Page 166 of Lessons In Grey

“Malachi told me—”

“Shut-up, Matthew!” I screamed, Sirius meowing loudly at my feet as I headed for my room. “It doesn’t matter! At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter! I’m not a part of your stupid fucking world. I’m not a part of any of this. This is exactly why I fucked and left,” I stated, turning back to the room at my bedroom door. “I made it very clear that I didn’t do this bullshit, and now look. I wish I had never let him get in my head.”

Everyone went silent, my heart thudding.

Ash stepped forward, worry in her eyes. “Emily.”

My eyes went wide, disbelief coursing through me. “I told you I didn’t want to talk to him,” I breathed out, shaking my head, horror filing me. “I told you.”

“Emily, wait,” Ash started after me.

I shut the door behind me and flipped the lock, covering myface and sinking to the ground a sob cracking through me. Goddammit. I told them. I tried to tell them. Why did they have to keep pushing?

43

Emily

February 21st, 2022

The Christmas decorations had long since been taken down, and on Valentines Day, Matthew, Jeremy, Ash, Syn, and I had spent the day going through mom and Charlie’s boxes, hanging up pictures and paintings, going through the clothes, putting things in a Salvation Army pile and whatnot.

The loft was now covered in pictures of family, including pictures of Ash and Syn, Jeremy and Matthew, and various pictures of me with all of them.

I had pictures of Grey too, but those had yet to be hung.

I felt guilty about that, but not as guilty as I should have felt.

We still hadn’t talked. He talked to Jeremy and Matthew, told them everything he wanted to tell me, but the routine remained the same. No texts to my phone, two calls to me in the last month, and nothing else.

I hadn’t wanted to learn how to live life without him, but here I was, forced to out-run the toxicity that had been our relationship. I suppose it was good in a sense.

Maybe when he came back, it’d be less toxic to the outside world. Less need, less craving.

But the pain in my heart at the thought left me breathless. I liked how we were. I liked the feeling of never getting enough. I loved it.

I wanted to drown in it.

Two months gone and I was starting to remember how life had been like without him. Only I was healed a little more now. Losing Charlie and my mom didn’t hurt so much. I wasn’t living with my dad. Jordan was dead. My life was normal.

It was mundane and predictable, and I was settling.

Although I was drinking more than what they thought was acceptable, it was fine for me. I wasn’t hurting anyone. It was better than being suicidal, although they seemed to think I still was. Jeremy checked on me often, asking how I was doing, what my thoughts were. Ash was tiptoeing around me, despite Syn urging her to stop, and Matthew? I wasn’t sure exactly what he was doing. I thought he had started pulling blows during training, going easy on me, but he assured me that I was just getting better.

It was easy to drown myself in training when I had nothing else to do during the day but schoolwork from my night classes and drink.

Today, however, Jeremy had called in because we had a guest coming.

They wouldn’t tell me who, although I knew it wasn’t Grey. They would be acting far more nervous if it had been him.

My guess was Malachi. I hoped I was wrong. I truly did because if it was Malachi, that meant Grey might be in trouble, and I couldn’t handle that guilt on top of everything else.

He was in trouble and here I was, refusing to answer his phone calls, refusing to talk to the others about him, because I didn’twant to fight with him.

Yes, it had gone from me not wanting him to feel guilty to just not wanting to fight with him. I knew he felt guilty, I could feel it in my soul. How could he not with me ignoring him and Jeremy reporting to him everything I did?

It was fucking ridiculous.

I strummed my guitar, shivering as I sat on the balcony, staring out across the city, humming nonsensical tunes to music not yet written.