Seventeen year old Safaya Bennett must navigate young adulthood under the stresses of her sins, her crumbling relationship with her twin sister, Rue, and a crippling mental disorder that makes her very dependent on her relationship with Nate Jacobs...
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Over the screams of everyone scrambling out of the pool, my sister whimpered to herself.
Cassie continued to vomit. Throwing up all over the place and Safaya unfortunately caught some of the backsplash. The vomit felt like it was burning a hole into my sisters shoulder. Her night was already kind of shitty and now it was certified fucked up.
"Oh my god." Cassie slurred. Her tearful eyes staring at my sister. "Safaya, I'm sorry." She started to cry over the loud gags of everyone. The blonde threw up again, making my sister's body rock with sobs. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry Maddy. I ruined everything!"
Safaya felt like everything was going to shit and the fact she had to deal with her problems sober, it was fucking her up.
Maddy locked eyes with my sister and saw that she was in distress. "Come on." She held her hand out. "Come on, Saf, let's get you cleaned up. Come on." She dry heaved.
My sister grabbed Maddy's hand and allowed her to pull her out of the puke-filled water. Listening to the high pitched wails of Cassie as she insisted on apologizing. Suze tried grabbing her daughter out of the water but she was dead weight. Maddy led Safaya to the side of the house away from the hot tub, trying to calm my sister down.
"Nate, get us a fucking towel." The birthday girl screamed to the top of her lungs. She turned to my sister and held her face gently in her hands. "Talk to me, Saf." She said quietly. "What's wrong?"
Safaya shook her head. Completely crying in front of her friend. "It's too much. I fucking hate feeling like this." She mumbled. "I don't deserve to keep being hurt. Why do people enjoy hurting me, Maddy?"
"Who hurt you?" She asked.
"Who hasn't?" Safaya shrugged, taking a deep breath as her tears slowed. "Rue's not clean. She hasn't been for God knows how long and I'm exhausted. I'm just fucking exhausted and I wanted to forget about my problems for the night but fucking Cassie threw up on me and ... and I've had enough."
Nate came out of the shadows, holding two towels with that same submissive look on his face as before. While grabbing towels from the laundry room he saw Cassie get dragged upstairs by her mother. The look of anguish on her face was a direct result of everything he had done. He had broken Cassie and frankly did not care. I think he liked the idea that he broke her, knowing that he would always have her wrapped around his finger.
He handed the towels to the two girls. Noticing that Safaya had tears streaking her face. "Are you okay?" He asked.
"I'm fine." She answered quickly. Nate didn't need anything else that he could possibly hold against her. "Thanks for the towel." She rubbed the throw up off of her shoulder. Grimacing at the potent smell of alcohol on her. Trying her best to not be triggered.
Maddy looked around her shoulder. "Where's TJ?" She asked.
"Uh, he headed out." Nate said. "And I think I'm about to leave to. Things got kind of weird so I'm gonna head out." He motioned towards the door. "Happy birthday, Maddy." He gave her a soft kiss on the cheek. My sister shooting daggers into the side of his head. The tall boy left the backyard, putting his tee shirt back on before heading for his truck.
