by Chloe Walsh
"I usually am," he replied in a mild tone. "But the key right now is not to push her too hard. She's traumatized. Suffering from some major PTSD. We've gotta have some patience. Chris slowly leaked his secrets into her. We have to slowly siphon them out."
"You think she knows more?"
"Oh, I'm banking on it," he said with a nod.
"And you believe everything she told us back there?"
"Do you?"
"Yes." My response was automatic and honest. I did believe Romi. I wished like hell that I didn’t, but there was no denying the truth in her eyes when she poured her heart out.
"Me too," Pres agreed. "She's not lying – she's petrified and some of her memories are probably distorted, but it's her version of the truth."
"And the journal?" I asked, quickly veering the topic away from brother's final moments. I couldn’t think too much about it. If I did, I'd lose myself in my hatred. "Where the hell is it?"
"No idea, but we need to find it before anyone else does," Presley replied. "If they haven't already."
"We're in serious shit, aren’t we?" I asked, surprised by how level my tone was.
"Affirmative," he replied with a heavy sigh.
"So, what do we do now?"
"Now, we don’t leave her out of our sights until we suck every last secret out of that pretty head of hers and unravel this shit storm," he replied. "Which, for now, means keeping her out of places that like to strap her to a bed and away from Pocketful. Can't have her asshole dad catching up to her. He'll toss her back in Tully House and we'll be back to square one, and us minus Romi equals an impasse, my friend."
"So, what? We're gonna move her from motel to motel?" I cocked a brow. "Seriously?"
"Seriously," he confirmed without a hint of hesitation. "Are you down?"
"Yeah, I'm down, but we should've packed some clothes for her," I noted, eyeing Romi as a swell of concern rose up inside of me. She looked so tiny. So fucking breakable. "She's gonna need something to change into when she wakes up."
"I think we passed a Walmart on the way into town," he replied, rummaging around in his bookbag. "We'll pick her up some stuff in the morning."
"I don’t like it."
He stopped what he was doing to look at me. "You don’t like what, Sketch?"
"Leaving her like that," I said, pointing at her. She was still wearing my hoodie and sweatpants and they swallowed her up. "What if she wakes up and wants a shower?" I shook my head in frustration. "She needs her own clothes, Pres."
"And we'll get her clothes," he repeated slowly. "First thing in the morning."
"And she'll need shampoo, and panties, and a hairbrush, and all that girl shit."
"Okaaay," he drawled, eyeing me curiously. "Sketch, would you like me to go out and pick some of that up now?"
I shrugged. "I guess it wouldn't hurt."
"Fine." He smirked and climbed to his feet. "Give me your keys."
"Don’t forget a toothbrush," I said, tossing him my keys. "And, uh, tampons – just in case."
"Tampons?"
"Yes, asshole, tampons," I snapped, flustered. "Girls tend to need those a few days each month. If we plan on harboring one, then we need to plan ahead."
"Sketch, man." Presley shuddered in the doorway. "I don’t even know what a tampon looks like."
"They're in a blue box. Get the one that says light flow," I reeled off the words I had memorized by heart. "It has one little teardrop symbol on it."
"Uh, what the fuck did you just say to me?" He gaped at me. "Did those words actually come out of your mouth? And how do you even know what a flow is, never mind what her flow is?"
I flushed bright red. "Just do it, douchebag."
"Ugh." Another shudder racked through Presley before he hurried out the door, muttering under his breath about being suspicious of anything that bleeds for a week and doesn’t die.
It wasn't until he was gone that I realized the mistake I'd made. Being alone with her wasn't good for me. Breathing was hard right now. It hurt too much. My ribs felt like sharpened daggers, piercing through my heart with every breath I took.
Still, I found myself staring at her face, unable to look away when a lone tear escaped. I watched its descent from her damp eyelash, sliding softly down her cheek until it landed on the back of her hand that was tucked under her face.
