The Nevers

Chap. Nine - The Newcomer

I am already here.

No take backs.

No going back.

Never.

"How do you like the new place?"

I turn around to see Josh standing at the doorway of my quarters. It's been a week, and I've barely done anything to the place. It's small, about the size of just a simple master bedroom: a bedroom and a bathroom. Still, even though wherever we are is deserted, it's actually very nice.

I give Josh a slight smile. "It's great, thanks."

He steps in and takes a displeased look around. The walls are still bare and the bed has plain white sheets on it. Cleo got me some clothes, and those are in a drawer somewhere. "It could use some color," he comments.

I suck my teeth. "Um, yeah, I know. I just don't really..."

"Feel welcome?"

He read my mind. "Exactly," I say. "I'm not even quite sure if I'll be allowed to stay."

"Don't worry," he says. "About thirty percent of us were born her, leaving the other seventy as dumped here. It happens to most of us."

I note how he sounds like he can truly relate. "Are you part of that seventy percent?" I ask. "Dumped like I was?"

Josh pauses. The gigantic thing that covered half of my face is now reduced to a bruise that covers an area of my cheek due to surprisingly effective medical treatment (from Josh) and tons of concealer (made by Cleo). So far, most everything is alright. A majority of the Nevers are either kind to me or want nothing to do with me (which was fine), Mars still hates my guts (as usual), and Josh is always there.

He's been nice, very nice, but the thing is, somewhere brewing behind those green eyes he stares at me with, he is searching his mind for something, anything, about me like we'd met before, like how he was staring at me right now.

"Um," he says. "Yes and no. I was dumped here, but it wasn't that bad. They, uh, just led me down some stairway and threw me out of a ground-level door. Fractured my wrist."

Jealousy and sorrow wells up inside of me. It was so unfair. They merely threw him out the door, onto the ground. It was a shameful, yet simple way, but me, I was thrown over two hundred feet off of a ledge. Josh got a fractured wrist, which probably healed within weeks, but my ribs will always hurt anytime I laugh hard enough. I'll never feel the same again, and neither will he. Even with all these thoughts, I keep silent.

"Ice, right?" Josh said. I look up. "I know what you're thinking and...I am really, really sorry for what happened to you. If I was there, if I could have stopped it, I would've."

I just shrug. The air feels thick here, like there is too much for the both of us. "Don't be sorry," I say quietly. "You saved my life, so it's all good now."

"Except it's not," he disagrees. "You had a family, didn't you? You had friends."

"A friend and a sister."

Josh's expression seems to shift. "What was her name?" he asks, more curious than concerned.

"His," I say without looking up. "My friend is, or really was, a 'he'."I haven't thought of Jack since I was banished. I can still remember his cold, unfeeling eyes as he accepted his job and walked away. It was easier then, at the Admissions, to miss him, for the pain was dull and quick, like getting a shot. However, I am here now and he was there now with Annalise-freaking-Winters. The pain is now sharper and much more dense, like being shot.