He fingers a piece of my hair and laughs. “The girl who smothers everything inside her fucking notebook? Tell me, bunny. How would you describe me now?” Releasing me, he leans back against the counter and strokes his chin. “Use those pretty words.”
“You’re talented,” I reiterate. “You’re cocky. You’re…honest.”
“Cocky and honest.” He nods in approval. “Two out of three ain’t bad, rabbit—”
“You’re talented.” I’m not even sure why I’m so adamant about it. Or why he frowns, his jaw clenched. “Did you ever think of pursuing art? As more than a tattoo artist?”
“Like what?” He grunts, turning his gaze to the window.
“I don’t know… College,” I say, picturing him lumbering around the campus. “Studying art. Running a gallery—”
“You see all of that in a few fucking sketches?” he counters. “Or is that what it takes to be valid in a bunny’s world? College?”
I flinch at the hostility in his tone. “What I think has nothing to do with it. They’re good. They are.” Saying it out loud feels empowering in a sense. I’m the dragon for once, breathing out compliments that he interprets as fire. “Why does it bother you so much to hear me say that?”
“The same reason it bothers you to hear the truth about your fucking Bran,” he snaps back. “Hearing it doesn’t change shit, does it?”
Before I can respond, he pushes past me for his jeans and yanks them on, shoving his feet into his shoes without even bothering with the laces. He snatches his shirt next, and the ferocity of each action betrays how angry he truly is, sparked seemingly from nowhere.
“I don’t know what I said wrong,” I blurt out.
Moving toward my door, he wrenches it open without looking back. “I think we’re done now, bunny. I’ll save you the trouble of cutting me loose.”
He leaves, slamming the door behind him, and I blink, alarmed as my eyes burn. It feels so childish and almost pathetic to care that I may have upset him.
I’m a moth again, fluttering too close to a blazing flame, only to be shocked when it burns. The pain feels different from the cold, numbed state it’s used to flying in. One taste of something new, and it can’t get enough, no matter how reckless the act becomes.
It would rather burn than continue to feel nothing.
My legs shake when I finally remember how to move. I stagger into my bedroom, falling to my knees beside the bed frame. Reaching under it, I withdraw the worn shoebox, throwing it onto my bed.
But for once, I don’t feel each item individually. Pushing the faded article aside, I curl my fingers around one, in particular, holding it up to the light. The gold bracelet is so simple in theory. And in so many ways, it’s more dangerous than Rafe’s lighter, capable of sparking a raging fire volatile enough to destroy my life in the aftermath.
And Branden’s.
I don’t know why I’ve kept it all this time, hiding in plain sight even while I lived in my brother’s house. Out of guilt? Regret?
Or maybe revenge? The vain hope that one day I’d be brave enough to spark that fire. Let it burn…
Instead, I do what I’ve always done in the end and return the bracelet to the box. Closing it, I shove the whole thing back into its hiding place.
My head feels heavy as I re-enter my living room, grab my bag from near the door, and find my pen. My journal. After flipping to a blank page, I start writing, losing myself in the swirls of ink gliding across the page.
Nothing else matters. Not the time dangerously inching toward when I need to be at the bookstore. Not the ache in my chest or the cramp in my hand that makes scribbling the next few lines a struggle.
The only occurrence capable of breaking through the impulsive trance is the thud of a fist pounding against my door. I jump so violently, my journal skids across the floor. My throat dries as my pulse surges.
Branden?
No. He wouldn’t knock. When I finally creep to the door, I feel my nostrils flare, testing the air. Cloying cologne tickles my nose, and when I open the door, the man on the other side is only vaguely familiar. A figure I last interacted with the day I moved in.
“Hey,” the man, the building’s landlord, says. “You sure you gonna be out by the end of the month?”
The words seem to take an eternity to register. The end of the