SEVEN
~Mia~
Something was going on with Jace.
Ever since the day before, he’d been distant; seemed… wrong.
He’d come home late and, saying nothing, slid into bed. There’d barely been a greeting. When he saw that his arrival had awoken me—saw me looking back at him as he walked in—there was a flash of tension. It was as though he’d caught himself nearly stepping on a venomous creature, a moment of disgust that was outweighed in leagues by fear. Then, seeming to force himself to act otherwise, he’d given me the only greeting I’d get that night: nothing more than a sad glance and a hesitant nod—his eyes seeming afraid to even aim themselves at me—and, after a painful pause, a contemplative grunt. Then he’d been lying down, back to me, and gone still. I’m sure he’d hoped I’d thought he was asleep, but I knew from the pace of his jagged breaths that he barely slept a wink that night. Because of this, I’d barely slept a wink, and what sleep I did manage to steal was haunted by terrible dreams. A portion of this broken-glass slumber was stomped out when I heard the whisper of fabric, and I pulled myself from unconsciousness and caught him getting dressed. This time he didn’t notice me—or maybe he just pretended not to notice—and he didn’t so much as glance in my direction as he slipped away, seeming content to leave me alone and confused in his bed. Terrified by this new demeanor, I’d gone after him, staving off tears, to ask where he was going.
The look in his eyes terrified me. It was cold and distant; it was enough to drive me to silence.
Then, without another word from either of us, he turned and was gone.
Unable to bring myself to do anything else, I slunk back to the bedroom—back to the suddenly cold bed—and allowed my depression to rape my thoughts again and again and again. And, with that being the sole occupier of my morning, a sort of sleep took me—dreamless and with no hope of rest, I simply lost enough hours to my broken heart to claim I must have been asleep. When, at last, enough awareness returned to me to justifiably claim I was among the waking world, the first thought that came was the memory Jace moments before he’d left.
I shivered at just the memory of those eyes on me.
Deciding that just sitting around wasn’t going to help anything, I pulled my phone out and numbly went through the motions to call Candy. When she didn’t answer, I forced myself to leave the bedroom, knowing it would only feed my depression to stay in that suddenly vast desert of a bed, and wound up slumped in the equally vast, equally lonely clutches of the couch. I barely remembered the trip down the stairs and through the living room, the entirety of my mind seeming to cyclone around the freeze-framed scene when Jace had turned to face me before leaving.
What had that look meant?
Was it intentional, or was he just too consumed in Crow business?
Was I taking something personally that wasn’t meant to be?
But something in those eyes…
No, I felt certain that his face was reflecting what he’d been feeling the moment he’d seen me; I felt like… like what was troubling him was me.
But why?
And what did whatever it was mean for us now?
Whatever it was, I knew I couldn’t stay there. Either I was working myself up with thoughts that weren’t accurate reflections of reality, or…
Or there really was something wrong between us.
Either way, I knew I couldn’t stay there; knew I couldn’t coop myself up in that cold, lonely place and wait for something worse to happen—either by my own mind’s doing or…
But I knew it was better not to just leave without at least something of a destination in mind. But I couldn’t reach Candy. Chewing my lip, I considered my other options. Just as I was about to give up, my phone began to light up and I saw that it was Danny.
“H-hello?” I answered, my voice sounding dry and hollow from my extended silence; the pain and sadness that had been carrying me since the previous night betraying my effort to sound otherwise.
“Mia?” Danny’s normally cheerful voice already had an undertone of suspicion, and I cringed at how just my name sounded. “How ya doing? How’s Jace?”
“Good,” I answered slowly, struggling to make the lie sound convincing. “I… uh, Jace is out. Umm… grocery shopping or… well, yeah. Grocery shopping.”
“Oh,” he said, sounding disbelieving. “So where are ya?”
“The condo…” I answered, then immediately realized what I’d just confessed to.
“Jace jus’ left ya at home, huh?” Danny questioned. I could imagine his wise eyes narrowing at the phone, keying in on the fact that something was wrong. “Well… if ye’re all on yer own then ya want to get some lunch or somethin’?”