Instinctively, I moved for her, only to halt in my tracks. Bad idea. Bad move. Step back. Exhaling a pained breath, I veered towards the couch in the corner instead. Sinking down, I placed my elbows on my knees and dropped my head in my hands, ignoring the pain in my chest that made me feel like I was going to die. My conscience was pierced and leaking, oozing my guilt and pain into every other part of me.
I couldn't fix this.
I couldn’t take any of it back.
"I'm so mad at you…"
"I think I hate you…"
"Hey," Romi whispered, startling me and causing my head to snap up.
"You're awake," was all I said, tone surprisingly void of all emotion.
"Yeah." Sniffling, she nuzzled the hand she had tucked under her cheek as she lay on her side, facing me. "Where are we?"
"Still in Texas," I replied, straightening up and placing my hands on my jean clad knees. "Some one-horse town between Odessa and El Paso." I shrugged. "Took a few wrong turn-offs."
"Oh." A small tremor rolled through her, but she kept her eyes on me, those whiskey-colored irises piercing right through my black heart.
"How's your knee since the surgery?" I asked, feeling at a complete fucking loss around this girl now. Ignoring the bazillion tiny hairs on my arms that had shot to attention, I inclined my chin to the boot-brace she was still wearing. "You need painkillers?"
"No." She shook her head. "I'm okay."
"And your ankle?" Concern filled me at the thought. "You sprained that, too."
"I'm not in pain."
"Okay." I nodded slowly. "That's good."
"But I am angry."
Pain. "I know."
"And I'm hurt."
Guilt. "Understandable."
"I want to hate you."
She was broken and I was numb to the bone. I saw the devastation in her eyes, heard it in her voice, and still, I couldn’t connect. I couldn’t find a way back from this. There was a Romi-shaped hole in me and I couldn’t get the words out to fix her when nothing would fix me. I sighed heavily. "Yeah, Romi, I know the feeling."
"You just…god, you hurt me so bad, Sketch."
"I know –" My voice cracked and I had to take a moment before I could speak again. "I don’t know what to say."
"You could say sorry," she whispered before rolling away and giving me her back.
No, I couldn’t.
Because it wasn’t enough.
Chapter Nine
Romi
When I woke the following morning, I felt like a freight train had mowed me down in my sleep. Everything hurt and my mind was reeling. All night long, I'd tossed and turned, reliving a childhood nightmare until the sun came up. Plagued with images of a locked door and a little boy trapped behind it, I slowly sat up and wiped the sleep from my eyes.
"Morning."
Sketch's familiar voice filled my ears and I swung sideways to find him leaning against the windowsill, wearing nothing but a pair of boxer shorts. His hair was in complete disarray and I swear I'd never seen anything more beautiful.
"So, Pres is gone," he said, turning to face me and waving a piece of paper in front of him. "And the fucker took my truck."
My mouth fell open. "What?"
Looking pissed, Sketch glared down at the note in his hand and began to read. "Dear lovebirds – jokes. I've put a lot of thought into it and decided that I have to go back home. I think I know where the journal might be. It's a hunch, but one I can't ignore. I'll be a couple of days tops. Lay low and stay put – well, I guess that's a moot point considering I'm borrowing your truck. Don’t worry, buddy, I'll take good care of your wheels. P
lease try not to kill each other while I'm gone. I'm reluctantly fond of you both and need your pea brains to save my hide. Love Pres. PS– " Sketch rolled his eyes before muttering, "Condoms. Rose. Condoms."
I flushed bright pink and Sketch roughly cleared his throat.
"Why didn't he take us with him?" I asked, keeping my eyes on his face and not his perfectly defined chest and stomach. "
"It's Presley," Sketch grumbled, balling up the note and tossing it in the trash can. "Why does he do half the shit he does?"
"So, we're stuck here until he comes back?"
"Looks like it," he deadpanned.
Great. I swallowed deeply.
"Did you have a nightmare?" he asked then, catching me by surprise.
Shrugging, I laughed humorlessly. "My whole life is a living nightmare, Sketch."
"That's not what I meant." Leaning back, he folded his arms across his broad chest. "You were tossing around in your sleep."
"Was I?"
He nodded. "Is it the crying?" He looked me dead in the eyes. "Do you still hear it?"
