Every day for six months you went to him. You sat on that rough pavement, even in the summer when it burned the backs of your thighs. You stayed still. No moving. No talking. Only waiting. You told me he needed time to get used to you. To learn to trust you.
Six months, you sat there and I sat beside you.
Not for the cat. I didn’t care about him.
I wanted to be near you.
Then, one day, that stupid cat came over and sniffed your knee. A few days later he bumped his head against your thigh. A month after that, you picked him up and carried him home. You named him Marmalade. He slept with you every night, curled against your chest, even though the doctors warned it was a bad idea.
I thought he was such a dumb cat, but it turned out he was the smartest creature around.
Now I can’t stop thinking about him.
Wondering if people can be tamed like that too. Or if some of them are born feral and stay that way.
Marmalade needed patience. You know I’ve never been good at that.
I’ll go with pressure.
God. I miss you so damn much.
Love always,
Becky
P.S. Marmalade still sleeps on your pillow. He’s waiting for you to come back. Stupid cat.
P.S.S. I was going over my notes last night. All my files and I noticed it again. All those frat boys, the ones who live at Ashford House, their names all end with -son. Carrson, Thomson, Jackson, Michealson, Steveson.
You get the point. That’s notnormal, right?
At first I thought it was legacy names passed down through rich Southern families or something. Like they recycle the same names over and over again. But now I’m not so sure…
Chapter five
Dirt
Becky
I get to the clearing before Carrson the next day.
Perfect.
The air carries that late-November bite to it. I feel it in my teeth when I inhale. The trees are mostly bare, their branches thin and skeletal, the last few leaves clinging like they don’t know they’realready dead.
I set everything up like I belong there. Books. Paper. Pencils. Water bottle. My blanket barely softens the ground, it’s a thin layer over cold, packed earth and brittle leaves that crunch when I move. My headphones hang around my neck, music spilling faintly from them at full volume.
Curious, I wander over to the tree, the knives still buried deep in the trunk. I work each one loose, the wood resisting before finally giving with a rough pull. They’re heavier than I expected, the handles worn smooth from use, the blades sharp enough that when I test one lightly against my thumb a thin line of blood forms, stinging in the cold air.
I adjust my grip, trying to balance the hilt the way I saw Carrson do yesterday, then pull back and throw, watching the knife fall short and sink uselessly into the dirt.Hmm. I grab another and release sooner this time, but it only hits the trunk with a dull thud before bouncing off and landing at my feet. I groan. Carrson makes this look effortless, but it isn’t. I try again. And again. Ten throws before one finally sticks, barely.
A quick check of my watch shows he should be here soon. I replace the knives, angling them deep into the wood the same way he did. I’m about to turn away when a slow smile spreads across my face. Seconds later, the knives sit a few inches away from where he left them, blades tilted up instead of down.
It’s subtle. Wrong enough that he’ll notice.
Still smiling, I retreat to my blanket and settle in, book open in my hands, body loose, relaxed, like I’ve been here the whole time.
Time drags. The cold seeps in slowly, settling into my fingers first, stiffening them before creeping up my arms in a dull, steady ache. I force myself not to check the tree line. If he’s there, I want him to think I haven’t noticed.
