We'll Never Be Apart (23 page)

I say Chase's name again. I say it so lightly it barely ruffles the air in the room. I look down at the file in my hand, just to make sure that my vision didn't betray me. But the label on the file still reads
ALICE MONROE
.

F
ROM THE
J
OURNAL OF
A
LICE
M
ONROE

 

In a month, Jason managed to find us. He had spent two days in juvenile detention, then was released into Candy's care to await trial. He would visit every week. And, among the smell of stale coffee and the sound of happy families reuniting with their loved ones, I would weep. I'd cried before, but I'd never wept. Something was broken inside me, and it felt like Cellie was ripping me apart. Everywhere I went I heard the echo of her screams. I came to realize it wasn't really me who was broken, it was
Cellie,
and for the first time, I thought it might be better for the both of us if she were dead. That's what no one will ever understand: the decision to kill Cellie wasn't born of hate. It was born of love. I loved Cellie. But love isn't a straight line. It's curved and kinked, and sometimes it's better if it's cut.

Jason held my hand and made small circles with his thumb. “They've charged me with assault and battery,” he said during our first visit. I'd seen his face plastered all over the news (Cellie was right; we were famous), and so I already knew about the charges that had been stacked against him. I turned his hand over so I could see his unicorn tattoo.

“I don't think . . .” I choked. The words were a ten-foot wall I couldn't scale. “I don't think I'll make it in here. Cellie keeps getting worse. She won't stop screaming and . . .” I trailed off again, unable to admit what I was thinking. Soon only one of us would be able to survive.

“What about Cellie?” he asked.

I turned from him, and involuntarily my fingers grazed the bruises where Cellie had grabbed me and tried to sink her teeth into me.

“Alice.” He grasped my chin, forcing my gaze back to him. “What happened to your arm?” The black-and-blue marks were impossible to ignore. “Did she do this to you?”

Trying to tell him she'd actually caused me bodily harm was one of the hardest things I'd ever attempted. And in the end I couldn't quite force myself to do it. But it didn't matter. The answer was drawn all over my face. “You don't belong here,” he said. He leaned forward so all I could see was his back. The way his T-shirt stretched over his shoulders made me think of the ink scrawled beneath—
God's Will.
He bowed his head. “I can take care of you.”

I scooted forward and rested my ear on his shoulder blade. I could feel his heartbeat. I wanted to dive into his certainty, his strength. I thought about those nights at Roman's house, cold hours spent huddled in the dark corner of a closet. How I'd made paper lions.
My lionheart.

He cupped my cheek and kissed my forehead. “If you could go anywhere, anywhere in the world, where would it be?”

I pushed my face against his chest. Images of my grandfather's house, of gray clouds pregnant with snow, drifted across the backs of my eyelids. “Somewhere warm. Somewhere light.”

“We could go somewhere like that.”

“Where?” I teased.

Jason forced my chin up and made me meet his gaze. “I'm serious. I can get you out of here. I came in through the visitors' entrance. It's not as secure as you think.”

I pictured us living our lives together on the run, and it seemed romantic but not unreal. After all, isn't that exactly what we'd been doing all our lives? We'd been pushed around by the state, by the government, tossed from home to home, living on the fringes. What Jason proposed was taking our lives back.
My
life back. No more group homes. No more hospitals. No more Cellie. The possibility was like a heavy drug in my veins. The feeling was sweet and addictive. “I'd go anywhere with you.”

We spent the rest of the time planning our epic escape. I was eager to put our plan into action, to break free that very day, but Jason said he needed more time to make the necessary arrangements.

When he got up to leave, he kissed me goodbye. The heat of his lips spread through me like wildfire. There are many ways to burn. Jason's kiss was one way. By Cellie's hand was another.

CHAPTER

“W
HAT THE FUCK,
C
HASE?
”

He sighs, rubs the back of his neck, and calmly comes to stand by the bed. “You weren't supposed to see that.”

No shit.
“What are you doing with my file?”

He shakes his head. “I can't tell you.”

“Can't tell me!” I repeat stupidly. “I think I have a right to know. Did you steal it?” The whole time he's been lying to me. He's been reading my file and laughing behind my back.

“I don't—” He stumbles over the words. At least he has the decency to look ashamed. “It was to help you.”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better?” I spit out. “Why?” I press the file to my chest, where my heart is breaking, where it's disintegrating in Chase's hands.

