"I wasn't supposed to pick you up until four," Mark spits out.
Stop talking.
Oh my God.
"We got done early so I got a ride, since you didn't respond to any of my fucking messages."
It's impossible to look away from the carnage.
Spilled milk spreads out in a pool, covering the entry room rug, splashing against the crushed bread bag, seeping into the slats of the wood floor. An egg carton flopped open and now sticky yellow yolk stains the side of Liz's white Keds.
It's a crime scene, and I'm a serial kisser.
Momentarily, my eyes flick to the back of Mark's head. He runs his fingers through his hair and yanks the sides so they stick out straight like a shot of electricity went through them. I can see the swirl of a cowlick at the crown, and suddenly I'm remembering all the times I sat staring at it in homeroom, all through high school, and I can't help it. I smile.
"Are you smiling?" Liz asks, her voice vibrating at a frequency of kill. She takes a single step closer to me, and Mark moves into her path. His hand stretches out to stop her, and she glares at it like her eyes can set it on fire.
"Wow." She laughs, but her lips twist like she has a bad taste in her mouth. "Protecting your big city slut." The t at the end of slut rings in my ears.
It's beneath her to use that word and she knows it. Her eyes sheen with tears she's trying to hold back. My own burn—just like the tip of my tongue—with all I'm not saying.
We stare at each other for a blistering second.
No matter what their relationship is like. No matter how much I have always wanted this. I'm a thief, Mark is a cheater, and we defiled her couch with our make-out session. Not exactly role model behavior.
She flicks her eyes from me to Mark, beaming lasers of death through him. He doesn't turn to ash, but his cheeks burn red from the heat of her gaze.
"Fuck," he breathes. I get a sick feeling in my stomach. "I fucked up."
She clutches her house keys in her hand until I am one-thousand percent sure she'll draw blood.
"You fucked up?" She lunges at him. The keys are a weapon. He puts his hands up to shield himself from her wrath unleashed.
Oh. Shit.
I slide behind the couch, hoping to use it as a shield should she maim him and then decide to come for me. She's screaming at him, all her Woodland Sprite features lit up like Galadriel when she touches the One Ring in Lord of the Rings. It's ferocious and personal. I'm embarrassed to be watching. She's saying things like how could you and is this because I haven't been in the mood lately and other secret, awful stuff I shouldn't be privy to.
"It's not your fault." Mark's voice cuts through the screaming panic of Liz's. She stops shouting and goes eerily quiet, her lip quivering as tears stream down her face in anguish. "I'm an asshole," he says.
"You're a spineless, fucking asshole," she edits. She yanks her engagement ring off her finger and throws it at his feet. He doesn't even flinch. He just watches her rage dissolve into sobs. She covers her face with her hands and he says nothing else—just calmly wraps his arms around her, and she lets him.
Jesus. I so don't want to watch this. I don't want to hear about how much he loves her. I don't want to see them kiss and make up and smooth things over. It's the most selfish I've ever been in my life, but I want him to be mine. I want to go back to a time when I could have had Mark all to myself, no fiancée or anything else to get in our way.
No me getting in our way.
I back away, my eyes darting around the room for another exit. There has to be more than one door. That's like a fire code violation or something. From my vantage point, I can see that the dining room connects to the kitchen and I don't know, but I hope against hope that there is a back door.
I try to noiselessly scoot past the side table with all their framed photos on it. My eyes catch on one of those frames you get at Michael's with little ceramic hearts attached to the wood. The kind of completely kitschy shit girls in love usually adore. In the picture, Mark is holding Liz from behind, the side of his face pressed lightly against her hair. She looks so damn happy — laughing, the wind whipping her strawberry strands around her head. Then there's Mark, and he's much more subdued than she is, sunglasses hiding his eyes, but he's smiling that small smile of his.
A smile I know is totally real.
I'm so focused on the picture that I don't notice my foot slide too far to the left and hit the table leg.
Everything begins to topple like glass dominoes of their life together.
I jut forward, trying to stop them from breaking but making it so much worse. My purse hits the ceramic heart frame and it crashes to the ground, shattering.
Not the smooth getaway I was hoping for.
I squint up at both of them, who have stopped talking to glare at me. Liz's face is now stained with tears, the hair in her side braid coming out in wavy tendrils. Mark's eyes lock with mine.
"Apparently, I'm not very good at sneaking out."
"I drove Ellie here," Mark says.
Liz's tear-stained face turns to stone. "You're sure as hell not taking her home," she spits. She rips off her Keds and throws them across the room, slipping her feet into a pair of sandals by the door.
Sadness mixes with rebellion in Mark's eyes, the tiny ring of gold standing out in the brown. He knows he's done something wrong, and there's no telling how long it'll to take for them to resolve everything, but he doesn't want to let me walk out, either.
The conflict is clearly written on his face.
Liz grabs the car keys. "I'm taking her."
Hell NO.
I turn to Mark, panicked. Taking a car ride with the girl whose almost-husband I just made out with is a hard. Fucking. Pass.
"That's a horrible—" Mark starts.
"My dad can totally come get me," I interrupt, fumbling in my purse for my phone.
"I have things to say," Liz says, stepping around the mess of destroyed groceries on the floor and opening the front door. Her eyes lock on mine as she waves me forward. "Let's go."
I don't know why, but for a split second I think: This is a Liz I can get behind.
