Page 80 of Came the Closest
Cheyenne is quiet, but I don’t think it has to do with what I just said.
“Fini?” I squeeze her hip. “Everything okay?”
“Everything’s fine,” she says quickly. Too quickly. “It’s just…”
“Cheyenne, if you tell me I have toilet paper sticking out of my—”
“Milo told me Indi was in a coma.”
The words are quiet, intended only for my ears. But based on how I rear back, you’d have thought she said it through a megaphone. That she’d broadcast the words over a live radio station or shouted them from the rooftop of the Empire State Building.
Maybe she should have. Then I wouldn’t be the only one on this dance floor trying to process them.
“What?” It’s all that can make it through my pulsing thoughts.
Ones like Indi was in a coma? and Did I know this? and Indi was in a coma? Funny how simultaneously blank and crowded your mind feels after hearing something life-altering like that.
Cheyenne steadies me with a gentle hand on my chest. “I don’t know more than you do, Colt. Milo and I were talking about last night when he asked if I had a daddy. I was trying to figure out how to explain a coma to a four-year-old when…he already knew.”
“Because Indi was in one,” I say lamely.
“Because Indi was in one,” she confirms. Then, after a beat, adds, “According to Milo.”
Read: according to a four-year-old who could easily have misunderstood a “food coma” joke as the real thing. That doesn’t ease the tension knotting itself right back up in my gut.
“I’ll talk to her,” I say.
Right now, I add silently. I look over Cheyenne’s head to find my sister. She passed Milo off to Hazel and is dancing stiffly with Grayson Adair. He’s saying something to her, and she’s pointedly ignoring him.
The warning bells are now impossible to ignore.
“Colton, wait.” Cheyenne holds me still, her hands on my biceps and her gaze unwavering. “Not tonight. I—”
“Yes, tonight,” I say, sharper than intended. “If she was—”
“Let me talk to her, Colton,” Cheyenne pleads gently. “Tonight is not the time, but I think it’ll be easier if she doesn’t think you’re going to take what she has to say straight to your brothers or dad.”
Celine Dion fades into Billy Joel, and my emotions spiral. “Cheyenne, this isn’t just some little scratch my sister got on her knee when she was four. You realize that, right? If Indi was truly in…” I shake my head. I can’t finish the thought. “I need to talk to her.”
“I know,” she says softly. “But can you just trust me? Please?”
Instantly, my flight-or-fight instinct dies.
Bodies push us closer as more couples edge onto the packed dance floor, but all I hear is her plea.
Trust me.
Trust me.
Trust me.
Trust doesn’t come naturally to me. Not after my mother bouncing in and out of my life and my father prioritizing work over my brothers and me. Jordan’s right—I did choose a sport where my fate only depended on eight seconds. I don’t want the possibility of losing to be drawn out.
But right now, looking into the deep blue eyes of my best friend, I dig deep for that Running Scared box inside, and I do it. I relabel it. I try scared.
I lean down, my voice a low rumble near her ear that lifts goosebumps on her skin. “I will always trust you, Fini.”
Chapter Twenty-Five