“Lunch…” I repeated the word, feeling like I might shudder—certain that Depression would tell me I was too nauseous to eat—but was surprised to hear my stomach growl instead. “Lunch actually sounds great,” I finally said.
“A’right. I’ll be by in a jiff to pick ya up,” he said.
“That’s okay,” I cringed, hating the idea of him coming here and catching me like this. I at least needed to collect myself and get away from here. Making a quick-yet-calculated decision, I said, “I’ll take a cab. Where do you want to meet up?”
“Denny’s sound good?”
I almost laughed at the cruel irony of that, but still managed to keep myself composed as I answered, “Sounds fine. See you soon.”
I hung up and thought back to my last experience at Denny’s, the closing act of my first encounter with Jace. I remembered just how strange that night had been. I clenched my eyes shut, not wanting to worry about how Jace was acting. Wanting everything to continue to be as amazing as it had been the past few days.
Was that so much to ask for?
Didn’t we deserve that much with everything that had happened to us?
I sighed—a heavy, almost meditative exhale—and, deciding that it felt good, repeated it more times than I could count. Then, feeling (more or less) collected, I went about getting dressed. Then, still focusing on my breathing, I took the elevator down to the garage and made my way to the security booth. The guard on shift was all smiles and “ma’am”s as he called me a cab, and before long I was in the diner chain’s parking lot and slipping a few bills into the cabby’s hands.
****
“Ya okay, girlie?” Danny called out from the entrance, already holding the door for me despite an entire parking lot still waiting between us.
“Y-yeah, sorry,” I offered. “Just distracted.”
“Well, get yer toosh in here,” Danny smirked. “I’m starving, an’ my chivalry only waits so long when there’s food on the line!”
I smiled at that and hurried in. We were sat with relative ease, the hostess pausing to look at me. I could see that she seemed to recognize me, but that she was unable to place the ‘why.’ This, I realized with some surprise, filled me with a strange sense of pride. Then, just as quickly—realizing that the changes I’d gone through were almost entirely because of Jace’s introduction into my life—I felt myself begin to plummet back into that dark forest where Depression and other mind-monsters lurked. We sat, and for a while we sat in silence; Danny studying me while I withdrew into myself, only distantly aware that I was being studied. I still couldn’t help but feel that something wasn’t right. And I couldn’t hide that feeling that it was only about to get worse. My stomach turned, Depression finally talking me out of what my stomach had been so eager to bring me here for, and I looked away from the menu. I decided that I would just get tea and maybe some toast.
“What’s on yer mind?” Danny asked, his concerned gaze boring into my own.
“You can tell that easily, huh?” I answered with my own question, unable to bring myself to look up. “Honestly? It’s probably nothing. Just me being stupid…”
“Yer lotsa things, girlie, but stupid ain’t one of ‘em. You say it’s nothin,’ but hows about ya let ol’ Mercury decide that?” Danny pressed, leaning forward on his big slabs of arms.
The entire table shifted under his weight, and the condiments at the end of the table slid a half-inch in his direction. They seemed in that instant to side with him.
I realized I was inclined to do the same.
“Well, last night when Jace got home, he… well, he just seemed really distant,” I shook my head. “I thought maybe he just didn’t want to wake me up, you know? Or maybe he’d had a rough night or something; some pressing Crow business maybe.” I paused then, perking up and asking with no effort to hide the desperation from my voice, “Something didn’t happen yesterday, did it? Something that would have him acting off?”
But Danny only shook his head and shrugged. “Not that I know ‘bout,” he confessed.
That, I knew, meant “no.” If Danny didn’t know about Crow business, it was because there was no Crow business to know about. Nothing happened without his knowing it.
Not unless Jace didn’t tell him, and that, from what I’d gathered so far, just didn’t happen.
I sighed and nodded, already suspecting that was the case. “And then, this morning, it was the same thing: distant and cold. And then he looked at me and it felt like…like he was a totally different person. Like he didn’t even know me. Like he didn’t even…” but I couldn’t complete that sentence.
Not that sentence.
