“Summer, wait. Where are you going? You can’t just?—”
I stop when my hand touches the handle of the truck. Flashbacks come over me, buzzing through my mind like electricity. Me, Constance, Adelaide, running through the yard, Papa spraying us with the water hose. Mama baking us cookies, still warm and gooey and bringing them out and placing them on our picnic blanket.
My parents weren’t just special to me. They played a huge part in Adelaide and Constance’s lives, too. I owe it to them. For the memories. For the love they felt for my parents.
I shake my head and release the handle. I turn to face them both, the tears still flowing down my cheeks, crisping in the cold air. My voice rasps out broken.
“Okay,” I almost say to myself. “Let’s just… go inside.”
They glance at each other, uncertain, but when Jacob stalks around the truck and wraps an arm around my shoulder, they follow us back toward the house.
The silence in the kitchen is too loud. Every surface gleams, too clean, too still, like it doesn’t belong to me at all. I need something to fill the air. Something to stop the echo of Adelaide’s sob.
I go to the counter and fill the water container for coffee. The familiar click, the rising hum—it should be nothing. Just an ordinary sound. But then my vision blurs. The kitchen fades. I’m there—in my parents’ burning house. The smoke rolls thick, choking me, burning my throat. The walls groan like they’re about to collapse, flames licking higher. I curl in on myself, heaping on the floor, hands over my ears, sobbing so violently I can’t breathe. My chest convulses, every breath a war.
Footsteps thunder. And then he’s there. Jacob. Dropping to the ground, wrapping his arms around me before I even know it.
“Summer. Christ—Summer.” His voice is rough, desperate, cutting through the smoke in my head.
I sob harder, burying my face against his chest, clawing at his shirt like I’ll drown if I don’t hold on. He doesn’t hesitate. He scoopsme up, lifting me as if I weigh nothing, carrying me into the sitting room with a fury that makes my head spin.
The sofa catches us as he sinks down, but he doesn’t let me go. He cradles me against him, strong arms wrapping tight around my shaking body. His lips press to my temple, then my hair, then my damp cheeks, over and over like he can kiss away the fire.
“I’ve got you,” he murmurs, fierce and low, like a promise. “You’re safe. I’ve got you, baby.”
My sobs tear out of me, unstoppable. Every kiss he lays on me is a brand, searing, grounding me back into this body, this moment.
I feel other hands then—softer, tentative. Constance crouches beside us, brushing her fingers over my arm, whispering my name through her own tears.
Adelaide hovers close, her palm on my knee, her voice trembling as she says, “We’re here too. We’re here, Summer.”
Jacob rocks me against his chest, kissing the top of my head, again and again, his breath ragged. His heartbeat thunders under my ear, fierce and unyielding, the only sound loud enough to drown out the echo of my mother’s screams. It’s his arms that stop the fire.
And I can’t let go.
The storm inside me begins to ebb. The sobs taper into broken breaths, then shallow hiccups. My chest still aches, my throat raw, but the fire recedes under Jacob’s heartbeat. His warmth wraps around me, steady and solid, and for the first time since the phone call I feel something that almost resembles safety.
Adelaide has slid close on the sofa, her hand moving gently through my damp hair, smoothing it back from my face. Her touch is feather-light, the opposite of Jacob’s iron hold, but together they cocoon me, pinning me in two different worlds.
From the kitchen, I hear Constance moving—mugs clinking, the coffee machine hissing, this time muffled by distance. The sound doesn’t choke me now. The smoke has gone.
Jacob shifts slightly, his chin brushing the top of my head. His arms loosen just enough to let me breathe without shuddering.
By the time Constance returns, the tray rattling in her hands, my body feels heavier than stone. She sets it carefully on the coffee table,the scent of tea rising in a cloud that makes my stomach twist with grief but not panic this time.
“Here, just how you like it.” She sets a mug down within reach, then straightens, her eyes flicking warily to Jacob before softening again on me.
Slowly, I shift. Jacob’s hand tenses as I move, but I don’t leave him completely. I slide off his lap, settling beside him instead, my hip brushing his thigh, his arm draping possessively along the back of the sofa as if to remind everyone I’m still his.
I wrap my hands around the mug, letting the heat seep into my fingers. For a moment I just stare into the swirling surface, gathering the courage to break the silence.
Then I speak. My voice trembles, but the words come anyway.
“Benny came. Just after Jacob left.”
Constance frowns. “Benny did?”
Adelaide blinks, confusion rippling across her tear-streaked face. “I—I don’t understand. Why would he?—?”
