People You May Know

Unspoken Revelations

Chapter 14: Unspoken Revelations

Lucas

Anger is a dangerous emotion. Not because of the things it can cause you to do, but because of what it can change on the inside. Anger causes you to morph into a version of yourself that you didn't think could ever exist. It causes you to become someone else entirely - a stranger who is part of you forever. Someone you don't recognize. And that is exactly who I became at Jensen's party the other night.

"Lucas, you okay, man?" I looked up from the countertop I was staring at to see Zay standing in front of me with a fresh bag of peas in his hands.

"I could be better," I mumbled, removing the bag I was already pressing gently on my eye, and replacing it with the new one.

"Dude, what got into you last night? It was like I didn't even recognize you," Zay sat on the stool next to me and leaned against the counter.

"Trust me, Zay, I didn't recognize myself," I sighed, and swiveled the stool so that my entire body was facing Zay. "It's Jensen. He's pretty much blackmailing me, if you could call it that."

"Okay, now you have to tell me what's going on," Zay lightly hit my shoulder, clearly intrigued with the impending story.

"The easiest way I can explain it all is - do you remember the party after the championship game last year?"

"How could I forget it?" Zay shook his head solemnly. "It was the day our entire school will remember forever."

"Well, we were all pretty far gone that night," I gave Zay a knowing look and he nodded, as if he understood. "There's a lot of it that's still a little hazy to me, but my memory has been coming back in sporadic fragments for the past few months... And back in March, a few weeks after it had happened, there was something that came back to me that I approached Jensen about... And it didn't go well."

5 Months Ago

"Lucas Friar. To what do I owe the pleasure?" Jensen greeted me as I lightly tapped on his bedroom door. Merritt was upstairs working on a new dance routine for dance team tryouts when I decided to sneak down to Jensen's room.

"Jensen, you were pretty close with Jessica Evans... Do you remember anything about what happened to her that night?"

"You're starting to remember," Jensen stood up from his computer chair and crossed the room to meet me in the doorway.

"I- It's still a little foggy, but I think... I think that I was there... When it happened," I explained, furrowing my brows together and glancing up at Jensen. "And so were you."

"Lucas, if I tell you what happened... You're never going to be the same again," Jensen explained. His tone had a hint of warning to it that made me feel uneasy, but I brushed it off quickly.

"I need to know. It's been eating me up ever since it happened, and I can't take it anymore," I looked up at Jensen with desperation in my eyes. "Please."

Jensen paused for a moment, as if he was analyzing my expression to determine if I could handle the truth or not.

"After we took the bus on that joyride, we ended up at the lake behind Jessica's house," Jensen explained, leading me over to his bed and gesturing for me to sit down. "She had already had one too many, but she kept asking for more. We didn't have anything left on the bus, just the one that you were holding in your hand. Jessica reached for it, but you didn't want to give it to her."

My heart started beating fast in my chest and Jensen closed his eyes as he gathered his words to finish his explanation.

"Anyway, you two were walking on the rocks near the shoreline. They were slippery and it was dark... She kept reaching for you, you kept pulling away. And when she finally grabbed the beer, something inside you must have snapped," Jensen looked me straight in the eyes and took a deep breath. "You pushed her, man. You pushed her and she fell back onto the rocks. You were so shocked that you backed away and wouldn't help her. I lunged for her, I tried to do whatever I could, but it was too late. She was gone."