“Promise me you’ll be safe,” I whispered, and she nodded against me.
“I promise.” She paused. “I’ll even make sure not to hit any trees.”
I laughed despite myself. “Dammit, Alyssa, don’t make me laugh right now.”
She pulled back from the embrace, and she cupped her hands on either side of my face. “You’re the most luminous person I’ve ever met, Jade,” she said, her eyes locked on mine—those damn eyes that made everything else stop existing—and my heart missed a beat, missed a hundred beats, a lifetime’s worth. “Please. Have a good life without me.”
I swallowed, the lump in my throat too thick for me to say anything. I nodded, finally, because—what else was there for me to do? She smiled sadly.
“Can I… stay here tonight?”
“God, I’d never forgive you if you didn’t.”
“Thank you.” She kissed me, her lips warm against mine while the tears on her cheeks were cold on my skin. “I’m going to…”
She didn’t need to complete the sentence, to add themiss youat the end. I knew I would too.
∞∞∞
I hated pretty girls.
Alyssa and I had the most emotional sex that night, and I never thought I’d cry myself to an orgasm, but fucking sure. Life was full of new experiences all the time. Whatever.
Then it was the next day, and just like that, she was gone. Out the door, stuff all packed up in her car, and poof, no more Alyssa. Left everything tidy in her wake, not a single trace of the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen, nothing except my million and one stupid scent samples from a stupid fucking candle thatI shouldn’t have even been making in the first place, but I guess that was what happened when you were fucking stupid.
I expected a lot more to happen. I don’t know what I thought it would be, but the day just continuing on as normal with Alyssa on her way out of Vermont felt like a slap to the face. Was that how it was supposed to be? Time just carrying on like I hadn’t watched a piece of my heart drive away in that Toyota Camry? Like it was business as usual and now I was back to my regular life?
I definitely expected people to talk to me about it, to try to say something to her, to dosomething.But maybe she was right that Drew and Charlie had already done their thing and that nobody gave a shit, because dead silence was all I got. A whole day just drifting around like I barely existed—I wished it were a workday, because spending a weekend in this state was soul-crushing. I’d have done anything for a distraction, but all I could get, sending out job applications, was rote enough it did nothing for me. I lost track of how many I sent—probably way too many, given I was applying to just about anywhere in the country. Anywhere for a chance to get out of here, away from where every building and every street would remind me of her. Where every blue flower would break my heart.
Wasn’t until I got an autoresponder email in Spanish that I realized I’d accidentally applied to one in Mexico. Whatever. Maybe I’d learn Spanish. Buenos días, soy estúpida. I could make it work.
Turned out a workday wasn’t any better, though. I managed to fall asleep somewhere around one in the morning, and I was a zombie getting to work, not just because of sleep deprivation. Wasn’t even enough to distract me from the churning abyss in my head, still circling the drain as I circled the town in my car and marked down the location of fallen detritus from the rain, surrounded by the detritus of my own life. Iwas dramatic, needless to say, and I felt like I’d throw up from overthinking by the time I finished and got back to a quiet home and sat down in front of my candle station.
Had an order to fulfill. But all of a sudden I hated making candles, at least now while there was a box of scent samples on the shelf that I knew were supposed to smell like Alyssa. And that none of them were quite right, and that I’d never get it right, because the reference was gone and I’d never see her again.
Was she okay right now? Back at her mother’s house? She hadn’t talked much about her parents… it hadn’t been the healthiest place for her, from what I could tell, but it was a hell of a lot healthier than Sawyer. How long would it be before she decided she didn’t deserve that either?
I moved in a thrashing anger I didn’t even recognize, everything a blur until I wound up with the box of scent samples flung out with the trash cans at the end of the driveway, slamming the door shut. The dried flowers I’d prepped, as well, flung off the back deck for nature to reclaim them, and I was still riding that flush of anger when someone knocked at the door, and it was like gasoline on the fire. Sonowthey came around to ask about her?
I stormed through the house, and I flung the door open, not surprised to find Daniela there with Cat at her side, both of them flinching back from the way I opened the door. Daniela recomposed herself, steeling against me with an even expression.
“Hey,” she said, signing as she spoke. “I get you’re pissed off with me right now, but we should talk.”
“About what?” I signed the words hard enough that I hit the side of my hand on the door, and I would be embarrassed about the pain, but in my current state, it just pissed me off more, and I kicked the door open wider. “If you want me to leave town,I’m already on my way out. So let’s just settle there and all be happy.”
She frowned. “You’re leaving? Is it because of…”
Cat shook her head. “She was already planning to. I only found out recently, too. From all the Birdhouse drama around… well, me.”
Daniela looked wildly between the two of us. I leaned against the doorframe. “Guess Alyssa kept my dark secrets to the bitter end, huh?”
She pinched the bridge of her nose, taking off her glasses and wiping them anxiously on her sweater before she put them back. “Okay,” she said. “One thing at a time. Is Alyssa here? What’s happening with her?”
“What’s—” I dropped my arms by my sides, briefly forgetting to even sign. “What?”
“She came here, right?” she said. “She ran out after we had an argument, and I figured she went here…”
“You don’tknow?”
