Raven's Song

No Chance

I didn't look up as Tylor slid onto the stool beside me two weeks after our fight. The bell hadn't rang yet and everyone was talking as they drifted into the room, but I was working to finish my math homework. Tylor didn't say anything as he typed on his phone. It was as if we'd never spoken before.

"Are you off house arrest yet? Overnight house arrest I mean?" Dove asked as she and Amber bounded in.

I shrugged and looked up at her. The problem I was on wasn't making any sense to me.

"He's basically letting me do whatever I want to now," I told her. "Why?"

She looked over at Tylor before she leaned across the table and whispered, "We want to go on a camping trip to this cabin that Alec's parents have."

"I'm in. I have to run it past my dad, but I'm sure he'll be glad I'm hanging out with friends," I told her.

"Good," Amber said, "because we think Alec is going to try to make a move toward you this weekend, too. Be prepared!"

I rolled my eyes and looked back down at my math book. I picked up my phone and typed the calculation into the calculator.

As I was writing it on my paper, Tylor said, "You're not even close."

"You don't get a say. We're not together," I told him, rolling my eyes.

"I was talking about the math problem, Kenna. I couldn't give a fuck who you slept with," Tylor said coldly. "It has no solution." He reached over and wrote the steps in the margins.

I didn't look at him until he finished. When I did, he ducked his head away from me, but not before I could see the large bruise and cut on his left side. I reached over, but he moved away.

"Don't."

"What happened?" I asked quietly.

"You don't get to ask that anymore."

I sighed, turning away. "I'm not allowed to be worried now?"

"Not when you want nothing to do with my life."

"That's not true, Tylor. I–"

"We're not friends. We just happen to go to the same school," he said coldly.

I didn't answer. I could have argued with him all day, but what he'd said was mostly the truth. I didn't want any part of the life he had with his father. It didn't mean that I didn't care about him. It didn't mean that I didn't worry about him. I did. I didn't want to see him hurt or know that he was hurting and not be able to help him. It hurt me to not be able to take his mind off what was happening.

He had never let me see that side of his life. The information he'd given me when he had told me about Tessa was all the more he had let me know. At first, I had thought he was trying to protect me. The more I thought about it, though, the more I realized that he was only trying to protect himself. People couldn't stop him if they didn't know.

I wondered if I talked to my dad if he could do something. Have Tylor removed from his dad's custody because of child endangerment. It would almost be too late for Tylor by the time everything was processed, but maybe not for Spencer. If I couldn't convince Tylor to walk away, maybe I would be able to get his brother out. Tylor wanted Spencer away from it all. It meant going up against a very powerful man and most likely losing. Unless there was evidence that could absolutely prove that his father was at fault to a degree that nothing could possibly cover up what he had done.