Marginal Love (Book 4 LS Series)

Chapter 1

~1990~

Skipper's POV

The city is always there for me.

Even when I was just a fifteen year old girl trying to grow up too fast, the city was there.

Okay, well... maybe there were inappropriate parties, a little vodka, a little "pedophilia," a whole shit ton of heartbreak, a butterfly tumor, some rape, some drug cartels, and Michael... but the city kept me alive and well, which is all I can ask.

And well, the city giveth, and the city taketh away.

I can't remember a time in which I was truly happy here, but the apple always provided me with some sort of distraction to numb the pain. When matters of the heart weighed heavily, there were countless surgeries I could ace without thinking. When parental expectations took control, there were drug cartels.

I never said it was healthy.

The flashing street lights console me, the people milling about on the streets intrigue me. Everyone seems to be going nowhere fast.

So now, in the wake of my newest tragedy, I stare out the window-wall of Rosie's old apartment on the Upper West Side of Manhattan and look for remedies in the smog-covered stars. Placing my fingers against the cold glass, I realize that it might help to know what the hell is going on in my mind before I can find out how to solve it.

"Skipper." I hear Daddy's footsteps entering the living room behind me.

I don't move.

"You should eat something, get some sleep. Tomorrow's going to be hard."

As if I didn't know that. I turn and he looks at me as if I'm five years old again, in need of his paternal guidance. Maybe the latter is true.

I nod once and lift shaky hands to my face to wipe away the tears. It's no use, they only come right back as I am wordlessly walking up the spiral stairs to the bedroom. Cringing at every reminder of... him.

Daddy will putter around for most of the night, unsure of what do with himself or how to be useful. He isn't sad, I know that much.

I have no clue what I am.

I pull the comforter up to my chin (it's supposed to be white, but three years of dust collection has rendered it an off, greyish color) and stare at the ceiling. It feels like if the wind blew, I'd go along with it. Like a shopping bag in a parking lot.

I close my eyes and the images come again.

What do you feel? The city whispers to me.

I've got no fucking clue.

Michael's POV

"Fuck," I whisper with a sinister grin.

You could say that this fucked-up world played me a cruel hand. It delivered me a perfect girl on a silver platter. She was beautiful, and even smarter than I was (except for when it came to the streets), and then the world destroyed her. And corrupted her with the temptation of other people.

But now, obviously, the world's trying to make up for it. It's given me another chance to play.

Kate looks at me carefully. "Um, turn that TV up son."

Jermaine gives me an unreadable look and kneels in front of the ancient ass television set (which is weird, given all the monetary fucking success with music) to turn up the volume.

The reporter's voice floods the room.

"Rock fans everywhere are mourning the sudden death of Guns N' Roses frontman Axl Rose. The 31-year-old male is said to be the victim of California's unpredicable weather, as a landside carried him off the side of a cliff and to his untimely end."