Page 31 of Mouse
“Fuck, you’re useless,” he said and then he was moving on.
Which was good because I had no desire to help him out.
While I may have known the reason deep down, I wasn’t ready to admit it.
Amber’s words rang out in my head. I hadn’t touched her in nearly three months before she ended things. She was dead right, I hadn’t touched her since Ingram had been back.
Fuck!
I hadn’t realized it until she’d said that.
That one thing had fucked with me in the deepest kind of way.
Ingram.
Her coming back had been something I kept in the back of my mind but I never really thought of her return.
I needed another drink because I didn’t want to deal with all of this shit. I knew alcohol wasn’t the answer, but it was the only thing that made sense right now.
Sometime later, when the room was on the verge of spinning, I slid off my stool and made my way outside. Bed, that was the plan, and the fresh air on the way to my room wouldn’t be all that bad either.
“Malcolm,” her soft voice said from the edge of my dark mind right before I lifted my foot to climb the stairs to the second floor.
I froze and looked around. The night was dark, the moon barely casting any kind of light.
I was sure that it was my imagination playing tricks on me.
But then I swore I saw her small frame step out from the darkness of the back of the stairs. I shook my head because there was no way she was really there.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, sure that I was talking to my mind.
As her figure stepped closer to me, I closed my eyes and imagined that it was all real.
A hand— her hand— ghosted over my face and I tilted my head into the embrace.
“My Malcolm,” her voice practically whispered into my ear.
I was so fucked.
IwantedIngram.
This was the first moment I let myself give up the fight. I let the feelings in and the realization hit me like a sledgehammer to the heart.
Something had changed through those letters.
Something had tugged at my soul and my heart, even now as I stood here in the dark of night.
I felt for Ingram.
I had missed her.
More than a friend should have.
I was convinced it wasn’t right.
Ingram was so…
Innocent.
