“Used to it isn’t the right word.” I think about it. She asked, so I give her an honest answer, which is more than most people get. “You learn to need it. And then you can’t go back.”
She’s quiet for a moment. “I think I might already need it.”
“Where were you before?”
“LA. Burn unit.”
Three words. They land with a weight that tells me everything I need to know about why she left. I’ve seen burn units. I’ve been in burn units. The fluorescent lights and the smell of debrided skin and the sounds that come from people whose nerve endings are still firing long after they should have stopped.
“That’s a hard place to be,” I say.
“Yes.”
She doesn’t elaborate. Doesn’t explain or justify. Just “yes.” One word that closes a door without slamming it.
I respect that.
We stand on the porch for another ten minutes. She asks about Chief. Not the usual questions. Not “what breed” or “how old” or “can I pet him.” She asks if he’s always this calm. I tell her he’s calm because he trusts the perimeter. She nods, and the nod says she understands what that means in a way that most people wouldn’t.
There are no questions about my leg. None about the scar. She doesn’t glance at them the way people do when they’re pretending not to look.
She just stands next to me and breathes the mountain air and doesn’t push.
And that terrifies me. Not the pushing. I can handle pushing. I’ve been handling pushing for four years. People push and I push back, and the wall stays up, and everybody goes home. It’s simple. It’s safe.
She doesn’t push. She just stands there with my dog at her feet and the mountains at her back, and something inside me shifts. I didn’t give permission to shift.
I feel it. A warning and a certainty at the same time. Walk away.
“I should go,” I say. My voice comes out rougher than I mean it to. “Early morning.”
She nods. “Of course.”
No protest. No stay a little longer. She lets me go the way she let me leave the clinic. Clean. No weight attached.
It makes it worse.
I call Chief. He stands, reluctant, and follows me to the steps. I take them cautiously, one at a time, gripping the railing. The leg is stiff from standing still too long, and the cold has settled into the joint.
At the truck, I open the door for Chief and he jumps in. I pull myself up after him. Turn the key. The engine catches.
I look back.
I shouldn’t and know I shouldn’t. But I look back, and she’s standing at the porch railing where I left her, her hands wrapped around the wood, her red hair catching the light.
She’s watching me go.
Not waving. Not smiling. Just watching, steady and quiet, and the look on her face isn’t expectation or invitation. It’s simpler than that. Worse. It’s an ‘I see you.’
I pull out of the lot and drive up the mountain in the dark, and the crack in the wall doesn’t close.
I don’t think it’s going to.
Chapter 5
Bianca
Sleep should be easy tonight. I’m tired in the way that means my whole body is ready to shut down—legs heavy, shoulders loose, the bone-deep fatigue that drops me in ten minutes flat. I’ve showered, brushed my teeth, changed into an old t-shirt and underwear. The sheets are cool against my skin, and the apartment is dark and quiet, and perfect for sleeping.
