Page 145 of Ghost Ribbon

Mine.

He called for me.

And I wasn’t there to answer.

“I’m his boyfriend.”

Rei’s face contorted. “You are what?”

His voice pitched up, cracking on the word. “He’s scared shitless of you,” he said, stepping forward again. “Did you force yourself on him?”

I was one minute away from grabbing him.

One minute.

Sixty seconds.

That was the distance between me and killing Rei Kurosaki in front of Dimitri and every witness in this hospital, but I couldn’t bother to do any of that.

Because I was suffocating.

“I know Marco,” Rei continued, his voice breaking and rebuilding and breaking again. “He would never look at you willingly.”

I looked at him with deadpan eyes. “You know him?” I asked in mockery. “Did you know he is sick? Did you know he is not doing okay? Did you know he is struggling?”

Rei’s mouth opened but nothing came out.

“What the fuck do you know, huh?”

That shut him up.

The anger on his face crumbled and what replaced it was worse.

Guilt.

“I…” Rei started, but didn’t finish. Dimitri stepped forward, placed himself between us and said, “Enough, Alexei. Just go sit down.” I didn’t move.

“Sit down,” he repeated. “They will come out. They will tell you something. But you can’t go in there, so sit down.”

I gave him a look and then I walked to the row of plastic chairs against the wall.

Behind me, I heard movement. I didn’t turn around to look, but I heard it - the sound of arms opening, of a body being pulled against another body, of Rei’s composure irreversibly breaking.

He started crying harder and Dimitri held him.

I could hear him murmuring something against Rei’s hair while I sat in my chair and stared at the closed door at the end of the hallway.

My hands were shaking.

I pressed them flat against my thighs and willed them to stop.

They didn’t stop.

I pressed harder.

They didn’t stop.

For the first time in my life, I understood what people meant when they said they were praying.