Chapter 19

The throaty rumbleof Griff’s car pulling out of our driveway startles me out of my half-asleep state.

I stare at the ceiling, replaying the night over and over. My eyes drift shut a few times, but I can’t seem to hold on to sleep.

Why can’t I shove Torch’s words out of my head? Remy told me he believes Griff. Eraser seems to believe him too. Neither of them tried to force me into believing Griff, though. Vapor and Juliet have never said anything either way, but I know they were Griff’s phone call home during the show.

What do I expect? The five of them have been friends forever. Of course they’d take Griff’s side.

But Torch saying it…he has every reason to want me to believe Griff cheated. We never spoke about it over the summer. Not once. Then the first time he sees Griff, he tells me to reconsider?

I have to know.

Downstairs seems quiet. None of Remy’s usual nocturnal noises. No hum of the television or rattles from the kitchen. Or worse, giggles from some girl spending the night.

I crack open my door and peer into the hallway like a burglar checking if the coast is clear. I tiptoe past Remy’s closed bedroom door. No light spills from under the crack and I breathe a sigh of relief.

My heart pounds as I ease down the stairs, avoiding the one near the bottom that squeaks.

Without turning on any lights, I perch on the edge of Remy’s recliner and swivel toward the television.

Can I really do this again? Should I wait for Remy to watch it with me?

No. I’m not a kid who needs her big brother to hold her hand.

I turn on the television and flip through the on-screen menus until I find the show. Griff’s face flashes on the screen as the cover photo for the whole show. My heart squeezes. I scroll through the episodes until I find the right one.

Am I really doing this to myself? It took me forever to get those images out of my head.

I fast forward through the dumb opening montage that includes my face as I tearfully hug Griff goodbye. The big bad moment happened near the end, so I keep it fast-forwarding through all the dumb fighter antics, the girls strutting around in their bathing suits, and the outing.

The images on screen shift to black-and-white and I hit play. I mute the announcer’s annoying voice and just watch.

Griff and Kiki at his door.

A couple in bed together. The picture is so grainy. Without the announcer telling me who’s on the screen, would I have assumed it was Griff?

I can’t really see the girl, either. It could be Kiki. Or it could be one of the other ring bunnies in the house.

Disgusted that I feel like I’m intruding on what was an intimate moment for…whoever’s on screen, I shift my gaze to the left. The shadowy shape of the plain nightstand, a chair in the corner, a—wait a minute.

The nightstand.

My heart pounds painfully. Am I crazy? How did I miss this before? Why didn’t anyone else notice?

The picture I tucked away in Griff’s bag, the one the show mocked in the first episode, isn’t on the nightstand where Griff put it, right at the edge, so he’d see it first thing when he woke up every morning.

I rewind and watch again. The quality of the footage is terrible but it’s clear enough to see the top of the nightstand is completely empty. Nothing. Not even the tube of lip balm I sent with Griff, which he also left by the bed.

It’s not Griff’s room.

I grab my phone and Google “Griff Stonewall Supreme Fighter Cheat Nightstand” and find an entire sub on Reddit dedicated to the show. Every comment I read makes my heart thud harder.

Episode: Something Big Happens

FlockingFab20: “I hope his girlfriend knows he didn’t cheat. The photo wasn’t there.”

SUF36: My theory is he removed the picture before Kiki came into the room. Probably stashed in his nightstand so he wouldn’t get the guilts.

FlockingFab20: That makes zero sense. It looked too spontaneous.

On and on the speculation continues. Hundreds of different users. Two thousand different comments in this thread alone. They seem split fifty/fifty on whether Griff actually cheated.

Why would any normal person care this much about people they’ve never even met?

Bile burns the back of my throat. Strangers on the Internet stuck up for Griff more than I did. I was his girlfriend. His friend long before that. I didn’t even let him explain. I wouldn’t hear him out.

Worse, I destroyed the car he gave me for my birthday. The car he bought for me and so lovingly poured many hours into restoring.

How am I supposed to fix this?

Can it be fixed?

He still chose the show over our relationship. He still told that awful woman intimate things about me. The humiliation burns every time I remember her mocking text. I was so embarrassed, I never told Remy—or anyone else—about it.

“Molly, what are you doing?” Remy’s sleep-rough voice sends my heart rate spiking to the sky.

I whip my head around. “You scared the crap out of me.”

He opens his mouth to say something, then stops. His eyes widen in horror as he takes in the television screen. I left it frozen on that scene.

Shame stings my skin. Why’d he have to catch me watching this? Now he’ll know for sure I’m not over Griff.

Remy hurries closer and snatches the remote off the arm of the chair. “Why would you watch that again?” He clicks the television off. Darkness descends around us.

I reach over and tap the lamp next to his chair. A weak pool of light pushes the shadows in this corner of the room away.

“I had to know for sure. To see it again.” I can’t tell him what Torch said. Remy’s always been oddly silent on the topic of me dating Torch. I thought he would’ve blown a gasket the first time Torch asked me out but maybe he finally realized I’m old enough to make my own decisions about who I date.

He stares at me with his unfathomable blue eyes—a mirror of my own. Pity? Concern? I can’t tell what he’s thinking. “And what do you think now?” he asks carefully.

“I’m not sure.” I don’t want to tell Remy my photo-on-the-nightstand theory. It sounds so desperate and childish.

“You should at least have a conversation with him,” he says.

“I did.” I shrug, striving for the indifference I’m having trouble holding onto. “It didn’t change anything.”

“You’re breaking his heart.” His voice drops to an anguished whisper.

How dare Remy try to guilt me. “He broke mine first!”

He holds out his hands like he’s trying to tame a wild bobcat. “I know how bad it looks.” He glances at the black television screen. “But it’s not him. We watched it together not long after he came home?—”

“You did? Why?”

“He wanted to see it. I don’t think he understood how bad it was until he watched the episode.” He shrugs. “It sounds like all sorts of things were taken out of context and edited to fit a certain narrative.”

As if I give a cracker about the show’s “narrative.”

“Did he hear the awful stuff they said about me?”

“Yeah, he saw some of it. He was pissed, Molly. I told him when I talked to him, but I think it was different seeing it for himself.”

None of this changes anything. “It doesn’t matter now.”

“Of course it matters.” He drops his shoulders, relaxing his posture from protector to comforting big brother. “If you really don’t think you can repair things, that’s fine?—”

“But?”

“No buts.” He gestures to the television again. “Maybe tell him you believe him, though.”

My face hardens.

“Or not.” He holds up his hands again.

“What about you two?” I ask. “You’re not really selling your part of The Castle, are you?”

“Nah.” He shrugs. “I thought about it for a second.”

“I never wanted…I don’t want to be the reason you two aren’t friends.”

He’s quiet, thinking that over. “I really hate that he hurt you. Even if it wasn’t intentional.”

“Grief’s the price we pay for love. I’m fine now.”

He tilts his head, silently calling me out on my big, fat lie.

“Okay, maybe not fine. But I’m getting there.”

He nods slowly. “I’m proud of you. Just focus on school, for now. If you two are meant to be together, then it’ll happen.”

I shake my head. “I think Griff was only meant to be a chapter, not my whole story.”

Why does saying that feel like throwing the whole book in the fire?