"Yeah, I can tell." He hands me a cup of coffee. "Drink this."
I take it and the heat feels good against my palms, grounds me in the present instead of the past.
"What's going on with you?" Tank asks.
"Nothing."
"Bullshit. You've been off for weeks."
I take a drink of coffee and don't answer.
Tank leans against the workbench and crosses his arms. "This about Everly?"
"Partly."
"And the other part?"
I set down the coffee. "You ever do something you knew was wrong but you'd do it again anyway?"
"Depends on what it is."
"Hurt someone who didn't deserve it, someone who was trying to help you."
Tank's quiet for a second, then he says, "This about what got you sent to juvie?"
"Yeah."
"You were thirteen. You were trying to save your sister."
"I shot my teacher, held her kid at gunpoint."
The words taste like ash in my mouth.
"And she forgave you, didn't she?" Tank asks.
The question lands like a punch.
He's right, Octavia did forgive me.
She did. She let me stay with her and her family when I was released from juvie. Her and Digger gave me a home. They gave me a lifeline to cling to while inside and when I came out.
"I understand," she said when I was out. "I know you were scared. I know you were trying to save Ruby."
"I shot you."
"I know."
"I could have killed you."
"But you didn't."
"That doesn't make it okay."
"No, but it means you're not a monster, Rush. Monsters don't feel guilt."
Her kindness made it worse somehow, made the guilt heavier.
Because I didn't deserve her forgiveness, didn't deserve her understanding.