Sins of Aiden

22

AN/ You better make sure you sit down, and grab whatever is necessary, cuz this is going to hurt.

CHAPTER 22

The cold cinches at my cheeks long before I realize how much time I've actually spent standing here.

The cold is ferocious today. It's the kind of cold that settles into your bones—quiet, creeping, patient. The kind that makes every exhale bloom in the air like an obscure cloud. I pull my jacket tighter around myself, shifting my feet through the brittle grass. A streetlamp buzzes overhead, flickering every few seconds, casting long shadows that tremble across the pavement.

If anyone looked out their window right now, they'd think I'm a ghost. Or a very confused bandit. Because I've been here for almost twenty minutes.

Hiding.

Watching.

Not even for something dramatic—for a quiet, perfectly normal house on a perfectly normal street that I've walked past a thousand times. Except nothing about today feels normal. Nothing about me feels normal. And I don't know what to do with the hollow, aching feeling sitting under my chest since last night.

My breath shivers out.

I step back, deeper into the bushes lining the side of the lawn. They crunch under my shoes—loud enough to make me wince. I lower myself until my knees hit the cold earth, fingers digging into the branches for balance.

It's ridiculous.

Absolutely, utterly ridiculous.

I shouldn't be here. I shouldn't be doing this. I shouldn't be thinking about a boy who very clearly had another girl wrapped around him last night. A girl who kissed him like she had every right to. A girl he let do that.

I close my eyes.

Don't think about that. Don't think about her hands on him. Don't think about any of it.

I squeeze my eyes tighter.

The wind pushes through the hedge, carrying the faint warmth of homemade bread—the kind that always drifts from this house in little puffs. It reminds me, painfully, of exactly where I am.

Lucas Brown's house.

A place that has absolutely no reason to hold the answers I'm looking for.

And yet, here I am.

Peering between leaves and branches, trying to make sense of something I don't say aloud. Something that has been clawing at my chest since the moment I saw Aiden step out of that car with her.

I inhale shakily, trying not to lose my mind.

I want to tell myself this isn't important—that Aiden can do what he pleases and that I shouldn't care enough to hide like an idiot behind the bushes, trying to find a way to get answers that I'm sure lies within his best friend's walls.

After all, that's where Aiden spends most of his time. I think.

Okay, just one more minute.