Ecstasy

Eli

She begged him.

She fucking begged him when I gave her an out.

She fucking begged like she really is a fucking whore.

Alex locked the door before he pushed me out, and then left without a word to anyone. I thought about breaking down the door to the room she was in, but she fucking begged him.

I went upstairs. Kaitlyn was in my face, demanding to know what the fuck I was thinking.

I left. Fuck her. Fuck Zara. Fuck Alex.

I left for my dad’s house. A two hour drive I took in silence.

My father lives ten minutes from Caven’s campus, but I never go home. He’s usually traveling anyway for work, or else he’s fucking some bitch he barely knows, and I don’t want to hear that shit.

When I get here, early Saturday morning, he’s gone.

I knew he would be. He’s with his girl of the week. It’s a little ironic, the one time I decide to come here, it’s when he’s gone. Maybe that’s why I’m here.

I don’t want to go to my house right now. I don’t want to see Alex. I don’t want to deal with that bullshit.

She fucking begged him.

I drop my bag by the door to Dad’s huge, empty house. The spacious foyer is the size of a goddamn bedroom itself, a winding staircase to my right. His office is to the left, closed and probably locked.

Addisons always like to keep their secrets close.

If you let people in, they can hurt you.

It’s a damn good thing I never let Zara in. She’s obviously not who I thought she was. I guess I thought that night, the one when I watched her take a knife from the block, roll down her shorts and run it across her hip as she cried, I guess that night I saw something that wasn’t really there.

Someone that wasn’t really there.

Maybe all that time we spent together meant nothing to her.

Fucking bitch.

I head up the stairs, turn down the hall toward the double doors that lead to my room. Dad and I have our own suites, as I liked to think of them when I was younger. Mom had one, too, the one she shared with Dad.

But that was eight years ago.

She hasn’t been back since she left, giving me a kiss on the forehead, squeezing my hands in hers.

I wrench open one of the doors to my room, flinging it back. It crashes against the wall, but I don’t fucking care. My bed is before me, and on either side of it are two dark, wooden nightstands.

One is empty.

The other has a framed photograph.

I head straight for it, yank it up and stare at it as I do every single time I come in here.

A boy’s face, with dark hair like mine but brighter eyes like my mother’s, looks back at me.

Adonis.

His first name is my middle name. Almost like Mom was trying to replace her family completely when she went back to Greece.

Adonis is my half-brother that I’ve never met. Living a life that I was meant to live.

He stole her from me.

He fucking stole her from me.

I hurl the frame against the glass door that leads out to my balcony, and it shatters into pieces that fall to the hardwood floor.

It’s not enough.

I run my hands through my hair, looking around this empty room. There’s nothing else to fucking break. I don’t really live here, I never did.

I went through the motions.

I took showers.

Did laundry.

Jerked off.

Fucked girls.

Ate in bed.

Stared at Adonis’s photos that Mom sent every year with a letter wishing me well.

I didn’t live, though.

I haven’t done that for a long time.

So, there’s nothing else to break.

There’s my dresser, but it’s empty. I took all my shit when I moved out.

I kick the dresser anyway, loving the pain that lights up from the tip of my foot to my thigh. I kick it again, the wood splintering.

It feels pretty damn good.

Imagining my father walking in on this makes it feel even better. He did it. He probably held her so tightly. He probably suffocated her. He never wanted to visit her family. Never wanted her out of his sight. It’s why he made such an elaborate home office.

They were always together when he wasn’t in the office.

I thought it was because they were happy.

Really, it was because she was trapped. He didn’t let her live.

But I let Zara live. I let her do whatever she wanted.

And she begged him.

The one who doesn’t let her do shit.

I kick the dresser again. And again. And again. And soon there’s a hole in the bottom of it and my heart is pounding, sweat on the back of my neck.

I tip the whole fucking thing over and it splinters onto the floor, the sound ringing in my ears.

My chest is heaving, and I step back, up against the wall. I knock my head against it, close my eyes, my hands balled into fists.

Everything swims into focus then.

Everything I’ve done.

Everything I should have done.

The scene with Zara at the pool plays in my head. How I dove in to save her.

Then one with her between me and Alex that night Riha

I didn’t really want to hurt her.

I just wanted her to learn a lesson. I just wanted her to know that he wasn’t good for her. He’s never been good for her.

He’s never let her take a breath without him. Never let her live without him. Just like my father, with my mother.

It’s why she held me under.

I know it’s his fault.

He was too much for her. He was too controlling. Too demanding.

I would let Zara do anything she wanted, if she’d just choose me.

Instead of someone that wants to change her.

I’ve known Zara was a lost cause since I first met her. But I didn’t care. I don’t want to change her. I didn’t want to change for her, either. We could be as fucked up as we wanted to be, together. I haven’t gone to any of my appointments, for her. Because she would want me just how I am.

I slam my fist against the wall.

My kind of fucked up is the kind I can’t tell anyone I know. But it’s the kind she’d understand.

But she begged him. Even after he treated her like shit.

Maybe that’s what she wants.

Maybe she wants someone to try and save her, after all. Save her with violence and threats and cruel words.

Someone to not accept her for the fucked-up mess that she is.

If that’s what she fucking wants, I can give her that, too.