“That don’t sound like Jace,” Danny said with a deep frow, rubbing a large hand over his chin. “But, I mean, this is Jace we’re talkin’ ‘bout. Boy’s nothin’ if not focused, y’know? Maybe he’s jus’ workin’ another surprise for ya. Or maybe he’s jus’ throwin’ himself full-force back into his work; catchin’ up an’ crap like that; not like he needs my permission or involvement to do that. In either case, I’ll talk to ‘im t’morrow; see if there ain’t somethin’ more I can dig up fer ya.”
I blushed and nodded my thanks. “Again,” I said, not wanting Danny to discover that nothing was wrong and think I was nuts for saying anything, “I’m sure it’s nothing,” I bit my lip, suddenly worried about what might happen if Danny said anything of this to Jace. “A-actually, you don’t need to do that. No point in bothering him. Really.”
“A’right,” Danny said after a skeptical pause, his eyebrows raised at me like he already thought I was nuts. “But if things get worse, ya tell me, kay?”
“I will,” I said, forcing a smile. “Thanks, Danny.”
“‘Mercury,’” he corrected me before saying, “So is that all that’s on yer mind?”
“No, I was also thinking,” I began, considering something that had been bothering me for some time. “I don’t know much about his past… and I don’t know exactly how to ask him.”
“Well, let’see…” he began, only to have the waitress arrive and interrupt his thoughts.
The waitress took our orders, and, feeling a bit better, I managed to talk myself into ordering a small plate of pancakes and a blended coffee drink instead of just toast and tea. Danny’s order went on for nearly two minutes and, when all was said and done, comprised of four full entrees, a heavily modified appetizer, and a salad that somehow contained more calories than most of the meals on the rest of their menu. Still scribbling the modifications to Danny’s order into her notepad and looking more than a little war-torn from the experience, the waitress hurried away. I thought she seemed to be retreating from the possibility that he’d change his mind and start ordering more, and this thought made me giggle a little.
With her gone, Danny continued where he’d left off:
“I’ve known Jace since he was little. Used t’bounce ‘im on my knee while ‘is dad an’ me talked business.”
I caught myself genuinely smiling at the thought.
Danny responded with one of his own before continuing. “He was the smarts of the Presley-fam. That’s not t’say that the Presleys were dumb—far from it, n’fact—but Jace was…” Danny paused, considering, and then said, “Even when ‘e was a babe, he’d jus’ look at ya like he was thinkin,’ y’know? Like, ya’d walk into a room, an’ ya’d know there was a li’l tike in there—think nothin’ more of it—but then ya’d find yerself lookin’ at these eyes that just seemed… just seemed to know things. Even ‘fore that boy could talk, folks’d say ‘there’s a boy who can think.’” He paused on that for a moment, seeming to replay his own words back in his head, and then nodded, apparently deciding that, yes, he’d explained this right. “Michael, Jace’s older brother, was sort of raised with the understanding that the Crows would eventually be his to lead. It seems unfair to say aloud, I know, but there was never really any sense of force or demand with the Presleys when the Crows was involved. Everyone in that family jus’ sort o’ knew their place and played the part—‘cept that Jace never had no place in the Crows. He was jus’ a Presley. His dad ran the ship, his mom ran his dad, an’ Michael was the one on deck to run things when his dad stepped down or… well,” Danny sighed and shrugged, “Michael was the one on deck. So everyone jus’ loved Jason fer bein’ the li’l thinkin’ tike he was. With no expectations loomin’ over him he was free to do what he pleased, an’ he was pleased with keepin’ to hisself fer the most part. Didn’t have a lot of friends—wasn’t exactly the socializin’ sort—but he liked music and he liked girls—liked lookin’ at ‘em, at least, even when he was little—and, really, he just liked keepin’ things organized.”
I raised an eyebrow at that. “Organized?” I repeated, not sure I understood.
Danny nodded, furrowing his brow in a confused-yet-entertained expression. “Yeah. Like…” he thought and then smirked, “Like, if he had any porno mags—an’ I can almost guarantee he did—I wouldn’t have been the least bit surprised to find out that he had ‘em alphabetized and separated based on fetishes or whatever. Like, the big-titty mags sorted over yonder an’ the dick-suckin’ mags sorted over yonder. An’ so on an’ so forth. Even young, Jace was the ‘a place fer everythin’ an’ everythin’ in its place’-sort.”
