{18+ COMPLETED • COLLEGE ROMANCE}
When a college freshman with a learning disability and a reputation collides with a straight-A, straight-laced girl in the dorm kitchen one night, he sees the darkest parts of himself reflected in her. But the two o...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
B R E N
There wasn't time to stop it.
Just like that night with my mom, there wasn't anything I could do.
The bullet left the gun before my feet had the chance to move.
My mom had collapsed to the floor.
Now it was my turn.
The only thing I could do was flinch. In that millisecond before the bullet hit me, I tried to escape it. For some reason, I actually fucking tried.
I ended up on the floor. Just like I had known I would. I wasn't even sure if the bullet knocked me down or if I threw my body to the ground myself. But now blood was hitting the dirty, wooden slats. That spilling, seeping blood. Out of the corner of my blurry vision, I saw it.
There was screaming.
When my mom had died, it had been my voice ricocheting off the walls. A sixteen-year-old boy, shrieking like a small child. Drowning like a victim, yet still left alive to breathe in the cold water.
Now, Madie screamed.
Pain radiated down from my shoulder, spreading throughout my chest. If this was dying, it was going far too slow. I lifted my hand to my shoulder, trying to find where the blood was coming from, tracing the source of the pain. It wasn't enough blood. It wasn't enough blood for dying.
I felt the open wound, hissing as it throbbed beneath my fingers. The cut skimmed across the surface of my skin, my shirt ripped from where the bullet must have grazed me.
I groaned and lifted my head.
"Bren!" Madie shrieked, flailing as she strained against Quinton, her face turning the deepest shades of fire.
"Oh, fuck," Quinton said. He lifted an unsteady hand to his face. It was the one with the gun, the gun that had just unloaded on me. But then Quinton shook his head, running that hand over the sweat on his forehead. "Thank fucking god."
He dropped the gun. His face twisted in hatred. But it was a different kind of hate than what had been there two minutes ago. It was deep, dark, self-loathing. "I couldn't—I fucking couldn't—."
It was almost like he was apologizing for not killing me.
Without warning, he released Madie, his other arm swinging to his side. She collapsed to the floor, her knees hitting the ground first. But it only took her a moment to recover from the sudden fall. Her head whipped up; her eyes found mine.
"Madie," I croaked. I started to reach out for her, wincing and swearing beneath my breath from the pain. And then she was in my arms.
Hell, she was in my arms. And I was alive, actually alive.
