Misplaced Trust (Misjudged) (17 page)

A
diary.

A
pink diary.

The
diary.

Why in hell is Holly’s diary here in Neil’s room?

Confusion overcomes me as I
rest back on my heels. Picking up the small book, I try to make sense of why it would be in here. Maybe it had gotten mixed up with his things before we travelled back home from my fathers?

The diary has been here all along?
I feel the relief whirling through my veins at knowing that this could actually be all we need. We could get Brandon’s blackmailers put behind bars, and have our forever, once and for all.

Opening it up, it falls to the same page as it had on the day I first laid my eyes on it at my fathers.

Thursday.

Its eleven o’clock and he just called. I love when he calls to say goodnight, although I wish he’d have stopped by like he said he was going to. My mom and dad invited him over to have dinner with us, but at short notice he had to cancel, something about having to go to another band meeting.

He’s dedicated, I’ll give him that. He loves music and since he started the band not so long back, he’s worked hard to try and get The Vultures some local gigs. I just wish sometimes he was as dedicated to our relationship as much as he is to his mic.

Skimming over the written pieces that I’ve already seen, I note that the band written in here is the same as the one Brandon had put together. I knew it. I knew I wasn’t going crazy.

Saturday.

Instead of sitting around and waiting for my cell to ring, I went to the mall with some girlfriends and bumped into Neil and Ryan. They’re going away to travel soon and because I don’t have any plans later today, they invited me along to the movies. Brandon seemed a little relieved when I told him I wouldn’t be sitting in on a Saturday night alone and told me to call him when I get home.

Sunday.

I should have stayed at home. I should have called Brandon, but I couldn’t. I can’t believe what happened last night … actually happened, and I want to hurl every time I even think about what I just did.

I’m in love with Brandon. Brandon Taylor. Nobody else. We’ve only been together a couple of months, but I know he’s meant for me. We haven’t even slept together. He said he doesn’t want to rush things and when I’m ready, he’ll make it special. Really special. I know he’s been with a few girls before but I know he means what he says. I’m a virgin, or I was, at least up until a few hours ago.

I hate myself. I need to tell him. I need to tell him what I did.

Friday.

I thought keeping away from him for the last few days would wipe away what happened on Saturday night. Instead though it’s made things a whole lot harder. I’ve avoided Brandon all week, and to make things worse, he thinks it’s his fault. I should have told him what happened. I should have accepted any consequence and just told him, but I don’t want to lose him.

‘Hey by the way, I lost my virginity to some guy last weekend, so you want to go to dinner?’ I don’t think that would be the smartest of things but it’s probably likely to come out like that. I want to look in his bright eyes and see the love and warmth staring back at me, not the hurt.

He thinks it’s because he’s been spending too much time with the band and not enough with me. He thinks this is why I’m upset. How do you go about bre
aking the heart of the one person you love?

Saturday.

My cell won’t stop ringing but it’s not particularly someone I want to speak to. Neil’s not taking the hint no matter how many times I tell him that I love my boyfriend. I just wish he would stop calling me.

Brandon stopped by briefly earlier, kissed me, and told me he’d be picking me up later on in the afternoon for dinner. Dinner and a movie. He was literally standing on the porch for around sixty seconds before he had to head away again. Seeing him has made me realize that telling him might not be one of the better things to do. Dinner and a movie, tonight, with Brandon. I love him so much. I never want to be away from him. Ever.

Fuck.

Throwing the diary across the room, I can’t stop the tears that are cascading down my face and dripping through my shirt.

Holly cheated on Brandon,
with Neil?

Neil did this? He can’t have, he just can’t have.

Before I have a chance to think about anything else, I find myself running towards the bathroom, hurling the entire contents of my stomach into the bowl, and then some.

Leaning myself against the cool tiles in the bathroom, I try and take long, deep breaths
, and will for this horrible and sickening feeling to go away.

Not sure on how long I’ve been
sitting here, I go back into Neil’s room and pick up the diary again, this time flicking through all the pages, until it stops on a photograph. A photograph of Brandon and a pretty blonde haired … FUCK.

The photograph Neil had in his cabinet the other da
y, the one he said was a girl he’d been seeing. That photograph … that photograph was of Holly.

