“Quit swinging your head around. It makes the light spaz,” Jaycee said. “And I’m not going to girl talk with you about Mik. Oh, and thanks for eating pancakes with my dad. He went on and on about how nice it was to see you.”
“I like your dad.” Natalie looked down, illuminating an old fire pit that they’d almost walked through. “Where was your mom this morning? I saw her at graduation. She looks…different.”
“She looks crazy,” Jaycee spat. “Because she is. She lives at Stanwood Behavioral Hospital for most of the year. Addicted to happy pills and crying about Jake.”
“Jesus, Jayce!”
“You asked.” Jaycee sighed. “It’s actually a lot easier when she’s not around. For her. For us. It is what it is. You know she was never the soundest boat in the marina to begin with.” Jaycee’s snark was rolling downhill fast. “Speaking of crazy, how’d you get Zach back?”
“It’s more like we never broke up than that we made up.” Natalie felt a feverish flash of what had happened in that frat boy’s bedroom. “Zach is better than I deserve.”
“I don’t know about that,” Jaycee said. “You seem made for each other in a weird, ‘it’s a small world’ kind of way.”
“If you knew what I…” Natalie was desperate to talk to someone, but Jaycee? Jaycee would not hold back her judgment. She would definitely not make Natalie feel better about what had happened or almost happened. That was the worst part. Natalie couldn’t actually remember how far she’d gone in that bedroom, but outside of asking the guy in question, what could she do? Ask Mik?
Could she ask Mik? What had he seen when he busted into that room?
No. She didn’t want to know. She didn’t.
“Knew what, Natalie?” Jaycee’s tone implied that she already suspected Natalie was hiding something ugly. “What did you do last night? Or perhaps more importantly, who did you do?” Her voice dropped. “Was it something you wanted or…”
Natalie’s emotions flared. “Look. You’re innocent, so I’ll break it down for you. There are not two types of sex in this world. It’s not all black and white. It’s not all perfect or a crime. There’s another kind. And it’s gray and miserable and right in the middle.”
Jaycee snorted. “And those hookups are called…what exactly?”
“Mistakes,” Natalie said affirmatively, exactly like she’d been telling herself all day. If Natalie had in fact slept with that guy, it was a mistake. Mistakes were part of the human experience. Natalie remembered ever-so-damn-clearly how much she’d gone after him. Singled him out. That was before she’d gotten drunk, but she still couldn’t remember why she’d done it.
God, why?
Natalie’s chest went tight, her head spinning. Jaycee backed up instinctively.
“You’re having a panic attack,” Jaycee said, taking Natalie’s bag off her back. “Breathe.”
“I’m trying!” Natalie pressed her face against the brick of the tunnel and bit back a sob.
Jaycee grabbed the water bottle and squirted it down the back of Natalie’s neck. The coolness hit her like a slap, and she inhaled in a rush.
Natalie came out of the attack feeling old. “I suppose I should thank you for that.” She took the bottle and drank most of it. “Don’t say anything. I don’t want Zach to know.”
“About the panic attack or the guy you boinked?”
“Both!” Natalie cried out so loud that the tunnel bounced her desperate voice back at her.
“I’m trying to get you to relax,” Jaycee said. “You’re worrying me. A lot.”
Natalie sat down with her back to the brick and flicked her headlamp off. The instant dark helped despite the tunnel’s creepiness. “Do you remember when we used to talk to our shadow selves, Jayce? When we’d turn the lights off and whisper to the dim reflections in the mirror?”
“Yes.”
“That’s how I see myself. All the lights are off. I’m not always sure I’m there.”
“Sometimes I feel that way,” Jaycee said, her voice dead serious. “Maybe you should shed some light on things.” She switched on Natalie’s headlamp. “The truth always helps me. I throw open the curtains and look in the mirror and say, ‘Jake’s dead.’”
Natalie somehow managed not to point out that that seemed to be the very root of Jaycee’s problem, not the solution. She shuffled to her feet, tucked her water bottle back into its assigned pocket, and tried not to growl. “Thanks anyway.”
