‘I’ll be back soon, as soon as possible,’ he promised as I breathed in and out, trying to calm myself as my fingertips bypassed a tingle and began to buzz. ‘And I’ll call every day until then.’
‘And send me photos of cool dogs,’ I replied, trying desperately to calm myself before I caused another earthquake. ‘I heard that’s what cell phones are for.’
Wyn smiled sadly and heaved his overpacked backpack off his shoulder, dropping it on the ground with a heavy thud before pulling out one of his sketch pads and a pen.
‘You have my number. This is everything else. Use any of them, all of them, whatever works. All day every day, I’ll be waiting to hear from you.’
Shaking his head in disbelief, he scribbled down an email address, street address, and a username, then tore out the page, pressing it into my hand before running his forefinger over my cheekbone to wipe away a tear I hadn’t felt fall. Then, placing his hands on my shoulders, he straightened out his arms, extending the distance between us.
‘Look at how beautiful you are,’ he said, staring at me with wonder, like I was some kind of impossible prize.
But I didn’t feel beautiful. I felt like someone who was about to lose the only thing in her life that made sense.
‘You’ll come back,’ I said, meaning my words to be soft and gentle but instead barking them out like an order. ‘You promise you’ll come back?’
‘There’s nothing that could keep me from coming back to you, Em.’ He paused and took a deep breath in. ‘This is meant to be. I love you.’
‘I love you too,’ I replied, melting with the words. ‘I love you, Wyn Evans.’
It was easy to say because it was true. I wanted to say it to his face every day, the two of us laughing and smiling under the stars, not holding on to each other in the thin morning light with tears streaming down both our faces. I drew him down to me, pressing my lips to his and sealing in the words forever. No matter what else happened, nothing could take them away from us.
‘I have to go now,’ Wyn whispered, still so close to me I felt the words before I heard them. Even though every part of me told me to stop him, I didn’t try. I didn’t dare. After what happened at The Olde Pink House, I was almost afraid to breathe in case I accidentally summoned a tornado and tossed his pickup truck into the sky.
‘I’ll call you as soon as I know what’s happening,’ he swore and I followed him to the gate, one magnet drawn to another.
‘Get home safe,’ I told him, one of those empty things you say when you don’t know what else to say. He climbed into the truck, tossing his backpack in first, and above him clouds began to gather in the sky. When he gunned the engine, they turned black.
‘Drive safe,’ I said with a shaky voice. ‘Looks like there’s going to be a storm.’
‘Looks like,’ Wyn Evans agreed over the twin rumbles of engine and thunder. ‘I love you, Emily James. Nothing is ever going to change that.’
I stood in front of Bell House and watched him go, so strong but completely powerless. The bright red of his truck stood out against the muted colour palette of Lafayette Square andwhen it finally passed out of view, I sank down to the ground, keeping myself together until I felt him cross the bridge, leaving me and Savannah behind.
Only then did I let it rain.
Chapter Twenty-Five
‘There are a million good reasons why he ghosted you,’ Lydia declared, six days, seven hours and forty-three minutes after Wyn left Savannah. She was stretched out on a sun lounger in the back garden of Bell House, lemonade in one hand, a chocolate chip cookie in the other, having invited herself over when I failed to respond to her last three texts.
‘Not that he has definitely for sure ghosted you,’ she added when she saw my scowl. ‘Maybe he broke his arm and can’t hold his phone, or maybe he’s in a cute little coma and he’s going to wake up any second, yelling your name.’
‘A cute little coma?’ I replied, unimpressed. ‘Lydia, no.’
Ever since Wyn disappeared, time had dragged. The first day was a black hole. Catherine left me alone, under the assumption I was coming to terms with everything I’d learned at supper. She wasn’t wrong, none of that helped, but the biggest knife in my heart was Wyn’s absence. He said he would call but he didn’t. For the first couple of days I let myself believe he was busy with family stuff, maybe something really awful had happened to his brother and he would get in touch with me when he could. By the fourth day, my patience ran out andI sent him a text. He didn’t answer. The next day I called but he didn’t pick up. I even had Lydia DM him on every possible platform but there was no reply, no read receipt, and no updates on his page.
As far as anyone could tell, Wyn Evans had vanished off the face of the earth.
‘All I’m saying is, there has to be a reason,’ Lydia stated. ‘He is super into you, Em, he didn’t have to come say goodbye. If he really wanted to ghost, he’d have left without saying anything. You said he had family stuff to deal with, right? Family stuff, as you and I both know, can be tough.’
She didn’t even know how right she was.
‘I think I made it perfectly clear that if he hurt you, I would end his life, and running off to North Carolina can’t stop me from making good on that threat,’ she added. ‘All I need to hunt a man down is half a name and his hair colour. This fool gave you his number, his email address, his mailing address, and his username. It’s almost too easy, there’s no sport in it.’
‘Maybe we should go to Asheville,’ I mused for the thousandth time that day. ‘We wouldn’t have to go in his house or anything, I just want to know he’s OK.’
‘Like I said fifteen minutes ago, fantastic idea. Your grandmother wouldn’t completely flip out and we wouldn’t both get grounded until the end of time. Did you want to steal a car, book a flight or take a ten-hour-round-trip Uber?’
‘Uber?’ I replied feebly. ‘Point taken.’
