❝i can tell that you've been cryin' all night, drinkin' all summer. prayin' for your happiness. hope that you recover.❞
❘❘
AN ENTIRE DECADE of repressed memories hit me, a violent assault of a million moments and mistakes, all strung together with that warm smile. It's fierce and ferocious, shards of sunlight blinding me, sensations of grime and dirt and sand stinging my eyes, a sheen of sweat coating my skin.
Frantically, I blink back that fucking memory, but he's still there—standing in front of me with dark hair and dark eyes, as if the miles and the years that tore us apart never existed.
My first instinct is to run to him, fling myself into his arms, cling to mi hermano with an apology. For ignoring him, for hanging up on him, for never visiting, for hating him, for creating this immeasurable distance between us, for this fucking separation.
"Neva."
Que se vaya a la mierda.
Because as soon as he says my name, I can almost fucking taste it—that breathlessly empty apology unraveling between us. Even if he says it, nothing will change. It will never change; it will never matter.
I want to hit him.
"Mano."
A sheepish grin tugs at his lips, and in that half a heartbeat, as I stare him down, surrendering to a wave of rage, I don't want to hit him.
Quiero matarlo.
It's another one of those feelings, impulsive and irrational, a red-hot streak of something caustic... a murderous thought plaguing me into paralyzing silence. I think I could do it.
Aquí y ahora. Podría matar a mi hermano.
My heart hiccups as I stumble back in fear. I can't even... I... I don't want to feel like this.
"Hermana, te he extrañado."
The words seem to drift between us innocently, melting into the low thrum of the bass, but I blink and blink and blink, desperate to dismiss them. Because maybe, just maybe, they don't exist.
Maybe this doesn't exist; maybe we don't exist.
Maybe I'll wake up beside Julian in a cold sweat, digging my nails into inked skin, riding out another crash, praying for a painless death.
I can handle that.
Not this. Something inside of me fluttering, cracking, burning. A hurricane of emotions thrashing in my chest, teetering on the edge of an inevitable destruction.
Is this how it ends?
Nada es para siempre.
The lights sway and swim, casting shadows into the empty space between us, slowing... slowing... slowing...
Numbly, I take a step back. "Why... why are you here?"
Beneath the bass, I don't know if the whispered words even leave my lips. I can only hear a heartbeat—a pulse of a city trembling beneath my feet... a party unraveling into a million strands of silence... and a...
He takes a step forward, and I fucking flinch.
"Enzo, why are you here?"
Not even the sharp edge in my voice stops him. After years of being too far away to fight, Enzo is finally here, refusing to back down.
YOU ARE READING
Snow
RomanceWhen Neva Álvarez moves to Queens, she's merely biding her time between bartending and dodging her brother's phone calls before her final year at NYU, and with the summer dwindling to an end, it's difficult not to find herself drawn to her new next...
