“But she’s already checked out of her hotel and doesn’t have anywhere to stay.”
What kind of bullshit ride did Jill take my niece on? “Then she can check right back into her hotel. It ain’t rocket science.” I jerk open the sliding glass door, and it sticks. Dammit. “And you’re not even leaving ’til the week after next so that makes no sense.” My thigh tightens in protest when I bend to see what’s wrong with the damn door.
“I’m leaving today!”
I turn sharply in my crouch, and my leg seizes, sending a jolt of pain across my thigh and up to my hip. I clench my teeth. “No. You’re on break this whole next week, and then there’s Thanksgiving after that.”
She reaches around me for the handle and slowly closes the door before pulling it open again with ease. “You gotta do it slow or it sticks.”
I stare at the door from my position on the ground and then stand carefully, giving my leg a minute to orient itself and stop cramping.
“I’m leaving today, Milo. My roommate and her mom are doing a college tour before the trimester starts, and they invited me to come along.”
My brows snap together. “You don’t even know these people. I’m not letting you go on a trip with some random strangers only to find your body chopped up in someone’s basement ten years from now. And that’s final!” Shit. This is even worse than “because I said so.”
“I’m starting to side with Jill about your attitude,” Felicity snipes back.
Oh, hell. This is just perfect.
“I’m not stupid, Milo. I’ve been online friends with Carmen for two years, and her mom is not a serial killer. She’s a special ed teacher. Real scary. And before you continue with the creepy dismemberment scenarios, Ted already did a background check on her, and it’s squeaky clean.”
I’m going to kill Ted.
I grasp for straws, not even sure why I’m trying to prevent her from doing something she’d otherwise probably never have the chance to do. I suspect I won’t like what I find when I examine it later. “There’s no way Sherry will let you go.”
“She already said I could.”
Dammit. I’m batting zero today.
I take a few long, slow breaths and finally manage to get over myself. “All right. I just… I just wish you had told me.”
“I’m sorry.” Her anger has calmed as well. “I was going to tell you when I told you about Jill, but I didn’t really expect a bomb to detonate in the kitchen like that.”
“Well, at least I never signed a lease agreement.” I huff out a mirthless laugh. “That’s something.”
Felicity doesn’t respond, and when I glance over again, one of her eyes is squeezed shut and the grimace is back. “Um, about that.”
It’s safe to say I’ve learned my lesson and won’t be signing anything ever again without reading it first. This could have easily blown up in my face.
If I weren’t so pissed, I’d be impressed at the skill level in Felicity’s whole cloak-and-dagger scheme here. Last night, while my attention was caught on the fourth quarter of the Panthers game, she dropped a small stack of papers in front of me saying she needed a couple signatures for some art contest. I remember glancing at the first page and seeing her school’s letterhead, but I admit I didn’t read past that before signing my name a couple times. In my defense, however, the Panthers were down by only two points and had just regained possession of the ball with fifty-four seconds to go.
But, so what, really. It’s not like Jill is going to come back here with a signed contract and demand I let her stay in my tiny guest room. Besides its lack of turn-down service, I doubt she wants to go to jail for homicide any more than I do.
And being upset with Felicity is worthless anyway. The kid was trying to help, as usual. She just has a ways to go on technique. After we had it out on the deck, I ended up spending the next four hours driving to and from Chapel Hill to meet up with Carmen and her mom. It saved Felicity the bus money and allowed me to check out this so-called special ed supermom for myself. Turns out she also teaches Sunday school and went to Yale. My fucking bad.
So, with Felicity on her whirlwind college tour and nothing on TV until tonight, the house is eerily quiet. Even the wind and the meddlesome seagulls have chosen to lay low for the afternoon.
I pop the top on a beer, more out of habit than thirst, and sit my ass on the couch where I focus on the empty beach out my window. I have a task to do—one that’s been an overweight monkey hitching a piggyback ride for some time now—and I’ve put it off for as long as possible.
I don’t know if it’s my past catching up with me or Felicity leaving, but I’m finally ready to admit I’m out of excuses. So I pick up my phone and dial the number from memory.
“Coastal Adventures Dive School, this is Luke speaking.”
I clear my throat as quietly as possible and seal my fate. “Hey Luke, this is Milo Papatonis. Is Leah in?”
Too late to turn back now.
Chapter Seven
MILO
Twelve Years Earlier
May 10th: “Mobility shouldn’t be too much of a problem. Most of the nerve damage was surface, thank goodness, but he’ll have significant scarring even with the skin grafts. And probably a slight limp if we’re lucky. The significant tissue loss to the thigh is our biggest concern. That and infection.” The disembodied voice is followed with a matching one a second later. This one sounds oddly like my dad, but that’s impossible. It’s Saturday, and he’s got back-to-back off-shore charter runs on Saturdays. I’m too tired to figure it out anyway. I’ll ask about it when I wake up.
May 11th: I blink but the light is too bright, so I close my eyes again. My entire head is muddy even though I know I’ve been sleeping for a while now. Damn, I told Bran to get rid of that shitty weed. I think it seriously fucked me up. Leah’s parents are going to kill me if I’m hungover on a Saturday in the busy season, and I can’t afford to lose this job. Just a little longer and then I’ll get up.
May 12th: Someone wakes me up with a chainsaw to my right thigh. This can’t be right. I hear screaming and it takes me a minute to realize it’s coming from me. Here are the voices again—and the sweet blackness.
May 18th: It’s been over a week since the accident, and every day has been a living hell. They say I’m lucky to be alive, but the pain makes me question it. I’ve only seen the worst wound—the one on my thigh—one time, but it weeps with pus and makes me want to vomit, so I keep my eyes averted when they change the dressings. My right half is covered in long lines of stitches and my fingers are still in splints. Bran says women love scars, so my fucked-up head should score me lots of chicks. I don’t care about girls, though. All I care about is the pain. And maybe Leah. She hasn’t come to visit, and I’m starting to think she never will. I need to ask Bran to replace my phone so she can reach me that way.
May 26th: I was discharged from the hospital today, and my mom cried. I missed graduation, so at least that’s something. My mom wants me to come home with her so she and Morris can take care of me, but I don’t want the attention. I just want everyone to leave me alone. I told her I needed to hear the ocean, so she didn’t fight too hard when I said I was staying with my dad at the beach house. He’s giving up his room on the first floor, something that tells me exactly how close to dying I came. Leah finally called and fired me. She kept it brief and clinical. Part of me wishes I had died anyway.