She presses her lips together and leaves to return to her own room. I stand where she left me until the door to her bedroom closes and locks, then turn back to my bed to check my phone for any new messages. There will be plenty of time for me to think about everything that happened with Cameron and figure out how to smooth things over with Leah, but the most important thing on my mind right now is to see if my phone has signal again so that I can check for baby updates.
There is an unread message in our group chat from Monika saying that she is going to bed, and to call her if there is any news overnight. I add my own text after hers that I am available anytime if they get a chance to call, but to enjoy every second. The plan is for both Scott and Gabe to be in the waiting room while the birth mom is in labor, so that they can be the first ones to meet their baby boy. They have been dreaming of this moment since they initially matched.
I turn the volume all the way up on my phone ringer and then toss it back onto the bed so that I can head for the bathroom. I flip the switch to turn on the ring of lights that surrounds the mirror and am immediately struck by how bright my eyes look in the reflection. The color of the dress helps, and I make a mental note to wear more periwinkle in the future, but I wouldn’t be surprised if meeting Cameron isn’t also part of the reason.
Before I can get too in my head about it, I move my attention to assess the knot on my forehead. The bump is visible in this light, but it doesn’t look like it will bruise.
I move on to my thumb. When I try to remove the towel, I find that the dried blood has crusted to the cut. I turn on the sink to run it under water to soften it. The cut bleeds again as soon as I can finally remove the towel, so I dry it off as best I can with tissues as I search the cabinets for Band-Aids. I bleed through the first one I secure to my finger in less than a minute, so I add two more on top of it and go back to my bed to lie down so I can elevate it above my heart.
In the silence that follows, I look up at the ceiling and allow myself to come to terms with the fact that Scott, Gabe, and Monika were right. Their crazy plan for me to step out and live as if I wasn’t cursed worked. Within the course of one day, I have found someone who makes me feel alive again, and I will soon be making plans to meet my nephewin person.
I let myself dream about the way it will feel to hold their baby boy in my arms until heavy footsteps approach from the hallway. I pop up to greet Cameron in the doorway and pull him inside so that I can close the door behind us but drop my hand immediately.
“You’re soaked,” I say, as I wipe my hand on my dress and look down to where water drips audibly from his clothes and onto the hardwood floor. “Why didn’t you wear a . . .” My voice trails off when the faint scent of chlorine stings my nose. “Oh my gosh, did you fall in the pool?”
He ignores me and falls back against the wall we were just pressed up against as soon as I close the door.
“Cameron, talk to me,” I say, stepping forward to steady his face between my hands, but keeping enough distance between us so that my dress stays dry.
His pupils are completely blown when his eyes finally meet mine, making them black as ink.
“Cameron—”
“She’s gone.”
“Who’s gone?”
My guess is Delaney, based on her display downstairs, but I suppose it could also be Judith. I can’t imagine either of their departures causing him to be this distraught, though, even with his aversion to being on the roads in poor weather.
“Delaney,” he confirms, then closes his eyes tight as if he is blocking out a mental image.
“Okay,” I say. “Well, I know you didn’t want anyone going out in the storm but—”
He shakes his head, and a fresh shot of ice-cold panic chills my blood.
“Cameron, what is going on?”
He continues to shake his head with his eyes firmly closed.
“When you say gone . . .” I press, but I physically can’t get the rest of the words past the lump that is forming in my throat, because if he is about to say what I think he is, then that means that my curse has bled outside of its normal lines.
Bad things can happen to anyone or anything that is around me at any time, but the gravest of dangers have always been limited to my birthday and Friday the thirteenths, which I made it through unscathed last week when Scott and Gabe surprised me at the bookstore. Unless my curse was living up to the phrase I’d assigned it, new and novel, and was just luring me into a false sense of safety for a delayed strike.
“She’s dead,” he finally says, confirming my worst fear. “Delaney is dead.”
Chapter twenty-nine
ASSIGNING MYSELF THE BLAME
Delaneyisdead?
My limbs fill with lead as his words sink in. How could that be? She was alive not ten minutes ago, as she hurled insults at us and said she was going to leave as a result of our actions. And now she is just . . . gone?
Even as I brace myself against the onslaught of grief, a small part of me is not entirely surprised. Until this weekend, I have lived for years with the fear of bad things waiting for me around every corner, and only this past week have I tried to switch that around to look for the good instead.
Clearly, that was a mistake, and the more it sits with me, the more Delaney’s death feels like an inevitability. Like I subconsciously knew that the other shoe was going to drop at some point.
I scoff at my own naivety that, just minutes ago, I thought that fate brought Cameron and me together as some sort of gift. As if I could somehow have this trip, my nephew,andhim in my lifewhen, thus far, I have had no more than a few fleeting moments of contentment.
