April 9, 2010 (25)
9:00 p.m.
Evalynne’s Apartment

Addison shut and locked the front door of our apartment behind us after we walked inside. It had been another long night, even worse than yesterday night. Mainly because I spent it with Michael and Valerie. After leaving the diner, we walked around the downtown area of Ann Arbor, Michigan for awhile. Then we’d went to some Italian restaurant for dinner. It was awful.
Especially because the entire time I had to be nice to Michael and Valerie. I had to call them Ben and Angie. I had to make it seem as if I didn’t actually hate them with all of my heart. It was extremely difficult.
“I’m pretty tired. I think I’m just gonna go to bed now.” I said to Addison. This was a lie. I was actually anything but tired. How could I possibly go to sleep when I’d just encountered the couple who had tried to murder Will and I?
“Can we talk for a minute first?” she asked me.
I really wanted to decline her offer, but Addison had been so good to me ever since I’d moved in. I had to at least give her the satisfaction of talking with her. “Sure,” I agreed reluctantly. So we sat down at the kitchen table to talk.
“You acted really strange tonight around Ben and Angie. It almost seemed like you didn’t like them or something. Like you were just acting nice to be polite. I thought they were a very nice couple, and Ashton likes them too. In fact, I was thinking about inviting them over for dinner one night. Ashton would come, and you could invite Cole too if you wanted to.” she said to me.
My skin began to prickle with heat as rage boiled inside of me. I hated Michael so much that words couldn’t even describe it. He deserved to be serving a life sentence in jail. But instead he was finding his way back into my life. He was befriending my roommate. And I just couldn’t take it anymore, but there wasn’t a thing I could do about it. Not unless I wanted Cole to die and Will to hate me.
“It just seemed like there was something a little bit off about them.” I told her. Michael might have gotten Addison and Ashton to like him, but there was no way in h*** he’d get me to. I wouldn’t even pretend to like him. I couldn’t pretend to like him.
“Why is that? They seemed really sweet to me,” she replied, her eyes wide with confusion.
“I don’t know. I just don’t really like them very much.” I said.
She looked at me for a long time before she finally spoke again. “Is this about Will?” she asked.
“No,” I replied. And it wasn’t about Will. It was about Michael and how sadistic he was. It was about how much I hated him. I hated Valerie too, but not as much as Michael.
“Are you sure? Because it seems like ever since you saw that news report this morning you’ve been acting really strange.” she said, sounding truly concerned.
“I’m sure.” I told her.
“Well did something happen between you and Cole? Did you guys have a fight?”
I sucked in a deep breath as the image of Cole’s crestfallen face flashed in my mind. That image would forever haunt me, bringing back the memory of how badly I’d hurt him. “We broke up,” I confessed.
“Well what happened?” she wondered aloud.
I looked up at her, trying to decide whether or not I should trust her. She was beyond nice and I felt like she’d probably be pretty understanding about what I was about to tell her. However, there was still a small part of me that was wondering whether or not she’d judge me for it. But I decided to tell her anyways.
“I told him the truth…that I still love Will. I’m going to go back to him too. He deserves a second chance,” I said to her. I watched as she tried to hide her shock, but it was easy to tell how surprised she was by the look in her eyes.
“Evalynne,” she began, “Will hit you. He’s an abusive person, and you deserve much better than that. I know that he probably made you feel as if you were loved by him, as if he were the best thing for you. But you need to understand that that’s not true. You can do so much better than him. You can find someone who will love and protect you rather than hurt you. It seemed like Cole really cared about you. Why would you rather go back to Will instead of staying with Cole?”
“You don’t understand,” I told her. And she didn’t. She had no clue what Will had been through, what Michael had put him through. “His brother, Michael, made his entire life a living h***. He turned every single person who he ever cared about against him. Including me. He taunted Will by sending him these threatening text messages. He pushed him too far and then he snapped. And since I was the only one there, he took it out on me. But it wasn’t his fault. It was Michael’s.”
She looked at me as if I were crazy. “Michael didn’t force him to hit you though. He did that all on his own. I’m sorry to be the one to tell you this, but the only person to blame for this is Will. Michael might have put him through h***, but you didn’t do anything to him. You didn’t do anything to deserve this. He punished you for something that wasn’t your fault and you’re finding an excuse for him.”