“Any idea why?” I asked, intrigued.
Danny shrugged. “I suppose he got it from the other Presleys. They all had their li’l vices. Dad loved ol’ movies, Mom was into anythin’ and everythin’ vampire-related”—I blushed at that, remembering his reaction to my own interest in vampires—“an’ Michael, ‘cuz of his pops, loved motorcycles and basically anythin’ with an engine. Dad’s movies were kept on a series of shelves in the TV room, organized with more care an’ attention than most libraries can boast. Same with all the vampire-stuff in their Mom’s own little private room.” He leaned forward like he was sharing a secret then. “She called it her ‘office,’” he explained, “but it was basically ‘er own private vampire museum. An’ Michael’s own collection of model bikes an’ cars were all lined up and kept spotless—damn kid actually dusted the things ever’day.” He gave another shrug, this one more dismissive. “So I guess Jace saw all that an’ jus’ took to that sense of order, but applied it to everythin.’ Those thinkin’ eyes never stopped; he jus’ always seemed to be puttin’ what he saw in some sort of box in ‘is head. ‘A place fer everythin’ an’ everythin’ in its place,’” he repeated with another shrug.
“Wow…” I said, considering this and how it applied to Jace in the here-and-now, finding that it explained his meticulous approach to our dates and… well, everything.
The waitress slid back our drinks, still seeming nervous that Danny might start ordering more, and she hesitantly asked if we needed anything else.
Danny dismissed her, and I saw a look of relief on her face as she left.
“So what about his wife?” I asked after taking a sip from the blended coffee. It was sugary sweet—almost too sweet—and I found myself going back for a second, then a third pull on the straw. “How did he meet her?”
A painful expression of pure joy and utter sorrow passed in front of Danny’s face. “Anne?” he said the name as though he expected a response from it. “She… well, she was a childhood friend, one of Jace’s only if she wasn’t his actual only friend,” Danny said. “Her folks were friends of the family—on their mom’s side,” he added, sounding like that fact was important somehow but not explaining why.
I felt like I had a good idea why.
“She was a sweet kid. Sweet to Jace, anyhow, which was rare. Bein’ the only kid in preschool who lined up his Cheerios in li’l shapes had a way of makin’ other kids think he was weird.”
“Kids can be cruel,” I agreed.
Danny laughed. “They’d learn not to be pretty quick with Jace,” he said. “This one time, a boy decided to mess with Jace. He was playin’ with dominos or somethin’ like that, an’ this li’l bastard comes and, like, musses ‘em all around—‘ruined their order,’ was how Jace explained it later—an’ Jace… well, Jace punched the kid in the pecker.” He laughed again and shook his head. “Funny to think ‘bout, actually: this li’l fucker stormin’ over, all cocky an’ swaggerin,’ an’ swings a kick at li’l Jace’s setup, right? An’ then ‘ere comes li’l Jace with a right-hook right to sonny-Jim’s tackle.” Danny nodded in admiration. “Yeah, Jace might’a been a bit screwy, but he had the Presley charm when someone tried t’fuck with ‘im.”
I caught myself giggling at the thought, as well.
“But, yeah, Anne,” Danny went on, bringing back the subject of Jace’s wife. “She seen somethin’ in Jace early on—everyone with eyes ‘nuff to see could see that much—an’ the two of ‘em got along great. I guess ya could say the way it happened was exactly how everyone suspected it would: they grew, an’ as they did… well, I won’t say they grew closer. That’d be a lie. No, they was always close, but that closeness started to realize what it was more an’ more as they got older. Like, they’d always held hands—right?—but when they went from bein’ li’l boppers to bein’ teens, we could all see that the way they held hands had gone from bein’ friendly to bein’…. well, y’know. Like I says: it jus’ happened the way everyone suspected it would.”
I blushed at that, feeling both a twinge of jealousy at the thought as well as a mighty wave of sorrow for Jace. Knowing how things turned out made such a happy story into a bitter tragedy.
“Annie woulda liked ya,” Danny offered with a smile, seeming to understand what I was thinking. “An’ I think she’d agree that ye’re exactly what Jace needs.”
“Th-thanks, Danny,” I smiled. “I think… well, I feel better knowing that.”