Jaycee was quiet as they walked toward the far side of the tunnel. “Do you really not let Zach know when you’re having a panic attack?”
“It’s none of his business.”
“Your mental state is none of your boyfriend’s business? Isn’t that a bit weird?” Natalie flashed a look at Jaycee that appropriately blinded the girl with the headlamp, but then after a minute, Jaycee added, “Hey, Nat, I’ve got a question for you.”
“What?”
“Why are you still wearing my shirt?”
Natalie gave a small, surprised laugh. “We’re hiking. I wanted to wear something comfortable and old.” Natalie looked down, the beam highlighting the ripped holes in the knees of her jeans. Despite the look, they were brand-new—from her purposefully laid-back wardrobe she’d been compiling for Cornell.
“Oh, right.” Jaycee was smiling again, her teeth extra white in the dark. “This is a perfect place to wear old stuff.”
Natalie turned to greet the boys, and Jaycee snapped a tag off Natalie’s back pocket. Natalie flashed her a warning look, but Jaycee just laughed, her voice echoing through the tunnel.
“What’s happening here? Were you guys kissing?” Zach asked. “Please tell me you were kissing.” Bishop punched his shoulder. “Well, it’s not out of the question. Right, Natalie? Remember what you told me about when you guys were kids and you wanted to practice—”
Natalie punched his other shoulder. Jaycee laughed harder. It made her look even more beautiful, and it was a rare glimpse at the girl Natalie remembered from childhood. All the boys noticed. Especially Mik. He smiled and glanced away. Yep, Mik was totally in love with Jaycee. Natalie would have to do some serious work to get them together. No doubt Jaycee would be against the idea like a brick wall, but Natalie knew all her tricks. Maybe this was how she’d win Jaycee’s forgiveness…
Natalie launched into the campaign. “Where do you go to school? What do you study?” There was a static pause while everyone realized that she was talking to Mik. “Do you still live in Athens?”
“He doesn’t talk,” Bishop pointed out.
“Selective mute. That means he talks sometimes. I’m simply giving him the opportunity, should he be interested.”
Jaycee moved between Natalie and Mik. “She’s harmless,” she told Mik, glaring Natalie’s way. “Most of the time.”
Natalie felt Zach’s hand on her lower back, and she left the rest alone. At least she’d gotten Jaycee to stand closer to Mik. Better than nothing.
Jaycee opened the Mead journal she’d been carrying and tried to use her cell phone to read the pages. “Can I borrow that headlamp?” she asked after a moment.
“You mean the headlamp you made fun of?” Natalie asked.
“Yes. May I borrow the headlamp I made fun of?”
Natalie gave it to her, and Jaycee beckoned Mik back through the tunnel. The two of them began a thorough search of the walls.
“What’re they looking for?” Zach asked.
“A marker from Jaycee’s brother,” Natalie said. “Like they found last night. If they find it, expect something stupid to happen next.”
Bishop looked around like he was in love with the walls. He touched the graffiti.
“I brought you something,” she said, pulling out two cans of spray paint from her bag.
Bishop took them with a huge grin. “You completely read my mind. Thanks
.” He went to find a spot for his art, muttering something about letter stencils.
Zach wrapped an arm around her waist. “Jaycee seems kinda happy with you. At least, she’s not unhappy with you. You feel better?”
“Maybe.” Jaycee and Natalie had actually talked—really talked. Natalie had even admitted that thing about her shadow self. And Jaycee didn’t tell Natalie that she was being imprecise like her therapist did—or melodramatic like her mom.
Natalie touched Zach’s hair, pushing it to the side of his face. Why, why, why had she gone after that other guy? How could she? “I love you,” she said. “You.”
He put his arms around her and kissed her neck. “I love you too.”
I am Natalie. I can make this right.
She took his mouth with hers, and the kiss was much deeper than Zach was ready for. He leaned out of it. “Hey. You can’t just kiss me like that. Do you know what you’ve started?”
She kissed him again and tugged on his belt. “Let’s go down the path. Out of sight.”
