The Twenty-One (Emerald Cove #2)

by Lauren K. McKellar

  I press my lips to his cheek and taste the salt there. “Hey,” I whisper. My hands find either side of his face and I look him in the eyes, so close to my own. “You don’t know that that’s a fact. I’m sure there are things we can do, like ... like a natural diet. Have you tried a natural—“

  “I know, okay?” Joel’s gaze is fiery. I flinch, and drop my hands. “I’m okay with it. I just ... I’ve led a good life. A great life.” He pauses and turns to me. “I just didn’t count on meeting you again. Things with Vanessa were casual. Safe. With you ...” He shakes his head. “I didn’t count on falling so far.”

  I wrap my arms around his neck and bury my face there, just breathing him in. Hoping I can breathe him in for much longer than just the next few months.

  Joel takes my shoulders and pulls me back to look me in the eyes. “And if you need to leave ...”

  Staying isn’t safe. It’s the biggest risk I’ve ever taken. It’s indoor sky-diving, hot-lap racing, drinking too much and falling too fast all at once.

  “I’m not going anywhere.”

  Loving Joel Henley hurts.

  But it’s totally worth the ride.

  ***

  Work drags. I started at six a.m. and spent the entire day thinking about getting home, preparing for Mum’s next event, then hopefully seeing Joel afterwards.

  “You’re in a good mood, then,” Colin says, as I line up the empty picnic baskets in his office in record speed.

  “Just trying to get out of here on time.” I give a wan smile.

  Colin places his hand on my shoulder and steps close to me. Too close. I stiffen and move back, but he tightens his grip. “Have an early mark, Ellie.”

  His words are nice, but his body language is oh-so wrong.

  I frown and slowly step backward. “Thanks.”

  “You’re not being funny about the other week still, are you?” Colin shakes his head. “I thought we’d gotten past it.”

  “I just ... I have to go.” I turn on my heel and leave. I have to quit. I have to find another job and leave this one behind.

  As I walk to the car, thoughts of work fill my mind. Maybe I can actually do what Joel said. Maybe it’s time I pushed myself, applied for university, and—

  I’m just about to open the door when a lone figure jogs toward me from the still running motorcycle that’s now parked alongside the lot. “Wait!” Zy calls.

  “What?”

  He crosses the lot and stops in front of me, his chest heaving, big puffs of mist clouding his face. “It’s Dani.”

  Tilting my head, I study the overcast sky. “What now?”

  “She didn’t come home last night.” Zy shoves his hands in his jean pockets. “Do you ... know where she is?”

  “Shit,” I mutter. The pounding in my head that seems to be a regular occurrence when my sister’s name is mentioned starts up again. “No idea.”

  “I tried calling, but you didn’t pick up.”

  I shake my head. “My phone’s on silent. Why are you only telling me now? Why did you wait?”

  Zy shoves his hands in his pockets and looks sheepishly at the ground. “I ... I only got home this morning myself.”

  Cold air rushes through my lungs.

  Dani is gone. I just hope it’s not too late.

  “We have to go look for her.”

  Zy nods. “I’ll check Sandy Cove.”

  “I got EC.” I throw my body into the car, turn the key and start the engine. I grab my phone from where it’s sitting in the centre console and clear Zy’s missed calls, then hit dial, plugging my headphones into my ears. “Call Dani,” I instruct Siri, and soon the ringing starts.

  And then, after a while, it stops.

  So does my heart.

  “Redial.”

  My fingers clench and unclench the wheel. My knuckles are bone white.

  Minutes speed by, and I watch as the clock ticks over, but still my sister doesn’t answer or call me back. My stomach does a funny twisty thing and I wonder not for the first time why I ever let her leave the house without me. Why I somehow thought having her and Zy move in across the road from Hope and I would keep her safe.

  I race out of the parking lot, then head onto the freeway. Silence eats the space in the car. It’s the white noise of fear. Because what if it’s happened again? What if I haven’t managed to keep her safe?