I can’t think. I can’t straight at all. Finding myself to be walking around, having absolutely no idea where I’m going or what I’m doing, I hear the main door closing.

Shaking uncontrollably and unable to stop my heart from banging so hard in my chest, I hear a voice.

Neil’s voice.

“I’m just grabbing it now, and then the real party can begin,” his laugh is harsh, evil even.

Son of a fucking bitch!

Glancing around the room, I have nowhere else to hide but in his closet, and I only just manage to close the doors on myself before he enters the room.

“Yep, sure is!” he laughs into the mouthpiece.
His voice makes me want to throw up again. “A one-way ticket to San Francisco, yep, only I have one more thing I’ve gotta go and take care of before I leave this fucking place for good.”

He doesn’t sound like the Neil I know, he sounds like a completely different person. Tell me I’m dreaming this. Tell me it’s a horrible nightmare and at any moment,
I’m going to wake up in Brandon’s arms, happy, ever so happy without so much as a care in the world.

“Got ‘em, it’s time to end this once and for all … see you on the other side.”

With that I hear his footsteps as he leaves the room, and I swear I’ve been holding my breath this whole time.

Time to put an end to this once and for all?

Stepping out of the closet, I grab my cell and call Brandon’s, pleading out loud for him to pick up.

Calling over and over again,
but still not getting an answer, I throw the stupid thing across the room and watch as it hits the wall, smashing into what looks to be hundreds of pieces.

Grabbing the diary again, I run out of Neil’
s room. I run out of the dorm. I run out of my building.

I need to get to Brandon
… before it’s too late.

The tears that have been streaming from my eyes ever since I found out about Neil haven’t let up, not even on the way over here.

It took
me almost twenty minutes to wave down a cab, with that and being held up in Seattle’s busy traffic system, it’s taken me well over an hour to reach the cabin.

Throwing dollar bills at the driver, I don’t wait around for the change. He can keep i
t, it’s worthless to me anyway. Everything is if Neil’s already gotten over here first.

Running up the steps to the cabin, and pounding on the front door with everything I have, I scream for him to let me in, and plead for him to be okay.

“BRANDON!” I shout, and keep shouting over and over again. “PLEASE!”

My fist is beginning to swell from how hard I’ve been
banging on the doors, trying to get him to answer me. I’ve tried both the front and back doors, I’ve even tried to wedge open one of the windows, but there’s still nothing.

Looking all around me, yanking my hands through my hair as I try to think of a way to get inside, my eyes land on a pile of bricks to the side of the back porch way.

Picking one up and throwing it directly at the nearest window, I step back as the glass smashes, with shards flying in each and every way possible.

Using my jacket to wipe the glass away, I climb up through the window, and after searching through every room throughout the entire place, shouting out for him as loud as I possibly can, there’s
still nothing.

No sign of Neil, and no sign of Brandon.

My heart hurts. It feels like its bleeding inside. I need to find him. I need to warn him that it was one of our closest friends all along, someone who we’d completely misplaced our trust in.

Dammit! Where the hell is he?

Hearing the landline phone sound, I run over to it, hoping it’s him and that he somehow found out about all of this, “Brandon?” my voice sounds hoarse from the amount of screaming I’ve been doing.

“You’re at the wrong lake, beautiful.”

No. No. NO!

Breaking down as Neil
ends the call, I fall onto my knees and cry. I can’t stop the tears, because I don’t think it’s in any way possible.

Retrieving the phone, I dial for a cab,
and just hope that I can get there in time.

***

Entering back into the outskirts of Seattle, I’m only roughly five minutes away from him, if nothing else manages to stand in the way.

Leaning back against the seat, feeling exhausted from all the tears I’ve shed, I try and make sense of it all.

Neil? I still can’t … I still can’t believe any of this.

Closing me eyes, I try and think back over everything, right from the beginning, right from
when Brandon first arrived here … right from when he first arrived here, and stole my heart.

“We’re here, Miss,” the cab driver alerts me, and I do the same as I
did before. I throw a whole load of dollar bills at him and hastily climb from the cab, removing my heels as I sprint down the pathway and towards the lake.

