Lexy’s eyes shoot to mine.
“I was not!”
“Yes, you were! So much so that you hated Wendy,” Cas says.
I groan.
“I don’t know what any of this has to do with anything, but we need to go,” I tell a smiling Lexy, who somehow is avoiding my gaze.
I turn to my mom.
She’s watching me like she knows something I don’t. Or maybe like she knows something I refuse to admit. “Drive safe,” she says. But she’s still smiling, still looking between me and Lexy like she just solved a puzzle no one else could see.
Lexy says her goodbyes, thanking everyone again, and when she reaches the door, she pauses next to me. “Peter Pan fan?” she whispers.
I groan.
She smiles, and somehow that smile hits harder than anything Ethan just said.
CHAPTER 11
Alexis
The hospital walls are mint green. The doctor is talking to Mama. He looks pale, and I’m holding Mason’s little hand in mine as we both stare at them. I try to hear, but I can’t make out the words he’s saying to her. I don’t know what’s happening. One minute we were setting the table for dinner, waiting for Dad to come home. The next, police officers came to our door. Mama took both of us and put us in a car as we rushed to the hospital. Her hands trembled the whole way here. Now the doctor is talking to her… then she yells.
“No!” She shakes her head. The doctor looks grim. His eyes hold my mother’s, and I can finally make out his words.
“I’m sorry.”
“Noooo!” My mama’s cry fills the waiting room. Then she’s on her knees on the floor, and I still don’t understand. I look down at Mason, and suddenly I’m in a graveyard. Everyone is wearing black. A coffin is being lowered into the ground, dirt hitting the lid in dull, final thuds that echo somewhere deep inside me.
No…
I know this.
I know this.
The knowing settles slowly, heavily, like something breaking open inside my chest, like my body understands before my mind can catch up.
Daddy!
I scream and wake up. Marvel, curled up on my side, is staring up at me, eyes questioning.
“It’s okay, buddy. Just a bad dream.” I smile at him. His little head tilts to the side as if to say, I don’t buy it.
“Go back to sleep.” I kiss his little head, and he starts to purr, drifting off.
Every year, every single year on my father’s death anniversary, I have this dream. Every year, this day is the hardest, most painful day. I get up and look at the clock. Two thirty in the morning. I sigh. I already know I won’t be able to sleep now, so I make my way to the kitchen. The apartment is quiet, and Dex’s bedroom door is closed as I walk by. Good. I don’t want to wake him up.
I put on the kettle and make my way over to the couch. Two minutes go by, and I hear Dex’s door open. I look behind me, and he’s standing there, wearing only pajama pants, his hair in disarray. You’d think that made a person look bad, but not him. He looks… well, handsome. My eyes follow his tattoos to his abs, and I mentally slap myself out of it.
“Can’t sleep?” He walks over to me, his muscles making the tattoos on his skin shift as he runs a hand through his hair.
“I’m sorry I woke you up,” I say as I get up and walk over to the kettle.
“Are you okay?” he asks as he takes a seat at the kitchen island.
“Yeah, I’m okay.” I shrug.