"Do you?" I breathed, heart hammering furiously, as I mentally recanted the nightmares Sketch used to tell me about when we were kids. The ones where he was surrounded by wailing women. He used to sketch these really graphic drawings when he was little that were absolutely freaking terrifying, and I spent half my life trying not to think about them. His dreams always seemed so much worse than mine, but he was never affected by them. He never cowered under his bed or screamed at the top of his lungs like I had. No, even as a small child, he was brave and fearless. Meanwhile, I was a nervous wreck, seeking comfort from the boy next door because of the monsters in my subconscious.
Sketch stared at me for the longest moment before shaking his head. "No."
"Lucky you," I replied, staring down at my hands.
"It ain't real, Ro," I heard him say, reciting the same words he'd told me a thousand times. "You know that."
"Maybe," I mumbled, trailing off as my mind kept taking me back to that night, to that specific moment in time, to that memory. "Can I tell you something?"
"Always."
"Something else happened to me that night." I swallowed deeply before whispering, "Something I don’t understand."
Frowning, he unfolded his arms and pushed off the wall, coming to sit on the edge of my bed. "What kind of something?"
"Chris said –" My survival instincts fought hard to overpower my mouth, to keep me safe, but I poured the words out, needing to put it out there. Needing him to help me make sense of the crazy. Even though we had nothing resolved and I was simmering with resentment, I needed him right now. "Chris said that I already knew."
"Knew what?"
"Everything I needed to know. Everything that was in the journal," I squeezed out, panicking. "He said I knew but that I wasn't ready to remember." Sagging forward, I reached up and pushed my hands through my hair, ignoring the pain in my scalp when my fingers came up against knots. "He kept saying it over and over in the car that night… and then I started getting these terrible flashbacks." Blowing out a shaky breath, I tugged on my hair, shoulders stiffening. "Of the dreams I used to have when I was little." I flicked my eyes to his. "Dreams that felt incredibly real."
Reaching over, he peeled my hands from my hair. "The one with the locked door?" There was no reservation in his eyes now. He was completely invested in what I had to say. "And the crying?"
It warmed my heart that he remembered something as miniscule as my recurring childhood dream about the horrible sounds coming from the other side of a locked door. "Yes," I admitted, pushing down any feelings of warmth. "And I don’t know why, but my mind keeps going back to that door."
"Did you ever tell Chris about the dreams?" he asked quietly.
I shook my head. "You're the only person I've ever told."
He thought about that for a moment before asking, "Tell me again."
"But you already know."
"I know," he agreed. "Just humor me."
Confused, I did as he asked. "It always starts out the same," I began. "I'm really little and I wake up because I've wet the bed. It's the middle of the night and I'm thirsty. I'm so thirsty that my throat is raw. I can hear voices coming from the other side of my bedroom door. It's my mama. She's crying. She's screaming and wailing at my daddy. I can hear men shouting. And women – women who aren’t Mama, they're screaming. I throw back the covers and climb out of bed, but the moment my feet touch the floor, it starts moving. I'm swaying and trying to keep my balance in the darkness. And the moon? I can see it, big, bright, and full, but my window is a circle and I know I'm not in my actual bedroom." I expel a shaky breath before continuing, "But wherever I am still feels like home, if that makes sense? Like I know exactly where I'm going when I sneak into the hallway and start walking down this really long corridor. It's never-ending and the closer I get to the end, the further away I feel. Until I hear him."
"Him?"
"The little boy," I squeezed out, cringing at the horrible thought. "He's sobbing. He's crying so hard that I start running towards the sound. It's so dark and my bare feet are cold, my heart is beating at a hundred miles a minute, but I don’t stop until I reach the door at the end of the corridor. It's the biggest door I've ever seen in my life, with a big, brass door handle. When I reach up and turn the handle, it's locked."
Sketch paled, but continued to hang on to every word I said.