  Half an hour later, I take the exit to Emerald Cove, and my head aches with a pain so severe, so intense it’s hard to see. Black dots crowd my vision and I shake them away.

  “Come on, come on,” I whisper. My knuckles grip so tight on the wheel, they’re white.

  Reaching the beach takes a total of fifty-eight minutes. Ten steps from my car. Four typed out, not-sent text messages to my mother where I go to tell her that Dani is missing, then take it all back. One lonely metal bench overlooking the ocean, freezing my legs through my thin denim.

  She finally answers the phone on the tenth ring, her voice sleepy. “Yeah?”

  “Dani, thank God,” I rush, biting on my lip. “Where are you?”

  Pause.

  “I ... I don’t know.”

  I press my eyes shut and inhale, the salty ocean air filling my lungs. When I open my eyes, everything is the same. Stormy skies, fierce ocean, and me.

  “Do you need me to come and get you?”

  More silence fills the line, so thick it could choke. Then, after what feels like hours tick past, I hear one tiny, muffled word.

  “Yes.”

  It’s all it takes. It’s all it’s ever taken.

  “Look at your phone map and text me your address, babe. I’ll come now.”

  A hiccough that could be a sob comes through the line, and my heart breaks. It really does. Because watching her float away like this is so damn hard.

  I hang up the phone and wait for it to vibrate with her location. Two minutes later, a text comes through, and I walk back to the car, phone in hand. Instead of feeling relief that she’s found, tension lines the muscles in my back. Finding her is half the battle.

  I text Zy and tell him things are under control, then I drive to the address Dani gave me as fast as I can. Where normally I’m safe, with her I take risks. She needs me too damn much.

  Fifteen minutes later, I pull up out the front of an old rundown house. Tiles are missing from the roof, and couches line the veranda, battered and stained beyond salvation. Danica Mayfield sits on the concrete front step, her knees huddled to her chest, her long, blonde hair straggling around her shoulders.

  She shakes.

  I’ve never seen someone look so broken in my entire life.

  I open the car door and her head snaps up, as if she didn’t hear me pull over. She pushes to her feet, meeting me halfway across the too long lawn, and when I open my arms she falls into my embrace, her tiny shoulders shaking as she sobs.

  “Hey.” I rub my hand soothingly on her back. “I’m here. I’ve got you.”

  We stand there and she cries, full body sobs. I sometimes worry she might break. She’s so fragile. So damn small.

  “You her ma or some’n’?”

  My gaze shoots to the balcony. A guy stands there, shirtless, arms folded across a pale, weedy chest. A cigarette dangles from his lips, and demons haunt his face, the ghosts of hallucinations past.

  “Well?” He prompts. Attitude curls from his mouth with the cigarette smoke.

  “Or something.” I shift so my arm is around Dani’s shoulders and shepherd her to the car. She doesn’t look back—doesn’t make eye contact with the guy once, despite the holes I feel he’s burning into our backs.

  I open the door and she collapses into the seat, an unset Jell-O of the girl she once was. My hand is on the handle to the driver’s side when he calls once again.

  “She’ll be back.”

  It’s not a question. He turns and strolls back into the house, flicking the cigarette to the concrete porch beneath him as he walks.

  My stomach sinks.
/>   Those three words are the threat I fear the most.

  ***

  With every kilometre we drive from the house, tension tightens in my stomach. My hands grip the steering wheel, nails digging into my palms on the other side.

  “We need to talk about this.” I force the words. They’re from a script I’ve performed before. It’s one my sister hates.

  “I don’t want to.” Her tiny voice answers me.

  I slam my hand against the steering wheel. The plastic smarts my palm, and I give a small shake of my wrist as if I can jiggle the pain off. As if life works like that.

  “Relax,” Dani says, but her voice is so quiet that I have to strain to hear it above the chug of the old car.

  “Relax?” I spit, shaking my head. “I just picked you up and you were crying, Dani. Crying. Less than a week ago you were in hospital because of a fucking overdose. What are you doing?”

