slowly over my features, seeming to linger on my mouth.
“Who upset you? I’ll kick their ass.” His voice was firm but rough. “Tell me,” he said softly as he framed my face in both his hands.
His controlled anger on my behalf, added to his gentle concern, made me melt. Okay, to be honest, all that he was and had once meant to me melted me. There was a time I’d cast him in the role of my very own Prince Charming.
“War.” I wet my suddenly dry lips and swallowed. “War upset me.”
Bryan released me and took a big step backward.
“Yeah.” I let out a nervous laugh, wrapping my arms around myself as the concern in his expression disappeared. “Figured you’d react like that.”
His eyes narrowed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You tell me, Bryan. We were once close friends. But now there’s War, and you can’t seem to be bothered with me anymore.”
“We’re still friends,” he said, frowning.
“Really?” All my sleeplessness, frustration, and anger spilled over and out of my mouth. “How can that be? Friends talk to each other. I haven’t heard from you in years. Not a single word, nothing since the night of the Metallica concert.”
“I was just a kid then,” he said, as if that were an excuse.
“And I wasn’t?”
“How was I supposed to react? What was I supposed to do?” Frowning, he raked a hand through his hair. “You were almost raped, Lace. And all I could do was stand there.”
Did he blame himself like Dizzy did?
“It wasn’t your fault.”
“It felt like it was.” He blew out a breath. “I should have stopped you from going upstairs.”
My eyes widened, and his turned unfocused as if he were remembering that dreadful scene.
“Then after,” he said, “you didn’t even want me around.”
“I was scared,” I whispered. “Confused.”
“So was I. Barely older than you when it happened. Then you moved away right after that, and I knew I needed to let you go. You were better off someplace else, anywhere else.” His eyes refocused. “Or that’s what I told myself. You’re better off, Lace, aren’t you?”
I was better off in a lot of ways, but in others I wasn’t. Before, I would have shared the bad and the good with Bryan. All of it. But not now, even though I wanted to.
“Sure,” I said, letting him off the hook.
“Good.” He let out a shaky exhale, as if he’d feared my answer.
“I have plans,” I said, deciding to give him a little more. “I make good grades like your mom encouraged me to do. I want to go to college and study fashion design.”
“Makes sense.” He tilted his head to a reflective angle. “I remember all those outrageous Britney Spears costumes you used to throw on for our performances.”
“Hopefully, slightly better than those,” I said, and he grinned. Encouraged by that, I blabbed more. “If I do well on my SAT, I should qualify for a scholarship.”
“What’s after that?” he asked, and I shrugged.
“That’s pretty far into the future.”
“Don’t tell me you haven’t thought further.” He raised a brow.
“I’d love to have my own label, see my clothes modeled on the runway at fashion shows in New York and Milan.” Curious, I squinted up at him. “And you?”
“I want to be a world-famous guitarist. Walk onstage with my guitar at Madison Square Garden. Own it.”
Nodding, I said, “I can see you doing that for sure.”
“And there she is.”
“Who?” I asked.
“You, Lace.” He shook his head. “You always had a way of making me believe anything was possible.” His eyes shone. “I never thought I’d see you again, let alone talk to you like this.”
“Me either.”
“I wanted to see you again. So many times, I thought about it after you left. But my mom wouldn’t let me. She said I’d interfere with your healing process, maybe even trigger a flashback.”
“All these years.” I shook my head. “I had it all wrong. I thought you didn’t want to be friends with me anymore because of what Sean did.”
“That wasn’t it at all. And now that I’m older, I wonder if there was some other reason my mom wanted me to stay away.” Closing his hands around my upper arms, Bryan pulled me closer. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. I thought I was doing the right thing.”
And there he was . . . the Bryan I knew before. Doing the right thing for those he cared about had always been important to the boy I’d befriended.