Her face falls, and she hangs her head, not saying anything right away. She’s quiet for so long that I start to realize she’s being serious. She actually wants to run away.
I open my mouth to say something different, but she beats me to it.
Wren offers me one of her signature smiles so bright it lights up the entire room. If I were less exhausted or self-absorbed, I might’ve noticed how it doesn’t even come close to reaching her eyes.
But I don’t.
“You’re right. You’re totally right, Lulu. Ignore me and yet another one of my harebrained schemes. You’ve only got a year and a half of your program left. I can make it a year and a half. That’s nothing. I’ve done way harder things than that.”
My forehead scrunches in confusion. “What do you mean, you can make it a year and a half? What’s going on, Wren?”
She rolls her eyes at me as if I were being ridiculous. “Nothing’s going on, you worried walrus. You know how much I hate this house and that I’m only sticking around until you’re ready to leave. I just got impatient is all. Now go back to sleep, brainiac. You’ve got big things to do tomorrow, remember?”
Squinting at her, I try to figure out what’s going on, but I’m too sleepy to make sense of it. Sighing and flopping back onto the bed, I ask, “You wanna spend the rest of the night here?”
She snorts. “You know I do. Now move over, you bed hog.”
Huffing out a laugh, I do as she asks. She climbs into bed and gives me her signature bear hug.
I don’t realize that it’s the last time I’ll ever get to share a bed with my big sister, something we used to do almost every night as kids. I don’t soak up her love or memorize how her face looks before the light inside her was snuffed out.
Instead, I close my eyes with a mumbled goodnight.
But Wren doesn’t wish me sweet dreams like she normally does. Instead, she asks, “Why were you so selfish? Why didn’t you save me when you had the chance?”
My eyes jump open at the question. I turn to ask her what she’s talking about, but the scene changes.
Instead of lying in my bed, I’m kneeling next to Wren’s unnaturally still form. As much as I want to look away, I can’t seem to see anything other than her bruised and broken body, unnaturally pale skin, and the scars marring skin that was smooth four years ago.
And I can’t stop myself from wailing her name over and over as I realize she’s never going to wake up.
“Wren!” I scream one last time as I bolt upright and almost crash into Colt’s nose.
“Fucking hell, sweetheart,” Colt rasps as he crushes me to his chest. His hands shake where they hold me to him, and I can feel the rapid thud of his heart against my cheek. “I thought you were never gonna wake up.”
When my heart stops pounding so hard in my head that I can finally hear myself think, I pull back to look at him and croak, “What do you mean?”
Colt scrubs a hand over his face and looks far more weary than usual. “You’ve been whimpering in your sleep for the past ten minutes. I’ve been trying to wake you up, but it wasn’t working. Then you started screaming, and I was seconds away from taking drastic measures to wake you.”
“I’m sorry,” I whisper to his chest, hating that he’s seeing me like this. Shaky, scared, and broken after a memory that turned into a nightmare.
“You have nothing to apologize for.” He’s quiet for a beat before asking, “Who’s Wren?”
I close my eyes as more tears drip out. “She was my sister.”
Colt rests his head against my forehead. “Fuck, sweetheart. I’m sorry.” Colt keeps his arms wrapped around me but sits back on his heels, so I’m resting on his thighs. He holds me to his bare chest with one hand and soothingly rubs the other up and down my back.
“Me too,” I choke out.
After a long moment of just holding me, he quietly asks, “Will you tell me about her? What she was like?”
I freeze for a moment because I’m not used to talking about happy things with Wren anymore. Whenever I talk about her lately, it’s to tell people she’s gone or to process all the difficult feelings that won’t go away.
And that’s not how I want to remember her, as a figment of her worst day. I want to remember her for the amazing things she’s done and the amazing person she was. I appreciate Colt giving me a chance to do just that.
“She was… fierce. Strong. Wild. Rebellious. She never bent for my parents, no matter how they treated her. At least, until Marcus.” Feeling a fresh wave of tears threatening to pour out, I quickly switch my train of thought. “She was the embodiment of pure, unadulterated joy. She loved painting, making her own clothes, animals, being on the water, and pranking Coop and me.She was the most amazing big sister anyone could’ve ever asked for, and the world is a darker, drearier place without her here to lighten it up.”
Shoving one hand under my borrowed shirt, Colt runs his fingers up my bare spine, causing me to shiver. “She sounds like she was a really special person.”
