Konnor: Just stop fucking running! Seriously, this is bullshit.
Konnor: Sorry again for swearing at you. Please just talk to me.
I press my hand to my heart and count to ten to steady my urge to scream. I wish I could take away his pain, wish in the same breath that I had somewhere to put my own that wasn't sitting four feet away from me with a tube in his throat.
Despite jumping up when the door swings open, my entire body relaxes at the sight of a large, stubbly fifty-year-old man with a solid build and a generous girth—the result of his love of wine.
My dad.
"Blesk.” He opens his arms for me, and my feet take me to him without my conscious permission. I bury my face in his chest just as my tears fall. He kisses the top of my head. "Don't cry." His arms tighten around me as he exhales a long breath.
"Hello," he says to Elise over the top of my head while stroking my hair. "I'm Blesk's dad, Jasper."
"Nice to meet you, Mr Bellamy," Elise says.
"No, no, just Jasper is fine," he says, worry painfully clear in his voice.
"Okay. Nice to meet you, Jasper."
"I hear you were both there when it happened.” It wasn’t a question but definitely wants an answer.
I stare at the picture on the wall as the intensity in the room becomes palpable, thickening and separating us from each other. Something in my chest pulls hard in two directions at once. My brain tells me to answer, but when my mouth moves, my voice is suddenly held captive by fear.
Elise’s feet shuffle. "I was. But… I'm not sure, Jasper. I didn't see much.”
My dad grasps my shoulders, pushing me out in front of him, forcing me to lock eyes. "Blesk? Are you okay, baby girl?"
I nod.
"Tell me what happened."
My eyes go wide. "Erik got into a fight.”
“Over you?”
I open my mouth and shut it again.
Then nod.
His brows furrow. "The doctors seem to think you two know more than you’re letting on.”
I shake my head, looking at the floor, shuffling my feet and fidgeting with my bag. "It happened fast.”
He lifts my chin. "Blesk, this is serious. Tell me who did this to your brother."
My dad's eyes are still on me. Each second that passes feels like the room gets that little bit smaller. Then tears come without warning, a sudden hopelessness that spills over. I can't stop, don't hide it. Not from my dad. If I had just stayed away from Konnor, he wouldn't be waiting for me to be Liz, his dream girl, and Erik wouldn't be so small and… ruined.
I search my mind for the right thing to say. I’ve been keeping secrets from my dad for years, what is one more? Shuffling various versions of the truth around in my head like puzzle pieces, I try to find a picture with the least consequences.
“It was a boy I went on a date with, but Erik started the fight, Dad. So… It was self-defence. I don’t want him to get into trouble.” I don’t clarify thehim.Dad thinks it’s Erik, and that is fine with me. Underneath the fear of consequences, there's something else stirring, something like loyalty. I realise at this moment that I’m loyal to Konnor or am I loyal to my secrets? And knowing that one thing will lead to another to what Konnor saw Erik doing to me…
Dad looks at me, disappointed, before taking a seat on one side of Erik and looking at him. “Son… what am I going to do with you?”
Time rushes by after that.
I’m a little disconnected.
An hour after my father arrives, two officers in blue uniforms fill the doorway. Their faces are professionally blank, almost bored, as if they are running a routine car license check.