I stare at him at first as I pat my body up and down before dropping my eyes to follow the pattern of my palms. I half expect to find a gaping hole where the rope burned a stretch of skin on my right hand and a patch the size of a quarter by my navel. It stings, but it’s my heart that’s in worse shape, threatening to beat right out of my chest.
“I’m… yeah. I mean, no. I’m fine,” I finish, sounding like I don’t believe a single word coming out of my mouth.
“Okay… good.”
He drops his gaze to his feet.
“I should go then.”
He lifts his headphones to his ears and starts jogging back the way he came.
“No, wait!” I shout.
He doesn’t make it more than five feet before coming to a halt. The muscles in his back bunch with tension but he doesn’t turn around.
What am I doing?
If I thought rope swinging in the pitch black by myself was risky, striking up a conversation with a complete stranger is ten times worse. He could be a serial killer for all I know. This is how thoseDatelineshows start.Nineteen-year-old girl wanders into wooded canyon alone… doesn’t make it out alive.
Not to mention, it was mere minutes ago when I settled on leaving the past behind me. Now here I am, playing tennis with it. It doesn’t help that I can’t shake the feeling I’m supposed to know him, and I need the ball in his court to find out if I’m right.
The stiff wind against my small frame has me wrapping my arms around my torso like a shield, but I know it can’t possibly be strong enough to keep this six-foot male from turning his shoulder and looking at me. I don’t know what else to do to get his attention but to introduce myself.
“I’m Teddy,” I say, balancing the weight of my body on my tiptoes.
He pivots, a flash of grief passing over his expression. It’s something I’m sure I would have missed without the memory of a similar silhouette drawn with a smile.
By the time he’s facing me, he’s a blank canvas.
With a polite nod, he says, “It was nice to meet you, Teddy.”
Was?He’s supposed to sayI know, like everyone else in this town. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe we’ve never met before this moment. Maybe I just want him to stay because I could use a friend. It’s isolating being stuck in a cabin with no one but your parents for months on end.
“What are you doing out here all alone?” he asks.
For most women, a thousand alarm bells would be sounding in their head with a question like that.
Stranger danger, stranger danger.
But he lifts his hat, his dark ruffled hair falling along his forehead, and my idiotic brain repeats a single word on a chronic loop…
Handsome handsome, handsome handsome.
I swallow, searching for my voice.
“Wasn’t it obvious?” I lift my palms in the air to show off my sandpapered hands, only to notice how raw they look and swiftly jerking them behind my back.
“Not at this time of day, no,” he says, looking at me like I need to be admitted to a psychiatric facility.
And who am I to disagree? I look unhinged.I have literally lost my mind, I want to offer in explanation, but even people you know on an intimate level don’t understand that form of early-life crisis.
“Good point.” I chuckle, trying to keep the conversation as lighthearted as possible. The last thing I want is for this guy—who has still not offered up his name, by the way—to be another person on my lengthy list of individuals who know I’ve suffered a brain injury. Yet I’m strugglingnotto be transparent with him.
“I just wanted to feel free,” I admit.
I hadn’t noticed how tense he was until his shoulders soften.
“Yeah, I get that,” he says.
