I practice my yoga breathing and replay yesterday’s conversation with Jake. The comfortable one. The one in the car.
It’s foolish to entertain thoughts of this guy. He’s . . . I don’t know . . . mysterious, I guess. And hot—yeah, there’s that. But I know better. This is exactly what
she
did.
There’s just something different about him.
I snort at myself. I’m ridiculous. Surely I’m not the first girl who’s thought that about a guy.
Probably not even about Jake.
My eyes close against the fleecy white sky as I banish thoughts of him.
I should have brought my cell. If Dad calls . . .
It’s so cold.
Something hurts.
My forehead stings.
My lips.
My neck.
My hands fly up to defend the onslaught, and my eyes snap open.
Man!
I’ve fallen asleep. The sun has already set behind the gushing clouds, and if there’s one thing I’m more afraid of than being alone at night, it’s being alone at night and lost in the dark. Hail bounces off the large rock, off the ground. I stand and zip my parka, flipping the hood up to protect my head. I grab my camera bag and turn toward the house.
At least I think I’m turned toward the house. The light is fading and I can’t really tell.
Stupid short winter days.
I turn left and right looking for something familiar. This is right, isn’t it? It has to be. My feet pound through the slippery grass as panic curdles in my stomach and turns it sour.
I don’t have time to be sick.
I don’t have time.
I break into a sprint. I won’t be able to keep this pace up, but I have to get home before night falls. Of that I’m certain. My legs burn, and I trip over a rock. Or a tree root? I fall and scrape my hands. The camera bag smacks me in the face, but at least it keeps my head off the ground. Mud splatters my chest and neck.
I get up. Fast. Fast. I count my footfalls, my breaths, anything to keep my mind off the encroaching darkness. Three hundred and eighteen strides later, the creek comes into view. The clouds shift just enough for me to catch the moon’s light bouncing off the rushing water.
Halfway there.
Almost home.
I can do this!
It’s completely dark now and my lungs ache. Every breath is a sharpened needle sewing stitches into my side. Ten more footfalls and doubt begins to eat away at the encouragement I’ve given myself. The moon has hidden again behind black clouds, and the hail has turned into a soaking rain. Visibility is diminishing quickly. A sob rips from my chest, and I can’t find the energy to fight back the tears.
Even through the wind and rain, I can hear the creek ahead—its water splashing over the rocks I’d crossed so easily this morning. I slow to a walk. The creek has risen and nearly overrun its banks. I have to cross now. I walk up and down the rushing water, looking for the narrowest way across. When I find something that seems acceptable, I take three giant steps back and then run as fast as I can. I cross my fingers and launch off the muddy ground.
There’s a moment of relief as I clear the creek bed, but my boot catches something on the way down and I lurch. That’s when I hear the crack. I don’t feel the pain until a second later, when I’m sprawled in the mud. I scream and try to curl into a ball, but whatever’s caught my boot still has hold of it. My first thought is that something, a stick maybe, has skewered my leg. I reach for my ankle and find it’s tangled in a mess of roots jutting from the mucky ground. With shaking hands, I work it free. It’s been skewered, all right, but from the inside out. My ankle’s broken—bone straining against skin.
Panic turns to hysteria, and my body shakes. I know full-blown shock is not far off, and I fight to keep it at bay. The wind whistles, louder and louder, calling my name.
“Brielle!”
I fear I’m losing my mind. And then I see him, running through the mud and sliding at my feet.
“Brielle!” he cries again. “Here. Put your arm around my neck—no, don’t stand. I’ve got you.”
It isn’t the wind at all. It’s Jake. The fire in his eyes demands my attention, but I vaguely note the white beam of a flashlight bouncing around. He shoves it into his back pocket, and we’re shrouded in darkness again. He pulls me tight against his chest and stands. I turn my face into his neck to avoid the rain forcing its way into my nose and mouth.
He smells like coffee—hot coffee—laced with chocolate.
“You’re okay. You’ll be okay.” His voice is thick with emotion—an emotion I can’t define.
A thawing blaze roars through my body, and my breathing slows. His speed and agility are impressive, and before I’ve had much time to digest his presence, we’re inside, out of the rain. I feel him adjust me, hear the squeal of hinges and the slam of a door. He kneels carefully, placing my weight on his knee. I tighten my arms around his neck. If I don’t, he’ll let me go, and I’m not ready for that. Not yet.
He’s patient and waits several long moments for me to loosen my grip and look up at him. He’s staring back at me with those eyes. They scour my face so deeply I look away.
“Will you be okay if I set you down?” He frees one hand and pulls the flashlight from his pocket. In the white light I see the concern etched on his face. And something else: blood.
I’m not the only one injured.
“Of course. I’m—Yes, I’m so sorry,” I blurt. He’s cut. Rain and blood run mingled down his face and drip onto my jacket. He sets me down on the moist earth. “Your face,” I say.
“What?” Jake reaches for his cheek. He pulls his hand away, and his fingers are fresh with blood. “I didn’t even realize. A branch must’ve caught me.” He swipes a dripping sleeve across his face and turns his attention back to me. “What about you? Let me see that foot.”
He repositions himself and slides my dripping pant leg up over my calf. “Oh man. Yeah, it’s broken.”
His words shatter some sort of delusional barrier, and the shock starts to wear off. I feel pain again. More physical pain than I think I’ve ever felt. My body tightens as he sets my foot on his knee.
“Don’t move. I know it hurts, but give me a minute.”
Careful not to jostle my foot, he removes his sweatshirt and hands it to me. He tugs off his undershirt and tears it into strips.
“What are you doing?” I ask, struggling to keep my attention on his face. His certainly isn’t the first bare chest I’ve seen, but the emotions running through my veins have charged the moment, and I twist the sweatshirt in my hands nervously.
