Endgame (Book 3)

Chapter 42

I didn't know what else to do. I was angry, and tired, and sick of being tired.

And as I stood there, fists clenching and unclenching at my sides, I wondered if I should've followed her to make sure she wouldn't ever come back. Really, I just wanted to yell at her some more.

But I couldn't allow myself to fall down that rabbit hole again. It would hurt me just as much as it did her. I was a broken, sobbing mess right now.

I floated myself down to the ground with a harder landing than I would have liked, but I was surprised at the amount of control I had developed considering how little time I had to do it.

Before opening the door, I wiped my face clean of any fresh tears and got rid of the snot under my nose to remove the visible effect Cassie had on me so my parents wouldn't see. Even still, as I entered the house, they were waiting for me in the kitchen and called me back.

As I rounded the corner, the two of them were fixing dinner, and Ashley was at the counter sitting and looking at me sympathetically.

I tried to hide my puffy eyes, but they already knew.

Mom left the sink to give me a hug. I accepted it without returning it. I wasn't in the mood.

"Honey, it's going to be okay," she said, trying to soothe me. "We could hear everything from down here. You will get through this."

"You sure do curse like you used to," Dad half-joked, not turning to look at me. His voice was strained. He was unsure if he needed to be completely serious, lighten the mood, or just listen.

I laughed into Mom's shoulder. Part of me wanted to give in to her, to bawl my eyes out, to say how unfair it was, how cruel the world could be- and I didn't because of how ashamed I was for crying over it already.

The other part was trying to figure out how even my extraordinary life could still throw me the most normal curveball in existence- a breakup- and still almost send me spiraling into depression and teenage drama.

"'You will get through this?'" I repeated to her as she pulled away. "You make it sound like I'm going to be around for a while."

Her tone quickly changed from sympathetic to defensive. "I know you will. Have faith. We'll figure out another way."

I wanted to believe her, but there was just so little time. Too much had happened already, too much on both my shoulders and Jeremiah's. I had to right both our wrongs.

On my own.

As I had been from the start. People kept switching and rotating out of my life and no one seemed to stay for long. Life in the pod, where very little made sense, had told me so much about real life without me realizing it, but the problem was that it was my life until I woke up. Now I've been playing catch up on the past sixteen years only to realize I can't even finish the race. My journey is pretty much at its end.

The truth of the matter was, I was no one to them. And as much as they tried to make me feel like I was at home, they weren't my family. I didn't have one.

Zero was my more powerful and opposite half, yes, and my enemy, but he was also the only person keeping me together right now. And if what he said earlier was true, my well being was the only thing keeping him going as well.

"Just, uh...thanks for always being here, Mom. And you, too, Dad," I said, giving him an uncertain nod. I took several steps toward the stairs. "I'm going to head to bed. Tomorrow's going to be a busy day."

I glanced at Ashley in the corner. She was still watching me intently, but didn't say anything.

"I think I'm going to get some sleep, too, Mrs. West." Ashley jumped from the table and hurried to go up the stairs. "Ben is on the phone working some things out with the facility, but I'll check on him and then check in."

"Alright, then. Goodnight," Mom said.

"See you in the morning," Dad said.

Ashley raced up the stairs to catch up to me and caught me before I went in my room.

"Hey!" she said a little too loudly.

"Hey.." I said, a bit weirded out by her enthusiasm. "Is there something you wanted to say to me?"

"Just that I care. About you," she blurted out. "And I don't want you to die. And if there's anything I can do to stop it, I will. And I know you just got out of a relationship with my cousin, but I'm going to tell you this anyway in case you do something stupid."

This was very different from her normally cool attitude, and it took me a second to think about the fact that A: she may have liked me back and B: Cassie was her cousin. That explained the resemblance.

But she wasn't finished. "Jay, I want to spend more time with you. I don't know what it is I feel for you, or if you feel the same about me, but I am willing to give up everything I have right now to find out. And that only comes with time."

"Which is something I don't have." I took the breath she paused to take as an opportunity to stop her. "Look, I don't know if I can even deal with another girl after I just went through. And that's assuming I survive after this," I said. "I won't let you and I start to develop something and allow you to be heartbroken over me when I saw it coming. That would make me just as bad as her."

I raised my left fist and put it to my heart. "I feel it here right now. I was blinded by loving someone who wasn't meant to love me back, and as a result, I have this giant hole in my chest that I know can't be filled by another person. Not right away."

I let it sink in. Who thought it would be me rejecting her?

But there was no other way. I had taken the first step; lied and told all of them I had three days to prepare for the fight when I only had two just to make sure they didn't see what I was about to do coming. I had pushed them all away and told them I had to do this alone.

It was necessary.

I had let them pay the price for my actions for too long. The best I could do was prevent them from wasting any more of their lives with me.

"If Ben doesn't make you happy, break up with him, do whatever. Just don't put your bets on me. You'll lose."

I turned and walked towards the direction of my room, refusing to look back at her.
Ben was talking on the phone in an almost angry tone when I came in, facing my window. Upon seeing me enter, he quickly walked out into the hallway.

I closed the door behind me and stripped, putting on my sleeping clothes after and trying to forget the emotions tumbling around my mind. Then, I plopped onto the bed, my eyes closing the moment my head hit the pillow.

Before I knew it, I was out.