“You don’t have to be. There’s always a way out.”
“Perhaps I haven’t found it yet,” he whispers, as though he’s already dismissed the idea. His eyes are on my lips, which are waiting for him, trembling.
The thought of Justin flickers dimly in the back of my mind, a dying light among a thousand brilliant stars. I don’t think I’ve ever wanted anything more than this, now. The anticipation is painful. “Kiss me,” I murmur, and fully surrendering to my role as his own, I manage a “please” with the last of my breath.
He moves forward an almost imperceptible distance; then, in insult to my waiting mouth, his lips spread into a smile. He pulls away and stands. “If you don’t want to help us, why don’t you go back to the living? Why are you wasting our time?”
I open my eyes, momentarily bewildered and shamed. My mouth opens but words will not come out.
“If you want to help us, you need to go across,” he snaps. “Now.”
“I want …,” I begin, but I don’t know what I want. Ten minutes ago, what I would have wanted was to be anywhere but with him. He frightened me. And yet something has changed, and now I want to help him. I want it more than anything. Now, having him here, so near, I realize that what’s right for me and what simply feels right are two different things, and I can’t trust myself to know the difference. Maybe I am in the whirlpool, too. He leans over me until his lips are once again right before mine. And then he does it, he kisses me. It’s not like kissing Justin, not at all, because the taste of Jack is something foul, sour, like mold and rotten things, and still I push against him, my mouth moving against his, wanting more. I wrap my arms around him, pulling myself to him, lacing my fingers in his hair, every inch of me burning until I realize that my fingers are kneading through something wet and spongy, and that pieces of it are coming off in my hands.
I open my eyes and there is nothing there, only the quiet outlines of the trees, still in the bright moonlight. I’m crouched on my hands and knees on the ground, in a puddle of mud. My hands and most of my arms are painted black with muddy leaves.
I’m not sure how I manage to get up and stumble through the woods, toward the cabin. I don’t hear the sound of my feet hitting the ground. My breath billows in a cloud in front of me, and I blow through it. My hands feel sticky and wet and yet most of my body is numb, as if it has fallen into a deep sleep. Everything in the world seems asleep; there are no people, no sounds, not even the rush of the water I’ve come to expect. I stop for a moment and hold my hands in front of me. Yes, blood. So much blood. By now I can see the lights of the cabin. I rush across the highway, not bothering to stop. I must get home. I must get help.
I somehow get inside, and the heat is so intense my face feels like it’s on fire. Justin is standing under the giant moose antlers, clutching his head in both hands like he’s trying to lift it from his body. Angela is on the couch, chewing on her thumbnail, something she always does when she’s nervous. I expect them to both react when they see me coming, but they don’t. Justin continues to squeeze his head like his hands are a vise, and Angela stares off at the fireplace, even though there isn’t a fire there. I’m about to shout for help when Justin throws down his arms.
“I am such an idiot. I screwed everything up,” he says miserably.
“Oh, stop,” Angela says.
“It’s my fault she ran away. And now who knows what could happen to her? She’s not thinking clear. I really screwed it up,” he mumbles.
I stop for a moment, glad to hear him admit his guilt, then rush forward. “I’m here,” I say, holding out my hands.
I expect them to turn toward me. I expect to see their faces contort in horror. I expect Angela to launch into Florence Nightingale mode, ushering me to the couch, and Justin to whip out his cell and call an ambulance. None of these things happens. Well, not at first. After a long pause, Justin reaches into the pocket of his cargo shorts and pulls out his phone. “I need to call,” he says. But he’s not looking at me.
I move forward, into the room. “Justin,” I say to him.
But he won’t look at me. I’m standing where I can reach out and touch Angela, and all she does is continue to study and chew on her fingernails, as if I’m not even there. As if …
I look down at the blood seeping through my jacket, making it look sleek and black, like a seal’s skin. Then I stand between them. “Justin?”
Angela says, “Yeah. I think you need to.”
Need to what? I turn to her, I’m standing right in front of her, and her eyes are on me, but they’re not. They’re focused on what’s behind me. Justin. I move closer to her, wave my hand in her face. She doesn’t even blink. “Angela?”
Nothing.
Oh my God. I can’t breathe. I can’t even see, now, because the tears are falling freely and blurring my vision. I can’t wipe them away because my hands are crusted with dirt and blood. I just stand there, moving from one to the other, hoping that one of them will say, Oh, hey, there you are! But Justin has his phone up to his ear and is staring at the ceiling. I can hear the phone ringing, and then a familiar voice says “Yep?” on the other end. There’s only one person I know who answers the phone like that.
“Mr. Levesque?” Justin says into the receiver.
My breath hitches. Dad.
The tears fall harder. If he were here, everything would be better. My heart twists with the thought of everything I’d done to get away from him. I was so, so stupid. How could I have wanted that? How could I have thought that would be better? I want him here. I want him to wrap his arms around me and tell me he loves me, that I’m his girl. Never in my life have I wanted that so much. I reach for the phone, crying, “Give that to me!” But even though Justin doesn’t move, just stands there with one hand holding the phone and the other hand pinching his other ear closed, I can’t touch him. Something is wrong. I touch, and yet I feel nothing. I reach for where the phone is, but my hands pass through it like it’s made of air. I cannot snatch it from him.
Justin says, “There’s a problem with Ki. She’s missing.”
I’m sobbing now. “No, I’m not. Justin. I’m right here.”
But it’s useless. I drop my head, letting the tears puddle on the floor, with my blood. So, so much blood. Don’t they notice that? Don’t they notice anything about me?
Justin looks at the ceiling and exhales deeply. “It’s my fault,” he says to my father. “I was the one who convinced her to come up here.”
I can hear my father’s voice on the other end, an octave higher with worry. Though I can’t make out the words, I know what he says: “I’ll be right up. I’m coming. I’m leaving right now.”
Oh, Dad, I think, as I stare at the growing puddle of blood at my feet, I’m so sorry. But it’s too late.
Chapter Nineteen
I don’t know how much later, I find myself wandering the woods in the blackness. It’s dark, and yet I can see. I’m not cold or hot, I’m not anything. My feet don’t make a sound, and though there are brambles and roots popping out of the earth, my footing is sure, as if I’m walking a well-known path, and nothing touches me. My wound seeps blood endlessly, but it doesn’t hurt.
I don’t know how this happened. One moment I was talking to Jack, and … Oh, no, I was thinking of kissing him. I wanted to, so badly. Somehow, though I can’t feel anything else, I can still feel my face aflame with embarrassment.
Did Jack do this to me?