The Game Series (46 page)

“Bloody hell.” I mutter as I slam the door to my apartment. “Takeaway guy needs to get some manners.”

I set the cartons down on the small table in my kitchen and grab a plate from the cupboard. My chef’s clothes are in a heap on the floor in front of my washing machine, and I kick them to the side.

I’m a chef and ordering takeaway for dinner. But really, a guy who cooks for ten hours in a shit hot kitchen doesn’t want to cook at home as well.

I dump the food onto my plate and take the ten steps into my front room. I sit on the sofa, swinging my legs up, and switch the tele on. And my phone rings.

“Uhhh,” I groan, leaning my head back. “Jesus.”

My steaming plate earns a place on the coffee table as I grab the phone. And groan again when my brother’s name appears on screen.

“Jase,” I answer. My
favorite
brother. Actually, my only brother.

“Mum was wondering if you were dead. You haven’t called her.”

“So she has my barely-legal baby brother calling to make sure her eldest son is still alive?” I snort. “Save me the sob story, Jase.”

He sighs. “She’s on deadline-”

“And only has however long to get however many designs of her fancy shoes into her office. Yeah, yeah. I’ve heard it all.”

“Right.” He pauses, and the line cracks a little. “Well. I think she misses you.”

I snort again. This one full of disbelief. “I’m her biggest disappointment, bro. I was supposed to follow in Dad’s footsteps and go into the firm with him, but instead I decided to “cook fancy dinners,” as she puts it. Then I came to New York to do what Tori and I always promised each other we’d do, and she hates that.”

Jase doesn’t say anything, and even though he’s so much younger than me I know he remembers her. There’s no way he couldn’t. As usual, the mere mention of her name silences the whole family. Like they won’t forget – like I’m the only one who can remember the way her eyes sparkled when she laughed and the way she flicked her hair over her shoulder when she was playing up the daddy’s girl act. The way everyone loved her, because she was just the kind of person you couldn’t help but love.

“She doesn’t like to remember. It hurts her, Blake.” His excuse is lame, and he knows it. I don’t like to remember and it hurts me but I still do.

“She’s dead, Jase. She existed, as much as our parents would like to believe she didn’t. Tori was real and pretending she wasn’t and her death never happened won’t make it better.”

“It just hurts Mum that you left, and the fact you left to do what Tori wanted to do rubs salt in the wound.”

“Juilliard wasn’t –
isn’t
,” I correct myself. “Just Tori’s dream. It never was. It was always our dream, and you know it.”

“What’s wrong with dance school here? You could get into any London school you wanted!”

I swallow as I remember the honest reason I’m here.
That
conversation that the twelve year old me didn’t understand.

“Blake?” Tori had knocked on my bedroom door softly, pushing it open a crack.

“Yeah?” I looked up from the science homework I was working on into my big sister’s wide green eyes. We had the same eyes – we were the only ones of all six of us that had Mum’s green eyes. Jase, Laura, Allie and Kiera all had Dad’s blue eyes.

“Can I come in?”

I looked at her feet inside my room and laughed. “You already are.”

She looked down, shrugged, and laughed with me. “I suppose I am.” She moved across the room with the grace of the dancer she was and jumped on my bed. My homework scattered everywhere, sheets of paper flying onto the floor, and I chucked my pencil at her.

“Dammit, Tori!”

“I’m sorry!” Her amused tone said she was anything but. I glared at her for a minute before breaking into a big grin. I could never stay mad at her. She was both my sister and my best friend, both of us the black sheep of the perfect family for our dreams.

“I need to ask you something.” Her tone was hesitant and more serious than it was before. I froze from grabbing my work from the floor and looked up at her.

“What is it?”

“Did you mean it when you said you wanted to go to Juilliard? To dance?”

“Of course I did. Why? Did you think I didn’t?”

“I did wonder.” She chews her lip. “I wondered if you were just saying it for me.”

“No, Tori. I want to go to Juilliard. We’re gonna take on the world, remember?” I smile at her, and she smiles back almost sadly.

“Right. The world.” She pauses. “I want you to promise me something.”

“Anything.”

