The Destiny of Violet & Luke

He strolls up and leans over to catch my eye. “Not that. That weird little moment you two just shared.”

“I don’t share moments with anyone.” I glance out the window, keeping an eye on the yard in front of the building for her to step outside.

“So you say,” Seth says. “And I’ve never seen you do anything that would contradict that, until just now.”

“Seth, maybe we should just let him be,” Greyson says, leaning against the door.

I gather my pens and notebook out of the desk, along with the leather case that carries my insulin and needles and place it into a box. I relax when I spot a girl with dark hair and red streaks hiking across the grass down below. “Yeah, please drop it. I don’t have enough alcohol in my system just yet.” I back away from the desk toward the mini fridge. “Speaking of which.” I bend down and open the fridge, taking out a bottle of vodka, hoping it’ll drown out what I just did.

Greyson sits down on the bed and shakes his head disapprovingly as I tip back my head and down a much-needed shot. Seth snatches the bottle from my hand and takes a large gulp himself.

“You two are such alcoholics,” Greyson says. “Seriously, this isn’t normal.”

“Normal is overrated,” Seth jokes, handing me the bottle.

I put it back in the fridge and shut the door. “So not that I’m not super thrilled you guys randomly showed up way too early in the morning, but why are you here? I thought you were headed to your house,” I say to Seth.

“Well, we were,” he replies, sitting down beside Greyson. “But then I got a lovely call from dear old ma a few days ago, saying that she’d changed her mind and that she wasn’t comfortable with Greyson and me staying with her, so now we’re crashing in town for the summer.”

“Why don’t you just go to Greyson’s?” I ask, crossing the room to the closet.

“Because his parents live all the way over in Florida,” he tells me. “And we don’t want to drive that far. Besides, I got an offer to work at the clinic and I really want to do it, being a Psychology major and all.”

“You’re a Psychology major?” I question. “When did that happen?”

“When I registered for fall classes and my counselor suggested I declare something other than undecided,” he says, with a grin. “And since I’m so smart in the human psyche department, I thought I’d give psychology a go. And Greyson got a new part-time job as a bartender down at Moonlight Dining and Drinks. He starts in a few days.”

I grab all my shirts off the hangers and put them in the box, keeping a gray one out to put on now. I don’t like how unorganized I’m being, but I’m in a hurry to get down to the apartments, just to have peace of mind that I have a roof over my head. “So then where are you two living? Because getting an apartment around here on short notice is pretty much a lost cause.”

“We just got a place up on Elm yesterday,” Seth tells me, getting up from the bed. “Which is why we stopped by… it’s got an extra room and we were wondering if you wanted to stay with us, since you don’t have place to stay.”

I glance up as I fold the top of the box shut. “How did you know I didn’t have a place?”

Seth grabs the tape from the dresser and hands it to me. “You told us the other night at Red Ink.”

Me and my drunken mouth. “Well, I’m good now.” I pull a piece of tape off and stretch it out over the box.

“Good living with Violet?” He exchanges a disbelieving look with Greyson and Greyson sighs. “Come on, you seriously want to live with her?”

“Maybe.” My chest constricts as I say it because I do. “I can’t just leave her with nowhere to go and she’s got a job and everything so she can pay half the rent.”

“She can get her own place,” Seth says as I tug the gray shirt over my head.

“No, she can’t,” I reply, running my hand over my hair. “She needs help.”

“Obviously.” Seth rolls his eyes. “She’s scary as hell.”

“I’m scary as hell.” I pick up my cologne off the desk and spray a little on me before adding it to another box. It seemed so hard to pack before, but it seems easy now that I know I’m not going back home.

“No, you just think you are.” Seth roams around my room, collecting my watches and sunglasses I have lying around, along with loose change. He hands them to me and I add them to another box I have open next to the foot of the bed. “Just crash with us. We can split the rent three ways and Greyson knows the guy running the place and he gave us one of the furnished apartments for cheap.”

“How cheap?” I clasp a leather band on my wrist that says redemption on it.

“Six hundred bucks for a two-bedroom and you’ll get your own room.” He smiles like it’s the best deal ever.

It’s about the same price as the Oak Section, yet much nicer and it has furniture. Shit, it’s tempting. Way too tempting. Plus the bills would be split three ways. I fold my arms, my jaw set tight as I dig out my old self that’s been hiding for days, the one that thinks of himself first because no one else ever has.

“All right I’m in.”

Violet

I’m trying to keep it together and not run out into that road. Cars crawl by at a snail’s pace so it wouldn’t do much good throwing myself in front of them anyway. But everything’s crashing over me; opening my eyes to an unfamiliar room, Luke witnessing me spastically waking up, and the fact I’m officially alone in the world. I don’t even have Preston anymore. The one person I could ever consider family is gone and now I’m standing out in front of a building, not a single person in sight. All I want to do is pick a fight, stand on the ledge of a tall building, drown in a dark pool of water. Push myself to the brink of death and maybe this time just let it take me over. Maybe it’s time. To let go. Give up. Because I’m so God damn tired of struggling to hold onto life.

I tug my hands through my tangled hair and glance around the grassy area surrounded by trees, searching for something dangerous that might give me the numbness I so desperately need. My gaze scales up to the roof of the loft dorm building, and I angle my chin up. The sun stings at my eyes but I don’t blink as I observe the thin trim of the roof. How do I get up to it?

“Violet.” Luke’s voice flickers the tension inside me down a notch, enough for me to stop thinking about the roof.