Page 22

Rhodes

T he sound of glass being placed on a wooden surface near my head roused me from sleep, though not all the way.

I ended up in some strange limbo haze where my brain was inching itself back towards consciousness while my body remained unmoving, out of my reach.

I thought I managed to twitch a finger, but I could have been wrong.

My ears, however, were working well enough that I could pick out the voices and the vague sense of words that gradually came into focus.

The voices I deduced belonged to Mikey and Dakota, but it took a moment for me to understand what they were saying.

A few words trickled through the hazy fog.

Words like police , Chance , missing , and Blake .

It wasn’t difficult to figure out the topic that had worked them into a tizzy.

Well, Mikey, at least, sounded calm, like he was trying to soothe Dakota while she spiralled into a panic.

Her voice was high-pitched and harried, anxiety choking off most of her words.

She was afraid. Mikey was trying to reassure her, but she wasn't listening. She seemed to be in such a state of distress that she couldn't physically listen.

‘Kota, you don’t have to go anywhere you don’t want to. You never have to go back to him. I swear, if that’s what you choose, you won’t be left out in the dark,’ Mikey pleaded with her in a soft, yet urgent tone.

‘He’s going to kill me like he killed her. And even if he doesn’t, he’s not the only monster after me. I’m not going to survive this. I’m going to die. Oh, god, I’m going to die.’

Her hysteria finally drew me the rest of the way out of unconsciousness, my eyes blinking open blearily. I could move now, but it was slow. Sluggish. It took more effort than it should have just to sit up.

I glanced over to see that a fresh glass of water had been placed on my bedside cabinet, ice floating at the top and condensation turning the sides opaque.

I watched as a drop accumulated on the side and slid down, its pace slow and leisurely.

I was jealous. My pace may have been slow, but it was anything but leisurely.

Dakota’s voice climbed even higher, and nothing Mikey was doing to try to help was working.

They were just outside my door, which was still open a crack, just enough for me to see the way Mikey was embracing Dakota, like he could physically hold all her broken pieces together before they could fall off completely.

I was panting by the time my feet hit the floor.

The effort it then took to stand almost knocked me right back out again, but I staved off the wooziness with sheer force of will.

I stuffed my feet into my slippers and shuffled painfully over to the door.

When I reached it, I wanted to smack my forehead when I realised I hadn’t taken a sip of the water before making this journey.

My breaths were heaving, my throat was dry and raw, and it felt swollen as I swallowed the small amount of spit in my mouth in a feeble attempt to create some lubrication.

All it did was cut off my lungs for far too long, my entire neck aching after the effort.

Swallowing had become harder and harder as of late, the action more like my throat was closing up than pushing sustenance down, my tongue sitting heavy in my mouth like it was the first part of me to have died, and I was losing the will to keep trying.

When I finally succeeded in swinging the door open after a few failed attempts of my hand not grasping the handle properly, I was able to take in the full scene before me.

Dakota was on her knees, her face twisted into a forlorn expression with wide, wild eyes darting in every direction like she was waiting for something to jump out of the shadows to devour her whole.

Her hands were tangled in her short, red hair, and they yanked at the strands so harshly I feared she would tear her scalp from her skull.

Mikey had positioned himself beside her, with no sign of his usual timidness as he kept his arms wrapped securely around her.

He was whispering soothing nothings into her ear as he rocked them back and forth, and it was such a powerfully intimate scene that I felt like I was intruding just by standing here.

They looked like a couple. Albeit where one was drowning and the other was her life raft, keeping her afloat, but a couple all the same.

I decided it was best if I left them to it.

There wasn’t anything I could do anyway.

Not when I was about to collapse any second now with my legs struggling to hold up my weight, but more than that, I didn’t know them well enough to insert myself between them.

I had only met Dakota a few times, and none of them were particularly happy scenarios.

Her entire life was falling apart in the worst way, and I was nothing more than a stranger who had somehow gotten stuck in the middle.

So, I inched the door closed to give them a sense of privacy, glad that neither had seemed to notice me, and shuffled back to bed and the glass of cool water awaiting me.

My energy today was so depleted that I had nothing left to give after sipping at the water and tucking myself back in under the covers. As soon as I was horizontal, my eyes closed and sleep dragged me under once again.

∞∞∞

The next time I came to, the sun was setting, and I wasn’t alone. There was another body in the bedroom with me, one that was more familiar to me than any of the guests I had inadvertently taken in.

His back straightened when he saw me move, his large, broody frame rising from the chair in the corner to perch at the edge of my mattress.

‘How are you feeling?’ Davey asked, concern lowering his gruff voice even further than usual.

