The Boiling Point | ✔️

44 | nosedive

a/n: just a reminder to please vote, it might not seem like much but it really helps the story out! also you'll probably have a lot of thoughts about this chapter so don't hold back your comments ♡

•·················•·················•

SUMMER

I'm not sure how I got here. I know I drove, but I can't remember doing it. I think my mind just took me on the route it knows off by heart because I drive it every day. School to Villas, Villas to school. What I've been limited to for weeks. Until yesterday. Yesterday. When it felt so simple. So peaceful with him.

I swallow the pain and get out the car, walking up the pathway to the house, but I struggle to unlock the door because of my trembling hands. How is it possible to be full of energy and none at all? How is it possible to feel numb and a million stabs to the heart at the same time? I take a breath and shake out my hands, steadying them enough to turn the key. The doorbell camera catches my eye, but I don't care if I set off an alert to Mrs. Villa. She'll see that I'm alone.

It seemed like the safest solution to be alone. Staying at the lake probably would have resulted in me having a full-blown meltdown, worse than the explosive one I had. We'd carry on fighting, talking everything through, but what could be said that hasn't been said already? What other justification could Ashton give for sleeping with two other girls on a night that meant so much to us? Leaving them and running to confess his secret to me, to have sex with me, to gain my trust back. To sew my heart back together.

Now, it feels like the gold thread has been ripped away without warning, my heart becoming undone. Nothing but raw debris left.

That night was our turning point. Without it, yesterday wouldn't have happened. Last night and all that intimacy wouldn't have happened, all that vulnerability this morning, and me being so stupidly under his spell that it blinded me to his natural habits. Lying, and womanizing, and fucking anything with a pulse.

He never would have told me if Charlie hadn't opened her mouth. I would have given up everything for him, and he would have sat on this big ugly stain of a secret forever.

A fresh bout of anger rushes into me as I climb the staircase, and the urge to grab my pillow and scream my rage out overcomes me. But then a light grabs my attention on the landing. The door to Mr. Villa's study is ajar, a dim light spilling into the hallway. He must have forgotten to turn it off before they left for their weekend getaway.

I put my pillow-screaming urge on hold and go to switch it off, but the urge flies away when I walk through the doorway, pausing at the sight of Mr. Villa himself illuminated by the lamp on his desk. He's hunched over, rubbing his temples with one hand, a tumbler of whiskey in the other.

"Mr. Villa!" I gasp. "What are you doing here?"

He jumps at my voice, his head snapping up. "Summer! Oh, we uh, cut our trip short. Denise went to bed so I was just—" His eyebrows crease as he gathers himself. "Wait, what are you doing here? Aren't you supposed to be staying with Lola this weekend?"

His voice is a little lazy, his demeanor a little disheveled. I wonder how much whiskey he's gone through.

"I am," I stumble out. "I mean, I was, but... um..." I can feel myself start to wilt, the heaviness in my chest dragging me down as I try to get the words out.

The concern builds in his crystal eyes the second I hesitate. "Did something happen?"

I grit my teeth, holding myself together before I have another meltdown. "Yes, but I don't wanna talk about it."