He grabbed my hand before I could think to pull away and held it tightly, like maybe my bullshit didn’t scare him. My heart cracked a tiny bit and a few more tears leakedout.
I heard voices heading our way – chatter and laughter loud enough to mean a whole bunch of people were tramping around out here, likely searching for the missing camper. I scrubbed at my eyes furiously.Crying? Why yes, I am, because as you can see from my jeans, which are fucking soaked with mud, I gave Silas Sloane a blow job and then lost mymind.
“Come on,” Si said. “I doubt they’ll come this way, but let’s head over the top of the falls anyhow. There’s no trail, but it’s gotta join up with the area around John Carpenter’s campsiteeventually.”
I sniffed loudly, wiping the last of my tears on my shirt. “Local cop and art teacher found mauled by squirrels inwoods…”
“Squirrels?” Si frowned. “What?”
“…after suffering fromexposure…”
His expression cleared. “Afraid it’s not nearly cold enough for that, babe,” he said, turning me to face away from him and pushing me gently between the shoulder blades. “And not a cloud in thesky.”
“…or possiblydehydration.”
“Uh huh,” he grabbed my hand again, like I wasn’t moving fast enough and towed me along behind him. “Your backpack has been sloshing on my back for the past mile, and we’re feet from freshwater.”
I sighed. “If the worst happened and you were starving, I wouldn’t care if you had to eat my corpse tosurvive.”
“Where do these thoughts come from?” Si demanded, but his eyes were dancing with laughter, like these weird tangents delighted him. “Your mind is like a labyrinth; you steer down a path and I never know if you’re going to find a secret garden or adementor.”
“No shit,” I said sourly. “Welcome to my life. And here’s me without a wand or aPatronus.”
Si grinned. “Ev, honey, if the worst happened, I’d take one of our cell phones and call for pizza. We’re only a mile from Frank’s place. There’s still a signal outhere.”
“But just incase…”
“Just in case,” he agreed. “I consent to this cannibalism pact.” He pressed another kiss to my lips like aseal.
“I might have a tendency to be overly dramatic,” I confessed a second later. I brushed the fingers of my free hand over my mouth because I could still feel Si’s lips against mine, and I waited for the guilt IknewI should be feeling to assail me, but it didn’t. “It can be a bitmuch.”
He stopped and turned completely. “Hilarious, that’s what it is. And sexy. Andfrustrating, which somehow is also sexy. I like you, Everett. Keep that in mind. Just incase.”
He turned and started walking again and I scrambled to keep up. My diaphragm was having trouble workingproperly.
“Shouldn’t be too much further,” he said. The sound of the falls had receded slightly, though I could see peeks of water through the trees from the river that fed it. “Maybe justa…”
He stopped short and so didI.
“Bells,” I whispered, remembering the sound I thought I’d imaginedbefore.
They weren’t really bells, but wind chimes — enormous wooden ones that clanked satisfyingly, smaller, tinkling glass ones, and even a couple of sets of metal ones that clinked like coins — all tied to tree branches in a loose circular shape, like some kind of fairyring.
“What is it?” I askedwonderingly.
Si shook his head. “I don’t know,” he said, sounding more annoyed than impressed. “I’ll ask Frank and Myrna, but I don’t know if they ever come up thisfar.”
I took a step around him and reached out a hand to touch one of the hundreds of short bushes that filled the circle. Their leaves were already gone and they looked oddly skeletal, long bones topped with fully-intact seedheads.
“Don’t,” Si said, grabbing my hand. “That’s giant hogweed. It’spoisonous.”
“Poisonous?” I gasped, and Si shook his head, looking at me like I was adorablynaive.
“Thinkpoison ivy, notarsenic.If you touch it, it’ll make your skin blister like you wouldn’t believe, but it wouldn’t killyou.”
I put my hand in my pocketanyway.
“Dare is gonna bitch about this,” he predicted. “Hogweed’s invasive. The state’s gonna have to come out here and remove itall.”
