downstairs.

I slide down the wall, sitting on the floor of my dark room and lean back, my arm hanging over my bent knee.

I’m here. She’s somewhere on the other side of the tracks—shopping or doing homework with her friends or meeting him or…

If she wanted to be here, she’d be here. She doesn’t want to be here.

She doesn’t want me. She’s not thinking about me right now. She wants to be free of me.

Silent tears spill down my face, and I lean my head back, squeezing my fist as I hear paper crinkle.

I look at my hand, seeing a ball of paper inside that I didn’t realize I’d grabbed hold of from my school bag.

I open my fist, recognizing the lined paper and black handwriting. It’s her note. I don’t remember reaching into my school bag for it on the way home.

She wants to be free of me. Yesterday, she was mine.

I bend the other knee up and rest my elbows on them, burying my head in my hands.

Fuck her.

Fuck Clay Collins, piece of shit Saint with her money and hair and…

But I can’t stop sobbing, nearly choking.

My door swings open, and I smell the grease on Macon’s hands as he squats down next to me.

“Please don’t yell at me,” I beg, not looking at him. “Just let me get past it, okay? I will. I’ll get past it. I just need tonight.”

My family is good about staying in their lane, but when one if us is upset, everyone goes on alert. With our mother being clinically depressed, it only makes sense one or more of us will have inherited her problems.

I’m not depressed. I’m just…shredded.

“Look at me.” He puts his hands on mine. “Livvy.”

I shake my head. Please go away. A lump stretches in my throat so big it hurts. Just let me get past it.

“You’re going to stand up,” he says.

I shake, a cry in my throat. “I can’t…stand up.” I gasp, fighting for air. “I can’t breathe.”

He pulls my hands away, and I see him hover over me and take my face in his hands. “You’re going to stand up,” he tells me, “and you’re gonna do your homework, and you’re gonna go to prom.” My stomach twists into knots, and I shake my head. I can’t. “You’re going to be in the same room with her, Monday thru Friday for the rest of the school year, and you’re not sacrificing yourself out of fear. You’re going to do all of this, Liv.”

I cry harder, squeezing my eyes shut. I’m not in love with her. She can’t do this to me. This wasn’t supposed to happen.

“You’re going to go to Dartmouth.” He dips his head down close to mine, holding my eyes. “And you’re going to join a club and make some friends, and in a couple of months you’re going to have a life.”

How?

“You’re going to leave,” he grits out. “You’re going to leave here and leave any hope of her. You’re going to do the hardest thing you’ve ever had to do, because it’ll save you, Liv. Because you’re Trysta Jaeger’s daughter, and we’re going to do what she would’ve wanted us to do and didn’t have the courage to do herself. We keep biting back. We survive, because sometimes that’s the most violent thing we can do to other people. We stay alive.”

My body shakes as the tears pour.

“And in a year, you won’t even understand how you could have loved her this much,” he tells me. “I promise you.”

How can he promise that? He doesn’t know. No one does. I don’t think I can see tomorrow, much less months from now. God, how do I leave?

“I promise,” he says again, his eyes hard. “I promise.”

But I can’t imagine not wanting her. I can’t see not hating her with someone else and wanting anyone else as much as I want her. I cry, covering my face with my hands again, so he doesn’t see how fucking awful and pathetic I became because of her.

How I let this happen to myself?

But for a moment, maybe I understand a fraction of what my mother felt all her life. The despair. God, I hate it. I hate it so much.

Macon doesn’t say more. He scoops me up into his arms and carries me out of my room. Holding me tight, he carries me into his, where my father’s old recliner still sits, and sits down, hugging me close.

“Old world pepperoni,” he orders as he tucks my head into his neck.

And faintly, I hear Trace’s grumble, “I hate old world pepperoni. It scratches the roof of my mouth.”

But he leaves, following instructions, and after a moment, I let my arm circle my brother’s neck as he holds me until the pizza comes.

“YOU OKAY?” KRISJEN asks.

I empty my books into my locker, pulling out my Spanish book and my copy of Othello for homework tonight. “I’m fine.”

Liv stands across the hall, chatting with Chloe, and I hear laughter. I glance over my shoulder, trying not to look like I know exactly where she is every moment. Chloe leans in and greets Jessa Washington and Erin Merluzzi who approach. Girl certainly makes friends fast. They strike up a convo in their small group, Liv smiling and like…actively-fucking-participating.

“Are you sure?” Krisjen’s voice is low. “You look like hangry, like you haven’t eaten in days and you’re going to morph into something outrageous if you don’t get to dine on an unbaptized baby soon.”

I shut my locker and close my bag, tearing my eyes away before Liv sees me looking.

“Clay…” She touches my arm.