Page 108 of The Other Side

Flames scorch his slitted eyes as he walks closer to me, vaporizing those golden flecks to ashes.

“You gonna turn back time and make my mom immune to alcoholism? Make your daddy a stand-up father?” My throat constricts as I absorb his lashing, each whip of his words stabbing me with blunt force. “You gonna encourage me not to resent her so damn much? This way, when I’m twenty-eight years old, I won’t have to regret all the fucking time I missed with her? Huh? Is that what you’re gonna do, Callie? Magically become a miracle worker?”

His dark brows crease. The skin between them is etched with deep wrinkles, and he pierces me with his stare.

I shake my head, my lungs thirsty for oxygen. And my next words travel through a broken whisper. “No, I understand. I-I just want to help.”

He gapes his eyes in mortification, leaning in. “You understand?”

His question is mocking as his features screw tighter with offense. Agony is embedded in every crease of his face, the sight clobbering my heart to bits.

His hands lift between us, his teeth grinding as he seethes out the rest of his admission. “I have your daddy’s blood on my hands, Callie. Every goddamn day, I can still feel the warmth. The sticky texture. It stabs me like a thousand knives when I’m back here. Every. Fucking. Time.”

My tears flood when he darts an arm down between us.

“And for once, I just wanted you to be there in these last ten years.” His arm punches down more intensely. “To reassure me it’s okay.” Punch. “To reassure me you don’t hate me!”

Salty droplets sprout from my eyes, my palms grazing his hoodie. “Brant,” I hush.

He calms for an instant, cementing his stare to me as his breath wobbles. “Instead, you were too busy accepting a ring from a man who wasn’t me.” His head shakes. “Who wasn’t me, Cal,” he echoes roughly.

His words are like a chainsaw to my soul.

I reach for him, but he swats my hands away. His broad chest thrashes with impending rage as he whips his head to the side. “No, I don’t want to look at you,” he mutters. “I can’t look at you right now.”

Tears sprinkle his gorgeous eyes, and I fight to swallow as I reach for him again.

His palms nudge mine, his body pivoting from me. He avoids my stare at all costs, his breath shredding. “Callie, get away from me,” he warns. “I can’t look at you.”

I manage to lock my arm around his stomach, and his palm clutches me there. His chin swoops to the ceiling, his eyes crinkling shut as he licks his lips. His grip on me fastens, the wrath brewing inside him threatening to demolish this entire room.

Including me.

But I’m not scared.

I’m not scared at all.

He drops his chin, his attention dodged from me. The glaze in his irises vacuums out, his jaw ticking with bitterness.

My chest pounds with sorrow, my head rotating to the side as I unlatch ripe tears. We’re locked in an embrace we’ve never fell into.

It’s a first for us.

I thought we experienced all our firsts in Willowhart, but I was wrong.

Trauma bleeds from both of us, pooling between our bodies. Until we’re left paralyzed in the middle of a room. But this time, there’re no pine trees to run off to. There’s nowhere to dance. There’s nowhere to pop a burned CD in.

Just two adults with a child trapped in each one of them.

Begging to be set free.

Begging for us to let their love be wild and reckless.

Brant’s palm on my forearm massages me. His eyes hood as he inhales, and I turn into him. I place my free hand on his shoulder, my head nudging his firm bicep in a desperate plea.

The air swings from glacial to boiling. Our trauma drains from our bated breaths to dangle in the heavy atmosphere.

With a hunger.