Somehow, it failed.
Even after all that, her noose is still around my neck.
This noose isn’t my job to place, though. My brothers have done worse than killing a man who participated in their debauchery. It’s time I stopped protecting them and admit they’re just as fucked up as I am, just as capable of getting their hands dirty. Out of guilt, I’ve given them too much leeway. I told myself I was letting them be who they are, accepting them even when I don’t understand their version of fucked up. It was my job to protect them and their job to back me up.
But the truth is, it hasn’t been that way for a long time.
Not since we moved here. That’s when it all went to shit. For a while, King held us together. He was a pro at keeping up appearances. After I killed Crystal, he made it look like we were still a united front, like it was all the Darlings’ fault. They hurt me, they took Crystal, and we had to stick together and fight back. The bastard was so good he even had us halfway convinced.
Gloria Walton herself would’ve been impressed if she was around then.
We’re as fake as she is. When King moved away, we kept pretending nothing had changed, to the world and maybe ourselves. But in truth, the twins are as far from me as King. I cut him out when he left Faulkner, but I’d already cut them out long before that. I told myself they didn’t need to know, that I was protecting them just like I protect them from Dad, like I always protected Crystal.
Until I didn’t.
I already face that shit every time I catch them looking at me, and some unspoken weight settles between us, and I know we’re all thinking the same thing—that I’m to blame for all of it. For her dying, for us falling apart. Maybe they wouldn’t say it, just like no one said it when King hammered into our heads that the Darlings were to blame, but we all know.
So, when they wasted Mabel, I saved her fucking life for them. That was penance.
One girl in the river.
One girl out.
They should have done the same.
An eye for an eye. A life for a life.
But the difference is, they don’t owe me. I was paying back a debt, if only some small part of it. I have no right to ask for them to do the same for me, even if I would have done it for them. I can’t despise them for keeping the truth from me all summer. They owe me nothing. The lies between us started with me, after all. For that, I have only myself to blame. Not even the Darlings can take the blame for that. It’s my burden alone.
“I’ll do it,” Baron says after a long silence when we all stand frozen on the bridge, lost in our own internal wars.
“No,” Dawson says again. He turns and tries to run, but Baron steps in front of him and shoves him back. “I was just doing what you said! I was followingyourorders.”
“Then follow them now,” Baron says coldly. He takes the rope and makes the slip knot in the loose end. Then he hands it to Dawson. We wait for him to put it around his neck.
“Now kneel,” I say. “And get out your phone.”
Dawson sinks unsteadily to his knees.
“Don’t worry,” I say when he gets his phone out. “We’ll tell you what to say.”
I start, and Duke and Baron jump in after a minute. I think they’re actually having fun with it. At least, Duke is. I consider telling him to stop clowning, we’re at a fucking funeral. If he’s having fun, he won’t have to think about the consequences. But I decide the punishment is enough, considering the confused asshole’s crime was justified.
Baron’s enjoyment is something different than fun, but I don’t stop him, either. We’re all dealing with it in the ways we know how.
When the note is done, I order Dawson to post it.
“I was just protecting my sisters,” he says, his shoulders heaving with a sob. “You would have done the same.”
“I did protect your sister,” I say. “Better than you ever could.”
“You did the same to them,” he says, hanging his head. “They told me what you did to them our first year. I didn’t want it to happen again when I wasn’t around to put an end to it.”
I know he’s not talking about protecting them anymore. He’s talking about the fact that his three best friends have all banged his sisters, and instead of putting a no-touch policy in effect on them, he let my brothers keep doing it. Now he’s going to pretend he’s the heroic big brother when he didn’t do shit for them. I’m a better brother to Lo than he ever was.
“Don’t kid yourself,” I snap. “You never protected them from us. You didn’t put an end to anything. I did.”
“Yeah,” Duke says. “If they hated it so much, why are they still coming around begging for a nice deep dicking every time they get thirsty?”