I couldn’t believe her. She was making it seem like Michael had nothing to do with this, like it was all Will’s fault! That wasn’t true though. Michael had everything to do with this. He was the cause of Will’s violence. If it weren’t for Michael, Will would’ve been perfectly fine. He wouldn’t be damage both mentally and emotionally. This was Michael’s fault, not Will’s. And part of it was my fault too, because I hadn’t given him the help he needed when he needed it. I’d noticed the signs of his mental disorder, but I’d just ignored them, focusing on myself. I’d been selfish. I deserved everything that Will had dished out on me.
“Michael might not have physically forced Will to hit me, but he mentally and emotionally damaged Will so much that violence was all he knew. He can’t express his feelings in any other way, because he doesn’t know how. He was brought up with so much hate and violence and cruelty in his life that he never got to experience love or kindness or compassion. And that’s Michael’s fault, not his.” I remarked, growing defensive. “So I will go back to him, because I know that he really does love me. He might not display it the same way Cole does, but he still loves me. And I love him too.”
She looked at me with pity in her eyes, like she felt bad for me because I was still in love with Will. And it made me so angry that she felt that way. Will hadn’t done anything to deserve this. Why had he been cursed with Michael as his brother? It just wasn’t fair.
“Will’s life might be a mess, but it’s not up to you to put it back together.” Addison told me. “You shouldn’t feel like it’s your responsibility to go back to him or to make him happy, because it’s not. Why should you sacrifice your own life for his?”
Addison actually made sense with what she said, and it actually got me thinking. Why was I so intent on basing my life around Will’s? But after a moment of contemplating it, I realized exactly what the reason was. “Because Will is my life,” I replied.
“Well he shouldn’t be.” she snapped back. “I know that because of the time you spent with him, you now feel like you need him. Because of him, you’ve thrown you’re entire life away. But what for?”
“For him!” I cried. “I love him! And I do need him. I did it all for him,”
“Why?” she replied. “So that he can hit you? So that he can yell at you? So that he can keep you from experiencing what real love is like? So that he can continue to use you as his own personal punching bag?”
I had no idea how to respond to his, because as I listened to what Addison I had to say, I began to realize that she was absolutely right.
“I know we just met a little while ago, Evalynne, and I know that I don’t really know you that well. But I’m still your roommate. I’m still your friend, and as a friend, I’m not going to let you continue throwing your life away for a boy who feeds off of hurting you. It’s not right.” Her green eyes were full of compassion, like she actually did care what I did with my life. I was grateful for it too, because she just saved me from going back to Will. She saved me from destroying whatever was left of my life. And I knew for a fact that I could trust her now.
“Do you want to know why I really hate Ben and Angie so much?” I asked her.
“Why?” she replied.
“Because they aren’t really Ben and Angie.” Her eyes were full of confusion when I said this, so I explained further. “Ben’s real name is Michael McKnight. His girlfriend’s name is Valerie, not Angie. Michael is Will’s twin brother and Valerie is Will’s ex-girlfriend. They tried to kill me before, but didn’t succeed at it. So they’ve come back for me. Only this time, they aren’t going to kill me. This time, Michael wants me to himself, as his new girlfriend.”
The look on her face was a mixture of complete shock and total fear. For a moment, she was speechless. But then she finally responded. “Why haven’t you called the police yet?”
“Because if I do, Michael will kill Cole.” I informed her. “I know what you’re thinking: how would he know if I called the police or not? Well honestly, I’m not sure how. All I know for sure is that the moment I turn him into the police, Cole’s life will be taken from him. He never said anything about telling you, but I’m pretty positive he didn’t want me to. So can we please just keep this a secret? If he finds out I told you, he’ll kill Cole and I can’t let that happen. So please don’t tell anyone about this, not even Ashton.”
From the look on her face I could tell that she was still trying to process all of this information, but I could also tell that she knew how serious this was. “I promise I won’t tell anyone,” she assured me. And I trusted her enough to know that I could believe her.

Author's Note: Check me out on youtube if you want to. My username is LexiWrites & all the videos on there are based off of this series (: