Every Breath After: Part 1 (Lost Boys, #3)

by Jessie Walker

As Above, So Below.

In theory, there is a balance to things. The tides are supposed to turn.

Shadows play on memories Eclipsing their jagged edges Where’d you go? Who are you now? Who am I, when you’re not around?

Let the record show—I tried. I really fucking did. I tried to be stronger. Better. Good…

“One breath in, one breath out. That’s all you need to focus on for now. Okay?”

Day by day. Breath by breath. That’s all I have.

And just like that, a maw of shame opens up inside me. Because…he shouldn’t. He shouldn’t trust me. I don’t even trust me anymore.

And all I can think when I look at the round, shocked and wounded amber eyes of the boy who’s been my best friend since I was six—the boy I’ve secretly vowed to protect amongst all else—the boy who is currently looking back at me like I’m a stranger… This is all his fault. That’s what runs through my head. This is his fault. I lost her because of him… Because of what I felt for him that night. Because of what I did.

It’s everything. A culmination of years’ worth of bullying and anxiety and struggling to accept himself. Tonight was just the tipping point. I was the tipping point. I see that now. I feel it.

All for one, and one for all… “I’m so sorry.” Fingers dig into my neck. “M-make it stop,” he sobs. I hold him tighter, rock him. “I can’t, I can’t…” I can’t fix this. I can’t protect him from this.

And I find myself pleading. Praying. For once not for her… But for him. Make it stop. Please, make it stop. This can’t be happening It can’t. She can’t be dead. He won’t survive it… We won’t survive it.

I’m not Jeremy the Coward anymore. I’m Jeremy the Wicked. And if hope shall be my downfall… Then fall I will.

And just like that, I remember. I can’t fix this. Nothing short of bringing her back, will ever fix any of this. And God have I tried, bartering myself up to any god or devil that might be listening—anything to switch places with her. But the truth is, she’s gone. This is it.

I can’t fill this emptiness in either of us, any better than a stuffed animal or Polaroid could fill an empty coffin. I can’t soothe our shared, and yet polarizing pain any better than a prayer in an ancient book can.

Just as it hits me now: The Mason I knew and loved… He’s not coming back either.

“She’s the love of my life.” Yeah, well, you’re mine, Mason. So fuck us both I guess.

Because Izzy is gone. She’s not coming back.

Is just…gone. This is it.

We all are. We’re broken. Shattered. Pieces scattered across a frozen alien landscape. We’ll never be the same. How the fuck did we get here?

Because I know, I just know. My words are met with silence. No…

It’s just gone. Disintegrated. And I am lost. It’s so cold here…

“Just gotta…hold my breath and count to ten, right?” He wets his lips. “Every breath after that…it’ll be a little easier.”

And without another word, I turn away, taking Mason’s shield with me, and praying he’ll survive without it.

But then again, I’ve always been a bit of a masochist.

The thing is… I’m in love with Mason, and I have been for years. Longer than is probably normal or healthy, but it is what it is. So there you have it. Finally. The ugly truth in all its raw, pathetic glory.

O’Leary’s Pub. The sign is lit up green, making the brick surrounding it look more gray than red in the shadows falling over the street as night creeps in.

I’m helpless to turn away and bolt. Because the second he starts singing… Any speck of delusion I had left that my time away from him somehow cured me, is gone. Disintegrated. Turning my mouth to ash in the process. Mason…

His pierced lip curves wickedly as he strokes the mic stand in a way that should be illegal, head bowed like he’s fucking worshiping the thing. And hell if I don’t want to kneel at his feet.

Like he was born for nothing else but this. Hearing him, watching him…

It’s just his voice—words that aren’t his, but feel like his. And us… Mason and me. My Mase Face.

My heart breaks a little bit. At the confirmation, that like so many times before⁠— It’s all in my head.

CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT Abandoning my guitar against the wall, I ignore the voices calling out to me as I hop down from the stage, and shoulder my way through the crowd. He’s here, he’s here, he’s here. It’s an incessant chant in my head. One I try to tamper with, It might not be him. Relax. Be cool. But…it is. It is him. I know it is. I know it as certainly as I know that I just fucking killed that song. It’s way more vocal heavy than most of what we play, but hell if I wasn’t determined to nail it. Roughen it up a bit. Make it mine. Ours. My heart pounds with the familiar rush of performing—of singing and playing music I actually enjoy, for a crowd of people who are just as infected by the music pouring out of me as I am, and aren’t just sitting about with placid looks of judgement on their faces. It’s a fucking high I never realized I craved, not until these last couple months as Shawn, Waylon, and I went from hiding and jamming out in my mom’s basement, to making a little studio of our own beneath this bar, to actually playing for people. Handfuls at first—lingering regulars. Then slowly, slowly, and all at once, to playing for wall to wall crowds as word got out about us—the Lost Boys. A name that started as a sort of dark humored joke, prompted by Waylon—a call back to his obsession as a kid, before I moved to town—and eventually just…stuck.

O’Leary’s is just some small-town dive bar after all. The

And maybe a better person would see the tension rising in his shoulders, and be more tactful. Maybe a less selfish person would not draw attention to the boy who never wanted any. But I’m not that person. And deep down, I don’t think he’d want me to be.

My trembling fingers betray me with the truths that still escape me Do you hear their whispered confessions Burrowing in your skin In your bones In your dreams The angels can’t hear me I’m praying to ghosts

There’s that melody. The one that sung me awake. The one that’s haunted me for years.

There’s something…something there. Something just on the edges of my awareness. A dream. A bedroom. There was a bedroom. There were…shadows, slithering like snakes. Eyes…her eyes, but not… Why? What was wrong with them?

The bar calls to me—rows and rows of bottles taunting me. Just a taste. Just a glass. Just enough to ease my nerves and help me sleep. Just for tonight.

Music and fighting—my only vices left.

Art breeding more art. That’s how I see it. I let it feed my muse, and summon forth tangles of words I try to match to the melodies taking shape and giving way beneath my fingers.

He’s gorgeous. Painfully so. A single glance from those baby blues is enough to steal my breath. A mere smile, a slash through my heart with a serrated blade. Perhaps the universe did me a favor not aligning our stars. To be loved by Mason Wyatt would surely be a death sentence. The weight of it would crush me. Would that really be so bad? And therein lies the problem.

Izzyizzyizzyizzy… This time, the reminder of her isn’t welcome. It just fucking hurts. She’s still out there. Don’t give up now. Just don’t think about it. She’s alive.

She’s dead. She’s dead. And just like that, every steel door in my head is blown to shreds. No warning. No time to prepare. Every line of defense between me and the monster with my face I’ve tried so hard to appease… It’s all just… Gone.

He kissed me. Mason Wyatt fucking kissed me. He kissed me. And I kissed him back. Me…Mason…kissing…

Hope. It’s a vicious fucking thing. Like love—like death—all it does is take and take and take. We’re put on this earth for no other purpose than to be ravaged.

I can’t do this. I can’t survive this. Without her, I’ve been half a person. And now without him too, I’ll be lucky if there’s even a sliver of me left.

Beautiful. I’d found him beautiful that day. I remember that now. Remember it vividly. You were drunk, a voice reminds me. And yet… And yet.

“But that’s…them. Not you. You’ve never looked at me like that.” Again, he just stares at me. Blinks. One second passes. Two.

Just like we’ve said goodbye a million times before… Not knowing this one would be the last.

In some ways, I remember it vividly. The rain. The bite of vodka, the bite of teeth. The warmth. In others, it feels like a dream.