My mind was hazy by the time Brie helped me to the car. My head hurt from the endless memories that seemed to hit me all at once. I continued to clutch my head as the pain continued to torment me. I wasn’t ready to face my parents. I wasn’t ready to hear any more lies.

Brie pulled the car into the drive and turned to face me. A sympathetic look passed over her face and a new form of pain slashed through me. I would have to get used to that look. The pity. I wasn’t sure what hurt most—being frowned upon or looked at like I was broken. Both hurt equally.

Brie placed a hand on my knee and squeezed gently. “Are you going to be okay?”

I shook my head. I wasn’t sure I would ever be okay.

“I can come inside with you if you like?”

I shook my head again. “No, I need to do this alone.”

Understanding crossed her face and she leaned in to give me a hug. “I love you, Lo.”

“You too, B,” I said, and pushed open the door with a sigh.

The second I walked through the door, they were there waiting for me. It was apparent that Jen had been crying. I couldn’t even look at them. I wasn’t really an angry person, but in that moment it was right there on the surface along with the hurt of being lied to for so long.

“You lied to me.”

“Honey, we didn’t lie to you. We were trying to protect you.”

“I killed someone, Mum. I killed him.”

“No. It was an accident. It wasn’t your fault, Lola. None of this was.”

A sob tore free from my chest. I didn’t even try to hide it. What had I done? I’d killed someone. Someone I’d loved more than anything in the world. Someone who had loved me back. I’d killed the one person I could count on. The one person I knew would never lie to me. He’d done everything he could to make me happy, even if that meant hurting himself, and I’d killed him.

And then I forgot all about him.

My selfishness, my lack of responsibility, had forced me to forget everything he’d meant to me. I’d pushed him aside as though he wasn’t the best part of my life. How could I do that? How could I forget the boy who had owned my heart and soul, and guarded them as though they were the most precious objects in the whole universe?

The locket. It was his heart.

He had given me his heart.

We were only seventeen. We shouldn’t have even known what love was. But we had. We really had. Whether it was real or not to everyone else, we’d felt something for each other, something deep and special. And that love—no matter how big or small—should never have been diminished. That love should never have been forgotten.

Grief washed over me. Every emotion, feeling, touch, it was all right there, and I could feel it all as though it were happening all over again.

“No,” I cried out, clutching my knees as I sank to the floor in front of them.

“It’s okay, sweetheart.” Mum’s voice hushed me, her hand soothing my hair in an attempt to calm me.

“It hurts,” I sobbed. “It hurts so much.”

“I know, baby. I know.”

“Make it go away,” I pleaded. “Make it stop.”

"Andy, do something,” she said.

I didn’t remember much after that, only that they held me as I wept beside them. I didn’t even remember falling asleep until I woke up in my bed, the darkness surrounding me just like it had at school. I wanted to forget. Forget everything. Austin, the accident, Taylor. I wanted to forget it all. And I tried. I really did try, but no matter how hard I fought to forget, I couldn’t. The pain was still there. It would always be there.

I couldn’t remember much from the accident; it had happened too quickly. I remembered everything from after, though. Those last few moments…

How I tried so hard to help him.

I remembered the burning that shot through my arm as I pounded the steering wheel in desperation. I remembered Austin’s face. It was so calm, but I knew how terrified he was. His eyes had been wide and raw. He knew he didn’t stand a chance. He knew that it was over. For us… And life… The small smile that tried to light up his face as I was lifted from the car would stay with me forever. I would never forget.

Oh, Austin.

Brie called sometime during the night to check up on me. She was the only person I could rely on right now. The only person I knew would never lie to me. She had shown up around midnight and stayed all night. We sat in comfortable silence, neither one of us needing to say anything because we both knew what the other was thinking. Brie held me as I sobbed into her neck and she continued to comfort me until the crying stopped.

She told me that she’d seen Taylor and Melanie together at school after it had all come out. Although it should have, it didn’t surprise me. Taylor hadn’t even called to check up on me, which I had hoped he would. When she went on to say she believed they had been in on it together, it all began to make sense. I had been so stupid to think that he cared for me. Was it not enough to know that I had killed someone? That I was responsible for taking another person’s life, and now I had to deal with the realisation that they had been in on this whole thing together. They had wanted everyone to know what I did and they wanted me to suffer.

