Chapter 273: I Can't

Tallulah's POV:

My fingers drumming on the table, I try to drown out my brother Nathan's voice. It's not that I want to be rude. I just can't face this conversation again.

"You need to report it," he's saying in that big brother voice that apparently never goes away.

I appreciate his concern and of course, I know that he's right. Reporting it is exactly what I should do. It's what I should have done when it first happened.

It's a bit late now though. It's been months. Three and a bit to be exact... well borderline exact. I stopped counting the days since it happened a month ago.

"What's the point?" I repeat the words that never win my brother over. "The evidence is gone now..." except the messages on my phone, I add in my head.

"What if he does it again? To someone else?"

I've thought about that. I know I'm being selfish, putting strangers' lives at risk by not reporting it. I've thought about it every night before falling asleep.

Except I can't.