Noise, and voices, and energy. Even the clusterfuck of the GAZ foyer is better than this…if I can avoid Thatcher. I’m starting a new job tomorrow, but at this rate it’s like I’m actively trying to sabotage my first day. First the drinking, now this?
Even so, the stubborn part of me, the desperate part of me, theRiversiderin me, wants to stay out here. She wants to—needs to—find Kai.
She always thought ofhimas the antidote.
I thought he’d be in the woods beside the campus. Guess a lot has changed in the past few years. Maybe nature isn’t his go-to safe place anymore. He could be at a friend’s house.
He’s got tons of them these days.
I should turn back.
But then I’d be letting Kai win.
Fuck that.
I’ve always been a sore loser. Mostly because Kai was a bad winner, always rubbing it in. Gloating.
Fuckhim.
“I know you’re here, Kai! Show yourself!”
Bluffing’s all I got right now. Might as well lean into it.
But hearing my voice out here just makes me feel colder, wetter, lonelier than before.
What’s the plan anyway, Haven? What are you going to do if you find him out here? Comfort him? Crap him out? Kiss him?
Wait—whythe fuckwould I want to kiss him?
Because he’s such a good fucking kisser. That’s one of my few happy memories since I started college.
Kai kissing me.
Kai telling me he loved me.
I know he didn’t mean it. It was the drugs. But I pretended he was sober. That we both were. That what we had was pure and romantic and not at all fucked up to the nth degree.
I’m soaked through. My teeth are starting to chatter. And my bare feet are so cold that all I feel is a faint stinging in my toes. The icy rain feels like needles on my exposed skin, my lips and face numb.
Five more minutes. If I don’t find him, then I’m getting the hell out of here.
There has to be another antidote out there. One that won’t have worse side effects than what I’m trying to cure.
I use the sleeve of my drenched jacket to wipe rain off my face. I can’t even imagine what my makeup looks like. Melissa said it was waterproof, but I doubt anything that comes in a glittery rose-gold tube could withstand this deluge.
“Kai!” Frustration strangles my voice.
I hear a noise behind me. I whip around, straining to see in the dark, but with the rain coming down as hard as it is, visibility is at zero.
“I’m not kidding around! Come out where I can see!”
I swear I hear a low chuckle. I might have brushed it off as imagination if my skin hadn’t broken out in goosebumps right then.
The body is an amazing thing. It can pick up on things our minds might be too tired, busy, or stupid to. An aroma in the air. A subtle change in temperature.
The feeling that someone is close.
And the instinct to run when it realizes they’re choosing to stay hidden for nefarious reasons.