Tori climbed from the bed and knelt in front of me. She reached forward and pressed her palms against my cheeks, cupping my face.

“Promise me, Blake, that no matter what happens, you’ll go to Juilliard. That you’ll go to New York and live our dream.”

“What?”

“Promise me. No matter what.”

I stared at her, not understanding why she was saying that. But I promised. I always would. I’d promise Tori anything.

“I promise. No matter what.”

She stroked my cheeks with her thumbs and pressed a kiss to my forehead as she stood up. Then she turned and walked away, pausing for a second at my door. Her head turned slightly, and her shining, wet eyes met mine.

“Thank you.”

I swallow, wiping at my eyes. “I promised her two days before she died I’d go to New York and get into Juilliard. I promised her no matter what, Jase.”

I’m halfway there
, I remind myself. Halfway there.

“Right. Look. I gotta go,” he says in a slightly thick voice. “Going out. Bye.”

The line clicks dead, and I fight the urge to throw my phone across the room. Same old response, same old thing every single time her name is mentioned. No one wants to talk about her, about the blot on the family name, about the perfect family’s dirty little secret.

No one wants to remember her. If my parents had their way, she’d be wiped from every family photo she was ever in, our house would have one less bedroom, and my mother would have a handful less stretch marks. If my parents had their way, my eldest sister would have never existed. They would have had five children, with Kiera being the eldest. As she is now, by default.

I look at my dinner on the table, still steaming slightly, and chuck my phone on the sofa instead of at the wall. I glance at the plate again, shake my head, and walk into the dingy bathroom.

My family may pretend Tori never existed, but they weren’t the ones who spent every spare second with her. They weren’t the ones who knew her hopes and dreams.

And they weren’t the ones who found her body.

They can try to forget all they want, but that’s the one image I will never, ever be able to erase from my mind. That memory will haunt me forever.

The clock ticks steadily in the background. Every tick brings me a second closer to leaving Dr. Hausen’s office and entering Bianca’s studio. Every tick brings me a second closer to my true therapy.

My psychiatrist clicks her pen in time with the clock ticking. My foot bobs as I stare blankly at a spot on the wall.

“I like your hair,” she says.

My hand goes to the braid hanging over my shoulder. “Thanks.”

“It’s a big change.”

“Yep.”

“Do you think it’s a good one?”

I sigh and look at her. Her greying hair is clasped to the back of her head and her glasses are perched on the top of her head precariously. She stops clicking the pen, instead tapping it against her papers. I know this tactic – but I still fall for it. Every time.

I hate pen clicking, tapping, or any variation of a repetitive noise. She knows if she taps long enough, I’ll answer just to get her to stop.

“Yes,” I grit out. The tapping stops. “You know, that’s a dirty trick.”

Dr. Hausen smiles, her eyes crinkling at the corners. “Ah, but it works.” She lets out a small laugh. “Tell me what made you do it.”

“What made me answer you? The pen clicking and tapping.”

“Abbi.” She tries for stern but the lingering upturn of her lips gives her away.

I shrug. “Worth a try.”

“What made you dye your hair?”

“The old Abbi was blonde. I’m not that person anymore,” I say quietly.

“So it’s the same reason you had for decorating your room before you moved back home.” Statement. Not a question.

“Mhmm.”

“Why do you think that is?”

Because I hate the old Abbi
. I hate that she never stood up for herself. I hate that she let Pearce walk all over her, abuse her, defile her. I hate that he made her a shadow of the person she was. I hate the fact she let him ruin her life.

“Because I wanted to separate the past from the present,” I half-lie, scratching behind my ear.

“And the rest?”

“The rest?”

“You’re scratching behind your ear.” Dr. Hausen’s lips twitch as she relaxes back into her chair. “Abbi, I haven’t been your psychiatrist for a year and not picked up on your habit. You scratch behind your ear when you’re keeping something from me. Usually I let you keep it inside, but this time, I want to know. I want you to tell me the whole reason.”

I push myself from the plush armchair I’m so accustomed to and walk over to the large window. Her office overlooks St. Morris’s gardens, and I look towards the apple trees filling with tiny apples.