“‘Mercury,” he corrected me again, but the smile didn’t waver. “An’ it’s no prob.” Then, after studying me for a moment longer, he said, “Hey, I gotta go downtown to pick up some supplies after lunch. Ya wanna join? There’s a few cool little shops ‘round there ya might like.”
“That would be nice,” I answered with a smile.
I wondered just how much Danny could see. He seemed to just understand exactly what I needed. Like Jace, as it turned out, I hadn’t grown up with many friends, and I wished I had someone like him growing up. Even though Danny seemed to occupy the role of a friend, I couldn’t help but see a paternal connection, and even I felt like I was being “adopted”—for lack of a better word—by the jolly gay giant.
As our food arrived, I found myself hoping all over again that things with Jace would turn out alright. I was too in love with my new life and everyone in it to have to go back to square-one.
****
“Danny? Why don’t you have someone in your life?” I asked over the bike’s engine as we headed downtown.
“Me? Well, I’m married to my work, I guess.”
“Really? I’m sure you could find someone nice,” I added. “There’s a few gay bars in the area even, have you been to any of them?”
Danny shrugged, glancing over his shoulder. “Don’t ya be worrying about my love life, I’m fine with how I am,” he turned back quickly.
I bit my lip, hoping I didn’t offend him. I didn’t want to lose one of the small list of allies I had in my life. With Jace’s coldness and how busy Candy was with opening the brothel for the Crows, I didn’t have many people left in my life.
“There was somebody,” Danny said over the bike. “But when he found out what I did fer a livin’, well…he didn’t want nothing to do with it.”
“I’m sorry for that, Danny,” I said, squeezing his shoulders reassuringly.
“Yer a good girl, Mia,” Danny gently patted my hand on his shoulder.
He turned the bike onto another street, pulling to the side and parking the bike. I moved off the bike, handing him the helmet and looked around. The street consisted of a few small local shops, including a parts store, a clothing store, and a small bakery.
“I’ll be over there,” Danny pointed to the parts shop. “That shop there,” he gestured to the clothing shop, “they might promote themselves as clothes, but they got a lotta cool knick-knacks if you wanna check ‘em out.”
“I think I will,” I smiled. “Meet me there when you’re done?”
“Will do,” he turned away, heading towards the parts shop.
Taking a deep breath, I headed inside the shop, deciding that I’d buy something for Jace. I wanted to get him a gift that meant just as much as the bird pendant he’d gotten me on the first date. Looking around the shop, I saw just what Danny had meant. While the shop did have a good amount of clothes for sale, the other half of the store sold a myriad of random stuff. I began to look around, wondering if I would be able to find anything for Jace here. As I made my way to the last aisle, I began to lose hope. I hadn’t even realized how much I wanted to find something to give to Jace. I wanted to be able to show my thanks, wanted to see the familiar smile I’d grown to love as I handed over whatever it was that I’d found for him.
Face it, Mia. Things are only going to get worse. You’re lost.
I remembered Jace’s cold eyes and shivered again. I closed my eyes, willing myself to relax. I didn’t know what was going on with Jace and I didn’t have any right to assume anything. Things would be fine when I got home. I was sure of it. Finishing down the aisle, I sighed, not able to find anything for Jace. I headed out, seeing Danny stepping out of the parts store. He seemed to see something on my face and moved closer.
“Ya okay? Somethin’ happen?” he asked, looking around as he did. There was a violent edge to his scanning gaze, and I realized that I wouldn’t want to be a person caught in that radar.
Knowing that he was prepared to hurt somebody on my behalf was more endearing than it was horrifying, and I realized I was smiling at the thought. “I’m fine,” I assured him. “I think I’m just tired. Rough night worrying about Jace and all,” I explained, then immediately regretted it. Knowing how intense Danny’s radar was for me made me wonder if he’d still take my concerns to Jace; made me wonder what he might say. Smiling, hoping it would be enough to convince him that I wasn’t as wracked in the brain as I was, I said, “I think I’m going to call a cab and get home. I’m sure you’ve got to get back to work.”
“Ya sure?” he asked with a frown. “It’s not a problem fer me to drop ya off at home.”