“But you never…you said no way would you do it outside ever.” Zach blinked at her. “Is this a trick? This is a trick, isn’t it?”
She shook her head and led him farther into the woods. Finding the right spot without poison ivy or problematic rocks took forever, but then she was on her back, all their clothes laid out like a blanket beneath her. She was nearly breathless from watching the contrast of the moon on the sky while Zach pressed into her. He was always gentle.
The branches of oaks and buckeye trees reached over them like shadowy hands, and the wretched half memory of the previous night made her cling to the thrill of what she was doing. Zach, Zach, Zach, she thought to remove the other guy from her thoughts.
She hoped and prayed that her daring would line everything up. Maybe shed some light, like Jaycee had said. Natalie even picked the brightest star in the black night above and made a wish.
Please let me feel brave.
Chapter 16
Mikivikious
Chapter 17
Jaycee
Natalie kind of attacked me, but it was worth it. Zach pulled her off, and I kept laughing until my stomach clenched. I fell to my knees and couldn’t catch my breath. Laughing felt foreign. New. Beautiful.
“Not funny. Go get my headlamp,” Natalie threatened before adjusting her glasses. “I’m going to the old town cemetery across the road. I saw pictures of it on Google. Who’s coming with me?”
Zach shook his head. “I want to go swimming in the river. I saw a rope swing, and I’m all…sweaty.” Natalie blinked at him like she couldn’t believe he was admitting that.
“I’ll go to the cemetery with you,” Bishop said. “Sounds cool.”
Zach scurried down the embankment to the water. Natalie and Bishop crossed the creek, jumping stone to stone, before heading back up to the road.
A new quiet left me with Mik’s still-smiling face in the night’s glow. I suspected that Natalie had meant to take everyone away from us via her excursion to the cemetery. She wanted Mik and me to be alone. Subtle, Natalie Cheng. Very subtle.
Mik’s eyes were on me in a permanent sort of way, and I could barely hold his gaze.
I motioned to Bishop’s picture on the wall. “Quite the masterpiece. I think love broke off a piece of him and threw it away.” I stared at the image of a gorgeous woman, the words in her hair striking a rather strong chord. “It is a fair question. What is the opposite of lonely?”
Mik took a step toward me, and I stumbled back. “Let’s get that headlamp,” I said, fleeing into the tunnel.
It was freakier this time. Mik didn’t ignite his Zippo, and we walked through the dark, toward the swinging light at the far end. I tripped and swore. I felt Mik at my elbow, but I walked faster, wanting to put some distance between us.
It wasn’t that I didn’t like him. No, that couldn’t be it; I did like him. I just didn’t know what was happening. What was he hoping for exactly? I couldn’t ask him because he didn’t talk, and what if he wanted something like Natalie and Zach’s relationship with all the hand-holding and codependency? If I couldn’t be off on my own when my emotions went nuclear, I’d destroy whoever was in my way.
Like my poor dad. I blasted him apart way too often, and these days, I had to nearly tell him that I hated him to keep him from crowding in.
There had to be some way to explain this to Mik. Some simple and straightforward way. I even found myself curious about Natalie’s opinion; she was good at factoring in people’s feelings. She was good at being careful, with the large exception of how she’d handled me during my brother’s death. I, for one, didn’t have anything close to this skill set.
I shoved my hands in my pockets, my fingers closing tightly around the triangle of Jake’s map. For all my hesitation, I had to admit that I wanted Mik in my life. I wanted to see him every year in The Ridges while we remembered Jake together. But more than that, he had been there—right there—when Jake died. He probably even knew things about Jake that I didn’t. I wanted to ask him. Come to think of it, I really wanted to talk to Mik, or at the very least, for him to text me. Man, that was a lot of wanting…
Maybe he could feel my energy, or maybe I’d slowed down without knowing it, but all of a sudden, Mik’s hand was on my lower back. I stopped walking, and I was suddenly hyperaware. The air prickled with deep cold in the tunnel, and my eyes caught on the bright water stains trickling down the curved wall. Mik moved even closer, his other hand now on my waist, and I could feel the inch between us.
