Miles didn't stop calling me until I turned my phone off. I tucked myself away while I waited for Oliver and kept a careful watch for any one of them. It took a bit, but the car finally pulled up with a confused Oliver and my concerned older brother in the passenger seat. Winter watched me carefully as I got in, already seeing something wrong with that keen sense of his. I'd texted him the night before that I'd be staying with Miles, so it wasn't like he was completely in the dark, but so much had happened between then and now that it felt like a life time ago. I didn't know what to say when we first pulled away, the droning radio was the only thing keeping us from an awkwardly tense silence. They wanted to know, but neither wanted to ask, and I wanted to tell them, I just didn't know where to start. In the end, I settled for just letting the words come as they'd come.
"Oliver, how well do you know Cain?"
He startled a bit, confusedly asking, "Not that well, why?"
"I'm going to hurt him," I answered honestly watching as both pairs of eyes widened and rounded on me. "I'm going to hurt him and I want to make sure I'm not hurting you in the process."
"What happened, August?" Winter turned almost completely around in his chair, too worried to obey simple traffic laws.
It was a momentary debate. Did I tell them what I knew, or did I keep it to myself?
"Please," Winter tacked on. "You're not an aggressive person, you know I'll only worry more if you don't. Don't keep me in the dark."
Nodding, I conceded. "Cain is the reason Diego's in jail. He admitted it to me this morning."
The elders exchanged a look, something I couldn't read, but knew was laced with disbelief. Oliver hesitated in speaking, "Not that I'm calling you a liar, babe, but Cain has worked with me for a long time and I don't really get how he would do that. Diego stole. That's it."
Shaking my head, I explained a lowly detailed version of all that had occurred since Frankie picked me up from work yesterday. I left out the fact that I actually really liked being around my friends, and that for a brief, alcohol infused second, I'd wondered what it would be like to be with one of them. I left out the kiss and the hazy memory of talking with Isaac, something that scared me because I couldn't remember just what I'd told him. Instead, I told them about Owen and Mae worming their way into Diego's head, and Miles using me for information. I told them about Cain mocking me and how he'd done it. By the time I was done, we were pretty much home, and both my companions had a sort of grave look on their face. Oliver's temper was no doubt spiked by the tale, his hands clenching the wheel a bit tighter than before. His eyes flit up to the mirror to meet with mine and I could tell he wouldn't put up a fight anymore.
"What are you planning?" He asked, suddenly eager to assist. Oliver probably took this as a personal insult considering they were supposed to be his friends.
My plan wasn't quite solid yet, I needed information first, so I told him, "Nothing's one hundred percent yet. I need to do a little research first and then I'll go from there."
"I know a lot about him if you need anything," Oliver offered.
"Great," I was genuinely happy he offered just in case, "I have a friend looking into it already."
"What friend?" Winter asked, suspicious again. He had every right to worry, because any friend of mine he didn't know was probably not a friend.
My connection wasn't exactly a bad person. He was definitely my mother's informant, but he liked me enough that anything I asked he would probably do. For me, that made us friends, but I wasn't sure my brother would agree. Still, knowing that my hesitation was bound to set him off, I quietly answered, "Zig."
Quiet fell between us, but his disapproval didn't need words. Winter didn't like Zig very much and I think it was partially my fault. He'd always been very friendly with me, something that Winter said was suspect in itself. Personally, I didn't think Zig's attachment to me was due to any underlying motives. Outgoing was just the kind of person he was, why wouldn't he be that way with us too?
"I don't like how he treats you," Winter declared abruptly.
Confused, I asked. "What do you mean how he treats me?" Zig's affectionate July rang through my ears. "He's nothing but nice."
"Exactly. You don't think that's at all strange?" He implored. "You don't see anything weird about the way Zig interacts with you?"
"No." And it was true. I'd known Zig for a long time and in that time he'd done nothing but treat me well. We weren't people who kept contact like ordinary friends, but he'd been a common occurrence in our house when I was younger. Zig was pretty young himself, edging towards twenty-one if I remembered correctly. He'd been a teenager when my mother enlisted him for one of her many revenge plots and that was one of the reasons we got on so well. Zig wasn't like my friends at school, he actually knew what our life was like and he pretended he didn't. When he'd come to visit, it was like things weren't crazy and he wasn't there with something stolen or otherwise illegal for my parents. It was this, and many other reasons, that put Zig on my list of trusted people. I trusted him enough to know that calling him wouldn't find its way back to my mother. I trusted that he would help me when I needed it.