Pausing when I get there, I look around, but I don’t see anything. Looking along each of the pathways, there’s no one in sight, no one at all.

Feeling so tired and extremely weak, I turn around to face the opening, and that’s when I see it.

Cautiously walking o
ver to the rotting, wooden door of the small building, the padlock is no longer there and the door is ever so slightly open.

Inhaling a sharp and shaky breath, I place my hand on th
e door and push on it gently, hearing it creak as it slowly opens.

Taking a small and hesitant step inside,
the room is almost pitch black, apart from the small oil lamp that’s flickering on the other side of the room, but only giving out a minimal glow.

“Brandon?” my mouth is dry as I search around for him
, and when I turn to face the same way as I came in, I see the door swinging fully closed.

Hearing
a mumbled cough from behind me makes me swing back around, and that’s when my whole body freezes and my blood runs ice cold.

“Brandon!” I cry out, running over to him when the dim light shines over only part of his face. He’s slumped against the wall and as I kneel down beside him, I notice him clutching his arm tightly,
with only his eyes revealing the pain he’s in.

“No, go, get the hell outta—“ his eyes are wide, appearing almost full of fear as he tries to tell me something, but the footsteps behind me draw my attention away from him.

“It’s nice of you to finally show your face, Alex!” the sound of his voice makes my stomach roll and my skin crawl.

“What the hell did you do to him?” I shout, standing back
up on to my feet as I charge straight towards him. “What did you fucking do?”

Striking a match and lighting another lamp before he answers me, he holds it out in front of him
, and that’s when I see the pure evilness within his eyes, “Don’t be turning all of this around on me, Alex,” he begins, letting out a harsh laugh as he grabs a hold of my arm and begins to drag me across the room, and over to where Brandon’s sitting.

“Let’s start with … HIM!” he barks out, pointing his finger over to Brandon
as he begins to shake his head. “Always getting the girl!”

“This … this is what all of this is about?” Brandon
scowls at him as he attempts to move, but stills his movements, and instead, he clenches his eyes shut before slumping back against the wall. He looks in absolute agony.

Shaking his head, Neil begins to look amused over something
, ”But there was one girl that you didn’t manage to get, and one that I did, isn’t that right, Alex?”

No, no please do not tell him about you and holly.

Closing my eyes, I hope to God he doesn’t say anything about what happened between the two of them. It will crush him.

Brandon glances between the two of us, his eyebrows furrowing with confusion, “What is he talking about?”

“Oh don’t worry, Brandon, it wasn’t this girl ... I don’t class just a kiss as getting what I want,” sounding highly amused with himself, Neil throws me a wink, and I feel Brandon’s eyes on me.

“What
is he talking about?” Brandon asks, his jaw tightly clenched as the anger builds in his eyes. “You kissed him?”

“No, no, he kissed me and I
pushed him away, that’s all, I promise, ask Zach, ask him, he was there, he—“

“
When?” he growls, now focusing his deathly glare over on Neil.

Laughing and stepping closer towards me, Neil kneels down and reaches out to me. Lifting my hand, I push him away
, which only encourages him to let out another joyful snarl, before grabbing my arm and pulling me up onto my feet.

“Let’s save that for another day,” he says, waving his hand around as though he doesn’t have a care in the world. “How about we talk about Holly?”

“
You leave her out of this! Don’t you think you’ve done enough already?” I snap out, trying to free my arm from his grasp but failing miserably.

“
I did her alright!” he laughs heartily, a wide smirk appearing over his face,

“
You’re sick!” I can’t even bear to be within his proximity.

“You’re lying, Holly would never …” Brandon’s voice trails when he looks over to me. I close my eyes and lower my head, wishing Neil would say whatever he has to say and then
just leave us the hell alone.

“
I have proof, don’t I, Alex? You’ve read it, you’ve seen it with your own eyes!”

“I hate you!” I spit at him, “You’re a—“

“Enough! Let’s play a little game of chicken, shall we?” he interrupts me again, and this time, he reaches into my jacket pocket and pulls out the diary.

Fuck no.

“Alex, I challenge you to break Brandon’s heart all over again, just like he did with mine when he not only took one girl away from me, but he took you away from me too.”

“No! No fucking way! Go to hell!”