His fingers were asking a question, turning me around, and I let them. The only light shone in from Natalie’s headlamp on the far stump, and Mik’s face was mostly shadow and dark eyes. His intensity made me stumble even though I wasn’t moving, and now we were chest to chest. I was nearly dizzy from how he was looking at me, and it made me wonder why I didn’t want him like that, and then it made me wonder if maybe I did.
But regardless, something was between us.
He leaned toward me, and I turned my face away.
“Mik, this isn’t really…I mean, I can’t…” The truth flew out as fast as a snuffed match. “Every time I look at your mouth, I think about the playground. About you giving Jake CPR.”
He stepped back, all his desire extinguished.
And then Natalie’s headlamp flicked off. By itself.
I gasped. Total blackness.
I fumbled in my pocket to find my cell phone, and when I hit the power button, the weird brilliance of the screen lit up Mik’s back. He was halfway gone down the other end of the tunnel.
I’d ruined something that I didn’t even know I wanted, but what was I supposed to do? Not tell him how I felt? Wouldn’t that be worse? Wouldn’t that be just as bad as Natalie hiding her panic attacks from her freakin’ boyfriend?
I reached the headlamp at the other end, suddenly furious. I kicked the stump. “Come and get me you fucker Brakeman’s ghost.” I smacked at the headlamp until it flicked back on. “Every day of my life is worse than whatever you got.”
Moments ago, I’d been laughing so hard that I couldn’t stand up straight. And then I’d been nearly kissed. My first kiss. From Mik.
Hell on fire. Truth was supposed to work. It was supposed to be hard and fast and freeing, but for the first time in my life, I wondered if telling the truth could make you a liar.
Chapter 18
Bishop
Chapter 19
Zach
Zach could never really tell how a night was going to go. Sometimes events got epic in the woods with your buds. Sometimes they wound up with a make-out session in the backseat that heated the car up like an oven. And sometimes you ended up all by yourself in the woods because your friends were too busy thinking deep thoughts or pontificating or some shit.
Zach splashed in the creek because he needed to piss again,
and he didn’t want to be the guy who had peed twice since they’d got there. Tiny, female bladder, Tyler always taunted.
When Zach was a kid, crying because of his big brother’s crap, his mom would gather Zach on her lap and explain that Tyler just wanted Zach to be like him. To do what he did. She said this like it wasn’t a bad thing, but when Tyler broke his Stomp Rocket, he broke Zach’s too. When he spilled his milk into his spaghetti, he’d pour some into Zach’s bowl as well. Being like Tyler had been the worst part of Zach’s life so far. Worse than his parents’ flame-torch of a marriage and all the fights he’d endured with Natalie put together.
And this was all still happening. When Tyler became a drunken undergrad Lothario, he’d dragged Zach into that scene by the hair and told him to be a man. Zach had run crying to Natalie, which only escalated Tyler’s cruelty from a six to an eleven.
Besides Zach’s bladder, there were other reasons he wanted to be alone. First off, he just felt weird. He walked farther down the creek thinking about Bishop, who had talked about their trip inside The Ridges like they had gone backpacking through Europe. Granted it had been cool, but life changing? Not quite. Then there was Hottie Snarktart Jaycee and her “too cool for words” boy toy.
Zach snorted. Those nicknames were pretty solid, although if he were being honest, he’d have to admit that they scared him. He was pretty sure that although Jaycee had warmed up to him the night before, she could turn on him at any moment. And Mikivikious? There had to be knives concealed in that trench coat. Didn’t the Bowling for Columbine assholes wear trench coats? That was a good point; he should tell Bishop and Natalie that one.
And Natalie…Natalie had definitely cheated on him.
Zach kept surprising himself by turning this thought over. Technically it wasn’t cheating. Technically they weren’t even together for those hours. Besides, he’d kissed a girl two years ago when he was in LA visiting his cousins. That was his big, black secret, and he kept it in the back of his mind like a Christmas present he’d never opened.
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