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Was any of it true?
...gazing at me starry-eyed
I had been an angel once, when I was a kid, before I was cast out of the good graces and left to burn.
Remember, I’m the devil. The devil does as he pleases.”
Everyone ends up in the same place at some point, six feet under. Doesn’t matter how we get there.
Fire is a key element in my existence. Every strike of a match, every flick of a flame is a compulsion.
“Who are we without each other?”
Separately, we are just kids born with tragedy leaking from our split veins. Together, we are utter chaos.
Tough love isn’t always popular, but it prepares you for the life you are set to lead in a town like this.
My mother taught me early that your image is everything. Your reputation here will make or break you anywhere. You do what needs to be done, no matter the consequence. You smile, no matter what they do to you. No matter the pain that is inflicted, because no one cares.
The psycho. The vengeful one. The schizo. And the devil. The Hollow Boys.
I will not drown. I will survive.
I’ll see a guy being a douche or just walking down the street with an arrogant smirk on his face, and all I can think about is what he’d do if he were wrapped in flames, drowning in gasoline. That’s normal to me. It’s odd to me that no one else thinks that way.
I wonder what it would feel like for someone to look at me like that. Like I’m more than a problem. A mistake. A monster. Lucifer. Someone who looks at me like I’m human.
We are all rich,
donate to me please
The dark side allows for you to do things you’d never think of doing in the light.”
Sage is a poison apple. Too pretty for her own good, but could kill you with one single bite. Even at the thought of that, I’m still ready to sink my teeth into her. I was never the one who thought things through. I act on impulse only, and right now, the only thing on my mind is showing her exactly what she’s been missing. “I can’t wait for the day you come searching for trouble, princess. I’m gonna have so much fun with you.”
Parts of me that I keep locked away don’t want to accept that we had fallen so far apart from one another.
“No tears for boys. We are too pretty for that.”
Rook Van Doren does not give attention to things he deems boring. If he notices you, if you interest him, you’ll know it.” She glances over at me. “And I’d say he noticed you.”
Keep it together for one more year. And it’ll be your best performance yet.
Riding is a blank space. Even when I’m high, I’m still filled with thoughts and memories. But when I’m riding, everything is gone. I’m a complete white sheet with nothing scribbled on me. It’s the nearest thing to flying unaided that anyone will ever know.
That’s the thing about fear. At the root, it’s just the fear of dying, right? You’re not scared of the actual experience, just the aftermath. So fear doesn’t work for me. We found out early in our lives that fear doesn’t work on any of us. Not when you’re already dead on the inside.
Like ghosts, you could feel us in the air, but you’d never be able to prove it. Or demons that hide inside your closet, only coming out when we want you to see us.
Welcome to the gates of hell. The show is about to begin.
Leave the beautiful things alone, they tell you. They speak the same things about fire. And, well, we see how well I listened to those tales of caution.
His matte helmet prevents me from seeing his eyes, but I know whose face lies beneath.
“Yeah?” He kicks his head to the right condescendingly. “You think a good little girl like you can handle me?”
Did your books tell you what I’ll do to you, what I like?”
I feel him everywhere.
I’m not one to be interested in things that don’t excite me, but something about how real she looks up there is fucking with me.
I see her mask. And I’m tired of her keeping it on when she’s around me.
There are only two people who can look the pits of hell in the eyes and not flinch. Those in Hell and those who already made their way out.
I have this moment. And Rook is anything but boring.
I’m getting another up close and personal view of those eyes everyone is so afraid of. It’s poetic almost, how the outer edges are pure green like new earth, but as you fall closer, the inner portion is a starburst of amber fire, swirling and eating up the green, all spiraling into one solid black pupil.
“Because I need you.”
“I need you to help me take the mask off. You’re the only person I know not hiding from the world. You burn for it. This place, it’s eating me alive, turning me into a person I don’t recognize. Show me anarchy, show me something violent.” I shake my head, needing to feel that escape. “Show me all your truths, Rook. And I’ll show you mine.”
“Then take me to the place you hate most in the world, and I’ll show you how to make it choke on the ashes of the girl they left to burn.”
Alistair needs to hurt something every once in a while, slam his fist into a body so that all the wrath can leave his for a split moment, craving vengeance for a family that always treated him as “the other.” He needs that, and I need the pain. That’s how we work. How we all connect to one another. We understand what the other needs, no matter how dark and tormented it may be. We’re willing to do anything for each other.
The truth is, I don’t trust this girl. But I trusted the girl in front of me at the track. The one who looked broken and distraught. I trusted the girl on that stage, and until the only version of Sage Donahue I get is the real one, she’ll be my secret.
For a girl the world thought was made of plastic, God, she feels so fucking real.
“When you are told things so often, even if they aren’t true, you start to believe them.”
“You think I’m scared of your boat-shoe-wearing boy toy?”
I blame my hormones, my curiosity, and whatever deity had blessed Rook Van Doren with the face of an angel and the body of a god.
My entire life had been spent around fabricated relationships that barely scratched the outer level of who I am. I was existing in a superficial world, like Barbie trapped in her plastic box. Until this. Until him.
“I really want to kiss you right now,” I mumble, my tone veiled and deep. Without my mind’s consent, my hands clutch his Thrasher tee between my nimble fingers. “Then kiss me.”
“Then it’ll be our dirty little secret,” he breathes against me as his teeth grab at my bottom lip.
“Can you do that, Rook? Can you keep your mouth shut and be my dirty little secret?”
“What? What are you looking at?” she asks me, making me realize I had been staring. “Nothing.” I shake my head. “Just selfishly glad I’m the only person who sees you like this.”
“Because I’d become a serial killer trying to fend off men falling in love with you.”
I’m not allowed to love people. But thinking of anyone else trying? It makes my blood sizzle. This is mine. Her truths. Her quirks. They’re mine. She is mine. Unable to love or not.
