❝ shame on you for ever thinking she was . ❞ sarcasm laced into her voice , lenore drops bloodied rag down on the tabletop , hands falling her hips while top of her head angles to the side . she imagines she is the very image of her mother , disappointed look on her face as she took care of her clumsy daughter . she shudders at the thought . ❝ i don’t think it’s broken . who knew claud had such a mean right hook . ❞ an attempt made to lighten the mood unsuccessful , lenore purses her lips , chewing on the inside of her cheek until she skin there tastes metallic . she wants to scream , to yell and give him worse than a bloody nose , but exhaustion slumps her shoulders , and her body shifts to the seat across from him . it feels like for the first time in her life she’s at a loss for words , uncomfortable in the silence that spanned between them --- strange when she had spent more than half of her life alongside him . lenore feels scared ; afraid that she was on the verge of losing the only people she had in the world minus her parents . ❝ there was a better way of telling her what was going on . ❞ there were unspoken rules of their friendship , lines that lenore and alexander had gone far beyond . she thinks that claudia’s hurt stemmed from the secret , that never in their lives ( before this instance ) had there been even one thing that any one of them kept from the other two .
❝ she’s never gonna talk to me again , alex . she already won’t answer my calls . . . she can’t hate me . i can’t lose you , either of you . i don’t know how to fix this , ❞ desperation clings to the words let loose into the air , eyes searching his face for an answer that is absent . fingers find the rag once more , wringing it between her fingers in place of picking at her cuticles . ❝ this is so fucked , this is so fucked . what if she won’t ever talk to me again ? ❞