"I just think there are smarter ways to handle the situation," Winter sighed at me, obviously giving up the fight. "Please be careful. As friendly as he is, you never know who people can be."
We'd arrived at the house and he didn't hesitate to stand and walk inside. Oliver gave me a sympathetic shrug before we both followed my brother up the snowy driveway. They both disappeared immediately, no one else standing between me and my room where I tiredly dropped into my bed. It was then that I actually gave myself the space to think about what I'd been avoiding. I had been used again. Used by people I thought were kind to me, people I thought could make my life feel full. It was stupid of me to get so attached so quickly. I was stupid to think anyone would just get to know me for the sake of getting to know me, but at least I got something out of the experience. I may have been hurt, in more ways than I cared to admit, but I also had something I didn't have before. Now, I had a goal to accomplish. Something that wasn't just basic survival and it was almost a good feeling. Plus, now I had Zig again.
It had been years since the last time we'd spoken because I was too afraid to call. I was afraid that they'd somehow know despite knowing how secretive Zig was. I was afraid he'd take their side and send us right back, but I knew that wasn't the case. Winter may have had his doubts, but like I said before, I knew we could trust him. I knew we could trust him because I knew Zig trusted me, at least, he trusted me more than he did most people. Again, there was no particular reason for Zig and I to get along as well as we did. There was no reason he should've ever given me his personal number, or better yet, his legal name, but he did. Ravi would come through for me, and maybe this time we could actually be friends. Maybe without my parents breathing over my shoulder I could contact him like I wanted to. I could be someone he fully trusted.
Or maybe I was still being delusional. Maybe I read too much into Ravi's friendliness. Maybe I was so desperate for something, anything, that made me feel like my life was worthwhile that I was willing to take the risk. Maybe I was just a mess right then and I needed a nap. I absentmindedly nodded to myself. Yes, it was rest I needed. I needed to sleep away the hurt and the anger so I could make decisions with a level head. The promise I'd made to Cain wasn't something easy to deliver, but I would be ready for it. If I'd learned anything from my upbringing, it was how to bring a grown man to tears with a little dirty work and he was going to learn what made a Schuler. That asshole was going to understand exactly why you shouldn't judge a book by its cover, and I couldn't wait for it. It might've still been morning, but I fell asleep to thoughts of sweet revenge.
Every night that week, my dreams held hints of the future that both delighted and sickened me. I could see the crushed look on their faces when the ground fell from beneath them. I could almost hear the begging for forgiveness, and it terrified me. I don't think I have ever been as afraid of myself as I was that week because I'd never felt such a fire in my veins. I suppose it had never really hit me how protective I was over Diego, and Blair, and just everyone. I didn't think such a thing would affect me so much until the situation was shoved in my face and now I wondered how I could've ever called myself distant. It was clear that I loved these people whether I'd admit it or not. I really loved my brothers and for someone to come between us meant hell to pay. I was thriving off the planning and the thrill of getting back at them. I worked all three of my jobs with a renewed vigor, spurred on by the eventual coming together of ideas.
Within two weeks, Zig contacted me again. I was at the club, two hours into my shift and nowhere near able to answer my phone, so he did something he rarely did. The voicemail was sitting there waiting for me when I got home, driving me away from the house's inhabitants and into my private sector of the world where I promptly pressed play. It wasn't like him to leave a trace, so I expected the surprisingly cryptic call about pizza and meeting tomorrow. It was a silly coverup, but it got the point across and I couldn't wait. It was time for things to happen, time for the full force of karma to bite Cain in the ass. Tomorrow would come quickly, and the day would be January seventeenth, overcast as hell and exceptionally cold. Like the day it all transpired, I could remember the seventeenth fairly perfectly, another wonderful domino in the line of times I'd royally fucked up. This time, it wasn't me who payed the price.