I groaned, the sound weak and pathetic even to my own ears. ‘I’ve been better,’ I joked half-heartedly.

He grunted, unimpressed.

I huffed a shallow sigh. ‘Help me sit up?’

He did so without a word, hooking his hands beneath my arms and hauling me up.

He steadied me with one hand while the other adjusted the pillows, fluffing them and stacking them to ensure I was comfortable.

It wasn’t the first time Davey had taken care of me like this.

He had been my parents’ best friend and had been there for me throughout all of my cancer phases since I was a kid.

When my parents got sick, he stepped up when they could no longer help me.

He helped me take care of them before both of us no longer had the capacity to care for them and ourselves.

He had his family to take care of, and once I had made the decision to place them in a care home, I had ushered him back to where he truly needed to be.

I didn’t want to be a burden anymore. He deserved freedom from watching me constantly fade away, then bounce back, only to go through it all again.

It wasn’t fair to him, which was one of the reasons I had chosen not to undergo treatment this time.

I could have fought for more time, but there was no chance of getting better. I was going to die, and I was ready.

And I kind of hoped Kali and Chance would be there to greet me when I passed over. I liked the idea that I had people waiting for me, that I wouldn’t be alone. That I wouldn’t have to push people away anymore to keep from hurting them when I inevitably died.

People like Davey, who was watching me with a sheen in his eyes I knew he would deny if I brought attention to it.

‘Better?’ he asked, and both of us ignored the way his voice cracked.

I hummed my confirmation, but the sound was small, like a breath more than a voice.

‘I’ll get you another glass of water,’ he said after the silence between us ran on a little too long.

Normally, I would have broken it with a joke, but I no longer had the energy even for that.

My body was giving out quicker than I thought it would.

When he left the room, I took the moment of solitude to feel sorry for myself.

I had missed my short window of opportunity to do the things I loved the most one more time, and now I was going to be stuck in bed until my rapidly decaying body finally let my soul free.

When he returned, he settled back on the edge of the bed and, rather than pass the glass to me, he manoeuvred a straw in front of my mouth.

I wrapped my lips around it and sucked only enough for a trickle to enter my mouth.

I swallowed it down and rested my head back against the headboard, gulping painfully.

‘You need more,’ he said, but I shook my head.

‘I’m good.’

‘Just one more sip, okay?’

I didn’t argue. I let him put the straw back up to my lips and sucked a little bit more.

The chill was nice. Refreshing. And over to quick when my mouth heated it up in an instant.

Still, I swallowed, then took another sip when he wiggled the straw in front of me one more time.

Eventually, though he wasn’t satisfied with the piddling amount I had managed to suck down, he gave up and placed the glass on the bedside cabinet.

I could reach it if I tried, but my arms felt too heavy to move.

‘How’s the business?’ I dredged up enough energy to ask.

‘Fine. Same as always.’

The corner of my mouth twitched in the memory of a grin. ‘Don’t need my pretty smile to bring in the customers, huh?’

He snorted, the sound loud and unattractive enough that I coughed out a short laugh. ‘The show goes on, kid.’

I didn’t want the silence to extend the way it had before, so I asked him about his family.

I was genuinely interested in the answer, but I had never been one to sit in awkward silence.

My role had always been to fill the quiet with noise.

If there was sound, there was life, and I breathed all of it in as much as I could.

My entire life had been filled with small moments that, to me, were big.

Children’s laughter at a playground might have been background noise to others, but it was a reminder to me that though I would never have that for myself, others were lucky to experience the extension of life and the joy of building a family.

The sun rising on a Monday morning might have filled others with dread, but for me, it was another day to live to the fullest, to experience all that life had to offer. I never took a moment for granted.

I listened with rapt attention as Davey regaled me with stories of his daughters, his wife, and the life they led.

He told me about their dog, Perry, and how he had peed all over the neighbour’s flowers again, setting off yet another neighbour war that he took great pleasure in despite the animosity it wrought.

I listened to him talk about his wife, Gina, and the countless hobbies she was picking up that drained their bank accounts, but I could see in the way his eyes crinkled in the corners that he didn’t mind, because his wife was happy.

His gruff voice was relaxing in its familiarity.

Davey wasn’t one to talk much, but when he did, it was always something worth listening to.

I was one of the very few people he was so open with, and I took comfort in the fact that his life would go on just fine without me.

He would have the campsite to keep him afloat.

He had his family to keep him on his toes.

He had his daughter’s lives to look forward to as they grew into women and started families and careers of their own.

Yeah. He was here because he cared, but he didn’t need me, and that gave me peace.

His growly cadence lulled me to sleep, and I drifted off again with acceptance of my fate.