Page 105 of Cruel King

My brain fills with a single horrible thought I can’t believe is true. Theo’s dead. No. That’s not possible. It can’t be.

Matthias tries to wrap his arms around me, but I keep punching him, needing something to take out my pain on. “He can’t be gone! No! I never got the chance to talk to him. He can’t be dead. Please tell me it’s not true. Tell me, and I’ll forgive you for being cruel. I promise I will, Matthias. Just tell me he’s okay.”

He says nothing when I tilt my head back to look up at him. All he does is shake his head no. Please let this be a nightmare and I can wake up so it’s not real. Please don’t let Theo be gone. Not my Theo.

I let my hands fall to my sides as every ounce of strength drains from my body. Matthias holds me tightly while I sob uncontrollably against his chest, crushed by the news. Theo is gone. No, please God, no. I had so much more I wanted to say to him. How could he be gone? The world will never be the same without him in it.

“Why? Why did it have to Theo? We never got to talk to him again, Matthias. How can I go on without telling him I’m sorry just one more time so he can hear how much I never wanted to hurt him? I can’t handle this. Please tell me it’s not true. Please.”

Matthias presses a kiss to the top of my head and quietly says, “I’m so sorry, Ava.”

The tears continue to come as if I can’t stop crying. He guides me into the house, but being inside makes it all too real that Theo’s gone, and he’ll never come back now. I’ll never have a chance to see his smile when I say something funny. I’ll never get to wrap my arms around him again.

Worst of all, the last time we ever spoke to one another was horrible.

I collapse to the floor, shaking my head as utter sadness fills every inch of me. I never got to show him how much I loved him and how much I miss him, and now that chance is gone forever.

As Matthias carries me upstairs, I sob into his shoulder, desperate to wake up from what has to be a nightmare. Theo can’t be gone. I never got to say goodbye or make him understand how sorry I was.

“Rest a while in here,” Matthias says before gently setting me down on his bed. “I have to handle things for now, but I’ll be back, okay?”

I don’t answer him, unable to do anything but cry. My best friend is gone.

Matthias kisses me on the cheek and whispers, “I love you. We’ll get through this.”

No words come out of my mouth before he walks away and closes the door behind him. I don’t know how long I lie there sobbing until my throat is raw and my entire body aches, but at some point I realize this isn’t where I should be.

Guided entirely by emotion, I walk down the hall and open Theo’s bedroom door. The room smells like his cologne, that woodsy stuff I bought him. He wore it from that day on, claiming it was the only scent he ever liked.

Looking around at the walls covered in pictures, I see one of the two of us from that night at the Spring Festival this year hung over his desk. It was a selfie I had no idea he printed out later. He never mentioned it.

I reach out and touch his smiling face, remembering how he turned to kiss me right after he took this picture. My Theo.

How am I going to live without you?

The image becomes blurry through my tears, so I pull it down off the wall to press it to my heart before lying down on his bed. He can’t be gone. Please, God. Don’t let him be gone. Bring him back to me so he can know how much I miss him.

I stare up at the cloud that looks like a whale and wonder if things are always going to be like this. “You see the whale?” I ask Theo.

He doesn’t answer for a few seconds, and when I turn to look at him, he’s squinting his eyes. “I don’t see a whale. That looks like a car to me.”

Nudging his arm, I laugh. “It’s a whale. You’re crazy.”

“Just because I don’t see what you see? You’re pretty bossy today, Ava.”

I glance over and see him smiling. Theo and I have only had one fight in the entire time we’ve known each other, and that only lasted a week. It was when he was twelve and I was ten. Since then, we’ve been thick as thieves again, like my mother says.

“We aren’t going to have another fight, are we? Because that’s a whale,” I say with a chuckle.

Theo rolls over and shakes his head as he looks at me. “We’re never fighting again. I told you that. You and I are going to live here forever.”

“Best friends forever,” I say, happy at the sound of that.

He props his head up on his hand and looks down at me. “We should do something today. I’m tired of staring up at the clouds.”

“Aren’t you going out with Marley to the carnival later?”

Rolling his eyes, he blows the air out of his mouth like the thought of going out with his newest girlfriend bothers him. “Maybe. I don’t know.”

---