𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐝𝐢𝐩𝐢𝐭𝐲

Bonus: 83.5

TW: toxic relationship, questionable romance (fade-to-black). This chapter is experimental and won't affect the main story!

— 83.5 —
Silver and Gold

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C H A I N S

"For fuck's sake, would you slow down?"

Pressed right up against the passenger seat of Sage's purple sports car, my request went swiftly ignored. She pressed down harder on the accelerator pedal. Tires burned against the asphalt. Engine roaring, the line in her speedometer ticked into the red zone. With unpredictable control, she waited until the very last moment to swerve out of the way of other cars that happened to be on the road at this time of night—knowing full well that her reckless actions were scaring me shitless.

After following Sage away from the mess we'd made at the abandoned tracks, I'd gotten in her car, desperate to share my side of the story before she went off like a bomb and shot someone else—or worse, killed them. Seething in her own skin, she hadn't said anything to me, hadn't even looked at me. But she hadn't stopped me from getting in the car with her, either. Right now, I was just a fly on her shoulder, a harmless pest she was waiting for the right moment to swat away.

It wasn't easy to get Sage angry, but once she was, it took a lot of focus to keep her from destroying everything in sight.

"Where are we going?" I probed, daring to take my eyes off the road. Sage's full lips pulled themselves tight, silent. A line appeared where her brows had creased together. "Jesus Christ, would you just talk to me?"

Nothing. Nada. Zip. I would've had more luck talking to a mirror.

With my stomach somewhere three miles behind us, I suffered through her aggressive driving, trying to keep track of where we were going. The south end of Boston, from the looks of it. The vibrant, modern structures of the city had already melted into shadowy, unkempt streets, which were lined on both sides with parked cars, dimly lit lampposts, and dead, unswept leaves.

Soon enough, Sage finally pulled the car to a stop in front of a place I knew all too well. A drug house. Her house.

Not one that she lived in anymore, I assumed; but the house still belonged to her, nevertheless.

Her silence continued to permeate as we got out of the car. Taking a minute to regain my bearings, I stared up at the derelict two-story building whilst Sage cupped her bloody arm and trudged up the cement footpath.

Built from deep-red wood that was rotting and falling apart, the place was lined with once white—now beige—gutters, front steps, and support beams. Any patches of grass in the front yard had aged to a dull shade of yellow, as lifeless as the house itself. Its French front doors barely held themselves up on their hinges. The quartered windows were dusty, a few panes long broken, whilst the front porch was littered with decaying pizza boxes, mismatched shoes, cigarette butts and empty beer bottles.

In the state it was in, you could fool anyone into thinking that the place had been abandoned for years. In reality, once the sun hit, the whole house would be alive with activity—swarming with Pit Vipers, drug addicts, and barely dressed women, all of whom were desperate for their morning fix.

I huffed skeptically. "What the hell are we doing here?"

Again, nothing.

Catching up to her, I caught the door right before it shut, following Sage inside as she expertly navigated a path through the never-ending mess. A brain-frying stench of old smoke, rancid beer, rotting food and wet floor pricked at my eyes like needles. The place smelled as fucking dreadful as it looked.