“I don’t know what you mean.” I fold my arms across my chest so I don’t scratch my ear. Damn. I’ll have to remember that.

“So unfold your arms and sit back down.”

I swallow, silently counting the apples I can see on the tree. “I… I didn’t want anything to do with the person I was. What happened – what he did to me, what I did to myself – it changed me. I don’t like the person I was. I don’t want anything that reminds me of her, so I changed it. Moving on. Going forward. You know. Isn’t that why I was released from here? So I could move on and forget everything?”

“There’s nothing good in forgetting. Remembering, although it hurts, is what you need to do. You need to take all the memories no matter how much they hurt and force them out. Even if it means reliving every single time he hurt you and every single time you hurt yourself, you must remember. Forgetting isn’t the key to moving on. Remembering is, because only once we’ve remembered can we forget.”

“That makes no sense.”

“You can’t forget what you don’t know, Abbi. You can’t forget what you haven’t allowed yourself to know. All holding it back will do is keep you stuck in a limbo you have no control over.”

I glance over my shoulder at her. “I have control. I haven’t cut for months. I’ve wanted to, but I haven’t.
I have control.
”

My hands are shaking frantically as I look back out of the window. I blink to clear my eyes of the tears forming there. I feel like a frustrated toddler trying to get their point across without the necessary words.

I hear the shuffle as Dr. Hausen puts her papers down and the click of her heels on the hardwood floor.

“Abbi,” she says softly, laying a hand on my shoulder. “I know you have control.
That
is the reason you were allowed to leave St. Morris’s. Many people come here and never leave; for some reason some people don’t have the fight in them to push the darkness away. Some people will never get better, they’ll never fight their demons.

“But you? What you suffered was horrendous. Disgusting. I wish with every part of me you didn’t have to go through what you did, but I know you’re not one of those people. I know you have the fight in your tiny little body to push that darkness away. You are strong enough to remember everything you went through and still keep a hold on that light.

“Yes, I could have kept you institutionalized here. I could have kept you in your bland white room, kept your strict meal times, your group activities, your daily counseling sessions. But why? That wasn’t benefitting you. Not even I’m perfect, Abbi. I didn’t realize what you needed until you asked to dance – I didn’t realize how strong your desire to dance was until I saw you in the gym the first time. That’s why I let you leave.”

“But why? Bianca was happy to keep coming here. Why not keep me here where you had an eye on me? You know I still feel like I want to cut when it gets bad. You know how hard it is.” Tears stream down my cheeks, and Dr. Hausen turns me to her gently.

“Because, Abbi, you have something many of the others here don’t.”

“Which is?”

She bends down an inch or two so we’re face to face. “A dream. You have something to live for, something you
couldn’t
live for while you were locked up in here.”

“Why does that make such a difference?”

“Because you can only truly live for something once you’ve stared death in the eye. You’ve been close to death, close enough to touch, but you can still hold onto life because of your dream. You cannot appreciate everything until you’ve had nothing.
That
is the difference.”

~

The silence of the studio wraps around me, cocooning me in a blanket of security. Here is where I’m at home, with my foot on the
barre
and my head against my knee as I stretch out.

The emptiness of the studio is down to the fact I’m here half an hour early – before the ten minutes early Bianca demands of us. After seeing Dr. Hausen, I need to let off some steam before the class starts. Her room is so constricting, so suffocating, and I just need to feel free. Even if it’s for just a moment.

So I twist my braid into a bun, and I dance.

I leap and twirl and spin my way across the studio floor, dropping from pointe and raising back up again. My toes take a beating as I lose myself in the piece, my leg muscles tighten and my back arches when I stop for two seconds. Then I’m back into it. I’m back flying across the studio, the heaviness of my discussion with Dr. Hausen lifting a little more with every step, every
plié
, every turn.

And then, for one blissful second, I can’t feel a thing. All I can feel is the music. And in that second, I find a small piece of myself.

I find a tiny part of the fight Dr. Hausen told me was there. And I hold onto it as tightly as I can before the heaviness comes crashing in, weighing me back down again.

“Wow.”

