18
Nico
Laura was shaking. Actually shaking. I’d never seen her upset, but she was shaking. “Are you all right?”
She shook her head. “Not really, but I will be. Sometimes things get hard. Today was hard.”
I chuckled. “Things are always hard for me.”
“You don’t seem that way. You’re so steady.”
I shook my head. “Not really. I hide it. I revert into myself. I go home and I hide out. I don’t let anyone see me when I lose it.”
“I don’t lose it very often,” Laura admitted. “Ever since my mom…I know how devastating loss can be. I’ve seen it firsthand. I watched my dad completely disappear right in front of my eyes. It wasn’t on purpose and it wasn’t because he didn’t love me, but he still vanished. The one person he lived for was gone, and he had nothing else, so he vanished, too. As pain
