by Lexi Ryan
The butterflies recover from their swoon to flutter wildly. “Oh, yeah.”
Slowly, he leans over me and sweeps his lips against mine. Once, then twice. I’ve been kissed before, but Brogan’s kiss is different. Most boys kiss like they’re trying to rush to the next event. The kiss is nothing more than an irritating prerequisite to the activities they’re truly interested in. Brogan’s kisses are an effort to slow down time, to memorize the shape and taste of my lips. Under his mouth, I’m not some townie crashing the college kids’ party. I’m something to be cherished.
He doesn’t climb on top of me or try to snake his hand up my shirt. And when I part my lips, he only briefly touches his tongue to mine before pulling away and drawing in a ragged breath. “I’d love to hear you sing sometime,” he says, and I blink at him for a minute before my eyes can focus on his blue ones. “Would you mind?”
“I think I’d like that.”
Grinning, he finds my hand and laces our fingers together. “It’s a date.”
Part III: After
May, four months after the accident
Mia
Mrs. Barrett meets me at the door and wraps me into her arms before I have a chance to say hello. She’s a large woman—as tall and as broad as her son, and her hugs bring my face right into her bosom. “Have you been praying for a miracle, Mia?”
“Every day,” I whisper. “Every single day.”
When she pulls back, her eyes are filled with tears, but a hopeful smile covers her face. “He’s having a good day today,” she says, leading me to the back of the house. “You know how much he loves sunny days.”
“Spring is his favorite.”
The click of her heels against the dull hardwood floors echoes off the ceiling. Mrs. Barrett and I don’t talk about the past. We don’t talk about the fact that before the accident, she wouldn’t acknowledge me as Brogan’s girlfriend—that she objected to his dating someone she deemed so beneath him, and regularly thwarted his attempts to be with me. We don’t talk about the nasty things she once said to me.
We’re bonded by this tragedy and our love of Brogan. If she blames me for being there that night, she’s never said so. And if she doesn’t blame me . . . well, I’m sure she’d be the only one.
She opens the doors to the three-season room and motions me toward the big, sunny space where Brogan sits during the day. He’s strapped into his wheelchair, eyes at half-mast, mouth hanging open.
“I’ll be in the kitchen if you need me,” she says, before leaving and pulling the doors closed behind her.
I walk over to him and touch his face. It’s swollen from the edema, distorting the features I once loved so much. His body is gaunt after months of muscle atrophy have eaten away at the solid mass of a man he once was.
“Good morning, handsome.” I press a kiss to his cheek before picking up his hand and holding it in both of mine. “I saw Arrow this morning.” Hanging my head, I squeeze my eyes shut, remembering my argument with Brogan on New Year’s Eve, the betrayal in his eyes. “You think I don’t see the way you look at him?” But even as angry as he was with his best friend, I know Brogan wouldn’t want to see Arrow destroy his life. He’d want better for him. “It’s good. His house arrest will keep him out of trouble. It’ll help him get his head on straight.”
Swallowing hard, I lift my hand to Brogan’s jaw. “I think we’re all screwed up. And I know we all miss you.” My eyes burn with unexpected tears. Seeing Brogan doesn’t normally make me cry, but now that Arrow’s back, I feel like someone who’s never known she was blind and was suddenly given sight. Seeing Arrow makes the world too bright and loud and painful. All I want is for the dark numbness to return. It’s easier that way.
I sit with Brogan for almost an hour, holding his hand and thinking, avoiding my return to Blackhawk Valley. When I can’t put it off anymore, I go to the kitchen to find Mrs. Barrett.
She wipes down her already-clean counter. The house is modest, but always spotless. After the accident, the Barretts sold their house and moved to Indianapolis to be closer to his doctors. Caring for Brogan in the home like they do has exhausted their savings, and I’m sure they’re racking up more debt by the day, but the Barretts never complain about money.
“Have you remembered anything else about that night?” she asks.
I shake my head. “I’m sorry.”
