You Saved Me Once Book 1

The only female in a house of all boys. Still don’t know how I survived. Now it’s just Jake and me. Jake’s the youngest among the four of us. I’m the middle, then Adam, then our oldest brother, Jack.

They’re both off, living their lives. Just thinking about life outside of Versa, gives me chills, makes me envy them.

I miss them. We haven’t been together, in forever.

~~~~~

I get out of the shower and wrap myself in a towel. I give it 3 sec-onds, before Jake barges in. I watch the steam in the room, vanish in the new air.

“Is it just me or do females take so long in the bathroom, it’s in-sane.” He says.

I smile at his comment. I’m happy to hear Jake’s humor. It lets me know he’s doing better than before. It got bad a couple of months ago for him. Sometimes I’m scared, that he might be faking it.

“10 minutes is forever Jake, you’re right. Sorry about that.” I say. He ignores me.

We share a bathroom in our 4-bedroom 2.5-bathroom home. We’d never use the downstairs bathroom, the room closest to the kitchen, closer to the laundry room. We haven’t been in that room in years.

“Can’t be late, got a game today. The team’s already riding my ass.” He says.

He’s scrambled, and the day just started. Seeing him like this makes me worried. I call his name, but he ignores me. My wet hair drips on the steamed floor.

His cold hands touch the humid mirror. He slides it open. The fau-cet runs, everything else is quiet. I watch him gulp it down with the wa-ter. He leaves the faucet running. He smiles at me.

“You’ve had like 20 games in the last two weeks, you guys haven’t won, one yet.” I joke.

Jake almost falls on the wet floor. This makes us both smile through the hate. No matter what Jake said, I could never hate him. It’s just cold, humor hate. It’s us showing our love to each other.

“Of course, you wouldn’t understand, the only thing you're commit-ted to is photographing oceans, and stuffing your face with ice cream.” He says. I laugh.

“Hey! Make another sexist joke again, and I swear I’ll-” He slams the door in my face.

“Fuck you!” I yell. He shouts it back.

I smile through the cold chills that now coat my skin.

~~~~~~

just like every other day of the week. Super simple, super repetitive, yet tolerable. Tolerable enough, for

I feel like I would

and drive to school.

my last year of high school, sounds bittersweet. I’m thankful though, because I can

father when we turn a legal age. We can do whatever we want with it. I want to get away. I haven’t told any-one

Jake though. I need him as much as

day. I sit on my bed, staring at myself in

enough to stare at the reminders taped on the mirror, the collages, memories from the past. I can’t

I can see my once perfect, happy family, frozen in time, taped to the mirror. Then I look at another family on the mirror,

black scribbles. Now it’s just a shitty,

look at my short messy hair, and my

gets too quiet too fast. I can hear the shower running. I grab my

and hate relationship with

and I didn’t get along. It was a super dark time for me, for all of the Richards. We all handled

I let this dark

habit. It’s a secret though. One of my darkest secrets. I try to

crunch warms me. Stops me from

Jake comes downstairs.

“Do you have

you talking about?” I ask.

down the

my car.”

recovered. We’re close to the laundry room, we’re close to her

kitchen and go

spare?” Jake asks

away from him.

parked in front of Ms. Kristen’s

neighbor for years. We were once close. We share

car is

you whispering?” He

think it