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Author: L.T.Marshall
last update Last Updated: 2024-09-10 20:50:51

I stare at him in stunned quiet for a long moment, seeing Dane with fresh eyes. Trying to piece together the things he said and if they were true. Taking in that infuriating ‘ I don’t give a shit’ shrug and seeing that Dane is still Dane. He does not care about the heaviness of what he said or that protecting someone he wasn't even friends with was heroic. Deep down, he has always been that boy I thought was lost to me…staring me in the face in plain sight, even behind that mask of an asshole.

“So today?” I finally manage to push out, my heart aching and swelling with a different kind of pain. Truly needing to understand what I saw if it was all a façade and he never did anything with her. What were they talking about?

“She’s grateful. She wanted to tell me so… That’s all it was. A thank you for being a good guy and a promise not to ruin my street cred by telling people I was nice.” Dane shrugs again like it is nothing to him but a mere inconvenience, yet my brain is twisting and chur
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  • Teen Drama   106

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    “I know, I know…I’m working on it. I never thought your mom would take it as badly as she is and dig her heels in. I’m sorry it seems like we’re stalling but it’s just you know how she can be. She needs time to calm down and change her mind.” Bryan looks weary all of a sudden, and now my anger dims a slight tiny fraction at his attempts to douse my fire, I cannot deny that he seems unnaturally pale today.A tiny hint of empathy and maybe even concern peeks out, and I try and push it back down into the pits of hell and remind myself that these two humans deserve anything they are going through. I don’t want to feel anything for either of them.“Maybe you should ask yourself why she is stalling….maybe you need that test as much as I do.” I point out, appraising his expression and seeing real fatigue etched on his face for the first time in as long as I can remember, and I wonder how much of a mental toll it's taking on him, too. Maybe he does have doubts, or maybe losing Dane this way h

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    “She went to the airport early to wait for Bryan…to avoid me, I guess. Things here have been strained and hard, and we have come to a silent cold war. I can’t stand being in the same place as her, yet she insists now we eat together again and won’t let me stay locked up in my room. She had a carpenter come and remove the locks….who does that?” It’s a tired accusation, lacking real vavoom, even if it still angers me that she did it. I have long since lost the fight I had to stay away from her at all costs. She is like a buzzing fly around my head, and it’s easier to obey and eat silently while ignoring her presence than have her hammering down my door.If she’s trying to force normalcy back into this house, then she shouldn’t hold her breath for it to happen.“Sounds like something your mom would do.” Tyler snorts, and I am starting to see that all these years, Dane has definitely colored his friend’s view of my mom. As polite as Tyler was when he was here before, I have never actually

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    “Oh my god, I missed you so much.” Elisa catapults herself into my arms, almost knocking me into our pool with the enthusiasm of an over-excited puppy, then nearly strangles me to death while simultaneously crushing my ribs. Her excitement is palpable, and her hug is overdue. I regret now giving her the silent treatment for ten days before being able to find the mental strength to tell her everything in a phone call. I had no way of verbalizing things without breaking down in hysteria until last night, and I knew Tyler would have told her already, but she needed to hear it from me. I have never gone silent on my best friend in my whole life or hidden away Dane style like his, but I needed time to process and grieve. This was such a huge thing that I spent too many days crying in bed until no more tears fell. I am exhausted and now exist in some odd dreamlike reality where nothing seems real.I think I am finally spent. Tears have dried up, and instead of the constant agonizing pain of

  • Teen Drama   100

    “You have to eat, open the door. We need to talk.”“Go away…. Leave me alone.” My anger and venom have not dissipated any; instead, it grows by the hour. Irritated by my mom’s lingering presence because she just won’t leave me alone.Her whiny, pleading voice only riles fresh anger in me, and I throw my pillow at my bedroom door in frustration. Annoyed by her presence, and go back to staring at my cell, waiting for a reply that hasn’t come. I feel like I am going silently insane, and time has come to a standstill. I don’t know what else to do but sit here and wait given my entire existence has been turned upside down and my hope for any future is so far away I cannot reach him.Dane has been gone for days, yet he hasn’t called, he hasn’t texted me back, and Bryan has been silent, too, like they were sucked into some soundproofed bubble where all contact has ceased. For me, anyway. I don’t know if my mother speaks to them because I can't stomach her at all, even for a second, to have o

  • Teen Drama   99

    “Bullshit…this is bullshit. You’re lying.” Dane erupts before I can really swallow down the words that have wounded me with a sucker punch to my heart. “You’ve always hated me, and I wouldn’t put it past you to stoop this low and lie….so I break up with Kayla.” He half yells, half accuses, straining forward to get in her face, and I can taste the growing despair and anger circling him like a cyclone. “I don’t believe you.”“This isn’t true…you would have told me…dad would have….” I trail off, whimpering the words as something clicks in my head and slices through me with speed and severity, making my legs tingle, and my limbs grow weak. “Is that why? Why has he been this way towards me for the past ten years?”I don’t want to believe this or swallow it down, but it’s like something just smacked me in the head and woke up the underlying doubts.It races through my brain and thunders through my entire body like a shocking cold wall of ice. Tingling my brain through my scalp, and even my

  • Teen Drama   98

    “Mom.” Is the only word I can gasp out as I push Dane off me at speed and scramble to right my bra inside my shirt and haul my shorts back into place. Shame flushing over my entire body that we just got caught this way, and I want the ground to open and swallow me. Mortified about what they saw us doing and yet, at the same time, hitting an all-time ‘oh shit’ moment because I don’t want this to be the end. I don’t want Dane to be sent to London. I don’t want to lose him this way.I have an urge to wail and run away, taking him with me rather than face the wrath of our parents like this. My limbs are already trembling in cold fear.Dane shifts away quickly, too, to tend to his pulled-around outfit, turning away directly to probably calm the boner, causing him an obvious trouser tent, and yet it’s like time stands still. The sudden eery, heavy atmosphere and tense silence as though the world has hushed and the only noise is my mother’s subtle simpering.Our parents are standing like a f

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