Page 20 of Open Water
The name sat in the room.
I felt the heat behind my ribs, the tightening in my hands. The old program booting up. Find him. Hit him. Make it stop. My body had been solving problems with fists since I was fourteen. Since my dad's empty chair at the kitchen table made me so angry I put my hand through the drywall in the hallway.
But I'd been here before. And I knew where it led. Punching Marcus at the party hadn't stopped anything. Slamming Braden into his car hadn't gotten answers. Instead it had terrified someone who might be innocent. Snapping at Emily on the bridge hadn't protected me either. It had made the person I was hurting feel crazy for asking the right questions.
Every time I swung, someone who didn't deserve it caught the impact.
So I sat there. Let the heat rise and pass through me instead of acting on it. Leaned my head back against the wall. Stared at the ceiling.
"Talk me through it," I said.
Alex blinked. He'd braced for the detonation but got silence instead.
"Well, the timing," he said. "After our illegal race, Marcus had already known about it. He said the group chat was blowing up. And I didn't think anything of it — but it makes sense now. He probably recorded the video and started the rumor himself."
"Yeah," I said. "That tracks."
"And then we deleted the video, so he didn't have evidence anymore." Alex looked at me. "But then you punched him at the party."
I laughed. Couldn't help it. "Yeah. I did."
Alex smiled and shook his head, then locked back in. "Which pissed him off. And then I stopped talking to him. Called him out for being a bigot. So now he's pissed and he's got no evidence."
"So he had to go get more."
"Exactly. And I think it was him at the mixer. Outside the window when we kissed. He took that photo."
I nodded slowly. "Okay. Yeah. But what about Braden? Braden was there in the locker room. He was in the boathouse that time we kissed. Plus all the comments he's been making."
"I know. And Braden was pissed that I beat him and Mason in the singles trial. He had reasons." Alex rubbed his face. "But after talking to him today… I don't think so. I believe him."
"I mean, you're kind of right about Marcus. He was giving me shit back at Brackett Lake for no reason. Just because."
Alex got quiet. "What if that's when it started."
I turned my head toward Alex.
"Remember, I defended you on the dock? When Marcus was being an asshole?"
"Yeah... when isn't he, but yeah."
"What if he saw us at the bonfire?"
As soon as he finished that sentence, I could feel that moment in my body, grabbing Alex by the shirt and kissing him for the first time. It made me sick that one of the best moments of my life might have started this whole thing.
"You think he saw us kiss?"
"Probably."
I stared at the ceiling.
"Shit," I said.
"I'm sorry," Alex said.
"For what?"
"For all of this. Marcus is my problem. My world. My—" He waved his hand. "Legacy bullshit. And I dragged you into it."
