Page 5 of For Your Heart
“Yeah,” Declan answers. There’s no heat in his voice. No fight in his entire body. I have all the fight while he has all the defeat.
As if we were mirrors. We’re not. Usually, we’re pretty identical. Exact duplicates of each other. We like it that way. It feels good. Whole. How we’re supposed to be and feel and live.
The cause and what it’s about aside, this just feels foreign. Add this on top of all the fucking shit that rages inside and we’re beyond a hot mess. We’re a disaster of apocalyptic proportions.
“Sleep,” I murmur, and try to think of something mundane. Like sheep. Jumping over a fence. Baaing.
Declan snorts. “Really?”
I smile. Just a little. “I don’t know how to make the thoughts stop. How to turn off my brain.”
“I think mine keeps yours up and vice versa.”
“Fucking twin,” I hiss.
His arms tighten. “I can’t live without you, Damon.”
I squeeze him in return. “I know. Neither can I.”
Maybe we ought to be psychoanalyzed. We’re just chalk-full of co-dependent relationships. I feel like at least between twins, it’s okay. Right?
* * *
We wakeat least another half dozen times between us. When we stand under the spray of water the next morning, I feel heavy. Like I haven’t slept for a month. Which is exactly what my life has become. I keep waiting for exhaustion to just overtake me and to pass out for an entire day, but I suspect it’s exactly as Declan said. His brain keeps me awake and mine does his.
Maybe Simon was the wall between us. He dulled our connection enough to allow us to sleep.
I mentally roll my eyes. That’s not at all what he did. Nothing interferes with Declan and I. Ever. Simon just brought us peace. He settled all the restlessness. All the high energy. He wrapped us in his arms and trusted us to be exactly what he needed.
Until he grew out of us and found someone else to fulfill what he’d never allowed us to give him. We would have. We’d give him anything.
Did we not tell him that? Did we not make that clear? Can we try again?
“Eat today,” I tell Declan at our cars. “I don’t want to feel your hunger.”
He looks at me and frowns. “I’ll eat.”
It’s a lie, though he doesn’t intend it to be. I wish I knew someone on campus. Someone I could actually reach out to and make sure my brother eats something. Yeah, it’s for his own good, but man, does it get confusing when I can’t figure out why I have increasing hunger painsafterI’ve just eaten.
You’d think there’d be something to tell us who’s feeling what. Most of the time, that’s not the case. We know because we know. There are times, though, when we’re really not sure who is responsible for a thought or emotion. Talk about a wild ride.
We’ve never considered turning it off or finding a way to dampen it. Even as the thought passes through my mind, I can feel Declan stir and get angry at me. It brings a smile to my lips as I glance back at him. I offer him a kiss through the air, and he rolls his eyes as he drives off.
I never want our connection to go away or change. Something that I think really loudly until I feel him flinch. With a grin, I turn toward the gym and try to concentrate on harassing my twin for a minute. It feels good to take a break from the anger and hurt inside.
Pulling into the parking lot, I park and then take a minute to try to keep myself in this mindset. Not happy. Definitely not happy. But concentrating on Declan means I’m not focusing all my energy on Simon. It means that for just a second, I can feel something besides the despair that I might not see my best friend again and the all-consuming rage at the man responsible for making that my new reality.
And just like that, I’m falling down the dark rabbit hole.
Slamming my car door shut, I step inside. It’s still early so there aren’t many patrons here yet. Just the trainers and staff.
“Good morning,” Carly at the reception desk says, smiling.
I blink at her, trying to focus so that I see her clearly and not the shadows of my anger hanging around. Maybe the smile I offer her is more of a grimace. “Hi,” I say. “My eight o’clock here?”
She nods and gestures to the training room.
“Thanks,” I say and take a deep breath. When I smile at her again, it doesn’t feel quite as harsh. I must succeed at least a bit because she smiles in return.