He shrugs and stuffs his hands in his pockets. “I can't tell you. You're not ready.”

I snort. “You are such a coward.” I throw the file across the room and sheets of paper slip out and fan the ground. My glossy mug shot, from when I was arrested as an accomplice in Earl's beating, lands face-up. In the picture I'm crying and, I remember, my hands were shaking so bad, I could barely hold the placard with my name on it.

Chase's gaze locks onto mine, lightning fast. “What?” he says.

I trample the papers, leaving a footprint on the ugly photo, until I'm standing inches from Chase's face. “I said you are a coward, Chase Ward, a dirty, fucking coward. You hide behind your bullshit sense of humor.” I shake my head. “I should've known. You can't be honest with yourself, so why the hell would you be honest with me?” I turn to leave.

I don't hear him coming toward me until it's too late. “Wait.” He grabs my arm.

I whirl around and try to yank my arm away, but he's got me in a tight hold. “Don't touch me,” I say under my breath. “You make me sick.” I thought he was so different from Jason. But he's the same. A peddler of lies. A betrayer.

He releases me right away, his hand coming off my body like I've scalded him, like I've hurt him in some deep place, and I can see by his eyes that I have. “You don't mean that,” he says in a heartbreaking whisper.

“Of course I do. You're no different than the rest of them.” I turn from him and rest my hand on the door. I don't even care if a tech is out there. I just want out, out of Chase's room and his web of lies.

“I may be a coward, but you are, too.” Chase's voice stops me cold, reignites the fury inside me. My shoulders stiffen. “You want honesty, Alice? Why don't we start with you, then? Why don't you tell me what you're doing here? Why are you dead set on breaking into the D ward?”

I don't bother to turn around. I lean my forehead on the door, against the cool metal. “I told you, my sister's there.”

He snorts in disbelief. “Yeah, I'm sure. You want to get into the D ward to see Cellie? So you can do what?” He waits a moment, and I'm sure he can hear my heart beating in the room. Boom. Boom. Boom. He knows. He must know. He must have guessed my intent from the beginning.

I swallow my anger and resentment and fear. “Fine,” I say. “I'll be honest. I want Cellie dead. I want to go to the D ward. And I want to find her and cut her out like the cancer she is.” The truth has festered so long inside me that it's a relief to finally say it out loud.

He makes a little noise, like he's being strangled. “What do you think that's going to accomplish? It's not going to bring Jason back.”

Finally I turn, hands balled into fists. “Don't say his name.”

He takes a step back, and then he erupts. “Oh my God, that's what you think, isn't it? You think somehow if you kill Cellie, it's going to resurrect Jason.”

“Don't say his name. Don't say his name.” I shake my head back and forth. My heart pounds and blood rushes into my ears. I can barely form breaths.

But Chase is relentless, a dog with a bone. “Jason. Jason. Jason. Jason's dead, Allie. Jason's dead, but I'm here.” He takes one of my hands, and though I try to swat it away, he holds on. He forces my fingers open and lays them against his chest. “I'm here. I'm real.” He wants me to let go, run to him, and leave Jason behind. I shake off his soft plea and narrow my eyes at him.

I press my hand into his chest and push him. He stumbles back a little. “Now you be honest too. Why were you sent to Savage Isle?”

He lets go of my hand and I allow it drop to my side. “My sister.” His eyes drill into mine like he's daring me to call his bluff.

“Your sister. That's why you're here?”

“Yeah.” He jerks his chin at me.

“Bullshit.”

“What?” He's surprised.

“I said bullshit. What are you
really
doing here, Chase? What's with the files, the sneaking around?”

“I'm helping you,” he tries.

“Why?”

“Because I said I would.”

“You're helping me because I remind you of your sister.” His words from days ago haunt me.
You remind me of her, you know. My little bird with a broken wing.
“You want to fix me because you couldn't fix your sister. You want to fix me, and maybe I don't want to be fixed.”

“You're so wrong,” he says. But when he sees my expression, he backpedals. “Maybe that was it at first. But not now. Now it's different.”

“Then tell me what you're really doing here, with me.”
Why all the help for nothing?

He dodges eye contact. “I can't, not yet. I promise I'll tell you everything—it's just not the right time.” He hangs his head and backs up some more so he's pressed against the wall.

“This is a waste of time,” I say. “We're done.”

“Please,” he says. “There are some things I can't tell you, but I can . . .” He swallows. “I can tell you that I killed someone.”

