|75| The facing reality

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(Au

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(Au. I think I recommend this song already but I would read this chapter while listening to Disfruto by Carla Morrison.)

"This is all my fault," I started pacing back and forth around the hall and if I tried I couldn't stop shaking. "Why is it taking him so long? Dear God, what if something happened to him, what if he got hurt? He would still be here if I hadn't kept what happened to Matteo away from him. This– it is all my fault...I should've told him."

"Mia, hey, you need to calm down, everything will be okay. Rick will find him." Nathan tells me watching me give the nth lap so far.

"Nathan, I swear to God, if something happens to him I don't think I would ever be able to forgive myself. I love him. He's my everything, I can't lose him. I can't." My voice breaks, and the tears threaten to come out. I close my eyes to stop them, but that doesn't help because saying this out loud somehow made all of this even more real than it already was. I could feel the panic rising, my lungs getting tighter, and my breathing getting slower and messier with every second that passed.

"Mia, you need to breathe. I'm sure everything is going to be alright," Nathan walks closer to me, his tone calm and collected. "He will be okay."

Swallowing down the tears, I barely find a voice, "I can't, Nathan. I-"

I'm cut in the middle of a poor excuse of my speech with the sound of the main door opening, almost smashing the wall, and that's when I see Rick walk in with Carlos hanging on his shoulder. His head is down and it looks like he can barely hold himself straight. I take a better look at him and there when I notice his clothes – his belt, it's undone, and so is his shirt.

The conclusion makes its way into my brain. No, he wouldn't. He would never do that to me. He wouldn't, right?

Rick's voice pulls me out of my thoughts. "Help me get him to the bathroom," and that's when I realize that he's talking to Nathan who instantly goes to help him, putting Carlos' free arm around his shoulder.

"What happened?" I follow them in steps, trying to get closer and figure out what's wrong with him, and that is when I notice the red lipstick marks all over his neck. My earlier thoughts crawling their way back into my brain. "Where was he?" I look at Rick, my eyes full of desperation, silently begging for answers.

But, instead of replying, he just gets into the bathroom with me following them, now confused about why is Rick staying silent and isn't explaining anything. Thinking if he might be protecting himself, Carlos, or me from the truth, but it is when I see the look on his face as he sets Carlos down that the realization hits me like a train, this is probably not what I'm thinking but worst because he isn't looking at me with sadness on his face, no, he is looking at Carlos.

"Rick, what happened to him?" I ask, still standing by the door, fear invading my body. Don't let it be true. Anything but this, please.

"Leave." He tells Nathan that simply nods and leaves without saying a word. It's when Nathan is out of sight that Rick walks closer to me "It's not my story to tell but you should know that when I- when I found him he was almost unconscious, it doesn't look like he drank that much so I'm assuming they spiked his drink and there was this woman on him. She was uh-" he stopped for a second, trying to take a breath, "she was touching him. He was trying to fight her off but she- she wouldn't stop."

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