Page 46 of I'm Not Scared: Part One
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, man. I think you need some help.”
Manic laughter leaves my lips. “I saw you,” I tell him. “In the glass, I zoomed in and I have very good eyes, and a very good phone. I saw what you were doing. I can’t have you looking at her like that. She is mine, and you can’t look at her like that.”
“Vero, come on, please.” Kayla’s voice rings out behind me, but this fucker has to understand, and the way he is looking at me right now tells me he doesn’t.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” I tell him, which is what I believe in the moment. “I am just trying to explain the situation, then you can leave and go home, and everything will be okay.”
He stands, but something about his movement or his size hits me wrong, and I kick him in the face. It all happens so fast; I didn’t plan it. My brain is running so fast, and my body can’t keep up. The noise is back; it’s so loud. He goes sideways, and the noise is soloud.
The security guard comes in fast, and I launch myself over him, landing on the other side. Before I can process anything, he is on the ground beneath me, and I am scrunching his shirt inmy hands. “She is mine, that is all this is. It’s so simple—I don’t understand why no one can see how simple it is.”
Someone grabs my arm, and I come up fast. A bar stool goes over, and I pick up the nearest glass and throw it at the wall. I’m not trying to hurt anyone, but I need them to understand. Another person moves toward me, and I grab the stool. I can hear my paper-cut princess yelling, but her voice sounds like it’s deep underwater and so far away from my reality. I want to get to the surface to hear her, but it’s just so loud and I can’t find it. She is mine, and I need them to see that. Then it will all stop.
I can’t stop.
Then the air shifts, and I can feel him. I know he is here somewhere; he has come to help me show them she is mine, that they can’t have her. My vision returns enough that I can now see Brawley, Clay, and Ares. Brawley comes toward me, but Ares shifts out of my sight. I follow him as he goes straight to her. She has tears in her eyes, and as he puts his hand on her, something inside me detonates.
He doesn’t get to touch her, not after what he did to her. He won’t use her or pull her under his spell. She is not a statistic; Kayla is a person, and she had to sneak out. He isnother safe person now.
“Vero.” Brawley is close. “Stop.”
I am not entirely sure what I am doing at this exact moment. There is broken glass and an overturned table, and I am breathing hard. Brawley is inside the room, and the particular way he is looking at me means he is about to do something. I glare at Ares, and he looks back at me with his hands still on Kayla’s arms, and my whole body vibrates.
“She is not yours to fix,” I say, and my voice comes out really strange. It’s too quiet amid all the noise. “You don’t get to be the one.”
“Maybe we should go for now,” Clay adds, but I ignore him. He almost killed her—he doesn’t get a say in this.
“Vero,” Kayla says.
I look at her.
She has stepped away from Ares and is gazing at me. She isn’t scared, but there is something, and I don’t have the right words to tell what. All of a sudden, I am very aware of the wrecked bar, the people staring in fear backed up against walls, the broken glass, the men on the floor, all eyes waiting for my next move.
“Fuck, Kayla,” I start. “He was watching you... I saw the reflection. I know how that sounds, but I saw it.”
“Get out,” she says, and the words hit me right in my chest. My heart races, and I shake my head, bringing my hands to my hair, needing to pull on it, but there is nothing there.
“Please,” I cry, bringing my hands to the sides of my head. “I...”
“All of you.” She glares at Clay and Brawley and Ares and then back at me. “Get the fuck out.”
I open my mouth, wanting to explain. I want her to understand that it’s simple. It’s so simple. She is mine, and I protect what is mine. I don’t know why that is so hard for everyone to see, but the scowl on her face stops me, and I close my mouth.
Brawley grabs me, and I shake out of his hold. “No.”
Clay is next to grab me, and they drag me out as I thrash. “Why doesn’t anyone understand? I need you to understand she is mine and I will kill you all!”
Brawley holds me in a vice grip, and between him and Clay, they have me almost at the door, though I’m still fighting them. I need to find the right words so that she will understand.
Their grip loosens, and they stop. I look toward my paper-cut princess and see Rogue is beside her now, saying something, andKayla nods. She looks down at her hand, at the blood running down her wrist.
I stare at it, but it doesn’t register with my brain. It’s like when you stare at a word so long it no longer makes sense. Clay and Brawley have gone still, and when I pull out of their hold, neither of them stops me. The world around me blurs, everything except her; she is all I see. She looks at me as I drop to my knees at her feet, glass shards crunching beneath me, but I feel nothing.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “But get the fuck out of my life.”
I don’t move—I can’t.
The blood drips down onto my face as I look back up at her, and piece by piece the horror of what I have done hits me, each part worse than the last. Coming in here, the injured men, the tables broken, people afraid of me, her hand, and worst of all, the look on her face—it was all caused by me. Now grasping the weight of what I have caused, she doesn’t tell me it’s okay, that it isn’t my fault. She doesn’t even give me a scrap of hope to hold on to—she is right not to—and I struggle to breathe.
Brawley’s hand wraps around the back of my neck, and I let him bring me to my feet and turn me toward the door. I don’t have anything left to fight with. And I don’t look back because I already know what I will see.
For the first time in as long as I can remember, my head is completely silent.