It wasn’t knowing they were together that hurt the most. They had history. A whole lot of it. Maybe not now, but eventually, I could learn to deal with the knowledge that she meant more to him than maybe he knew himself. I was silly to even think that I could compare to her. I could deal with that. What I couldn’t deal with was knowing that Taylor had lied to me the whole time. He had used me as a pawn in this sick and twisted game of theirs. That, I couldn’t handle. I’d known Taylor was capable of most things, but I never would have imagined he could hurt me the way he had. To know that everything that had happened between us had been a bare-faced lie—that was hard to understand.

Everyone I trusted had lied to me. Jen and Andy, my friends back home, and now Taylor.

How long had they known? Had they been laughing behind my back all this time, pretending to be my friends? Taylor and Melanie had planned this little set up. No doubt sitting around scheming behind my back this whole time. Just waiting for the right moment to rip my world out from underneath me. Well, they had succeeded. I was officially more broken than ever.

“I’m sorry, sweetheart, I couldn’t stop him,” Jen apologised, just as Taylor came barrelling through the door right after her.

“Get him out,” I whispered.

"Taylor, you need to leave. Now,” Brie told him.

“Please, Firebox. Let me explain.”

How could I let him explain when I could barely even look at him?

“You lied to me. All this time, you knew what happened to me and what? What was I to you, Taylor? A game? Something to pass the time? You knew I was hurting. Why me?” I yelled and swiped away the traitorous tears that had begun to fall freely.

Taylor closed the distance between us and placed both his hands on my cheeks. He tried to force my eyes to his, but I still couldn’t look at him. It hurt too much. “I swear to you, Lola. I had no idea what she had planned.”

I shook my head in his hands. “Liar.”

Brie walked towards the door and looked back at me before she and Jen left the room.

“Look at me, babe. I promise, this was nothing to do with me. Please, you have to believe me.”

“Brie saw the two of you together afterwards so don’t try to deny it.”

“It’s the truth. By the time I realised what she had done it was too late. Everyone knew, and you… It was too late. I wanted to stop it, but I couldn’t.” I finally managed to open my eyes and I was surprised at how cut up Taylor looked. A part of me wanted to believe him, but he was a great actor. He’d led me on for so long that sometimes I struggled to know when he was being truthful.

“So the two of you hugging? That was all part of her imagination, too? Did she make that up, Taylor?”

“What? No.”

“She saw you, Taylor. The both of you.”

“If she’d stuck around long enough she would’ve seen me pull away. I wouldn’t do that to you.”

“Again…”

“That’s not fair. We weren’t even together then. You knew how messed up I was, otherwise I would never have gone there to begin with.”

None of it mattered anymore. Even if he was telling the truth, which my stupid heart was telling me he was, it didn’t matter. There was no coming back from this. Not now. Not ever.

“We’ve never been together, Taylor,” I admitted. “That’s just it. All this time we’ve been kidding ourselves. Me, thinking you were different. You, thinking I could change you. It was wrong. We were wrong.”

“I am different. Because of you, Lola, I am different. Being around you… I’m a different person. You make me believe I can be a better person. That whatever happened in the past doesn’t have to define who I am today. With you… I want to be better. I want to be worthy of you.”

“None of that matters anymore. I can’t be that person. Not now. Not anymore.”

“I’m not asking you to be that person. I’m just asking you to be you. The girl I fell in love with. The girl who changed my world. The one who showed me the sun on a cloudy, wet day. The one who brought light to a world that was once full of darkness and anger. That’s the girl I want to be with.”

“Don’t you get it? That strong girl? The Firebox? She doesn’t exist. This?” I said, thumbing my chest. “This is me. Weak. Pathetic. This is who I am. It’s who I’ve always been. We were just too stupid to see that.”

“That’s a lie. You are that person. Even if you can’t see it right now, it’s there in your eyes.”

“I need you to leave, Taylor. Please.”

“Don’t. Don’t do this, Lola. Don’t shut me out. At least give us a chance. I want to help you. I need to help you.”

“I killed someone, Taylor. I loved him and I killed him, and no matter how much I want to, I can’t bring him back. I can’t change what happened.”

“It wasn’t your fault, babe. You didn’t kill him. It was an accident.”

I shook my head. “It’s over, Taylor.”

“Don’t. Don’t say that.”

“I just did. We’re done.”

Taylor shook his head. “You don’t mean that. I love you, Firebox. I’m not giving up on you.”

“You don’t have a choice,” I said, pointing to the door. Taylor shook his head angrily and for a minute, I thought he wasn’t going to leave.

When I turned my back on him, unable to look at him any longer, he left. This time, for good.