Everything in my body goes cold and my heart slows, stutters, and then stalls. Amelia was right. Chase killed someone.

“Who?”

He looks away.

“Who?” I persist.

“I killed my sister.” His voice is small, weak, and wilted.

He's hinted at it before, that he killed someone he loved, but this is the first time I've ever actually heard him say it. “You killed your sister?” I say when he looks as if he's not going to say any more. “How?” I want to know every detail. What dark path brought Chase to the same point as me?

A shudder runs through him. “I can't.” He pauses. “I can't say.”

I shake my head, not in anger but in hopelessness. He won't share, and I can't give any more. We're at an impasse. Another stalemate. “I think we need to stay away from each other for a while.”

His eyes flash to mine. “What? Why?”

I dodge his gaze, the heartbreak and fear in his eyes. “Because we're broken, Chase. We're broken, and we're not going to fix each other.”

“That's not what I want.”

I chew the inside of my cheek, and resolve settles like concrete in my gut. He's too damaged. I'm too damaged. “It's for the best.” I stick out my hand. “Key?” I say. Chase makes a noise of protest. Still, he rummages through his pocket and finds the tech keycard. He gently places it in my palm. I go to the door and open it. When I look back at him, he flinches like I'm poison, like I'm a jellyfish, and that hurts even more than finding my file under his mattress.

As I walk away, I think I finally got what I wanted. I think about when Chase and I sat together in the rec room watching that God-awful movie. How I told him
I don't need you, you know.
I pushed him away. Another mission finally accomplished.

When I get back into my room I sit on the edge of my bed. My breathing is heavy and labored, like I've just run a marathon. Something hiccups in my chest—sorrow and bitter disappointment. I try to convince myself that it really is better this way, to have cut ties before our relationship got out of hand, before someone really got hurt. But the lie won't stick, and I can't stop fresh tears from forming in my eyes. As I curl up into a ball, something digs into my skin from my back pocket. I fish out the rock Chase gave me. With the pad of my thumb I trace the rough edges of the heart. I close my fist around it, and with all my might I throw it at the picture caulked to the wall. I want to hear something shatter. But all that happens is a soft thud followed by the rock dropping to the floor behind the dresser. I don't bother trying to find it. It's lost to me. Just like everything else.

F
ROM THE
J
OURNAL OF
A
LICE
M
ONROE

 

Jason visited the next week, and he said everything was almost ready. “My piece-of-shit car broke down, and it's going to cost too much to fix. We're going to have to go on foot.” I nodded my head and told him that I could run fast. “They moved my court date up to two weeks from now,” he said. “I could go to jail. We have to go soon. But I need another week to get everything together.”

I nodded again and hugged him tighter. He linked his fingers with mine. Sometime during our week apart, he'd gotten a new tattoo—my name on his knuckles.

“How's Cellie?” he asked. He worried that she was going to attack again. After her stay in the Quiet Room, she'd been admitted back into the general population. We weren't speaking. She watched me from the shadows. We were circling each other like two dogs about to fight. And with every passing week the tension grew between us.

I shook my head and pressed my lips together. “Not good.”

His thumb touched my lower lip. “You'll be free of her soon, I promise. That's the best thing about where we're going. She won't be able to find you. You'll be ready to go next week?” I was ready to go then, but I merely nodded and pressed my nose into his neck, trying to gain strength for the next few days.

That night, there was a crescent moon, and I felt as if I was swinging from it. Once, I had told Jason about Southern California, how the average temperature is seventy degrees and the sun stays out until the late evening. I hoped that was where he was taking us. I imagined us hitching rides along the highway, the sand between our toes and the surf in our ears. I could almost taste the salt in the air.

 

The next week Jason came and said everything was ready.

“Where are we going?” I asked, unable to contain my excitement.

He touched my cheek. “I found the perfect place.”

“Is it somewhere we've talked about before?”

“No, it's somewhere new. We've never talked about it. But I think you'll like it. It's better than anything you could imagine.”

I could only think of sun-kissed cheeks, coconut oil, and surfboards. All the bright colors of my future. But I trusted Jason. He wanted what was best for me. “Is it far?”

“No. That's the best part. It's not far at all.”

“How long will it take for us to get there?”

“Not very long, you'll see.”

He kissed my fingertips hard and asked again if I was ready. I took a look at the door that led back to Cellie and her madness. I nodded without hesitation. Yes. Yes, I was ready.

Jason said go. So I went.