I still don't want to get in a car with her behind the wheel, but I feel like my hands are tied. I'm not a fast runner and I don't think I can get away without her following me, mowing me down. With one more sideways glance at Mark, who looks like he's just had his stomach kicked in, I gingerly step away from their broken picture-framed life, and speed walk through the door toward their car.
I climb into the passenger seat and slam the door, buckling and tightening my seatbelt, sucking in a panicked breath. I can see Liz's lips moving, Mark tucking his hands in his jean pockets, and then she's walking, face all screwed up, across the tiny front lawn.
When she's inside the car, she cranks the ignition, hard, and slides it into gear. Backing out almost gives me whiplash. I clutch my purse to my chest for protection. For how fast she zipped out of the driveway, she takes the road out of their neighborhood at a glacial pace. Slow and unnerving. Her face cold as ice.
I stare out the window at a mom walking her napping baby in a stroller, her eyes on her phone, paying no attention to the woman who's about to be brutally murdered.
The mom easily passes us.
Liz should just get on with it. Whatever she wants to say to me, she should just lay it all out. When she eases to a stop before turning left out of the neighborhood, her hands slide from the wheel. She just sits there, looking out the front windshield, mom and baby crossing the street and ambling away.
Is she waiting for her to be gone so there will be no witnesses?
"I shouldn't have said that," Liz finally says. "The slut thing."
"You don't have to apologi—"
"Oh, I'm not." She cuts her eyes across me, turning on her completely unnecessary blinker. The tick-tick-tick fills the car. "But you aren't the problem."
She turns, accelerating at an almost normal rate. We overtake the walking mom, pass her, and turn onto the main road through town.
"It takes two to make out on a couch," I finally say to the inside of my purse. Liz's lips twitch and she nods. I'm not the problem, but I'm not off-the-hook, either.
"He's been different ever since shit went down with his mom," Liz says. "We've fought about everything to do with the wedding — I knew he wasn't as into it as I was. Maybe he was struggling with how it made him feel — I don't know. I just wanted things to be normal again."
Her words are almost stream of consciousness. She's trying to understand, but she knows she can't make it okay. This can't be explained away.
"I didn't expect him to make out with some random girl."
Wow. Random is a bit of an understatement. I bite down on my lip before replying.
"I wasn't planning on any of this happening. I just needed his help with a list."
Liz's brows shift in like she's furrowing them. She stops at a red light, and looks over, raising her eyebrows in question. I pull my phone from my purse. It's full of new texts from Vic and Tina, but there are a couple of missed calls from a number I don't recognize. Whoever it was didn't leave a voicemail. Nothing from Mark. Thankfully. He knows I'm still in the car with Liz, and while I'm sure he's flipping out, he would be a complete idiot to text me right now.
Salt in this gaping wound.
I unlock the phone, scroll to my photo of the list, and show her. After a second, she looks up, straight into my eyes, and asks, "High school crush?"
Her voice cracks on the word.
I pull my hand back, nodding. "Since sixth grade."
Fuck, somehow Liz actually looks sorry for me.
Oh hell no.
"I was over him," I say quickly. "For years. I hadn't even thought about Mark Wright, or high school. Not until my stupid showrunner gave me this ridiculous list and promised me a promotion if I came to this godforsaken reunion."
Thanks again, Andy. I'll have to remember to send him cyanide chocolates when all this is over.
The light turns green. Liz starts driving again, but I can tell she's mulling the whole thing over.
"And he was helping you?" She sounds almost hopeful. Like she wants Mark to still be the guy she was about to marry, the same guy who loved Stonybrook and wanted to grow old here. That guy might have helped me out of the goodness of his heart. That guy wouldn't have a secret reason all his own, a plan to change his whole life.
That first guy isn't the Mark I made out with on the couch.
Maybe he never really was.
"Yes, he was helping me." She deserves to know the truth of why, but Mark should be the one to tell her.
She turns down my street. Dad is out front doing some early fall pruning in the flower bed. As she pulls up, letting the car idle, he looks over, grins, and waves when he sees me in the passenger seat. I give him a tight smile, tiny wave.
We sit in awkward silence for another overlong beat. Can I get out? Is it rude to just, bolt? Cut and fucking run.
My hand hovers at the door handle. She doesn't stop me. So I pull it, flicking my eyes to her once before climbing out and letting the door slam shut. She drives away before I take a step up the sidewalk. My phone begins to buzz, that unfamiliar number calling again. I roll my eyes and answer. It's probably a robo call.
"Hello?" I say, pressing the phone lightly to my ear, ready to hang up. I squeeze Dad's shoulder as I pass him on my way to the front door.
"Meet me at the school tonight at seven." I immediately recognize the voice.
"Roxy, how did you get my number?" I grumble.
"Wear something spirited."
Then she's gone.
A/N
Hey, gorgeous readers, Faith here!
This week's chapter comes straight from my own worst nightmares. I've never been the other woman, but I am a recovering people pleaser. I would be utterly and completely mortified - maybe even beg Liz to kill me - if I were in the middle of this kind of situation.
Have you guys ever found yourself in a OMG I WISH I COULD CRAWL IN A HOLE AND HYBERNATE UNTIL AFTER THE ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE pickle?
Let us know!
As always, thank you for reading and voting and generally being AWESOME!
XO
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