Page 51 of A Summer to Save Us

“Damn it—” “Leave her out of this! What did Chester...”

It’s as quiet as a mouse for a while. The wind blows harshly, and I think River has hung up when I hear him suck in a sharp breath.

“Don’t you dare!” It’s a growl of horror and blind anger. “How could you... Don’t give me a fucking ultimatum, got it?” he shouts so loudly I step back. I hear a pop, and I think he kicked something I can’t see.

“Dammit, Davidson! Have you thought about what that means?”

“I swore it. And I promised June something. Don’t you dare!” Now he sounds so desperate that my heart sinks.

His ragged breath breaks in the night air. “She is fine. Sammy. Please !” The last is a plea. “Sammy! Listen to me! No... you listen to me!”

“What? Kansas should... why was she upset? Did she write to Chester?”

“That’s bullshit!”

Did Chester claim he was in contact with me? Tense, I hold my breath. The wind continues to roar across the dry earth. A monotonous whoosh. Again and again.

“You’re sorry?” I finally hear River ask in disbelief.

His harsh laugh cuts through the desert night.

He must be standing just around the corner; I can literally feel his concentrated anger on my skin.

“Are you still on it?” An ominous silence hangs in the air for several seconds, and then there are noises as if he was tapping his display with his nails. “Answer me! Answer me, you coward!”

Apparently, the person he’s talking to doesn’t comply. River redials—maybe a different number, maybe the same one.

I should leave. I’ve heard too much, and if he comes around the corner, he’ll catch me.

I turn when I hear him shout angrily, “You miserable coward! I’m sorry too! You have no idea how sorry I am!” He hurls a curse across the barren land, and the old wood creaks under his feet.

Damn! I step back carefully, hoping he doesn’t hear the rustling of the comforter.

“Kansas!”

His voice sinks into the darkness, and a silence surrounds me that is so thick you could cut it into slices.

As if in slow motion, I turn to him. His face is chalky white, his blue eyes as deep as the unfathomable trenches of the sea.

“You’re spying on me,” he says coldly.

My throat constricts. I had a nightmare and wanted to find you... I can’t get it out—not a single word, not when he’s looking at me so sternly.

He comes toward me. “What did you hear?”

I pull the blanket, which drags on the floor like a too-long dress, tighter around my body.

“What did you hear? Tell me, damn it!”

I can’t. Please, I can’t. I back away, step by step. He obviously notices that he’s scaring me because he stops.

I shake my head again and again. I want to know what’s going on. I can’t take it any longer.

“T-Tan...” I stutter, hating it. My throat wants to push the word back, but I fight it. “Tan-Tanner.”

If it’s even possible, his face pales even more.

My heart thuds dully in my chest. “Ev-Everyone says you’re s-sick.” The roof of my mouth numbs, leaving it feeling like I’ve had anesthesia at the dentist.

“Who says that?” He looks at me with angry eyes. “Chester? My dad?” He laughs emotionlessly.

I want to cry because it’s so difficult for me to talk, and I can’t stand this between us anymore.

“Of course they say that. But they don’t know anything about me. They no longer know me. They haven’t seen me in years. They don’t know what I’ve done these last few years.”

With trembling fingers, I fish my phone out of the pocket of my shirt and accidentally drop the blanket.

What are your friends sorry about? What shouldn’t they do? I write.

“That doesn’t concern you. You weren’t supposed to hear that!”

I pick the blanket up. I can’t stand these secrets between us any longer. Are you sick, Riv? I write.

“No!” He juts out his chin grimly. “I’m not sick.”

Your brother says you were in the hospital for some time.

He looks at me challengingly. “Why are you in contact with Ches? I thought you hated him? I thought he was telling lies about you and you went to Old Sheriff because of him? What’s going on?

” His voice is too loud; it pushes me against the wooden wall.

It demands too much. I tightly press the blanket against me, and he hits one of the wooden beams that run along the porch with both fists. “Fucking shit!”

I stand there completely petrified, hardly daring to breathe.

“Kansas,” he whispers, suddenly frightened.

I grasp the blanket firmly.

“What about Chester? Why were you in contact with him?” he asks, softer now.

My hands are shaking as I type: He sent me a video message that somehow self-deleted. I haven’t written to him at all. He does this a lot, sending me messages like that.

“Okay.” River nods several times, as if reassuring himself of the truth in my words.

He steps toward me and stretches out his hand.

“Don’t be afraid of me. Never in front of me,” he says harshly.

“Chester told the truth. I was in a clinic for a long time. My friends must have told him that because he couldn’t know that on his own.

It was a while after June’s death. I was nineteen.

In the psychiatric ward, they pumped me full of medication and said I was depressed.

In general, not just in response to the June thing. ..”

“De-depressed...” I whisper in dismay. My dad was, too, after Mom left him. I think he still is.

“With depression comes a gloomy mood and a lack of drive.” River looks at me. “You feel empty. Everything is pointless.”

And is that true? Do you suffer from it? I feel terrible as I hold the words out to him.

“No!”

But you slept for so long and then not at all. Isn’t this a lack of drive?

“Depression has different levels of severity, Kansas. Maybe I had mild form, maybe not. All I know is that I don’t want to take the medication anymore. Never again.”

