Total pages in book: 74
Estimated words: 73828 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 369(@200wpm)___ 295(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73828 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 369(@200wpm)___ 295(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
“Oh, fuck.”
“Fuck?” he asks. “That’s all you fucking have to say?”
“Mark, I don’t know how that video got out. I swear on my life. I never shared it with anyone. It was on my phone, and I swear to you I deleted them like the rest. I’ll get it taken down. I’m gonna make this right.”
“Make it right?” he asks, his words filled with contempt.
It pains me to see him like this, and hurts even more knowing he blames me as much as I blame myself.
“There’s no way to fucking make this right, Tim! It’s already out there. Greg just sent me the link—”
“Greg?”
I’m trying to think of how he could be responsible for this, but I can’t imagine a way. I deleted it the night we filmed it.
Regardless, someone got a hold of it.
“Can you imagine what Mom’s going to say when she sees it?” he asks. “When she hears about it? Oh, God.”
I start moving toward him, but stop myself. I want to console him. To make him know I’m going to make this better for him. To protect him.
Of course, how can he believe me after what just happened?
“Mark, please—”
“I’m going,” he mutters. “I have to tell my fucking parents before that monster Kendra does.”
His face trembles as he cries.
“I’ll go with you.”
“No. I think you’ve done enough to wreck my fucking life.”
“Don’t go. You don’t understand how much I care about you. I would never have done anything to put you at risk.”
“But you did. You hurt me so fucking much. Because I really did trust you. I guess that’s where I was stupid. Because obviously you lied to me about deleting those videos. And obviously you were off sharing them with someone who I guess now you know you can’t trust. Just like I can’t fucking trust you. Good-fucking-bye, Tim.”
He storms off.
I would never have done anything to hurt you, Mark. How doesn’t he understand that?
But I did.
I don’t even know how I did, and that’s what makes it even worse.
It reminds me of the night when that guy hit him.
It’s not him. It’s that I’m such a fucking mess of bad decisions. A magnet for trouble.
I don’t have time to fucking dwell on what a sad son of a bitch I am, though.
I have to fix this…as much as I can, at least, starting with getting this goddamn video pulled.
I head back inside. Nanna asks me what’s wrong, but I just tell her that I have an emergency to take care of.
I head into my room and pull up my laptop. I feel sick to my stomach, not just over what happened, but knowing that whoever is responsible took advantage of both of us. Victimized us like this. I flag the video on the site and contact their customer support via the email on their site. I’m sure Mark’s trying the same things. And soon, his parents will know, and they’ll likely be able to get it pulled in a matter of moments.
Although, the last thing he wants to do is be the one to tell them about this shit.
Fuck. I finally had something that was wonderful. That fucking made my life so amazing, and then everything had to go to shit.
Of course that’s how it fucking works.
34
MARK
There’s a knock at my bedroom door before it opens, Mom inviting herself in. Not that I would have wanted to get up to get it.
I’ve been lying in bed for the past two hours, waiting for her to get back from a lunch with some of her bigwig friends. I just messaged her to let her know we have to discuss something important. If I’d said what it was about, she would have come running, but this isn’t something I can drop on her through a text or over the phone.
I’m ashamed. Embarrassed.
Dad’s still working with clients at the office, but as much as he might be bothered by the news, it’s not going to destroy his image the way it will Mom’s.
“Mark, is everything all right?” she asks, and even though I can hear the love in her voice, I can also sense her uneasiness. Like she doesn’t want to deal with the hassle of any trouble I’ve gotten myself into.
I just need be honest so she can get her lawyers and PR people working on figuring this out.
I sit up, and she sits beside me on the mattress.
“Come on, baby,” she says.
She must see how upset I am—how this is eating at me on the inside.
She hugs me the way I remember her hugging me after Becky died.
“You’re going to be so fucking mad,” I say, my voice squeaking as tears race down my face.
My thoughts race back to the day she told me that I needed to stay in the closet. This is the very reason she didn’t want me being out—because she feared something like this would happen. In some ways, I know I secretly wanted vengeance against her, but now that it’s happened, I realize it was just a fantasy—and the realization of it is a nightmare.