“The police are sick of hearing my voice.” She releases a humorless laugh. “I keep calling to see if they have any new leads, but I don’t think they’re even working on the case anymore.” She settles her hand over mine. It’s cold and clammy. “Don’t you want to know who killed your brother?”
I did, once. Now all I want is for Brogan to wake up. The doctors tell us not to hold out hope for that, but it’s happened before. I’ve read books about men who’ve woken from PVS—medical speak for persistent vegetative state—and could recite everything that was said to them during their days trapped inside their own minds.
I would go the rest of my life without having answers about that night if I could have a miracle for Brogan.
But I don’t say that. I open my mouth and force air into my reluctant lungs. If I’ve learned anything in the last three and a half months, it’s that sometimes the best and only thing I can do is to take the next breath.
“I wish the police would do more,” she says.
“Me too.” The police chalked the hit-and-run up to “gang violence” quickly. They had nothing to go on, and everyone was satisfied with the answer but the Barretts and me. I told the police all I could, but they didn’t have much to form any sort of investigation if they’d even cared to—and they didn’t. It was dark. A big, dark-colored SUV came speeding up over the hill and killed my brother and destroyed the better part of Brogan’s brain.
Mrs. Barrett wants answers. The only ones I have she wouldn’t want to hear. His drunken pleas. His anger. His refusal to let me out of his car until I promised not to leave him. The bruises he left on my arm because I tried to leave anyway. Then Nicholas’s fists when he came to rescue me. A grieving mother shouldn’t have to know any of that. “I’m sorry,” I whisper.
Her cold hand squeezes mine. “It’s not your fault.”
If only that were true.
Arrow
“We saw Brogan yesterday,” Chris says, eyeing me as I put the burgers on the grill. Dad invited the team over to celebrate the end of finals week, so now it’s my job to entertain them and pretend everything’s normal.
“How’s he doing?” I have to force the question out and pretend it doesn’t hurt like a bitch.
Chris shrugs. “Not good.”
“He doesn't even look like himself anymore,” Keegan says. “He’s skinny and pale and he just sits there with his mouth hanging open and . . . What?” he asks when everyone turns to stare at him.
“A little delicacy?” Mason suggests.
Keegan lifts his palms. “What? It is what it is. No one here really thinks he’s coming back from this. Am I wrong? Except maybe Mia, but she’s inside.”
“You’re such an asshole,” Mason mutters.
Chris takes a breath, and we exchange a look. Chris comes to stand at the grill by me. “Ignore K,” he says, so only I can hear.
I swallow hard. “He’s not saying anything I didn’t know, right?”
Chris nods and shoves his hands into his pockets. “I still hate hearing it. Brogan was one of the good ones.”
“The best,” I say, and my voice cracks on the word best as if I’m going through puberty all over again. Fuck these regrets. If I could take back the things I said to him that night—if I could change everything . . .
“Don’t do that,” Chris says.
“What?”
“Don’t paint him as a saint because of what happened. We all love him and what happened sucks, but don’t beat yourself up for fighting with him that night. He cheated on Mia. He wasn’t a saint.” Chris’s jaw is hard, and I get the impression he’s been waiting aw
hile to have a chance to say that.
“My shrink wants me to visit,” I admit. “I’m stuck in this fucking house all the time, but she got my probation officer to agree to let me go see Brogan.”
“That’s great,” Chris says.
“I don’t think I’m going to. I saw him in the hospital and visited a few times before the Barretts moved to Indy. The doc thinks I’m more likely to start using again if I don’t resolve shit between me and Brogan.” Grunting, I shake my head. “As if we can have a conversation or something.”
“Mia thinks he knows what’s going on around him, and from what I’ve read about PVS, I’m not sure, but . . .” He takes the spatula from my hand and flips the burgers before I burn them completely. “It’s for you as much as him. You need to say your piece.”
I lift a shoulder. “We’ll see.”