“I’m going to splint your ankle so you can’t move it around,” Jake answers.
“Don’t you have to set it or something?”
I don’t know a thing about broken bones, but it seems like something I’d heard in Girl Scouts. He flashes a smile at me. Just a hint of patronization there.
“No, this will be okay.”
It takes him no time at all to wrap the shirt soundly around my ankle, shoe and all. Then he pulls his sweatshirt on and leans back against a stack of rotting boards, holding my foot tightly. I keep my eyes on his hands as the stabbing sensation recedes and my breathing slows. I can’t believe how hot they are.
Or maybe I’m just that cold.
“Where are we?” I ask. The heat soaks into my foot and seeps up my leg. My body is starting to relax, like sliding into a hot bath.
“A storage shed, I think. I hope this roof holds.”
We glance at the rotting boards above. The decaying wood is already letting streams of rainwater through in places. They splash in mud puddles and soak the ground.
“Oh. Right. The shed.” I lean my head against the wall at my back. It hadn’t even crossed my mind to take shelter somewhere other than home.
I used to be so savvy, so smart. Now it seems all my actions are motivated by fear. This revelation depresses me, and again my hands begin to tremble. Even with the poor light, Jake notices.
“Are you warm enough?”
He tightens his grip on my foot, and heat floods my body.
“How are you
doing
that?”
“What?” he counters innocently. He
has
to know what I mean. I’m incredulous, but he just flashes me a smile again and shrugs. “Body heat works wonders.”
“I’ve never known anyone as hot as you.”
I’ve spoken without thinking, and he raises an eyebrow at me in response. I feel the blood rush to my ears and we laugh, embarrassed. Broken ankle aside, this isn’t the worst way to spend a stormy night. It’s been weeks since I’ve enjoyed the company of another human being. Except Dad, of course.
Oh, sheesh. Dad.
“You don’t have a cell phone, do you?”
“Sure.” He pulls a phone from his pocket with one hand, his other secured around my ankle. One look at the fogged-up screen and I know water has made its way inside.
“Yeah. I don’t think that thing’s gonna work,” I say.
He presses the On button for good measure and then chucks the phone to the far corner of the shed. “Is someone going to worry about you?”
“My dad. All this rain has him working late, though, so I’m probably all right for a bit.”
“That’s good. We should stay here a little longer. Let your foot rest.”
We sit in silence as the rain pounds on the rickety shed, and the wind does its best to tear the rusty nails free. The bright but narrowly focused beam of the flashlight is hardly ideal for such a situation, but it casts enough light for me to see around the tiny shed.
We’re both soaked through, that much is apparent. I yank off my gloves, saturated and useless, and cram them into my jacket pocket. My hair drips a river down my back, so I wring it out, braid it into a long plait, and throw it over my shoulder. I’m sure I should be concerned about my appearance after the rain, the mud, and the hail, but I can’t make myself concentrate on any of it.
Jake breaks the silence. “You grew up here?”
“Stratus, Oregon. Born and raised.”
“So, why did Mr. Whatever-his-name-is say you were new?”
“Misinformed, I guess.”
“Maybe he’s new too?” Jake ventures.
“Maybe,” I concede. “Though that’s a lot of new blood for a cow town.”
Jake smirks. “And yet I haven’t seen a single cow.”
“Smelled them?”
“
That’s
what that was.”
I smile. “I went to Stratus High my freshman year. Just moved back here from the city.”
“Ah.” He has that look—like he’s figured it out. Figured me out. “Parents divorced?”
I wish.
“No. My mom died when I was young. It’s just me and Dad.”
“I’m sorry,” he says.
It’s an apology I’ve heard a million times—an unnecessary one.
“It’s okay. It was a long time ago.”
He waits for me to go on, and to my utter amazement it isn’t difficult to continue.
“Toward the end of my freshman year, a talent scout spent the weekend here at the bed-and-breakfast on Main. Behind Jelly’s? Anyway, she wasn’t here to scout, just taking a weekend, you know, but the only entertainment options in town that night were a Kung Fu movie and the high school dance recital.”
“I’m guessing you were at the dance recital.”
“Maybe I’m a Kung Fu junkie?”
“My apologies.” He laughs. “Continue.”
I grin. But just a bit. “Yeah, so she attended the spring dance recital. I’m a ballerina. Well, I was a ballerina.” I pause, but I can see what his next question’s going to be, so I hurry on. “Anyway, before the weekend was over she’d secured me a scholarship at a prestigious boarding school in the city: the Austen School for the Arts.”
“That’s very—wow. That was very generous of her.”
“Yes, it was,” I agree, remembering my first impressions of Susie Slade.
A woman dedicated to her clients and married to her iPhone, Susie is one of the best in the business. She took Dad and me out after the recital and promised to change my life forever with modeling jobs and commercial auditions. Sure, I could continue to dance. Several prominent dancers had graced the halls at Austen. Was I interested in theatre? I didn’t know. Could I sing? Absolutely not. But when she told me Austen was located in the heart of the city, far from the quiet life of Stratus, she became my savior.
“Susie was very generous, but moving me served her needs as well. She’s very hands-on, and the commute to Stratus isn’t exactly ideal,” I tell him. “So when the summer ended, I moved to the dorm at Austen.”
“Wow.”
Yeah, wow. Very few girls get such an opportunity, and the story starts out just like a fairy tale. The ending, of course, is more Brothers Grimm than Disney, but it comes pouring out of me nonetheless.
“It was the chance of a lifetime—a dream come true and all that—but I couldn’t imagine leaving Dad. We don’t really have anyone else, you know?” I pick at the mud drying on my knees, remembering. “But he wanted me to go and promised to visit often. Which he did. Nearly every weekend that first year.”
“Just the first year?”