* * * * *
Twelve noon, local time, was a stupid fucking time to be wandering around in an airport, but here we were anyway. There had to be five fucking billion people in the place. If we had to wait another fucking hour to get on our flight, I was going to slaughter someone, probably someone in a security uniform even though they were supposed to be keeping the crowds away from the long-lost castaways on the final leg of their journey home.
Fucking media.
We walked down the small terminal towards the gate where our plane would start loading in a half hour. The two security dudes who stayed with us blocked off a bit of the area near the windows for the five of us to sit. Nick was talking about the plane we’d be flying in – apparently he used to fly commercial aircraft as well – and Lindsay and Raine were beaming at him like he was some kind of fucking superhero.
I needed to get away – just for a few minutes.
I grumbled something about being back in a second but didn’t say it loud enough for anyone to actually hear me, just enough to claim later that I had. While Raine fiddled around with the small travel bag containing a change of clothes and some toiletries, I slipped down the corridor. When we had walked to our terminal earlier, I had seen the one thing I hadn’t managed to acquire since leaving the island, and I wasn’t going to waste another second without it. I headed towards the airport bar.
Upon entering the room, I inhaled deeply, taking in the smell of leather barstools, beer, and sweet, sticky liquors. Without hesitation, I walked straight up to the bar and ordered three vodka shots – top shelf. The Bartender raised his eyebrows at me and then poured out each – all in good-sized shot glasses and pretty full, which is how they fucking should be – and set them in front of me. I wrapped my fingers around the first glass and picked it up. It was cool against my fingers, and my throat burned in anticipation of the fluid about to fill it.
“Bastian!”
Fuck.
Raine raced into the bar, nearly knocking over a couple of chairs and a table as she rushed past and collided with the edge of the bar right next to me.
“Stop, Bastian – please!”
“Why?” I responded, barely glancing in her direction. I kept my vice-like grip on the glass in my hand. The clear liquid sang out, begging me to taste it.
“You don’t need it.”
“Like hell I don’t.”
“If you drink it, it controls you, Bastian. Don’t let it be like that.”
“Maybe that’s the way it should be,” I said.
“Bastian…don’t do this.”
“Do what?” I barked out a laugh. “Drink? I’m a fucking alcoholic, Raine. I told you that the first fucking day. That hasn’t fucking changed just because I didn’t have any alcohol available. I never stopped wanting it. Never. You know this shit.”
“You don’t have to drink,” Raine said. “I know you are an alcoholic, I know you want it, but you’ve been a sober alcoholic for over two months. Don’t throw that away, Bastian. Don’t you remember what you had to go through just to get dried out?”
“Of course I fucking remember,” I snarled. “That doesn’t change anything. I want a fucking drink, and I’m having one. You’d be better off figuring that shit out now and probably find yourself a decent guy to be with instead.”
“Bastian, you don’t mean that.”
“I’m never going to be right for you, Raine,” I argued. “I’m never going to be the guy who brings you flowers and remembers our fucking anniversary or buys you just the right gift for Christmas. I’ve seen too much shit I’m not going to get over. You deserve better than that, a lot better, and I can’t give it to you because I’m a fucked up drunk.”
I couldn’t look at her. I just couldn’t. Even when I felt her fingertips starting the familiar trail from my temple, around my ear, and down to the end of my chin, I couldn’t turn and face her. It took every last ounce of control I had just to keep my hand from shaking around the shot glass.
“I don’t want anyone but you.” Raine’s voice climbed up in pitch, and I could hear the tears in her tone. “You once told me that you would fight any motherfucker who tried to take me from you. Well, there’s someone trying to take me from you right now, and he’s in that glass in front of you. You told me you would fight, Bastian. Did you mean it?”
The liquid sloshed in the glass with the vibrations of my fingers, and I couldn’t make it stop.
“How many times have you berated yourself for hitting me?” Raine suddenly asked, her fingers trailing down across my shoulder and eventually wrapping around my forearm. My throat tightened, and my heart clenched. She had told me to stop bringing it up, and for the most part I had. It didn’t keep me from thinking about it, especially when I thought about how much better she could do without me. I was a little pissed she was using it against me now after all the times I had tried to use it against myself. It didn’t make any fucking sense, but that didn’t stop me from feeling pissed about it.
“I told you
to stop talking about it because it didn’t matter anymore,” Raine said. “You aren’t that person anymore, Bastian. I meant that. I wouldn’t be with someone like that. I couldn’t be with someone who I thought would hit me again.”
“I love you,” Raine said softly, her hand still on my arm, “but when you drink, you become someone else. I can’t be with that man, Bastian. I won’t be. If this is what you really want…well, then I’m going to go now.”
I felt her hand drop, and I heard her footsteps as she walked away from me and towards the exit.