“His mom says hi,” Chris says. He tilts his head. “She told me to tell you thank you, said you’d know why. Keegan overheard and made jokes all the way home that you probably tapped her. But I’m guessing you talked your dad into helping with some of Brogan’s medical expenses after all. That was cool, man.”
“It’s just money. It’s no big deal.”
Chris grunts. “Yeah, maybe, but we all know how your dad is. I’m sure it wasn’t easy talking him into that. What’s he getting out of it?”
Shrugging, I adjust the flames on the grill. My dad’s such a penny pincher, he wouldn’t help another family with their medical bills even if he’d get the Nobel Peace Prize for it. All I did was convince my father to let me tap into my inheritance. The Barretts assumed I got the money from Dad, and I let them. My father thinks I sold him my soul to get that money early, but the joke’s on him. It’s not mine to sell.
“There’s Mia,” Chris says, and I snap my head up, thinking she’s joined us on the patio. Instead, he looks toward the kitchen windows where Mia’s standing with her head bowed, probably doing dishes. “I’m worried about her.”
“Me too.” I’ve been home almost a month, and she walks around like a robot. Katie’s the only one who gets her rare smiles, and as far as I can tell she only leaves the house to see Brogan and check on her dad. She’s not living. She’s surviving.
“Bailey said she never goes out anymore, and she’s not herself. I’m sure all this hasn’t been easy on her, but since you two both live here, she thought you might know more.” He studies me, and the questions in his eyes are more complicated than the ones coming out of his mouth. “You think she’s okay?”
“I don’t know,” I say, but the truth is, I don’t think she’s okay at all. And it’s eating at me every day.
“I wish she’d join us. Want me to go talk to her?”
I hand him the platter for the burgers and shake my head. “No. I’ve got this. You feed the savages; I’ll talk to Mia.”
“Good.”
The inside of the house is like a different world. Cold to the hot, quiet to the loud. With the boys here, everything turns chaotic and messy out back, but in here everything is white and sterile. The inside of a tomb.
Mia’s sitting at the kitchen table with a book, the wine glasses she just washed air-drying in the dish drain. She’s in a short pink sundress that hides her curves but shows all that caramel skin of her long legs, and her bare feet are propped up on the chair beside her.
“Hey,” I say softly, but she still jumps and looks up at me with wide eyes.
She puts her book down. “Do you guys need something? I didn’t want to be in the way.”
“We need you to come outside.”
“To cook the food or—”
“To be with your friends.”
“No thanks,” she says, picking her book back up.
“Mia, Katie’s not even here right now. You can take an hour off to talk to other people your age.”
“No,” she says without looking up.
I tear the book from her hands and want to rip it in half when I realize what it is. I Can Hear You: One Man Wakes From PVS and Shocks the World. “What is this shit?”
“It’s called a book.” She avoids my gaze and reaches to retrieve it.
I hold it out of her reach and skim the description on the back cover before turning back to her. “Is this what you’re waiting for? You’re just going to put your life on hold and wait in case he snaps out of it one day? Haven’t they told you how it works?” I shake the book. “This isn’t what happens. This was a fluke. Brogan isn’t coming back.”
She keeps her gaze cast on the floor, and even though I know I’m right, I wish she’d argue with me, scream at me for giving up on him, or yell at me for not believing in miracles. Something. Anything to prove to me that she isn’t phoning in her life.
“You want this book back?” I ask, tucking it into the back of my pants.
“Yes, please.”
“It’s yours. All you have to do is stop ignoring the rest of the world and come outside.”
She springs from the chair, eyes wide, hands on hips. “You don’t own me, Arrow Woodison.”
I almost fucking smile. It feels so good to get a rise out of her, to see the anger flicker in her eyes and tinge her cheeks pink. “I never said I did.”
“Then leave me alone.”
“I’d be happy to if you ever did anything but work and study.”
“It’s none of your business how I live my life.”
I step forward, stalking toward her, but with each step I take, she takes one in reverse. “I don’t care how you live your life. I only want you to live it, not hide from it.”
