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7

My phone alarmwoke me up at five-thirty, still in Elliot’s guest room, and I groaned. My hands still ached, I had a crick in my spine from the futon, and I hated sleeping in a cold bed that didn’t have Taavi in it. But Elliot had given me a stricken look at the end of the football game and asked if I’d stay, so I did.

At this rate, I was pretty sure Taavi wasn’t ever going to forgive me. Or have anything to do with me ever again. Fuck.

I am a terrible fucking boyfriend.

I was going to at least try not to be a terrible best friend at the same time, so I dragged my ass off the futon and into the hall bathroom so that I would be presentable at Gregory Crane’s funeral.

And then I felt worse because I had a momentary thrill at the thought that at least I’d see Taavi at the funeral.

The fuck iswrongwith me?

Other than the obvious.

I sighed, then dragged myself into the guest shower in the hall, using the generic shampoo and soap that had probably been there for a decade because Gregory didn’t have people who weren’t Elliot staying at his house very often. Henry maybe.

I’d see Henry at the funeral home in a few hours. I’d always liked Henry Lamotte. When Elliot and I were little, he’d come over and tell us the old Mamaceqtaw legends—origin stories, stories about Manabush and Thunderbird and Spirit Rock—while we ‘helped’ Gregory with the garden or Naomi soaking reeds or cleaning pine needles.

Henry had been a regular for football games, hanging out with Gregory and my dad, Elliot and me, yelling at the TV as though the players could hear him. I felt another surge of sadness, because that experience was forever changed.

I sighed heavily as I toweled my hair off, then brushed and braided it before going back to the guest room. I dressed in a pair of Elliot’s sweatpants and a t-shirt—both too short for me—because my suit for the funeral was at my parents’, and my own clothes desperately needed washing. Mom was going to bring the suit by with the shit she had to drop off for the reception, which was going to happen sometime around six-thirty before we left for the funeral home.

I checked my watch—almost six.

I had time to make coffee and get some food into Elliot before any of that happened.

When I made my way toward the kitchen, I could hear the shower running, which at least meant I didn’t have to wake him up. I’d have laid out quite a bit of money that he probably hadn’t slept much, if at all.

Part of me felt guilty for not keeping vigil with him, but he hadn’t asked me to, and I figured that if I was going to drive both of us, I should probably not be delusional from lack of sleep. It’s how I was justifying my four hours, anyway.

I headed to the kitchen and started the coffee, then leaned against the counter, waiting. Once it had brewed enough for a cup, I slowly sipped my over-sweetened coffee, trying to come up with… fucking anything. What to say to Elliot. What to say to Taavi. How the fuck I was going to make this up to Taavi. Possibly how to convince him not to dump my ass after having subjected him to this. How to thank my parents for essentially adopting him—although that was probably going to come back to bite me if Taavididdump my ass, because I had the feeling that if that happened, my mother would never forgive me.

I ran a hand over my braid, tugging sharply on the end to remind myself that this shit wasn’t actually about me at all, and I needed to grow the fuck up and start doing things to help other people. Namely, Elliot.

But also Gregory. Because on top of all the emotional shit, there was also the really big problem of Gregory Crane’s murder that the Shawano PD were ignoring and which I had to do something about.

“Fuck.”

“Yeah,” came Elliot’s voice as he rounded the corner into the kitchen. His hair was down, and he was carrying a pair of scissors, which he pushed towards me.

I raised an eyebrow in question.

“I need you to cut my hair.”

“You need me to what?”

“Cut my hair.”

“El, I can’t cut hair. We could—”

“It’s a sign of mourning, Val. I don’t give a fuck what it looks like.”

Oh. I swallowed around the rock in my throat. “How short?” I asked him, picking up the scissors.

“Just cut a bunch of it off.”

My hands were shaking. “This is not a good idea, El.”