My heart jumps into my throat as my body jumps back. I somehow stop myself from falling over by grabbing the
barre
, and look towards the piano. Blake is standing by the great black piano with his bag at his feet and his awe-filled eyes fixed on me.

I shift uncomfortably. “Uh, wow?”

“Yeah. You can dance, huh?”

“Really? I thought I was lost on my way to a take-out.” I tilt my head to the side slightly and my lips twitch.

“That came out kind of dumb.” He laughs at himself and grabs his bag, walking over to the corner and sitting down. “Obviously you can dance, that’s why you’re here, and I’ve danced with you so I
know
you can dance, but yeah. I’m just going to shut up, because I’m really digging myself a hole here.”

My hand covers my mouth and I giggle into it. “Well, I’m glad we cleared that up.”

He turns his head in my direction, looking at me with a striking pair of green eyes, and smirks. “Okay, not only is she a beautiful dancer, she has a smart mouth, too. I’m pretty sure that’s a recipe for my perfect girl. Hey, this could be fate, you know.”

I feel my cheeks redden slightly and grab my water bottle. “If that was a line, it was a terrible one.”

“Really?”

“Really terrible,” I clarify.

“Worth a shot though?”

I sit on the bench and look at him, grinning. “Definitely worth a shot.”

“Then it was worth completely and utterly embarrassing myself.” He smiles at me. “I meant it, though.”

“What, the fate thing?”

“If I said “maybe,” would it work this time?” he asks hopefully.

“No.”

“Damn.” Blake pauses, and I raise an eyebrow. “In that case, I meant what I said about you being a beautiful dancer. I don’t know what it is about you, but when you dance it’s like you’re in a whole other place. I noticed it the other day when we danced together. It’s like you weren’t even here.”

I smooth my hair back unnecessarily, looking towards the open door as the rest of our class starts to filter in. “I wasn’t,” I admit. “We’re all allowed to get a little lost sometimes, because life sucks. This happens to be where I get away from all the sucky stuff.”

“Right,” he says softly. “I get that. I feel the same, I guess. Just sucks we have to come back.”

“Exactly.” I turn back to him and our eyes meet. Something flashes in his eyes, something indiscernible. An understanding, almost. Something that connects us in a way I’ve never connected with anyone. After a beat I pull my gaze away and stand.

Chatter picks up around us, and I approach the
barre
. The cold metal is grounding to me, as always, and I hold onto it like it’s what’s keeping me standing.

“I feel like I should apologize for my bumbling speech when I came in and the really, really shitty chat-up line I inadvertently used,” Blake’s voice says lowly from behind me.

“Hey, like you said it was worth a try, right?” I drop my head a little and fight my smile.

“Well, it was. But that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t apologize. Honestly, I’m twenty-one; you’d think that by now I could bloody well talk to a girl without making a complete and utter twat of myself.”

I lift my head and glance round at him. “Twat? What the hell is that?”

He groans, dropping his head back for a second. “Bloody Americans.”

“Freakin’ British,” I respond, amused.

“Touché.” He laughs. “A twat is pretty much a… Well. It’s a glorified idiot.”

I let my lips form a tentative smile as his eyes find mine. “In that case, I feel like I should tell you, you really did make a complete and utter twat of yourself.”

Blake grins as Bianca steps into the studio and claps her hand twice. He winks as I turn my head to the front.

I feel his eyes on my back as Bianca’s uncle begins to play our
plié
music. I feel him watching my every move like he’s memorizing every inch of my body, memorizing the shapes my limbs make. His gaze is hot on me and it burns into my skin in a way that makes me inhale sharply. Facing the front and keeping my concentration is near impossible when a part of me just wants to turn my face and meet that searing gaze. It’s thrilling and disconcerting simultaneously, but there’s nothing I can do. I’m here to dance, not have a wary session of eye-sex with Blake the Hot British Guy. I have to grit my teeth and bear it.

Besides – if he was in front of me, I can’t say I wouldn’t be doing the same thing.

I might not want to feel. I might have walls built around me that rival any prison’s, but I am still human. And that means I can still appreciate a hot guy.

And, if I’m honest, Blake is about the hottest thing that’s appeared in my life since my aunt dropped half a pack of chili powder in her chili con carne.