The drive home from the funeral is completely silent. Xavier's hands are tight around the steering wheel and he doesn't say a thing, he hasn't for the last half an hour.
"Do you want to talk about it?" I whisper, he looks at me but shakes his head. I can't tell whether he's angry or frustrated, maybe both. I don't think he's good at dealing with grief either, he just reacts in a totally different way than I do.
Sighing quietly I lean my head against the window, I'm so thankful we're nearly at my house because the tension in the car is killing me. There's too many emotions mixing together all at once.
"You've got to be joking" Xavier's voice snaps me out of my daydream as we pull up to the driveway. "Why the fuck is he here?"
My eyes land on Mason, his cellphones in his hand as he stands at the front door of the house. He turns around when he hears the car pull up and I sink lower in my seat when a dark scowl makes its way onto Xavier's face. What happened between them?
"He'll just be making sure I'm alright" I whisper, although I'm not really what he's doing standing at my front door. Xavier doesn't seem to listen though because he's already loosening his seatbelt.
"Well we better let him know you're alright then" my eyes widen as Xavier climbs out of the car before I can stop him.
"Xavier no, please don't - "
"Grace?" Mason looks at me confused. I guess it would be confusing to see Xavier and I get out of his car dressed the way we are at four o'clock on a Saturday.
"Hey" I reply in an almost awkward manner. I have no idea how to act when Xavier folds his arms across his chest and stares down at Mason, who looks at me and then back at Xavier.
"Are you alright?"
"She's fine" Xavier answers for me and I glance at him sideways. "What are you doing here?"
"I'm making sure my best friend is alright" Mason replies before looking at me. "You haven't been answering any of my calls, I just wanted to check up on you. I didn't think you'd be with him, again."
"We've just been to a funeral you asshole" Xavier growls venomously as I run a hand through my hair. "So if you don't mind, I'd like to take my girlfriend inside."
Masons eyes mould into slits as he looks at me, really Xavier? Did you really have to add that just to annoy him even further? We've never even talked about what what's going on between us. I don't even know what we are and lying about it to one of my friends isn't a good place to start.
"And I'd stop staring at her like that if I was you."
"Or what?" Mason rolls his eyes. "I liked her better when she didn't know you."
Xavier steps towards him so fast I don't have time to react. He grabs the collar of his shirt and slams him against the wall of the house with so much force I can almost feel the thud from where I'm standing.
"You are very fucking lucky she cares about you" his voice is low, deadly and Masons eyes are wide all of a sudden. "Or you'd already be dead."
"Charming" Mason replies. Xavier's hold around his neck is making it hard for him to talk, let alone breathe properly and I step forward quickly. "You really know how to pick them Grace, sad that he had to pretend to be your boyfriend just to piss me off though, don't you think?"
Why? Why do boys have to be so stupid all the time?
"Xavier don't - " I try to step towards the two boys but Xavier presses Mason further into the wall and sends a large, fast, fist into his jaw with a sickening crack that makes my blood run cold.
"Xavier don't!" I move as swiftly as I can between the two of them, pushing Xavier back with as much force as I can. Mason's bent over in pain, blood coming from his mouth and the bruise is already beginning to form underneath the instant swelling that appears.
"You're fucking crazy!" Mason spits, glaring up at him from where he's hunched over on the ground.
"Do you want me to do it again?" Xavier asks darkly but my hand pushes him back again. His chest is so rigid and tense that I feel like I'm touching concrete instead of skin.
"Xavier calm down" I plead desperately, this is the last thing I feel like doing. This is the last thing Sam would want right now. "Please."
"Now you're defending him?" he asks, anger very evident in his rough voice and I sigh. Surely it's because of everything that's happened today that he's acting like this. Mason's simply staying behind me but at least he's not saying anything for now.
"I'm not defending anyone" I lower my voice. "I just don't want you to do something stupid because you're upset about Sam."
He shakes his head scoffing and turns back around to his car but my feet leave me grounded to my spot on the doormat. "Now where are you going?" I call after him as he walks away from us.
"To do something fucking stupid."
"Xavier..... Please don't do this right now" he seems to ignore me in his fit of rage, slamming his door shut and starting the loud engine before I can say anymore.
"What an absolute dick - "
"Can you just shut up for one second?" Masons eyes widen as the words leave my mouth, unable to stop them. "You wound him up on purpose, he's just lost one of his best friends and you didn't help by doing that. Why did you have to do that?"
"Grace I didn't mean to make you upset - "
I huff in frustration, running my hands across my face in an attempt to wake up from this complicated nightmare I've found myself in. "Please just go Mason, get someone to look at your jaw."
The side of his face is undoubtedly hurt and the guilt fills his eyes, making me feel worse than I already do. "I'm sorry Grace."
"Mason please" I whisper, I just feel drained now. Mentally and physically drained. "Just go."
He walks back to his truck without saying anymore to me and I'm left alone on my front door step once he pulls out of the driveway, not looking back as he does so.
