I didn’t know why, but probably because his uncle was a part of him. It might help me understand him.
I supposed this was a selfish request, callous enough.
His look was dismissive. “I mean, what can I say? Charlie was my brother.” His head turned on the seat, his eyes hard. “The kid was my hero. We were Batman and Robin.” He smirked as if at the memory. “He was Batman, and I was his shitty-ass Robin.”
He took off his headset, tucking it under his arm, and I wished I hadn’t asked. I took mine off too. “You still blame yourself.”
“Hard not to, Sloane.” He lifted a hand. “We’ve talked about this. If I had nutted the fuck up, opened my goddamn mouth about him and Mayberry, he’d be here right now.”
“You don’t know that.”
“And neither do you.” He scanned my eyes. “That’s my reality.” He shook his head. “You probably wouldn’t understand.”
I think I did, a little. I shrugged. “Bru getting sick I think is my fault.”
“How so?”
I lay back. “We can’t prove it, but I think he might have gotten sick because he went into that lake.”
He frowned. “That’s what the doctor said?”
“No, but they can’t prove it.”
He studied the floor, his head shaking. “Well, I guess that’s my fault too, then.” His head tilted. “I got involved with your brother. He wouldn’t have even done that haze and tried to get into my crew had I not been fucking with you and him.”
“No more your fault than mine.” I nodded when he shook his head. “You and I…”
“Yeah?”
I shouldn’t have looked at him in that moment, my mouth dry. “We’re what you said. We fuck around. We fuck with each other, and people get affected by that.”
We really were chaos, madness.
“Maybe.” His shoulders lifted. “But it doesn’t always have to be that way. We can be whatever we want.”
“How?” We’d only been one way; he’d only been one way. “Why did you leave me?”
I hadn’t meant to ask that.
But the words were said.
I put them out there, and they hung between us. My throat tightened. “Where did you go, Dorian?”
I asked him this, but I didn’t want a physical place. I knew he’d been with his family, but I needed to know the why. He’d left me both physically and mentally.
That was what I asked.
I wasn’t sure if he got that, and when soft music played from somewhere in the stands, he faced me.
“Dance with me,” he said, putting out his hand. “Make this a real date.”
The plea in his tone matched his eyes. I didn’t want to dance with him. I wanted to run away and take back what I’d asked.
Instead, I took his hand.
Dorian helped me back on the field, and when he placed me in his arms, I hated how familiar that felt. I hated how it felt like home. I wanted it to feel as dark and foreign as how he’d initially been in my life. I didn’t want to feel comfort in our madness.
But I did. I felt warm…