Medication? I think about the pills on the sink.

“Lithium and such. I hate it. I can’t think when I take that stuff.”

They’re making a zombie out of me , I recall his words.

“They cloud your mind and close everything down. I feel like all my emotions are buried under tons of soil. And I have to feel, you know? I’m a musician; that’s all I am. I. Must. Feel. Something. Kurt Cobain said, ‘Thank you for the tragedy. I need it for my art.’ You’ve heard of it?”

No . Maybe River felt like I felt the last few days at Kensington. As if everything was infinitely far away and yet so cruel.

For a moment, I think of Mrs. Elliott and her aphorisms about the meaning of life. There was also a quote by Kurt Cobain —something about punk rock. I type something and hold it out to him.

“What is the meaning of life?” River laughs as he reads the question aloud.

“I have no idea.” He lights a cigarette and inhales the smoke so deeply, it seems to disappear into him.

As he speaks, he breathes it out again. “Maybe it doesn’t exist, and maybe God is merely a rapping madman who sings the wrong song. ”

Seriously?

“I loved someone and lost someone. What do you think the meaning of life is?”

Until I met you, my meaning was to avoid pain.

He gently touches my cheek with his fingertips. “I’m sorry, baby.”

For a moment, I enjoy the shiver that comes over my skin with the word baby and his fingers.

He lets go of me. “What is it now?”

I don’t know. You and kissing, maybe?

“Me and kissing. Well, well.” He smiles, which makes his eyes sparkle.

“A lot of people believe that the meaning of life is love. But let me tell you something. Life is like people. It hates you, it betrays you, it fucks you, and then it loves you again. Maybe life is a party that you end up at by chance. One goes earlier, another later, one drinks and the other is completely sober. In the end, it might just come down to who had the most fun!”

Now I have to smile even though his words make me think. A party—that’s so like him.

”Tucks, life and its meaning are as difficult to understand as psychopaths... Me and kissing, huh?”

Are you depressed now or not?

“Me and kissing?”

River!!!!!!

His teasing smile fades.

Are you currently on medication? Were those the pills on the sink?

“I haven’t taken anything. I thought about it last night, yes. There is a remedy that works quickly for depression, but I solve it differently.”

We both know how. Damn. My stomach clenches, but he smiles at me, and that smile completely confuses my concern and my love.

“Tucks, I’ve got this under control. Okay, sometimes I’m useless. But sometimes, I can work all night long, write songs, play guitar, and do something else. I love it. It’s not sick; it’s brilliant.”

Are you sick or not?

“Not so sick that I need treatment. Yes, of course, everyone seems to think so, but look at me. Do I seem to you like I belong in a psych ward?” He raises both hands to his sides and turns around.

The self-confident smile on his lips is Hollywood-like and sexy as hell.

He’s driving me completely crazy, and I’m afraid he knows it.

No . I shake my head. Do you hear voices?

“That’s what they asked at the hospital, too. Tucks, never answer yes to that. If you answer yes, you end up on the lockup list with a diagnosis of schizophrenia and for a very long time.” He looks at me, grinning crookedly. “No, I don’t hear any voices, not even yours.”

I punch him in the shoulder, but he catches my hand and kisses my knuckles. “I am okay. We’re going to Vegas now, and you’re going to see your mom.”

I look past him. I don’t want to go to my mom. I don’t even know if I can make a sound in front of her. I’d much rather find out what’s going on with River and if he’s telling the truth. I want him to be healthy. I want to be with him forever.

Could we even have a future if he is sick? I never thought further than the end of summer.

“Hey, Tucks... look at me. What’s up?”

“Riv.” The word bursts from my lips, foreign and rough.

I can’t say anything more, so I wrap my arms around him and bury my face in his shirt, breathing in his wonderful smell.

I never want to part from him again, no matter what that means for now and what it means for the future.

Even if I have to flee with him through all fifty states so that his father, Chester, and his friends don’t find him.

I reluctantly break away from him. I tug at his shirt like a child. “Riv,” I whisper.

“What?” he whispers back, his tone suddenly sounding dark and tempting.

Is that all, or is there something else you’re not telling me?

He takes the cell phone from me. Okay, there’s one more thing. I told you my dad wanted to have me committed.

I nod. It’s calming when he types.

I admitted myself at the end of May. And you can leave anytime when you admit yourself.

I didn’t know that.

Few people do.

We look at each other.

And are you really okay?

He nods.

They certainly wouldn’t have let him go if he’d been a danger to himself or others.

Why don’t you tell your dad all this, like you told me?

“My father has connections and is powerful. He’s the Medical Director at Rose Garden. I’m afraid he knows a lot of doctors who would keep me there for him, even without good reason.”

That’s cruel. How could he do such a thing?

“Clark Davenport only cares about his reputation, nothing more. Satisfied now?”

I nod, and he pulls me into his arms.

“Me and kissing?” he whispers in my ear, and I feel his warm breath in the cool of the night.

Goosebumps run down my spine, and when he kisses me, he picks me up and carries me into the warmth.

I’m the happiest girl in all of Nevada. This is River McFarley, my rescuer, and if we want, the whole world is ours.

We can also be life companions instead of death companions.

I just know that.