Her back hits the wall and she lifts her eyes to mine, her mouth set in a stubborn line. “I’m not hiding from anything.”
I take a final step, and her breasts brush my chest. Any closer, and her whole body would be pressed into mine. My mouth goes dry, and my nerve endings seem stretched to their limits as they ache for contact that isn’t quite there. “You are. You’re hiding from everything. From everyone. Brogan’s gone, and you want him back. I get that. But you’re here. Live your life, Mia.” My voice trembles slightly on the words. Does she notice? Does she care?
“What life?” she whispers.
I want to kiss her, suck her bottom lip into my mouth and bite down until she feels the pain and pleasure of being flesh and blood. I want to take her upstairs and strip her, put my mouth to her most sensitive bits of flesh until she screams with life. “You didn’t die that night.”
She swallows. “No. Death would have been easier.”
Mia
This time when the banging against my wall wakes me in the middle of the night, I know what it is.
I sit in the darkness for as long as I can stand it, but I can't just listen to his torment and do nothing, so I climb out of bed, grab the baby monitor, and pad softly into his room.
I don't know what I think I'm doing. Chances are, waking him up isn’t going to go any better than it did last time. I slowly shut his door behind me and set the monitor on his dresser before walking over to his bed.
The curtains are parted, and a sliver of moonlight cuts across his face. His brow is damp, glistening with sweat, and his jaw is tight.
“Mia,” he says. Or at least I think that’s what he said. His head thrashes side to side, and my stomach tightens.
I sit on the edge of the bed and skim my fingers over his forearm. “Arrow, wake up.” My words are too soft, I know, but I’m afraid I might startle him and make the nightmare worse. I speak a little louder this time. “I’m here. It’s okay.”
He moans softly, and some of the tension leaves his shoulders as his head stops thrashing and lolls to one side. With each inhale his breathing grows steadier, and his face relaxes until I feel like the nightmare has passed and I can leave.
Removing my hand from his forearm, I stand.
“Mia,” he murmurs. This time his eyes flutter softly. “Don’t leave.” He reaches out and his fingertips brush mine before dropping back to the bed.
I don't know
if he’s awake at all or if he’ll remember this in the morning, but I can’t resist the pleas of a defenseless Arrow, so I lower back down to the edge of the bed.
“Thank you,” he says. When he wraps his arm around my waist and guides me into bed with him, I don’t resist. My heart practically trembles with every beat, and tears surge into my throat at the feel of his warm chest against my back and his arm around my waist. But when I give myself permission to let him hold me, to stay and close my eyes, I find sleep is closer than it’s been in months.
Arrow
What am I supposed to do?
Mia is in my bed and in my arms, and I have no idea what the fuck I’m supposed to do about it.
Vague flashes from last night come back to me. The nightmare. Mia’s soft voice. I’d taken a damn sleeping pill and thought I’d dreamed her. Why else would she have come so willingly into my arms?
But here she is, and this is definitely not a dream. This is me with a fucking hard-on holding the girl I can never have.
I prop myself up on an elbow and look down at her. Her face is cast in shadows, and I wish there were more light so I could make out all her features, so I could memorize the shape of her lips and the flush of her cheeks as she sleeps.
It’s a dark, clear-sky night. The kind of night when I like to go out behind the barn and away from the lights of the main house and stare up into the stars until I forget I have a body. Until I dissolve and am nothing but this emptiness floating in the infinite space between here and forever.
But with Mia in my arms, I don’t want to become nothingness. I want to be here, to relish the feel of skin touching skin, to hear her moan and see the flash in her eyes before she gives over to the pleasure and comes apart.
Not trusting myself, I remove my hand from her stomach and back away as much as I can without shifting the mattress. It would be so easy to touch her right now. In my bed. In the darkness. I don’t need light to memorize her. I’d use my tongue to trace the shape of her lips, my open mouth to explore the curve of her hip.
