Jane lives on the brink of an adolescence about to end and an age she doesn't know how to deal with. Everything she knows about life has been taught her by Jace, the older brother, and his best friends: two guys that in common simply have a passion...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Jace and I are in the bathroom, the perfect infirmary after what happened. He, with a damp cloth, dabs the area just below the eye, the only part of the face that seems to have reported visible damage. Every time he touches me, however, I am forced to hold back the whines, even if the droplets of fresh water try to distract me from the continuous throbbing of the skin that is touched. I could try to lie anyway, but it wouldn't do any good: Seth's punch wanted to hurt, he had been charged to hit and make a mark - and he did, but on the wrong body.
What ensues, therefore, is the bewildering certainty that he seriously wanted to hurt my brother, punish him for something that, in his opinion, had to be right and that he, certainly, would have considered wrong.
I look at Jace's face with the corner of the eye. Is expression is so cruel that it is clear that he is reproaching himself for what happened. I almost think I can read his thoughts.
He will be endlessly repeating that he were an idiot, that he could no longer call himself an older brother worthy of the name - but he is, I was the one who was stupid enough to put herself in the middle of something that didn't concern or compete with her. So, as I stare at his face, I remember that in a little over an hour he will have to go down the stairs of the second floor, grab the suitcases he has at the entrance and go away, with a heavy heart and guilt to burden his spirit.
My brother is not the type to take things lightly, he will not forgive himself for what has happened so easily, indeed, I fear he will never really be able to do it, even if he should. The mistake was not his, not even Seth's. The mistake was mine, which I wanted to interpose between them to prevent the catastrophe from taking place, for their friendship to end with a broken nose and both of them at the hospital; because they certainly wouldn't stop at the first punch.
«Okay JJ, that's enough ...» with the arm I pushed his hand away from my face, trying to pull him away from me. I struggle to stand the way he has of looking at the bruise, just as I can no longer bear to stand here and breathe his feelings of guilt.
I jump off the marble top of the sink, trying to wipe the dampness from my cheeks with the fingers: «you have to call the taxi and make a final check of the lugg-» he interrupts me abruptly, in a tone of voice that shake my guts . He still yelling, without understanding that there is no reason, that we are less than two feet apart and that my hearing works very well: «Do you really thing a care something about the flight? Jay, did you see how your face is tanned?»
