And now I can sit here and watch TV like it is five years ago and Mom and Dad are in the other room and I’ve never spent a night hiding in a drainpipe with Jamie and a bunch of rats while body snatchers with spotlights search for the thieves who made off with a bag of dried beans and a bowl of cold spaghetti.
I know that if Jamie and I survived alone for twenty years we would never find this feeling on our own. The feeling of safety. More than safety, even-happiness. Safe and happy, two things I thought I’d never feel again.
Jared makes us feel that way without trying, just by being Jared.
I breathe in the scent of his skin and feel the warmth of his body under mine.
Jared makes everything safe, everything happy. Even houses.
He still makes me feel safe, Melanie realized, feeling the warmth where his arm was just half an inch from mine. Though he doesn’t even know I’m here.
I didn’t feel safe. Loving Jared made me feel less safe than anything else I could think of.
I wondered if Melanie and I would have loved Jared if he’d always been who he was now, rather than the smiling Jared in our memories, the one who had come to Melanie with his hands full of hope and miracles. Would she have followed him if he’d always been so hard and cynical? If the loss of his laughing father and wild big brothers had iced him over the way nothing but Melanie’s loss had?
Of course. Mel was certain. I would love Jared in any form. Even like this, he belongs with me.
I wondered if the same held true for me. Would I love him now if he were like this in her memory?
Then I was interrupted. Without any cue that I perceived, suddenly Jared was talking, speaking as if we were in the middle of a conversation.
“And so, because of you, Jeb and Jamie are convinced that it’s possible to continue some kind of awareness after… being caught. They’re both sure Mel’s still kicking in there.”
He rapped his fist lightly against my head. I flinched away from him, and he folded his arms.
“Jamie thinks she’s talking to him.” He rolled his eyes. “Not really fair to play the kid like that-but that’s assuming a sense of ethics that clearly does not apply.”
I wrapped my arms around myself.
“Jeb does have a point, though-that’s what’s killing me! What are you after? The Seekers’ search wasn’t well directed or even… suspicious. They only seemed to be looking for you-not for us. So maybe they didn’t know what you were up to. Maybe you’re freelancing? Some kind of undercover thing. Or…”
It was easier to ignore him when he was speculating so foolishly. I focused on my knees. They were dirty, as usual, purple and black.
“Maybe they’re right-about the killing-you part, anyway.”
Unexpectedly, his fingers brushed lightly once across the goose bumps his words had raised on my arm. His voice was softer when he spoke again. “Nobody’s going to hurt you now. As long as you aren’t causing any trouble…” He shrugged. “I can sort of see their point, and maybe, in a sick way, it would be wrong, like they say. Maybe there is no justifiable reason to… Except that Jamie…”
My head flipped up-his eyes were sharp, scrutinizing my reaction. I regretted showing interest and watched my knees again.
“It scares me how attached he’s getting,” Jared muttered. “Shouldn’t have left him behind. I never imagined… And I don’t know what to do about it now. He thinks Mel’s alive in there. What will it do to him when…?”
I noticed how he said when, not if. No matter what promises he’d made, he didn’t see me lasting in the long term.
“I’m surprised you got to Jeb,” he reflected, changing the subject. “He’s a canny old guy. He sees through deceptions so easily. Till now.”
He thought about that for a minute.
“Not much for conversation, are you?”
There was another long silence.
His words came in a sudden gush. “The part that keeps bugging me is what if they’re right? How the hell would I know? I hate the way their logic makes sense to me. There’s got to be another explanation.”
Melanie struggled again to speak, not as viciously as before, this time without hope of breaking through. I kept my arms and lips locked.
Jared moved, shifting away from the wall so that his body was turned toward me. I watched the movement from the corner of my eye.
“Why are you here?” he whispered.
I peeked up at his face. It was gentle, kind, almost the way Melanie remembered it. I felt my control slipping; my lips trembled. Keeping my arms locked took all my strength. I wanted to touch his face. I wanted it. Melanie did not like this.
If you won’t let me talk, then at least keep your hands to yourself, she hissed.
I’m trying. I’m sorry. I was sorry. This was hurting her. We were both hurting, different hurts. It was hard to know who had it worse at the moment.
Jared watched me curiously while my eyes filled again.
“Why?” he asked softly. “You know, Jeb has this crazy idea that you’re here for me and Jamie. Isn’t that nuts?”
My mouth half-opened; I quickly bit down on my lip.
Jared leaned forward slowly and took my face between both his hands. My eyes closed.
“Won’t you tell me?”
My head shook once, fast. I wasn’t sure who did it. Was it me saying won’t or Melanie saying can’t?
His hands tightened under my jaw. I opened my eyes, and his face was inches away from mine. My heart fluttered, my stomach dropped-I tried to breathe, but my lungs did not obey.
I recognized the intention in his eyes; I knew how he would move, exactly how his lips would feel. And yet it was so new to me, a first more shocking than any other, as his mouth pressed against mine.
I think he meant just to touch his lips to mine, to be soft, but things changed when our skin met. His mouth was abruptly hard and rough, his hands trapped my face to his while his lips moved mine in urgent, unfamiliar patterns. It was so different from remembering, so much stronger. My head swam incoherently.
The body revolted. I was no longer in control of it-it was in control of me. It was not Melanie-the body was stronger than either of us now. Our breathing echoed loudly: mine wild and gasping, his fierce, almost a snarl.
My arms broke free from my control. My left hand reached for his face, his hair, to wind my fingers in it.
My right hand was faster. Was not mine.
Melanie’s fist punched his jaw, knocked his face away from mine with a blunt, low sound. Flesh against flesh, hard and angry.
The force of it was not enough to move him far, but he scrambled away from me the instant our lips were no longer connected, gaping with horrorstruck eyes at my horrorstruck expression.
I stared down at the still-clenched fist, as repulsed as if I’d found a scorpion growing on the end of my arm. A gasp of revulsion choked its way out of my throat. I grabbed the right wrist with my left hand, desperate to keep Melanie from using my body for violence again.
I glanced up at Jared. He was staring at the fist I restrained, too, the horror fading, surprise taking its place. In that second, his expression was entirely defenseless. I could easily read his thoughts as they moved across his unlocked face.
This was not what he had expected. And he’d had expectations; that was plain to see. This had been a test. A test he’d thought he was prepared to evaluate. A test with results he’d anticipated with confidence. But he’d been surprised.
Did that mean pass or fail?
The pain in my chest was not a surprise. I already knew that a breaking heart was more than an exaggeration.
In a fight-or-flight situation, I never had a choice; it would always be flight for me. Because Jared was between me and the darkness of the tunnel exit, I wheeled and threw myself into the box-packed hole.