Page 53 of Make Me Scream
“Fuck off, dude.” I chuck the ball back at him, and he catches it with a grunt, doubling over.
“Damn, I’m wounded.” He clutches his chest as he tosses the ball back easily.
“Don’t act so surprised, Gabe. It’ll piss me off.” I try to shrug off the sensation crawling all over my skin, but it won’t budge, so instead, I focus on the ball in my hand. On the way it bounces on the cracked, worn concrete. Concrete that has become so familiar in the years I’ve lived here. For years, this has been home.
“I am, though, Peris,” he says seriously—and that makes me pause.
“Why?” I ask, but I can’t look at him.
“You really have to ask me that?” he deadpans, and I laugh but not because it’s funny.
“No.” I grip the back of my neck and squeeze. “I guess not.” I bounce the ball between my feet a few times to fill the silence.
“How is that going, your feelings regarding that?”
“Are you seriously asking me about my…homophobia,Gabriel?” I snap in a hiss, hating the way my hackles rise, but I can’thelp it.
“Yes.”
I glare at him, and he stares right back, resolute. And I know it’s not a fight I’m going to win—not that I really want to. I shiver against the cool breeze shuffling around as I make my way over to the picnic tables. Gabe follows me silently, and when I drop the ball between my feet, he straightens his shoulders, preparing himself for the conversation.
But then, I hunch, losing my bravado.
“It’s just me, Peris.”
I chuckle coldly. “It’s not that simple. None of it is—and I can’t even explain it. It’s still there—and it always will be, I think. But losing him… it’s changed some shit inside me. All I can fucking think about…” I pull my bottom lip in between my teeth and sink into skin until I taste copper.
I gnaw on the flesh, shredding it until little pieces flake off inside my mouth and I have something to chew on. I lick the blood off my bottom lip as I contemplate how to say what I need to say—but I can’t even put it into words.
“He’s all I can think about. I just know…” I pull in a deep, shuddering breath. The cold air feels good in my lungs, so I hold it for a long moment before letting it go. I stare out into the dwindling darkness and the shadows it casts across the park. “I just know that I want him, and I can’t let him go.” My jaw aches from clenching it so tight.
Gabe is quiet for a while as we listen to the breeze, to the nothingness beyond it. “I thought you hated him, Peris.”
I smile. “I think I do—and so does he.”
“That doesn’t make any sense.”
“It does if you’re us.”
“Okay…” Gabe drawls, and I can sense his confusion, but I don’t elaborate further because even I don’t fucking understand us.
“But he’s going back to live with his mother, isn’t he? That’s what you said?”
“In less than a week,” I grit out.
“That changes things.”
I laugh darkly and sit up from my hunched over position. I roll the ball around between my numb hands. My sweatshirt does nothing to block the cold, but I find I welcome it,needit, even. “It changes everything for me.”
That makes Gabe pause for a minute. “For you? Not him?”
“Never for him. He’s one selfish fucking runt.”
“Peris…”
“I don’t want to talk about him anymore. I want to play ball until I can’t fucking think, and I’m already halfway there, it’s so fucking cold, so are you down, or not?”
Gabriel sighs loudly, but he slaps his hands down on his sweatpants-clad thighs. “I guess that’s what best friends are for.”
