Page 7 of A Sea of Unspoken Things
Dealing with things. Was that an implication that Ihadn’tbeen? But when I searched Amelia’s eyes for any sign of an accusation, I couldn’t find it.
“Sure.” I nodded.
Better Micah than me, I thought.
“Okay, then I’ll take care of it. And please remember, if there’s anything I can do to help while you’re here, you have my number.”
“Thanks.”
I was out the door before the word had even left my mouth, gulping the cold air down into my hot lungs. My hands shook as I pulled the car key from my pocket, my breath fogging in spurts as I tried to fit it in the lock. As soon as I was inside, the door slammed behind me and I set the bag on my lap, tearing the plastic open until I could touch the jacket inside. My fingers moved over the softened flannel, the image of Johnny flashing in my mind. The color was faded from its original rich blue and the snap buttons had lost most of their shine.
Johnny’s phone, a small ring of keys, and a money clip with his ID were secured inside a smaller sealed bag, and I set them on the passenger seat before I held the jacket up to me, lining up the shoulders with mine. There, inches below the collar, was the bullet hole torn through the fabric. In the exact spot where the pain had been throbbingfor months. It was surrounded by a dark bloodstain that looked black in the dim light.
I let the jacket fall onto my lap and brushed my thumb over the stiff flannel, thinking that the sight was reassuring, in a twisted kind of way. An anchor to the reality that Johnny was really, truly gone. But I went still when I felt something take shape beneath the heap of fabric. Something round. No, it had a cylinder shape.
I sniffed, unfolding the jacket until I found the inside pocket. The object inside made a weak laugh escape my lips. It was a roll of film.
My head tilted back, finding the headrest. I used to find rolls of film around the house all the time, collecting them in the fruit basket where they would live for months, until Johnny got around to developing them. If he did at all. He left them everywhere. In the cupholder of the 4Runner, tossed inside a boot, poised on the bathroom sink beside his toothbrush.
I slipped the canister back into the pocket and bundled the jacket onto the passenger seat. When I started the car, the headlights washed over the pavement, illuminating the fine mist that drifted through the air. The diner across the street was the only thing lit up downtown, aglow with the warm light inside.Six Rivers Dinerwas painted in an ochre yellow on the glass in an old style that was rubbed off at the edges. The window was slightly fogged with condensation, making the people inside look like moving smudges.
What Amelia had said about this town was still wedged beneath my skin. It was a skipping rock on the surface of my mind, taking me from one thought to the next.
I’d all but erased my life here after what happened—after what wedid—moving to San Francisco so I could disappear into the city’s eight hundred thousand people who didn’t know anything about me or this place. But it wasn’t just my secret, or my story. It was Johnny’s, too. That had always been true about everything.
Three
Micah Rhodes had always been an expert in the unspoken, and there was a time when I was one of only a few people who knew that language.
The bacon sizzled in the skillet as the coffee dripped, and I eyed the bowl of apples on the counter. He had gone to more trouble than he’d let on, filling the fridge with several days’ worth of groceries.
We’d never been good at talking about things.Thiswas the way he had always communicated with me. And as much as I used to hate it, as much as it stirred to life a hundred memories I wished I could forget, I couldn’t deny the fact that in some ways, it was just so much easier.
I tapped my phone screen for the tenth time, checking for a notification that he had texted. I wasn’t sure if I was hoping he would or wouldn’t. Through the years, there were times I was sure I never wanted to see him again and others when I’d had to force myself not to get in the car and drive back to Six Rivers. I was eternally pulled between two warring beliefs. I’d lived years alternating between both of them—the idea that leaving things with Micah the way I did was the biggest mistake I’d ever made, and the certainty that it was the only thing I’d done right. For both of us.
I leaned into the counter, watching out the kitchen window, where the lush forest stretched in every direction. The little stone fire pit out back was encircled by two weathered Adirondack chairs that sat in the small clearing of trees. The red-painted shed out back was just beyond it, its roof piled with golden pine needles and a series of rusted yard tools leaning against its side. The whole scene was almost too perfect to look at. Like something that would be sketched onto the pages of a book. But it had never felt that way to me.
My gaze focused beyond the tree line, to where the Walkers’ place sat back in the forest. The drive was still empty, the windows dark, and I let myself hope for a moment that Rhett Walker no longer lived there.
Amelia’s mention of his son Griffin hadn’t exactly been out of nowhere. His death was the biggest thing to happen in this town in the last twenty years, a tragedy that shook Six Rivers to its core. Griffin Walker had been the boy next door long before he was the promising young athlete with a scholarship to Stanford. He and I were the only two kids from our high school who had a way out of this town. But he never made it.
I forced my attention back to the stove, fishing the bacon from the skillet with a fork and setting it onto the plate beside two fried eggs and a piece of buttered toast. Smoke hadn’t moved from his spot at my feet, sniffing the air with a whine buried in his chest. The animal was even bigger than I remembered, his eyes so clear and focused that it was a little unnerving to look at him straight on.
“No, Smoke.” I pointed the fork at his untouched food bowl in the corner. “Your breakfast is right there.”
I tore the toast in half, using it to break open one of the eggs and soak up the yolk.
His front paws shifted just a fraction, his gaze still locked on my plate. When he whined again, I sank down, scratching down his back with both hands. He was an enormous dog, but somehow still lean and slender.
“I think Johnny has been spoiling you.” Smoke leaned into my touch. “Am I right?”
When he didn’t move, I relented, breaking off a small piece of bacon and dropping it into his bowl. He leapt up, crossing the kitchen in a few steps as I took one of the mismatched mugs from the shelf and filled it with coffee.
The bacon was enough to entice him to eat the dog food beneath it, and I picked up my plate, going into the living room. The sofa was still draped with the quilts I’d found in the chest by the fireplace, my pajamas folded and stacked on one of the arms. I hadn’t been able to bring myself to sleep in the bedroom. When we were kids, I’d had the bed in the alcove and Johnny had slept on the couch. But after Dad went to Oregon, I’d taken the bedroom for myself, and when I left it had finally belonged to Johnny. I hadn’t even stepped foot inside; instead, I’d buried myself in the blankets on the sofa and watched the fire until I couldn’t keep my eyes open, Smoke curled on top of my feet.
I followed the hall to where Johnny’s makeshift office was tucked into the corner. The plate of food was still steaming when I set it down between the piles of envelopes, and the springs at the base of the chair screeched as I sat. But I froze when a rush of goosebumps raced up my arms, the quiet cabin coming to life. Almost immediately, the distant sound of fingers tapping on a keyboard drifted through the air. I could hear the drum of what sounded like a pencil’s eraser on the desk. The rustling of papers. The hum of music. But all around me, the house was just a still life. A place frozen in time.
My eyes moved over the desk slowly, my mind trying to sift the sounds from the room. I knew the sensation. It was the same one I had every time the hollow space between me and Johnny bled together. When the feelings flooding his mind pushed into my own. I was usually good at drawing a clear boundary between what was him and what was me, but this was different. It was as if the hours Johnny had spent at this desk still hovered in the cabin like an echo of his existence.