“It’s fine,” I assured him. “I need a bit on my own, anyway.”
“Alright, be careful though, a’right?” he said sternly, and I remembered that word again: “adopted.”
“I will be,” I said.
I watched as he sauntered over to his motorcycle. He kept looking back at me, concern filled his face and I offered him a reassuring smile as I pulled my phone out. I called for the cab, glad I had taken the number down earlier when the front desk assistant had helped me at the apartment.
The cab was there ten minutes later and as I slid in, not wanting to go home yet. Deciding I still had some time, I asked the cab driver if they knew any good area with a lot of various types of shops. After a few different choices, I picked one and the driver headed out. I stared out the window, hoping I’d be able to find something for Jace.
****
It was starting to get dark as I walked through the last shop. I’d begun to feel defeated in my mission to find Jace something, and with that sense of defeat came an overwhelming dread that we truly were doomed.
And then, when everything seemed at its most bleak, that’s when I found it.
Sitting on a shelf with a few others styles was a small hand-crafted black crow keychain with bright green inlaid eyes. The eyes, what initially caught my attention, reminded me of Jace’s, and I realized I was smiling at the find before I’d even come to register what I was looking at. Without a second thought, I grabbed it, feeling a sense of rightness from it in my hand, and hurried to the counter with it.
As I made the purchase, I caught sight of the contents of my wallet and realized that I was running low on funds. Since the encounter with T-Built that had ended in his death, I’d been sitting on a sizable wad of cash that would have otherwise been handed over. With Candy and I no longer (enslaved) working with the Carrion Crew, we’d seen no reason not to consider that money ours—we had worked for it, after all—and, with our otherwise frugal lifestyle acting as a sort of instinctual budget, I’d been surprised how long the few hundred bucks had lasted.
Then again, I thought as I handed over a few bills to pay for the keychain, I haven’t exactly been forced to spend much since…
I sighed at myself, deciding that it wasn’t fair to keep making Jace pay for everything, and I began to consider what sort of work I might be able to find so that I could help out.
The remainder of the trip back home was spent in equal parts of thought between this and the subject of Jace and, hopefully, making things better. As I exited the cab and started for the elevator that would take me up to Jace’s condo, I had to pause, taking a deep breath as I tried to fight the sudden growing dread that I’d begun to feel all over again. Holding the bag with the keychain a little tighter, I forced myself forward.
Onward and upward, I thought.
****
As the doors open, I was startled at how dark the apartment was. Stepping through, I moved my hand to the wall, finding the switch and flipped it on. The bright fluorescents assaulted my eyes and I had to blink a few times before finally adjusting to the new lit room. I glanced over, seeing Jace sitting at the dining room table, a large near-empty bottle of Vodka standing beside him.
“Jace?” I whispered, not wanting to startle him.
He hadn’t even looked my way.
Growing more concerned, I moved towards him, wanting to make sure he was alright. That’s when he looked at me. His eyes were cold like they had been. I froze in the middle of the room, terrified at the look he gave me.
“Where were you?” he asked, his voice just as cold as his expression.
“I… I was with Danny,” I stammered.
“After,” he spat. “I spoke to Danny. He said you turned down a ride home and went off more than two hours ago!”
My eyes widened at that, and I realized with dawning horror that I’d let the time get away from me in my hunt to find him a present. “I…” I fought to find the words, wanting desperately to make things right but feeling paralyzed by his voice; his eyes.
“So I’ll ask again, Mia:” he was whispering, but it seemed to grind like shale clattering down a rocky surface, “where were you?”
“… a place fer everythin’ an’ everythin’ in its place,” Danny’s words chimed back at me, seeming to accuse me of interrupting the order of things.
And how had little Jace responded when somebody had come along to disrupt the order of things?
“Why are you so mad?” I whimpered, shaking my head in disbelief. “You… the way you just left me this morning. I just had to… I felt so alone, Jace.”
“You and me both,” he grumbled, looking away.
I frowned at that, feeling wounded by those words. “You left me here,” I reminded him. “Why should it matter if I left, too?”
“Because you know I have no one else to go to,” he shot back, glaring.
“And I have someone else to go to?” I challenged.
