Saving Max

Chapter 8

Caden's POV

I haven't talked to Bella in three days.

I've tried calling her at least twenty times, and have left her over a hundred text messages, but she hasn't replied to any of them.

It's been hell.

Part of me wants to be mad at her for not talking to me, not even having the decency to send me even a simple text saying 'I'm okay.' But after thinking about it for a while, I started to question my original thoughts.

All of my thoughts, really.

I'm a bad person. I'm reckless, and probably on the road to life in prison for kidnapping Max. That in mind, I started to think that Bella not talking to me was actually for the best. I don't want her to get mixed up in all of this, especially since she has a bright future ahead of her. The brightest thing that I can see in my future is some rusty poles of a jail cell.

Maybe she's finally figured out all of the risks that come along with Max and I had and decided to just cut us out of her life.

Or maybe she's simply come to terms with the fact that I'm no good for her.

Both are equally as plausible.

I'm not sure which one I like better.

Part of me wants to believe she's opened her eyes and seen me for the demon I really am, but the other part of me just wants her here next to me so that I can pretend to be something I'm not, one thing I'll probably never be.

Normal.

Bella doesn't see me as the juvenile delinquent who doesn't know how to do anything right in his life; she sees me as a concerned brother who is really trying to change his ways. And when I'm around her, I start to think that maybe I am the person she's come to know.

But right now, I hate her for it.

I hate how she can make me feel like maybe, maybe, I could be a good person, and then just leave me, standing all alone and so completely broken.

All I can do now is question every thought I've ever had around her, not sure if the me I am with her is real or not. When I'm not questioning all of that, I'm thinking of anything terrible I could have done to or around her. I must have done something bad for her to not talk to me, butt I can't figure out for the life of me what the hell it was.

The last thing I said to her was that I hoped I'd see her tomorrow.

What did I do to her that would make her not return fifty seven phone calls?

I'm racking my brain for anything and everything I could have done to piss her off, but have come up with nothing. Well, nothing that we haven't already resolved.

And It's driving me insane. I can't sleep, I can't eat, I can't do anything. It's like I can't function now because I don't have her in my life. I don't know why, though. I was perfectly fine before she came in to my life, but now that she's pushed her way in to Max and I's world, she's changed everything. She's flipped a switch that's impossible to turn off.

Before, I though that was a good thing, but now, I'm not so sure.

"I'm not going anywhere."

Her words echo in my head, pushing me off the cliff of insanity, straight down to the hard ground below.

"Can I go to school today?" Max asks from the corner of the room, peeking his head around the wall to stare at me with his big, shining blue eyes.

"No." I snap. "You don't need to. I told you that you have the week off." I mumble the last bit incoherently, leaning back tiredly on the old couch.