Page 79 of Birdy

We can’t do this anymore.

I read it again and again and again, positive my mind is playing tricks on me after not sleeping shit last night, but nothing changes. My world was already spinning out of control, all of it unfolding in a span of days, and now it’s crashing down completely.

I knew something was wrong...

Was it something I did, something I didn’t do? Was it yesterday’s sweep and the fact they found the phone? Does he think I’m going to rat him out?

Did he really not believe me when I gave him my word?

These are just some of the questions floating through my mind as white-hot tears begin to stream down my face. I couldn’t stop them if I tried, much less hold them back. They’re falling of their own accord, the dam of pure, harrowing grief busting wide open, drowning me in its treacherous depths. Between Ma’s diagnosis, the Ryker ordeal, Koko and Franca banding together, Lena being thrown in the hole,andthe huge possibility that Counselor Judge has already ripped apart my early release papers, I can’t handle any more.

I just can’t.

I can’t handlethis.

I’d been afraid it would happen all along, and now, here we are in real-time. It’s happening, regardless of the fact I can’t understand how or why, when everything was perfectly fine just yesterday, and there’s nothing I can do to stop it. I can’t go out there and make a scene, can’t demand answers from him. I can’t do anything except sit here and lick my wounds, both new and old. The one I can’t reach?

My heart.

Feels like there’s a giant gaping hole in my chest, all those years of trying to repress what I felt over Ángel’s betrayal flooding back to the forefront and melding with this fresh, new wave of agony left in Andrés’ wake. Our time together wasn’t long, but that doesn’t make it any less excruciating. It’s so excruciatingly painful that I’m folding in on myself, a hand sealed over my mouth to muffle the sobs I’m just barely subduing.

Why? Why is he doing this?

You’d think it couldn’t get worse, right? Wrong, so fucking wrong.That obnoxious-ass buzzer resounds through the block, and I hear it, I do, but I’m so lost in the throes of this never-ending shitshow that it doesn’t really register until I hear a throat clearing.

Watery eyes snapping open in tandem with my head popping upright, I find Lena standing at the threshold of our cell. She looks nothing short of exhausted, yet her expression is alarmingly blank. The fire blazing in her eyes, though? I can’t bear it, tossing the note aside and rushing to embrace her.

But she wants no part of it, holding a hand out before I can wrap my arms around her.

I skid to a stop just a few feet away, all the air whooshing from my lungs like she’s just kicked me in the gut. “Lena, please, listen to me,” I start, but there’s that hand again keeping me at arm’s length as she turns her head away from me.

“Don’t fuckingLename,” she grits venomously. “I just spent almost an entire day in Seg for your ass, and you know what else I got?”

She’s still not looking at me, but I shake my head, my heart imploding and shattering for the second time in the span of minutes.

“More time.” Her voice comes deathly quietly. “They’re gonna add more fucking time to my already long-ass sentence becauseItook the fall foryou.”

She WHAT?

My jaw nearly tumbles to the floor, knees threatening to buckle as the gravity of that statement consumes me. Those damned tears hadn’t stopped flowing, but they’re really gushing down my face like twin waterfalls now. “Why would you do that? Why would you tell them it was yours? You should’ve told them—”

“Told them what? That it was yours instead when you’ve got early release on the table? You know I don’t snitch, Benni, ever,” she tosses back, eyes narrowing as they snap right on me, and while I know that’s true—it’s one of the things we bonded over when we first met—I’m still astonished.

Choking on more guilt than I can swallow.

“But why would you tell them it was yours? I don’t understand—”

“I didn’t,” she snaps, effectively cutting me off again. “I didn’t say shit. It wouldn’t have mattered anyway. Given where you had it stashed, it looked like it was mine.”

My eyes widen in realization. The bunk post—that’s why Mack didn’t write it off as mine. “Lena, I… I didn’t even think about—”

“Yeah, no shit,puta. You didn’t think about anyone but yourself. Now I’m the one that’s gonna pay the price while you get to walk free!” Lunging for me, she shoves me back, hard.

Hard enough that I stumble when I hadn’t even seen it coming.

I don’t retaliate, though. I know I deserve that and so much more. “No, I won’t let that happen. I’ll come clean right now, tell them it was mine. I’ll fix this, Lena, I swear to you. I’m not gonna let you go down for something you had nothing to do—”

Lena growls in frustration, and before I can dodge, her fist makes contact with my nose, a move Ishouldhave seen coming after that shove. White speckles dot my vision as my entire face sings from the force of her strike.

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