His eyes burned with fury, and I watched him wrestling with himself. He seemed to lose the battle, a part of him seeming to sink while another swelled. “Let’s not pretend”—there was a strange slowness to how the words were delivered, and I remembered hearing stories of people recounting attacks as though they’d happened in slow-motion—“that you didn’t make an entire career for some time out of having lots of ‘someones’ to go to, Mia.”
I felt my breath snag in my throat. The inflection he’d put on his name felt painfully parallel to the one that T-Built used to put on the word “whore” whenever he spoke to me or Candy.
“And… and what’s that supposed to mean?” I fought to hold myself upright despite every muscle begging to be let go from the demands to keep me upright. I had to be strong.
I had to be…
Everything was wrong.
In the back of my mind, I heard Mack’s laughter.
The threat of tears began to form in my eyes and I clenched them shut, refusing to cry right now. I didn’t want to be weak right now. I wanted to be strong, had to be strong. For myself. For us.
There was an us still, right?
“You’re smarter than that, Mia,” Jace challenged, folding his arms over his chest. “You and I both know that whores aren’t as stupid as everyone says.”
The words hit me like a punch to the stomach.
Somehow I avoided folding over in agony; somehow I kept the tears locked up behind my eyes.
“J-Jace, what’s going on with you?” I pleaded. “Please, you can tell me.”
“Why? So you can have more power over me?” he demanded, seething now. I could almost see another face behind his eyes—almost—spouting words at him, driving his thoughts into…
Depression. Forests. Rape.
You’re fooling yourself, Mia. He isn’t like that; isn’t like you. Only you’re fucked like that—only you; ONLY YOU!—and now he’s got your card. Your Jace has finally figured out that he can do better than some used-up slag and he’s not yours anymore. Not anymore!
If I heard my depression speaking to me in Mack’s voice, I wouldn’t realize it enough to admit it until later.
Until then, I had to at least carry myself out of there on my own two legs. Because there was no way Jace was going to do it for me…
“Power?” I spat back, refusing to let the hurt that was eating away my insides show. “What the hell are you even talking about? Do you even know?”
The venom in my voice was like gasoline for the fire in Jace’s eyes, and he seemed to swell up that much more from it. Still, somewhere deep, I could almost see a part of him struggling within the flames.
I wondered if he could see a part of me burning away within my own eyes.
Morbidly, I thought back to the fire that had almost killed us, and I wondered if this was just fate coming back around to finish the job.
“I was just an ease for you, wasn’t I?” Jace demanded. “Cozy up to the rival gang’s leader, let him slip it to you—pretend you give a fuck about him—and see if he couldn’t give you a better life? I mean, hell, I couldn’t really blame you,” he barked out a harsh laugh. “If I was a whore I’d probably do the same. Money, protection, and all you gotta do is what you were doing already: just put out, right? What’s one more dick in the sea of dicks that your life already existed as, right? One dick to free you from all others, in fact? Boy, oh boy, Mia, if I’d found myself in your shoes I’d be all over that one dick that could save me from all others. I’d almost—ALMOST!—feel sorry for you for following that logic…” he heaved and sucked in a monstrous breath of air, his face turning dark-red. I could already see he was about to shout, and I was hunching away from it before it even started. “BUT IT WAS MY DICK THAT YOU USED TO RUN! MINE! AND I’M NOBODY’S LIFE RAFT, ESPECIALLY NOT A STUPID, MANIPULATIVE WHO—”
Some force overtook me then, and I felt a sudden and morbid kinship to Jace’s own rage. Whatever dark force was driving his words was, at that moment, driving my body. My hand took flight without my mind commanding it, and I distantly wondered how much of what Jace was saying was just as mindless. I wouldn’t get to find out. The time for talk was over.
My hand came down hard enough on his face to stagger him. The sound echoed through the room and I realized too late that I was already crying. He stumbled back a step, two, and then dropped to a knee, his eyes wide and awed.
He looked horrified.
“Oh no…” he mumbled, seeming to say it more to himself. Then he looked back at me, tears in his own eyes. “Mia… shit, Mia, I’m so so—”
I missed the rest. I was crying, and I couldn’t bear the thought of him seeing me like that.
And so I ran.