Almost Broken Up (Almost Bad Boys) Read Free

God, Libby! My grandmother is here. How did she find me? I jump out of the shower, not worrying about turning the water off, and grab a semi-clean looking bath towel. It’s so small that I barely manage to wrap it around my hips. I pull the doors open. Two women stand there, their eyes huge with anticipation: Libby and her mother—my great grandma—Helga.  
    “Colin! Are you okay?” They both rush at me, wrapping their arms around me, hugging me fiercely.  
    I hug them back with one arm, holding the skimpy towel close to my body with the other hand.  
    Helga is very old and very tiny—maybe four feet two, that’s all—but she’s fierce and authoritative. Libby is all motherly love and wisdom. These two raised me since I lost my parents at the age of four.  
    They talk, shout, cry, ask questions. I don’t know what to do first, so I just motion them inside and close the doors.  
    “Wait, wait,” Libby quiets her mother and turns her worry-filled eyes to me. “What happened exactly? After I’d got your call last night, I tried to contact you at the dorm. Your friend Adam told me about the accident. But he didn’t know where you went. They only knew the police brought you back at night, but then you were gone… I traced your call to here. That’s how we found you. Colin… please tell us everything. From the beginning.” She sits next to me on the bed, and Helga sits on my other side, grasping my arm in her small, wrinkled hands.  
    So I tell them the whole story. I feel tears rolling down my cheeks, and it is embarrassing. I’m a grownup man, not a kid anymore, but I can’t stop. It’s infuriating, but it is good to talk; to get it all out of me; to uncork that barrel of pain and let it flow out and away. They cry quietly, wrapping their arms around me and around one another. And then they tell me that we are going back home to Seattle. For good. I don’t fight it. I don’t want to go back to UCLA. I can’t face it. If I do, that little part that hasn’t been wrecked inside me like everything else is, will shatter, and I will be a broken man with no hope.    
     

     
     

 

     
    ONE
     
    “If you can find a path with no obstacles, it probably doesn’t lead anywhere.”
    Frank A. Clark
     
    What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. This is such bullshit. If something is about to kill you, it will scar you for life. There is no strength coming from terrifying experiences. Maybe that saying should be more specific and read something like What seriously kicks your ass makes you stronger. Yeah, that makes more sense.  
    Did the car accident that took Faith’s life, but didn’t kill Colin make him stronger? Hell no. He will never really put it behind him; he will never recover; he will always be broken inside, blaming himself for what happened, for not stopping her, even if he had no chance to do so.  
    I watch him closely now and even though I see him becoming visibly more relaxed, as if a huge boulder has been removed from his shoulders, I realize the aftermath of the tragedy from his past boils right under the surface, ready to rear its ugly head and take him down.  
    I know Colin’s trying to control his panic attacks. A few years spent in therapy taught him how to recognize the first symptoms of an upcoming attack, and how to quickly disperse it. He’s really good at it, but I still keep an eye on him.  
    After witnessing his panic attack for the first time, I start to do my own research, pouring over the Internet and books, learning everything I can about his condition and how to help him. Colin teaches me what to look for and what to do in case he fails to restrain the attack. So far, over four weeks from the initial incident, he hasn’t succumbed, although I’ve seen the first signs of an upcoming attack twice.  
    He tells me that he’s getting better; that this is just a residual of the past and not something new; that it doesn’t have anything to do with me. This, in his