"He's right behind the door and I peek through the keyhole, but I can't see anything. I can't see, but I can hear him crying." I shuddered. "He's all alone and there's a crack under the door, small enough for a child to push their fingers through. I drop onto my hands and knees and reach under the door just as five tiny fingers brush against mine. I'm so freaked out that I start sobbing uncontrollably, and then the little boy whispers 'Are you –'"
"An angel," Sketch finished for me, still deathly pale.
"Yes." I nodded. "You remember me telling you?"
His frown deepened. "I guess?"
"Yeah, and I have no idea why I can't stop thinking about it," I said with a sigh. "It's like a broken record in my mind, playing over and over again."
"What happens after their hands touch?" he asked then, covering my hand with his almost subconsciously.
"Nothing," I replied, ignoring the electricity shooting through my body from the feel of his hands on mine. "I always wake up."
Sketch's brows furrowed and he shook his head, looking confused. "A boy," he said slowly, staring down at our joined hands. "You're sure it was a little boy behind the door?"
"Positive," I croaked out.
He stared at me, still looking confused.
"Sketch, what is it?"
He shook his head. "Um, it's probably nothing."
Anxiety gnawed at my gut. "Tell me."
"I have the same dream," he admitted, brows pinched together. "But it's slightly different." He grimaced before saying, "In my dream, there's no corridor. It's a room. And there's no little boy trapped on the other side of the door. It's a little girl."
Our eyes locked and several moments passed where neither one of us dared to breathe, let alone speak.
Sketch finally broke the tension. "Nah, it's bullshit." Shaking his head, he released my hand and rubbed his thigh. "Just a dream." He laughed then, shaking his head softly. "We terrorized each other so badly with that shit when we were kids, I'm not surprised we dreamed up the same damn crap.""
"You have the same one?" I squeezed out, heart racing. "You never told me that?"
"I never remembered," he replied, blue eyes flicking to mine. "Until now."
My breath hitched. "Sketch, do you think…"
"No." He shook his head, shutting me down. "Absolutely not."
"But that's more than just a coincidence, right?" I gaped at him, eyes wide. "Having the same dream? This isn't normal, right?"
"Fuck if I know." Standing up, he shrugged and moved for the bathroom. "I need to grab a shower."
"Yeah, okay." Flustered, I tucked my disheveled hair behind my ears and stared after him, still privately reeling.
"Oh, and Ro?" he said, standing in the adjoining bathroom doorway.
"Yeah, Sketch?"
"The floor wasn’t moving."
My eyes widened. "What?"
"In the dream," he replied quietly. "The floor wasn’t moving. We were on a boat."
Chapter Ten
Sketch
Quinton Presley didn’t need to worry about the apparent danger stalking us, because I was going to kill him myself. Slowly. Painfully. With my bare hands. "What the hell were you thinking?" I demanded when I finally got through to his cell later that night. All damn day, I'd been leaving messages on the tool's voicemail, waiting for him to call me back. "Leaving me here alone with her?" I growled, so damn mad I could taste it. "You fucked me, Pres," I told him, clenching the burner phone I'd snagged in Houston so hard my knuckles turned white. "You screwed me over real good, asshole."
He laughed down the line. "I heard a song on the radio earlier – reminded me of you two. It was one of Dylan Schneider's –"
"Presley!" I barked, tightening my hold on my cell. "I don’t give a damn about any songs. I need you to come back right now. I'm not fucking around here, dammit. You can't play me like this."
"How bad could one kiss hurt."
"Excuse me?" I spluttered.
"That's the name of the song on the radio that reminded me of you," he explained, still chuckling. "It's kinda fitting, huh?"
"Shut up and come back," I ordered, ignoring his jibe. "I don’t care where you are. Turn the damn truck around and get back here."
"No can do, buddy," he said breezily. "I'm in our hometown as we speak. I'll be back in a day or two so just hang tight and try not to lose your shit."
"Goddammit, Pres," I bit out, pressing my forehead against the exterior wall of the motel. Romi was asleep now, back in a room I wasn’t sure was safe for me to enter. I couldn’t handle my feelings for her. Not a damn thing had been resolved and I felt like I was going to explode if he didn’t get his ass back and fast. "What am I supposed to do with her?"
