Under My Skin

33 | i dont remember

Chapter Thirty-three:

"She's still not speaking to me." Reid groaned as he sat opposite an occupied Lydia in the booth of a burger joint. The bleach-blonde girl clasped a powder compact in her right hand and a lip gloss wand in her left as she languidly swiped the product across her pout.

"I mean, what exactly did you expect? You not only humiliated her on holiday, but then you dropped the bomb that your best friend was responsible for Rayhan's death. Oh, and everyone knew about it except for her." She exclaimed as she used the pert edges of a folded napkin to remove the excess product from her lips.

A mere five days had painstakingly slowly passed since that night of revelations that Blaine had been driving the car that had claimed Rayhan's life and that both Reid and Indiya had been back-passengers and thereby witnessed the act. The subsequent atmosphere of the house was strained to say the least. Sihem had stunned everyone by deciding against leaving. She astounded her children further by encouraging them to forgive Blaine for his malfeasance. Ria remained hell-bent on spurning Reid and, to a lesser degree, Sihem for concealing the truth, or at least the truth Ria felt was being fed to her.

"Well, when you say it like that, it sounds pretty bad," Reid argued. His hand slipped out to lightly slap Lydia's hand away as she sneaked it around the condiments to steal a few fries from his plate, "Hey, I specifically asked you if you wanted any fries, and you said no. So, hands off my fries." He teased her.

"I was just making sure you hadn't drenched them in salt again." She taunted back but still managed to steal a fry from him. She glimpsed at the waitress nearing their table and called out, "Sorry to bother you, but I asked for gluten-free bread on my burger." She offered the younger woman an empathic smile while endeavouring to hand her plate.

"That is gluten-free bread." The waitress retaliated, using the back of her forearm to wipe the smidge of sweat forming at her temple, the cleaning flannel in her hand swaying as she did so.

"Sorry, but I don't think it is. It's the texture. It's just too—" Lydia stopped short as Reid's exasperated stare became her focus. "You know what, never mind. I'll take your word for it." She offered a small smile before sighing to Reid as soon as the girl was out of sight, "That," she flipped the burger bun off the fried chicken, "is definitely not gluten-free." Nevertheless, she took a small bite from the burger before returning to the topic of their previous discussion, "And, how do you want me to say it? It's hardly something I can sugar-coat, even if I wanted to. Which I don't." She added.

He allowed his head to rest upon his hands as he thought back to the night's events, "I was a pretty shitty brother, wasn't I?"

"Uh-huh." She nodded, "And I hate to say this but Ria's right. Your story doesn't make sense."

"What do you mean?"

She positioned her burger back onto the table, shaking her fingers against the tissue to remove the residual grease, "Firstly, it's Blaine. He's hardly a criminal mastermind, is he? And secondly, why would Sihem keep him around if he did it? From the stories I've heard, Rayhan sounds like a damn good father and an even better husband. So, how could Sihem forgive him? Accident or not." She placed her hands in a fist beneath her chin, elbows propped against the table's hard surface, "And, Indiya? I mean, that girl is good. Like angelic good. Why would she go along with all this?"

Reid regarded Lydia's words, his head still perched in his hands before restoring eye contact with the girl, "He admitted it, though, Lyd. He told me it was him."

Lydia tilted her head forward at Reid's words, "Wait, what? What do you mean he told you?" But Reid didn't answer immediately, "I thought you were there. I thought you saw him. That was what you said, wasn't it, Reid?"