I ring Xavier's number three times straight without thinking about it, but it goes straight to voicemail each time. Who would know where he is?
My fingers skim down my contacts, Paige's number she gave me today is the first thing I press before holding my phone to my ear for the fourth time in the last few minutes.
"Grace, what's up?" She answers almost immediately and that makes me feel the tiniest bit more relieved.
"Paige, hey... do you know where Xavier is by any chance?"
"No why, what's happened?" I can hear the concern in her voice as she waits for my response but I don't have a clue how to explain this to her.
"We - well, we kind of had a fight but he said he was going to do something stupid, do you know where he might've gone?"
"He might be at Cels, that old shitty bar down town. Do you want Cameron to go and check for you?"
"No, no, it's fine. Thank you though" I don't want to cause them any trouble. Especially if Xavier's just said that to worry me and is really back at his apartment, which wouldn't surprise me after how he acted before.
To be safe, I climb into my car parked in the garage, Google mapping the bar Paige told me about a few minutes earlier. It takes me half an hour to find the run down shack that looks like it should be closed for more reasons than one. I ignore the warning signs going off in my head because of its location and the people hanging around it and leave the warmth of the car for the greasy double doors. I have to make sure Xavier isn't in here.
As soon as I take a step into the dirty bar all I can smell is booze and cigarettes, it's vile. Old, sleazy men sit around with young girls wearing nearly nothing sitting on their laps in such revealing ways I find myself staring at the ground instead.
My eyes scan the small space and they land on Xavier, easily spotting his muscled figure on the small stool. He's sitting at the bar by himself, at least there's no girls grinding on his lap like all the other men here.
"Xavier?" I walk towards him and the empty shot glasses around him. If he's consumed that much alcohol then he most definitely will be intoxicated.
"For the millionth time, fuck off" his voice is more like an angry boom, startling me for a moment. "I'm not interested."
"Xavier, it's me" I touch his shoulder, although he's totally wasted I feel safer already being with him in this shady place rather than by myself around all these strange men.
"Grace?" His voice is slow from the amount of alcohol he must've had already. His wide eyes are blood shot and glassy as he looks up at me with a dazed expression on his usually stone cold face.
"What are you doing?" I can't keep the disappointment from my voice, he smells strongly of booze and I hate it, it doesn't suit him at all.
"You shouldn't be in here" he lowers his slurred voice, almost looking like an innocent child with the worried look he has on his face.
"Can we go please?" I help him off the stool before he can answer. "My cars parked outside."
"I'm a horrible person" he whispers as we make our way to the carpark in the cold air, my arms wrap around his waist and he leans against me. His usually strong legs now wobbly from his intoxicated state. "I'm sorry I punched Mitch."
"Mason" I correct quietly, helping him into the passenger seat and locking his seat belt when he struggles to do it himself.
"Yeah, he's still a prick though."
I don't answer him, he's drunk and I'm tired which won't be a good mixture after the day we've had so I just drive as he stares at me.
"I killed Sam" he suddenly blurts out after a good ten minutes of silence. "It's my fault, I should've been there and I wasn't."
"You didn't kill Sam Xavier, you did everything you could've done and that's all anyone asks of you. You're too hard on yourself all the time."
"I've tortured people before" he tells me in a mumbled voice as I swallow, I don't enjoy drunk Xavier at all. "They beg me to stop and I never do. Everyone thinks I don't feel anything but I always do, the guilt eats away at me every single fucking day. I wanted to be a doctor when I was young, a fucking doctor that saved people's lives. Now I end them. I didn't even get a choice."
I'm thankful when we pull up to his apartment and I can get him out of the car because I have no idea what to say to him. "I'm turning into my Dad" he whispers as I help him up the elevator and inside the house to the sofa since I'm not sure where his room is and don't want to risk pulling his big body upstairs. .
"You're nothing like you're Dad, you're just drunk and upset" I answer as he rips his jacket and shirt off, revealing his toned and heaving torso. When he pulls his bottom lip between his teeth, he looks frightened for a moment, like a wounded puppy.
"You should take off your shoes so you're more comfortable" I tell him. He catches me off guard when he pulls off both his shoes and suit pants so he's only left in his Calvin Klein briefs. Every single one of his perfectly tanned, scarred muscles are on full display as he flops down on the leather, letting me drop the blanket I find from the cupboard over him.
"You're going to leave me" he watches me as I tuck the blanket around him. "Just like everyone else who said they cared about me. They all leave."
"I'm not going to leave you Xavier" my eyes sting with tiredness when my hand runs slowly through his hair. "You need to sleep."
"I won't hurt you" he answers instead. "No matter what's happens, I won't hurt you."
"I know you won't."
"Do you think I'm a bad person?"
"No Xavier, I think you're drunk and upset, but you're not a bad person."
"You're a beautiful person" Xavier's tired, drunken voice mumbles as his blinking becomes heavier than before. "I think I love you a lot."