Save Me

Chapter Thirteen

A.N. ROAD TRIP!!! This chapter and the next few go back to the original setting of this series, Penzance, in Cornwall, which is a typical and gorgeous English seaside town. If you haven't figured it out already, bad shit happens to my characters in this town, so be prepared. By Chapter 15, you'll be getting some major plot twists, hunty. I wonder if you'll see them coming! If you have theories, don't be afraid to share - you might even get something right! Anyway, enjoy, xoxo, Clay.

"I never play the victim, I'd rather be the stalker."

-Rihanna

♔ Chapter Thirteen ♔

I came from a small town in the south of England, as far south as south goes - a plain and pleasant countryside they call Cornwall. It was a sleepy and forgettable place, where the elderly go to live out their golden years, where families grow up in their picketed, perfect houses, and where the sun shines, and everyone is happy.

The place I grew up in, Penzance, was a quiet Cornish town on the English Channel. All along the coast, the waters were a light blue, the people always quiet or forgettable, and the roads that ran between towns were never too busy. The drive to Penzance was less than an hour, following a back road that swept along the Cornish coast.

I'd always known Penzance was a shitty, backwards place. I hated the people, the places, nearly everything about it. My memories tainted the light blue waters, as clear as crystal, and the dozens of white boats and yachts that lined the docks near the quayside.

Growing up in Penzance ruined its timeless and sunny visage for me. It was stained by the blood of my family, of their corpses at the bottom of the ocean, entangled in seaweed, decaying. In my head, I'd try and picture their spongy, rotting bodies, even though I knew I shouldn't think like that. But I pictured it anyway, and I hated myself for it.

"How long has it been since you've been back here?" Luke asked, when I parked the car on the curb at the end of a road, somewhere close to the waterfront. I could hear the crashing of waves from nearby, and I could tell how close we were to where it all happened. Luke was sitting in the passenger seat and unbuckled his seat-belt, taking a quick look out of the window, taking in the sight of where I killed his twin brother.

"I'm not sure, probably a year or so. I don't really come back here that much."

"Too many bad memories?"

"And not many happy ones, either."

"I'm glad you brought me here, Isaac. Honestly, I was a bit scared to ask at first, but then it started to make perfect sense to me, to invite you with me. Everything you've told me about you and Tom, I can see that you loved him. I mean, I know you say it ended badly, but you loved him, and that's what's important to me."

I didn't know what to say, how to reply, so I just closed my eyes in that moment, and told myself over and over again, shut up, shut up, shut up.

I couldn't tell if I wanted Luke to shut up, or if I was trying to stop myself from saying something I knew I'd regret. If only he knew the truth, I told myself, he'd leave me, just like the last guy. If he knew everything, he'd run for the hills. I noticed that my hands were starting to shake, so I pulled them off the wheel of the car and slid them under my thighs.

"When I first met you, I wanted to try and figure out what made my brother fall in love with you, I wanted to know what it was that made him choose you. I think it's because, deep down, Tom knew you were a good person."

I couldn't bare to hear him say it. "Then he was wrong."

"What do you mean?" Luke asked, shifting his body awkwardly.