“Fine, have it your way,” raising his hands at me, as though he’s retreating.

I’ve just about had enough of all of this, I don’t see why he’s so intent on hurting the people who care,
who cared
about him so much.

“You’re loss,” he shrugs his shoulders and walks over to Brandon, stamping on his leg before stepping over him, with Brandon
wincing and letting out a muffled growl from the pain.

“
Read it, or say goodnight to Brandon and watch him fade away, just like he watched Holly,” he snarls, sitting down just out of Brandon’s reach, although it doesn’t look as though he has a lot of fight left in him anyway. “I warned you, right at the start, right at the beginning when you first met him, Alex. I warned you and guaranteed that you’d get hurt if you ever got involved with him. Do you remember that conversation?”

Not being able to look
at him, I turn away as he continues on this little power trip he appears to have going on.

“I tried w
arning you both again with the flowers that were delivered for your birthday, everyone knows they’re funeral flowers, and then there was the whole ordeal of poor Brandon being beaten so badly that he ended up in a coma, and that, that still wasn’t a good enough warning for you both to keep the fuck out of it!”

“And my mom?” I ask, feeling nauseas from finally being able to ask the question, but wishing the answer wouldn’t be what I’
m expecting it to be.

“You take after her in so many ways, Alex, it’s sickening!”

“I despise you!” I lash out, wiping the tears from my eyes, and gazing towards Brandon, seeing his facial features showing all of the sadness he must be feeling inside. The betrayal of what his so called friend did to him. He trusted Neil like he trusts the rest of us.

“Read the fucking diary or I’ll do it!”
he scowls, pulling something out from his pocket and that’s when my whole body fills with dread and I feel my heart sinking. Glancing over to Brandon, I see him closing his eyes and lowering his head.

“Do what he says Alexis, please? I promised you forever and I swore I would never b
reak that promise, it’s okay … just read it, please?”

Giving me an encouraging smile, I open it up and begin the first line.

When I’ve read the entire thing, from cover to cover, my heart is hurting for him. Seeing him sitting there and listening to everything that was written down by the girl he so desperately loved, admitting she’d lost her virginity to his best friend, after he had been so loyal and never wanted to move on, because of his love for her. Listening to me, the person he loves now, reading out such a heart breaking thing, I can’t even imagine the pain he’s going through.

I just want to hold him and make it all better. Watching him as he lifts his head, I see the redness around his eyes and the tears streaming down his cheeks. He looks so broken.

“Are you happy now, Neil? Now that you’ve made whatever point you were trying to make before you left town?”

“Actually, there is one more thing …” he places his chin in his hands, and looks t
o be thinking about something, and then he does it.

Punching Brandon hard in the face, when he has no way of defending himself, he lets out an evil laugh again, and when I jump up to try and stop him from hurting him anymore, he pushes me backwards and then … and then … “NO!!!!”

“Enjoy your forever, Alex,” and with that, he runs from the building and out of my view.

Crawling over to Brandon, I see the fear in his eyes as I gently cradle him in my arms. Looking over him, I see where Neil rammed the needle into him, pulling it out from his neck as fast as I can, but when I look down, it’s already empty.

“Brandon, Brandon where’s your cell phone?” I ask, the desperation clear in my voice.

“Neil
took it,” he tells me, his voice weak as he keeps his eyes fully focused into mine, “I’m so sorry, Alexis,” he says, trying to smile as his eyes begin to close.

“No, don’t close your eyes, keep them open and I’ll go and get help!” I tell him, trying to stay positive for the both of us.

“No, don’t … don’t leave … it was … it was full, he hit me good …”

“What? What does that mean? Brandon, open your eyes! Please?” I beg of him, lifting him higher as I try to keep him from falling asleep, “Brandon!”

“Forever,” he smiles, whispering the only word he can manage to speak, the one word that means the most.

“You can’t leave me, you can’t leave me here on my own!”
I scream at him, seeing some sadness in his eyes as they begin to glaze over. “Brandon, stay with me, we’re having a baby, you have to stay, you have to!” I scream, my tears falling onto his face as his eyes begin to fade.

Holding him and clutching him as tightly as I possibly can, I feel as his body becomes limp and his breaths shallow.