He exhales, relieved, and nods, crossing the room. At my stiffening, he stops halfway. He rakes a hand through his hair.
“I’m not in the mood, Finn—”
“I know. I know. But I need to say something. And then I’ll leave you alone.”
I open my mouth to protest, but before I can, he says softly, “Please,” and I wilt.
“That first night in your room,” he says, “was the first time in a long time that someone actually saw me. And I don’t mean, like, literally, physically saw me— Well, I guess I do…”
Finn clears his throat. He comes to stand in front of me, close enough to touch, if we could.
“My whole life, I felt like everybody else’s problem. I wanted to be invisible way before it actually happened. And then you looked at me and you saw me, and all I wanted was for you to keep seeing me. Even if I had to keep secrets to do it.”His cheeks flush.“And trust me, I know how shitty that is. But I didn’t know how to let that go. I still don’t.”
My anger is a safety blanket I don’t want pulled away. Without it, all that’s left is grief. I look away.
“I don’t have any answers. Don’t have any solutions. So I didn’tsay anything. I might be selfish, but I’m not that selfish. I only want to keep you safe.”
“What about what I want?” I snap, unsure where the words come from. But once they’re out, they hang between us like a heavy fog.
His lips part, but before he can speak, more words tumble out of me.
“I was fine before. I was surviving,” I say. “But then you showed up and you made me care about you, and about Aisha and Sloane. I mean, what did you think was going to happen, Finn? Do you think I’m going to let you die if I know there’s a chance you could live?”
He says nothing.
I turn back toward the window, ready to lay into him further, but the space he occupied is empty.
Anxiety skitters across my skin like a cold wind. “Finn?” I call.
Silence. He doesn’t blink back into the room like he should. Like he has every time I’ve called for him.
“Finn?” I say again, louder this time. Whatever anger I felt collapses under a new feeling: Dread. A horrible, dragging, heavy feeling that settles on top of my lungs.
Nothing.
The longest anyone’s lasted is about three years, Finn said.And I’m a week away.
That was more than a week ago.
If I was paying attention, I might have noticed it. Might have realized Finn’s staying away may have been less about giving me space because he wanted to, and more about having to. It’s like when I first moved in. I spent so much time staring at my feet I didn’t see what was all around me.
He’s fading. He’s dying, and soon he’ll truly be dead. Even if I could find him, there may be nothing left to save.
Gone. The reality of it is sharp and cutting, like someone is scratching at my insides. Shredding my intestines.
I don’t realize I’ve fallen to my knees until they slam into the cold, hard wood.
“Finn, please,” I say. “This isn’t a joke.” I’m talking to no one, to the air.
I thought this was another attempt at an apology—it’s not the first time he’s tried—but it wasn’t. This was no apology. This was a goodbye.
Thirty-One
It’s been weeks since Icalled Harper.
And here I am again, dialing a dead girl from my front porch. Any other night, my mom might make a haphazard plea for me to come inside and go to sleep. Paige might quip about sasquatches that come out in the dark.
But Mom is asleep on the couch, where she’s slept the last two nights. Like she’s waiting for Jasper to wander in the door and she wants to be the first thing he sees. Paige left a few hours ago and hasn’t come back. Maybe to check on the store, which has remained closed since Jasper’s been gone, or maybe to escape the cloud of sadness that has dropped over the house. And my dad is at the one motel in town, vowing to stay until we find Jasper.