  A sob hiccoughs from her chest. “I’m so sorry, Ellie. Thank God you’re here.”

  “Now,” I mutter, shooting her a dark glance.

  “Always.” Dani leans across the console and places a hand on my knee, giving it a squeeze. “I know you’ve got my back, Eleanor. And I’m so grateful for that.”

  The words are a reminder to me. Look after your mother and sister.

  "No more drugs. No more drinking. No more—”

  “I got it. No more.” Dani’s voice is shrill. “I won’t do it again.”

  I have no doubt she means that. Until she doesn’t.

  “You just ... you can’t just go off-grid. You need to stay in touch. Let us know what’s going on.” I glance over, but she’s staring out the window. I stop at our street, waiting for a break in traffic to turn up the road. “Even Zy was worried.”

  “Ha!” Dani snorts. “When isn’t Zy worried?”

  “Are you kidding me?” I raise my eyebrows. “Zy is supposed to be a bad arse. He’s not supposed to do things like worry. He’s supposed to be the reason we worry about you in the first place.”

  The traffic clears, and I swing the car right and up the steep incline that opens our street. At the speed of a turtle wading through quicksand, we crunch into the gravel drive of the house I share with Hope. Zy sits on our front stoop, his hands resting over his knees. He stares at the ground, as if it somehow holds the answers to every question he’s ever wanted answered. When he looks up, relief is painted clear across his face.

  Before the car completely stops its roll, Dani opens the door and runs up the drive. I pull up the hand brake, and even over the grating noise I hear one last sob as she wraps her arms around Zy’s neck, her golden hair flying out behind her.

  They speak in soft murmurs, and I deliberately tune them out. Instead, I unclick my own seatbelt and get out of the car, opening the boot to the three baskets waiting for me to take them inside. A quick check of my watch and it’s after two—I’m going to have to hurry if I want to shower before Mum’s event tonight.

  I grab the baskets and walk toward Zy and Dani, still locked in an embrace, staring at each other. He wipes a tear from her cheek, and she buries her face in his neck.

  “She was at some kind of drug house, Zy.”

  He pulls back and looks at me then to Dani, concern shining from his eyes. “What?”

  “It was an accident. I’m so sorry.” Dani huddles into him, her shoulders shaking. “Please don’t hate me. Please ...”

  I walk closer and place the two baskets on the ground. “I’ve looked up a few rehab centres. Maybe we can—”

  “No!” Dani jerks back. Her eyes dart from left to right, a wild animal cornered. “I won’t. I’m already seeing the doctor this week as a follow-up from hospital. Please just ... give me one more chance.”

  “We’ve given you last chances before, Dani.” My tone softens when I speak. “It’s getting harder and harder to believe.”

  She pauses, licking her lips. Her eyes flit to the picnic baskets before us. “Remember when you said you thought Colin hit on you, and me and Mum didn’t believe you?”

  “What?” Zy eyes me.

  I nod. “Yes?”

  “Whoa, whoa. Let’s talk about—”

  “I have it under control, Zy.” Then, to Dani, “Go on.”

  “Remember how that felt? To not have people believe you?”

  I narrow my eyes. “Go on.”

  “I’m saying I’m going to do this. Believe me. I just need one more chance.”

  I walk up the step to the veranda and fiddle with my keys. With one hand on the door, I look over my shoulder. “Dani?”

  “Hmm?” she asks, a smile twinkling in her eyes.

  “Please. Please, just ... just make it the truth this time.”

  I open the door and push inside, yelling out a hello to Hope. I go to plug my phone in to charge, but it rings before I even pull it out of my pocket.

  I glance at the screen, seeing Joel’s number, and warmth floods me. My Joel. The one thing going right in this world. The man I love.

  I swipe right to answer. “Hey, lover.”

  Heavy breathing bursts down the line.

  Straight away, I know. My heart switches to double time. My pulses thuds urgently in my neck.

  “It’s Fiona,” she says, a croak in her voice. “Joel’s been taken to hospital.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  My feet thud through the corridors of the hospital. The sound echoes along the halls, rubber against lino, a racing thunk in time with the beat of my heart.

