Page 112 of Poison Wood

“My mom.”

“I’m sorry,” he says.

I’ve heard those words dozens of times over the years when people find out about my mom, but there’s something about the way he says it that tugs at my heart differently. Like he found the part I usually keep hidden.

I bite my lip. He opens his arm out for me, and I take the invitation.

Poison Wood Therapeutic Academy for Girls

Kisatchie National Forest

November 27, 2002

Jasmine

Dear Diary,

I know they’ve labeled me the bad one. The troubled one.

If they only knew.

I have to get the hell out of here. But I need a phone number first. I have to tell someone what’s going on.

I hope she doesn’t kill me.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Riverbend, Louisiana

Monday, February 18, 2019

7:14 a.m. CST

Pink light comes through the windows of my room. I roll over and check the time on my phone. I haven’t slept this late in months. Grant stirs next to me, still in his rumpled pants and dress shirt. We talked until we both fell asleep.

What is this guy doing to me? I want to tell myself he’s just for fun. But I know what that feels like, and it’s not what I’m starting to feel about him.

I scroll through the fourteen text messages I have in a group thread with Kat and Summer. They’ve seen the news about Crowley, and Kat said Summer’s mom and Kat’s father are meeting them in Natchitoches. Seems the pull of that school is reaching farther than just Riverbend. I text back that I’m planning on heading there, too, and that we could set up a place to get together once I was there.

Grant opens his eyes. “Morning.”

I roll onto my side and face him. “Morning.”

“Why doesn’t this feel awkward?” he says with a smile.

I laugh. “I kind of wish it did. It’d be easier to kick you out of my bed.”

He reaches over and tucks a stray hair behind my ear. “The easy things aren’t necessarily the right things.”

“Nothing about this trip home has been easy,” I say. “But nothing about it feels right either.”

“Hey,” he says, pointing to himself.

“Okay, maybe one thing feels right.”

He sighs. “I need to get going.” He sits up. “I really hope your dad is in the kitchen again when I walk out in my rumpled suit.”

“Yeah,” I say, laughing. “This could be fun.”