Page 10 of Into the Deep Blue
A coffee grinder whirrs from inside the house, and it’s loud enough to wake the dead, but Nick is still fast asleep. His leg dangles from the porch swing, his head is horribly contorted, and his nose all black and blue.
My body is a fantastic cocktail of sleep deprivation combined with a slight hangover. The swing was beyond uncomfortable. The cushions fell off overnight and are scattered across the porch, and Nick’s gross shirt is covered in ants. My back is throbbing as I peel myself from the swing. I watch him sleep for another minute before shaking his leg until his eyes flutter open.
“I’m going,”
I whisper.
He rubs his eyes. Cupboards slam from inside. I’m guessing Brooklyn is still learning her way around the kitchen.
“What? No . . . stay.”
“No, I need a bed. I need my bed. I’m so tired.”
“Come on. Don’t make me small talk with Brooklyn,” he moans.
“You’ll be fine. You’re good at small talk.”
I pat his shoulder as I make my way to the stairs.
Thankfully, I left my bag in my car, and the keys are inside, so I can escape without having to see his dad again.
Nick follows me down the driveway. In the morning light, I get a good look at my bumper. It’s dented, all right. Great.
Nick takes it in and squeezes my shoulder.
“Now it has character.”
I eye him.
“Kind of like your face.”
The bruising is so much worse this morning, spreading under his eyes. Yesterday was an accident, but I still feel terrible. I cup his cheek in my hand, and he presses deeper into it. Even with the bruises, his blue eyes shine.
“I’ll be fine,”
he says softly.
“Put some ice on it.”
He keeps his eyes on mine. I swallow and slide my hand away.
“It’s not that bad,”
he says, checking out the bumper again.
“Think of it as a keepsake to remember last night.”
When I open my door, I swear there’s a gamey smell.
“I don’t want to remember the wolf.”
I quickly get in and hit the buttons to roll down the windows.
Nick reaches up in a stretch and yawns, which makes me yawn, too.
“Don’t fall asleep. Text me when you get home okay?”
“I will.”
He stays in the driveway as I pull out, probably thinking of a way to get inside without being seen.
My car feels like the Ritz after last night. I turn up the radio, hoping it will be the fuel I need to keep me awake for the drive home.
The trees along the side road glisten with morning dew. Everything looks animé, all the colors supersaturated. Once I reach the stretch of road where I hit the wolf, I slow down, searching for any sign of it, but there is none—no fur on the road, no bloodstains, no trace of it anywhere. It’s like it vanished. A town worker must have removed it. The rational part of me knows this, but maybe that wolf is running through these trees, bathed in the glow of morning light, healed and alive. The Nick part of me wants to believe—to cling to the hope that some kind of magic still exists in this world.
***
The house is empty. I throw my keys on the console by the door and find a plate of banana muffins on the kitchen table, with Mom’s Martha Stewart cookbook beside them. She never used it. I guess Dad’s moved from reading fiction to cookbooks now. My eyes are already closing on my way up the stairs. I need to steal a few hours of sleep just so I can function. When I’m in bed, I text Nick.
Home
So tired
Sleep now no wolf
Nick: ?? night
He answered. I thought for sure he’d be sleeping. I type out a quick reply:
Night
love you
I drop the phone on my nightstand, and my face hits the pillow.
My eyes spring open.
WHAT? Tell me that didn’t just happen. I grab my phone and stare at the text. It’s there, all right.
Night
love you
The text echoes a million times in my head.
“Love you?!”
I shout across the room. Oh. No. Nononono. What did I do? It was a reflex. Something I text to Dad or May but not to Nick. Never to Nick. It doesn’t mean anything, I want to scream. The words magnify the longer I look at them. Unsend. Of course! I can unsend, but it’s too late. The message shows as ‘read.’ I wait and wait . . . and nothing happens. No three dots dance across my screen. He isn’t replying.
This isn’t happening.
I text:
haha now you know I’m tired
And delete it. Then I press on an emoji laughing face and delete that, too. Texting anything will only make it worse. Don’t make it worse, .
He must have clicked off his phone or fallen asleep in the twenty seconds since his last reply. I roll my eyes. There’s no way he’s sleeping, so I die a thousand deaths staring at this text, wishing I could suck it out of cyberspace.
But it’s okay, it’s just Nick. This isn’t a big deal. I push my phone to the far end of my nightstand as if it’s toxic. My head sinks into my pillow, but my eyes are still open wide.
Because this could be a huge deal. This could ruin everything.