Page 107 of Go Luck Yourself
About an hour later, I’m back in the library, now bent over a notebook I got from Colm, when Loch storms in.
“The fuck did ya think you were doing, leaving without a word like that?” he shouts.
I don’t look up from where I’m seated on the floor at a coffee table, head in one hand. My other fingers are fully cramped around a pen. I’ve been writing pretty much nonstop, stream of consciousness bullshit, the same type of stuff I’d typed on my phone while walking back from the festival.
I wrote about how mad I am for the way I’ve conformed to limitations I put on myself.
I wrote about how hurt I am for what my mother has done to me.
I wrote about what it would feel like to be alone, to be truly left.
I wrote, and I’m rusty. Most of it sucks.
But I’mwritingagain.
I cross out a word. “I asked Colm to let Siobhán know.”
“That wasforty minutesafter I realized you weregone,Kris. I nearly tore apart the festival searching for you.”
“Why were you searching for me?”
“I—” He stops. Stammers over his rampage, and it makes me look up at him.
Seeing him is the final nail in myI’m confusedbullshit.
I’m not confused.
I’m a mess, and I’ve got shit to work out, but about him? I’m sure.
His anger, though,isconfusing, infuriatingly so.Hewalked away.Hewas the one to put a stop to this, so he has no right, nofucking right,to reprimand me.
But I stay calm and refocus on my notebook. The words blur, so I pretend to write something. “I can’t imagine what else you needed me for. The paparazzi got what they wanted, didn’t they? My role was fulfilled.”
“Yourrole?”
I shut the notebook and climb to my feet. “Yeah. Myrole.You don’t get to—”
Siobhán rushes in. “See! I told ya he’d be in here. Kris?” She clocks my posture, Loch’s, the tang of our fight on the air.
God, we do fightall the time,don’t we? No wonder it was so obvious to Coal.
“I’m sorry I worried you,” I say. To his sister.
Siobhán frowns. “You two are being fucking weird.”
“Here.” I scrawl my number on a sheet of notebook paper, rip it off, cross around Loch, and slap it into Siobhán’s hand. “In case I wander off again.”
“Kris.” Loch snaps my name like a dressing-down.
“I’m tired.” I flip absently through the notebook. “I’ll be in my room. Still haven’t recovered from yesterday.”
My eyes go to his.
I don’t want him to see how much each of his rejections has hurt. I don’t want him to think I’ve been holed up here entirely because of him. I’m not sure what he sees though, what I’m showing him.
I’m headed for the door when my gaze catches on something.
“Ah.” I tuck the notebook under my arm and swipe up the stack of books from a side table.
