Page 54 of Friend
“Help me! I don’t know what to do anymore!” The words exploded from me, and my fingers shook as I gripped the back of my neck with my left hand. “You have to fix it!”
He had to fixher.
There was a short pause—a quick shuffling—and his voice was quieter, slower, as he responded. “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”
“It’s not me!” Just getting it out there was already helping, but there was still a suffocating pressure against my chest. “There’s something wrong withher!”
“Who?” Damen asked.
“A…” What was I saying? I couldn’t talk to him about this. I couldn’t not. “A girl.”
“Your girlfriend?” he asked, and my skin grew clammy. Was I doing the right thing?
“No,” I replied. “She’s…” How did I even describe it? I couldn’t tell him. Not directly.
But if he were to figure it out on his own…
Then it wouldn’t really be my fault.
“Someone I need to help,” I told him. “Like a friend, but not really. She’s different, more than that.” So much more than that.
“Okay…” Damen sounded confused but stayed engaged. “Are you feeling better now?” he asked.
“What?” I was momentarily stunned at his question, but then… I’d forgotten.
My face burned. I hadn’t had a meltdown in a long time. It wasn’t even a full-fledged one, but it was enough.
“Yeah.” I muttered, mentally counting the row of green lockers as I regained my bearings.
“Now,” Damen said, all calm professionalism, “what triggered it?”
“She was attacked,” I muttered. I’d reached the end of the line—thirty-three lockers—and my attention stayed there. “But she won’t tell me what happened.”
“The ‘not friend’?” Damen asked but didn’t wait for a response. “What makes you think that she was attacked?”
“She was tied up, her clothes were messed up, and her shirt was ripped.” I spoke low, still worried that someone might hear me, even though I knew I was alone. “And the guy was still there. He was…” How could I describe it? “He was trying to hurt her.”
Adrian had been trying to kill her.
“Do you think she was sexually assaulted?” he asked, and my breath caught. Hearing the formal term for my suspicion spoken out loud brought down a new wave of worry.
“Yes.” I was almost entirely sure, but… besides the few signs I’d seen, she kept saying that she was okay. That nothing happened.
What was I supposed to believe? “I don’t know. She said she was fine. That nothing happened.”
“Is she the type to worry about others before herself?” Damen asked. “Would she be afraid to say something?”
“Yes…” I mumbled, and added, so low that there was no way he could possibly have heard. “You would know.”
“What?”
“Never mind.” My heart was racing. I couldn’t believe I was doing this. I hadn’t spoken to Damen in weeks, and now I was basically telling him the secret I’d been hiding for eight years.
“Hey, Damen,” I breathed, trying to speak past the nervous lump in my throat. “What would you do if you found out Mu was alive?”
Subtlety wasn’t my thing, and I couldn’t make it more obvious than that.
He took so long to respond I thought he might have hung up, and just as I was about to check the connection, he said, “Why?”
