Watching Them Burn: My Rebirth Story novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: The Pink Envelope
Darby wakes at the desk where Dane proposes and refuses him in front of the whole lecture; Willa offers to keep her posted, the same words as last time.
The day Willa Stanhope jumped off the hotel roof was the day I married Dane Abercrombie.
I was in my wedding dress, two floors down, when I heard the screaming.
By the time I got to the window, she was already gone.
Dane held her on the ground with his eyes red and his hands shaking.
Then he looked up at me. "Darby Aldrich, are you satisfied now?"
I had no idea what I had done.
From that day he lost his mind.
He lay next to me every night and replayed old voice messages of a girl humming.
He said they were Willa's.
I lasted a month.
Then I took his phone, deleted every message and smashed it on the kitchen floor.
I walked out that night with one suitcase.
I never saw the van.
I opened my eyes in a lecture hall with a pen in my hand.
The projector said Introduction to Psychology, Week One.
My own hands were eighteen years old.
I was still looking at them when the whole room started to cheer.
A pink envelope landed on my desk.
Dane Abercrombie stood over it with his chin up and his ears red.
"Darby, will you be my girlfriend?"
His voice was low, so different from how he talked on the deck of the pool.
Two hundred students turned in their seats to watch.
"Say yes!" someone shouted.
"Finally!" someone else said.
"The best swimmer in school and the prettiest girl in class!"
I stared at the envelope.
Last time, I had blushed and picked it up.
That one pink envelope had cost me six years and my life.
My thumb started to tap against the desk.
Then I was humming, three low notes going down, the way I always did when I was scared.
Dane's face changed.
The grin stopped.
He stared at my mouth.
I stopped humming.
He kept looking.
"Darby?" he said.
Somebody laughed. Somebody else clapped.
A girl in the next row leaned over and put a pen into my hand.
"Here, you dropped yours," she said warmly. "Don't be scared. Dane's really sweet once you know him."
It was Willa.
She was eighteen too, with a blonde ponytail and a soft smile.
I looked at her for a long moment.
She was alive.
I would not let her climb a roof in front of me again.
"Thank you," I said.
Then I looked back at Dane.
He was holding his breath.
He believed I was about to say yes, because that was what I had done before.
I picked up the envelope.
The room cheered again.
I held it out to him.
"No," I said.
The cheering broke off.
Dane's hand did not move.
"What?"
"I said no. I don't want to be your girlfriend."
"You're embarrassed," he said, trying to smile. "It's okay. Everyone's looking, that's why."
"I'm not embarrassed. I just don't like you."
A boy at the back whistled low.
Dane's face went red from his collar to his hairline.
"You haven't even given me a chance."
"I gave you six years," I said.
He frowned.
"What are you talking about?"
"Nothing you will ever understand."
I put the envelope on his notebook and stood up.
Two hundred people watched me pick up my bag.
Nobody said a word.
I walked up the aisle and did not look back once.
I had made it to the double doors when a hand caught my sleeve.
It was Willa again.
She was out of breath. She had followed me all the way up the steps.
"Hey, that was brave," she said. "I'd never be able to do that."
"It was just a letter."
"I know. But he's been planning it all summer."
She squeezed my arm.
"Don't worry about him. He's stubborn, but he's good. I've known him since we were nine, so I know exactly how he thinks."
"That's nice of you."
"I want to help," she said. "You're new, and you shouldn't have to deal with this by yourself."
I looked at her hand on my sleeve.
Last time, she had said the same words in the same voice.
Last time I had thanked her.
She smiled at me.
"Give me your number. I'll keep you posted."
I remembered the way it felt, the day I got the first text from her.
Six years of texts.
Every one of them about what Dane felt, what Dane wanted, what Dane needed from me.
I had called her my friend.
I gave her my number anyway.
I wanted to see what she would send.
Down in the lecture hall, Dane was still standing at my empty desk with the pink envelope in his hand.
He was not looking at the envelope.
He was looking up the aisle at me, and he was humming the same three notes.
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