Part 1
1Landon
June1, 2003
I never meant to be a monster, but sometimes I wondered if certain people were born that way, born with a darkness that oozed into their bloodstreams and infected their souls.
My name was living proof that I should’ve been a better person.
I came from a line of extraordinary men. My mother named me after my uncle, Lance, and my grandfather, Don—two of the greatest men who ever lived. The name Don stood for noble, and Lance meant servant. They lived up to those names, too. They both fought in wars. They sacrificed their lives and their minds for others. They gave fully with arms wide open and allowed people to take and take from their good nature until there was nothing left.
Their names combined should’ve made me a noble servant to the world, but I was far from it. If you asked most of my classmates what my name stood for, they’d probably say asshole. Rightfully so, too.
I was nothing like my grandfather or uncle. I was an embarrassment to their memories.
I didn’t know why so much darkness sat heavily in my chest. I didn’t know why I was so angry. I just knew that I was.
I was an ass even when I didn’t want to be. The only peoplewho put up with my bad attitude were my core group of friends and Monica, the girl I was trying so hard to shake from my life.
There wasn’t anything noble or servant-like about me. I looked out for myself and the very few people who had enough willpower to still call me their friend.
I hated that about me. I hated that I wasn’t a good person. I wasn’t even decent. I did a lot of ugly things that probably had both Lance and Grandpa rolling over in their graves. Sure, they had their own issues, but they had a right to their problems. They were veterans who went to actual war. They fought for freedom, and the fight fucked with their heads. That’s understandable. But what reason did I have to be so broken? The only wars I’d ever fought were the ones within my mind.
My mind was a puzzle, and I hardly knew how the pieces linked up.
I headed to my kitchen after a pointless summer morning. At least I didn’t have to sit in school and pretend to be happy around whole groups of people. Now I only had to perform for my closest friends.
Then come September, I’d start my final year of high school. Only two more semesters until I could rid myself of small-town Raine, Illinois. I had no clue where I wanted life to take me, but I knew for a fact that I wanted to get far, far away from the place that grew me.
As I walked past my living room, I grimaced when I saw Monica sitting on the sofa. It wasn’t shocking that she was over. She was a part of the crew that always came to my place. My parents were never home, so that made it easy for our house to be the hangout spot. But it annoyed me that she was the first one to arrive that night, because that meant she’d be yapping her big mouth toward me.
Monica and I had known each other for a long time. We’dbeen neighbors since we were kids. Still were to this day. On top of that, we were two kids with messed-up lives. I had my demons, and Monica had her own set of terrors.
In the past when our problems got too heavy, we used sex with each other to shut off our brains. There was nothing romantic about the hookups. Honestly, we didn’t even like each other that much, which was why it worked for me. I wasn’t interested in a girlfriend or anything emotional. I just needed to get laid every now and then to shut up my overthinking mind.
It worked for a while until I decided to go cold turkey on the alcohol and drug front. Once I stopped using, Monica had so much crap to say about the matter. “I liked you more when you were high,” she told me the last time we banged.
I told her I never liked her to begin with.
Monica slapped me that night, and part of me kind of liked the sting. My skin flushed and bubbled up from the sensation. It was a reminder that I was still alive, still able to feel, even though for the most part, I felt like dry ice—frozen solid and painful to whoever tried to hold on to me for too long.
Monica told me she wouldn’t screw me again until I was high.
Therefore, whatever disaster we were was officially over—for me, at least.
“I’ve been thinking, Landon,” Monica called out to me as I grabbed myself some water. “You should have a party at your place this weekend.”
“You always think that,” I replied, walking into the living room to join her. I sat on her opposite side.
“Yeah, but you should really have one this weekend, seeing as how it’s Lance’s birthday. We should celebrate his memory.”
I felt a small fire starting to burn within me as she spoke of Lance as if she’d known him or cared. She said it for that exactreason, too—to get to me. To push me. To make me the monster she had recently been missing. In her mind, she couldn’t use me to forget her scars if my wounds weren’t freshly opened.
It had been almost a year since Lance passed away.
Still, it felt like yesterday.
I gritted my teeth. “Don’t push me, Monica.”