  Some things in life are ingrained in you. An innate knowledge of right and wrong. A sense of communication, and expressing how you feel.

  The way to the oncology department is ingrained in me.

  After all, I came here every second day for one whole year.

  As if blindfolded, I run. Tears gloss over my eyes and blur the filthy looks nurses give me as I tear through the department, past the different desks and surgeons as fast as my legs will carry me.

  When I finally reach the wing, I slow. My breath aches in my chest, blood pumping through my body as a result of the race I just lost.

  You can sprint all you like; sickness beats you in the end.

  I round the corner and shudder to a stop. The room is right in front of me, the letters written to the side of the door in big block figures. 318.

  With one hand to my heart, I try to slow my breathing. I swipe at my eyes, pressing away the tears. This is a weakness I can’t afford to show him. I have to be strong.

  “You got this,” I whisper to myself, then walk into the room.

  It doesn’t feel like a normal room in a hospital. Then again, it has Joel in it. Was I ever expecting anything less?

  Fiona, Kohl and Marc sit squashed into two chairs. They have a deck of cards out and are playing some kind of poker, from what I can tell. Joel’s dad, Henry, stands to one side, talking on his cell phone. His eyes are the first to make contact with mine, and he gives me a small sad smile. It says he’s sorry I know and he’s glad I’m here all at once.

  None of them hold my focus, though. My focus is on the boy lying in the hospital bed.

  Seeing him here develops a film of memories in my mind. The clinical sound of machinery. The deathly white of the hospital sheets. The way a body that you know is so big can appear so small when confined to a thin mattress on wheels.

  His eyes both lighten and dim when they see me, and when he finally does speak, the smile I know and love—and I do love it—isn’t there. “Hey.”

  One word.

  It stills the laughter coming from his friends’ table. Even his father pauses mid-sentence.

  All eyes are on me as I walk into the room, my hands shoved into my pockets. “Hi.”

  “I think I’ll go get a drink. You guys coming?” Fiona places her cards face-down on the table.

  “I’m not really thirs—” Fiona hits Marc over the top of the head, cutting him off. “Sorry, got it.”

  “You guys don’t have to ...” I trail off as
they depart the room. Even Joel’s dad leaves, and soon it’s just Joel, me, and the machines pumping fluid and God knows what into his body.

  “So ... about that whole twelve months thing ...” I try and make a joke, but a sharp pain stabs me in the stomach and a sob catches in my throat.

  Joel presses his eyes shut, as if it’s too much for him to watch, then sucks in a deep breath, his chest rising and falling under those stark white sheets. “Predicted twelve months.” His voice is hard, cold. I know right then and there that this isn’t the Joel I made love to at the lake. This Joel is an entirely different beast all together. “But sometimes, shit happens.”

  I reach out and take his hand, stroking my thumb over the top of it, but he doesn’t make any effort to engage with me. His hand is a dead weight in my own.

  “I know it sounds stupid, but there’s still hope. And I hear there are new tests being done in—”

  “Stop!”

  I flinch and jerk my hand away, as if his word struck me across the face.

  Remorse lines his features and he purses his lips, then shakes his head. “I know you’re only trying to help. But I’ve had treatment before, Ellie. This is ... this is it for me.”

  The tears that have been lurking behind my eyes all day break loose. I sniff to try and hold them back but still those suckers break free, running down my cheeks. All thoughts of being strong for Joel fly right out of my head as the grim reality of the situation kicks in. Something’s eating him alive, whittling away at the mechanics of his brain. Day by day, minute by minute it’s sucking at the marrow of his soul until his very life force runs dry.

  He’s not going to fight this.

  I think of the list, of the twenty-one things, and I know.

  He was never going to fight this.

  He’s fought it before.

  Cancer won.

  A sheen mists over Joel’s eyes, and somehow that’s so much worse than crying myself. He’s supposed to be the strong one. He should be happy.