NightLocker: Please talk to me

NightLocker: Let me explain

NightLocker: Pixie...I’m sorry

NightLocker: There are things you don’t understand

I tucked my fingers under my arms, ignoring the tingle to respond immediately.

Damn straight I don’t understand.

Betrayal stung like a paper cut while opening a package of lemonade mix.

My heart hurt. Like, I’d been burned before…but this? This physically turned my stomach and seared my chest.

This…

This was true heartbreak.

This was can’t sleep, can’t eat unless it’s chocolate, can’t breathe without sharp spikes rattling my lungs, relentless heartbreak.

NightLocker: Give me a chance

NightLocker: I can make this right

NightLocker: I want to...

NightLocker: I need you...DC remember? Doesn’t that mean anything anymore?

Tears stung my eyes as I read his pleas. His use of our secret word, a code that had become something so much more than a warning. Something as vital as breathing and as true as the ache in my heart.

Some deep part of me, the one he’d branded his name on, wanted to forgive him. Needed to.

Because who was I to judge…after what I’d done?

I should forgive him. I should tell him the truth about what I knew.

But what was the point? Once he uncovered it…once he learned what I’d really done…

He’d hate me.

I reached for the keyboard, the motion almost painful.

NightLocker: I need you...DC remember? Doesn’t that mean anything anymore?

PixieBurn: everything & nothing

NightLocker: Amber

NightLocker: Please

NightLocker: What does that even mean

I paused my response, choking back a sob.

It didn’t matter. He’d find out soon enough.

Might as well endure the break now.

I just wished like hell it didn’t have to hurt so damn much.

PixieBurn: It means

PixieBurn: Hack my gear like this again

PixieBurn: for a chat

PixieBurn: for help

PixieBurn: for anything

PixieBurn: and I’ll crash your entire system

I hated myself a fraction more with each message sent.

NightLocker: No!

NightLocker: Amber

NightLocker: Listen to me

God, did I want to. I wanted him to not be breaking into my system, showing up on my screen…I wanted him here. Telling me we could find our way back to common ground, or, hell, hit the reset button and start fresh. Erase every dark piece of our past.

But this was real life.

And it was heavy and hard and harsh.

PixieBurn: goodbye, Dean

I logged off and shut my gear down. He couldn’t find me if I wasn’t online.

Unless he shows up at my door…again.

My heart skipped at the thought—it betraying me as much as he had.

I’d barely survived his friendship, his light…

I certainly wouldn’t survive his hate, his disappointment, the way he’d judge me when he knew…