Unravel Me: The Juliette Chronicles Book 2

personality I seem to be developing lately.
    I tell Adam I need a minute. I tell him I need to stop by the bathroom before we head over to the medical wing and he says okay, he says he’ll wait for me.
    He says he’ll wait for me until I’m ready.
    And I tiptoe back into the dark tunnel to tell Warner that I have to leave, that I won’t be coming back after all, but when I squint into the darkness I can’t see a thing.
    I look around.
    He’s already gone.

SIXTY
    We don’t have to do anything at all to die.
    We can hide in a cupboard under the stairs our whole life and it’ll still find us. Death will show up wearing an invisible cloak and it will wave a magic wand and whisk us away when we least expect it. It will erase every trace of our existence on this earth and it will do all this work for free. It will ask for nothing in return. It will take a bow at our funeral and accept the accolades for a job well done and then it will disappear.
    Living is a little more complex. There’s one thing we always have to do.
    Breathe.
    In and out, every single day in every hour minute and moment we must inhale whether we like it or not. Even as we plan to asphyxiate our hopes and dreams still we breathe. Even as we wither away and sell our dignity to the man on the corner we breathe. We breathe when we’re wrong, we breathe when we’re right, we breathe even as we slip off the ledge toward an early grave. It cannot be undone.
    So I breathe.
    I count all the steps I’ve climbed toward the noose hanging from the ceiling of my existence and I count out the number of times I’ve been stupid and I run out of numbers.
    Kenji almost died today.
    Because of me.
    It’s still my fault that Adam and Warner were fighting. It’s still my fault that I stepped between them. It’s still my fault that Kenji felt the need to pull them apart and if I hadn’t been caught in the middle Kenji never would’ve been hurt.
    And I’m standing here. Staring at him.
    He’s barely breathing and I’m begging him. I’m begging him to do the one thing that matters. The only thing that matters. I need him to hold on but he’s not listening. He can’t hear me and I need him to be okay. I need him to pull through. I need him to breathe.
    I need him.
    Castle didn’t have much more to say.
    Everyone was standing around, some wedged into the medical wing, others standing on the other side of the glass, watching silently. Castle gave a small speech about how we need to stick together, how we’re a family and if we don’t have each other then who do we have? He said we’re all scared, sure, but now is the time for us to support one another. Now is the time to band together and fight back. Now is the time, he said, for us to take back our world.
    “Now is the time for us to live,” he said.
    “We’ll postpone tomorrow’s departure just long enough for everyone to have a final breakfast together. We cannot go into battle divided,” he said. “We have to have faith in ourselves and in each other. Take a little more time in the morning to find peace with yourselves. After breakfast we leave. As one.”
    “What about Kenji?” someone asked, and I was startled to hear the familiar voice.
    James. He was standing there with his fists clenched, tearstains streaked across his face, his bottom lip trembling even as he fought to hide the pain in his voice.
    My heart split clean in half.
    “What do you mean?” Castle asked him.
    “Will he fight tomorrow?” James demanded, sniffing back the last of his tears, fists beginning to shake. “He wants to fight tomorrow. He told me he wants to fight tomorrow.”
    Castle’s face creased as it pulled together. He took his time responding. “I . . . I’m afraid I don’t think Kenji will be able to join us tomorrow. But perhaps,” he said, “perhaps you could stay and keep him company?”
    James didn’t respond. He only stared at Castle. Then he stared at Kenji. He blinked several times before pushing through the crowd to clamber onto Kenji’s bed. Burrowed into his side and promptly fell asleep.
    We all took that as our cue to leave.
    Well. Everyone but me, Adam, Castle, and the girls. I find it interesting that everyone refers to Sonya and Sara as “the girls,” as if they’re the only girls in this entire place. They’re not. I don’t even know how they got that nickname and while a part of me wants to know, another part of me is too exhausted to ask.
    I curl into my seat and stare at