End

“Clean this up, Tor. I mean it.” With one more cold glance, my mom slammed my bedroom door.

I sighed and turned back to observe my room. It wasn’t that bad. Not really. Just a bunch of wrappers, pop cans, and clothes strewn on every available surface. My bed wasn’t made. It had been worse before, of course. A lot worse.

I started at the window and worked my way around, lazily flinging clothes over my arm, stopping every now and again as I was distracted by this shiny trinket or that computer-screen-displaying-the-so-much-more-fascinating-internet.

“What?” I asked, looking up from a webpage and noticing the especially forlorn look in Carrie’s eyes.

She answered hesitantly, “Tristan.”

“No.”

“But I need to see him,” she whimpered, her arms wrapping tightly around her knees.

“The fuck you do,” I snapped, dropping the clothes in my arms and throwing off the pair of jeans hanging over my shoulder. I glared sightlessly down at the mess strewn across my computer desk. “He killed you. You need to stay as far away from him as you can.”

“I’m dead, Tori. What more can he do?” Her fingertips brushed at her eyes.

Don’t cry, Carrie. I couldn’t stand it if you did.

“Move on, dammit. He’s an idiot. He’s always been a royal idiot. You know that! You’ve always known that!” I leaned forward to snatch up my trash can and gripped it until the plastic cut into my fingers.

“So? He’s still really, really nice!” Immediately, her fists clenched and her eyes narrowed, hardening into crystal bullets. She was so damn defensive.

“A lot of people are nice without being idiots. Why couldn’t you find one of those?” With a furious sweep of my arm, I sent an entire army of soda cans into the trash.

“Because none of them wanted me!” she shouted suddenly, making me jump.

“You arrogant bitch!” I hollered right back, shooting to my feet. I was solid, therefore, more impressive. “The hell with that! You don’t know anything, do you? Have you ever stepped out of your own selfish little circle to see what’s right in front of you?”

She blinked. Blinked again. “What?”

That damn boy had killed me when I found out he owned her. She’d come to me one day and whispered shyly that they were going out, that he’d asked her that very morning. That moment, something inside me snapped. He broke my heart when he took her.

I kicked the trash can across the room, where it flipped over the edge of my bed and went right through her chest and throat. If she had been alive, it would have hurt her. Bad. Shit. “You’re not going,” I hissed, struggling to keep my voice from shaking. “Deal with it.”

Her silent sobs cut off suddenly. Her eyes went icy and her face turned to stone. Anger, hate, bitterness, hurt. I was afraid that I’d pushed her too far.

I shouldn’t have worried. She was Carrie; she gave out chances like Halloween candy, even when they weren’t deserved.

Her gaze dropped to the floor and her expression went slack. “I need you to understand. But I know you don’t. Maybe someday.”

Her defeat hurt more than one thousand angry words, but I refused to let her see it.

She made herself solid long enough to shove the upended trash can off the bed, then lay down in her place by the wall, turned her back to me, and didn’t move.

I turned back to my computer screen and lost myself in cyberspace. Sort of.