Chapter 17
I could feel the sun and the gentle wind on my face.
The air smelled sweet and floral. Slowly, I opened my eyes and blinked at the landscape around me.
I was standing in a mountain meadow, surrounded by wildflowers.
The sky above was a bright blue with no clouds in sight.
A light breeze blew, making the flowers bob and sway and playing with my hair.
I slowly turned, and my skirt swung around my legs.
I realized I was wearing a simple but pretty dress made from a fabric with small flowers printed on it.
Something in my chest seemed to tug, pulling my attention away from the flowers to look out into the distance.
I froze, my heart pounding at the sight of a figure striding down the mountainside toward me.
They were walking directly in front of the sun, making it impossible to see any features, but I immediately knew who it was.
I started to run, and so did he, and by the time we crashed together in the middle of the wildflowers, I was sobbing.
“It’s alright, darlin’,” Trey murmured, his voice rough with emotion. “It’s alright.”
“No, it’s not fuckin’ alright,” I sobbed furiously into Trey’s shirt.
“I know,” he said softly, his strong arms wrapped around me. “I know.”
“Please, Trey, I can’t… I can’t do this without you.”
“You don’t have to.” He pressed a kiss into my hair. “I’m always gonna be with you.”
“That is such a load of shit,” I sobbed.
He laughed sadly. “I know, but it’s the best I can do.”
I couldn’t speak anymore, sobbing too hard for words. My arms moved up to twine around Trey’s neck, trying to pull him closer as though I could physically keep him here with me. He held me just as tightly, and it felt like I was somehow shattering and being pieced back together at the same time.
The wind blew my skirt and hair around us, but neither of us moved.
“Am I dead?” I finally was able to choke out.
“No.” He let go of my waist to move his hands up to cup my face, thumbs brushing gently across my wet cheekbones.
I studied his face desperately, trying to memorize every single detail.
His soft brown hair fell in waves against his face, and his eyes were just as warm and full of sunshine as I remembered.
He smiled that slightly crooked smile that I fell in love with, and those broken shards of my heart ached with excruciating pain.
“I can’t do this,” I repeated brokenly. “I can’t.”
“You can,” he whispered.
“No, Trey, you don’t understand.” A sob choked me. “I don’t want to.”
He leaned down and pressed a gentle kiss to my lips, but I surged upward. He responded eagerly, but I had to break away after a second because I was sobbing too hard. Gods, I was coming apart at the seams.
“Bones—” he started softly.
“Ember,” I interrupted, lifting my head to look at him as tears streamed down my face. I was barely able to get the words out between the sobs, but I was determined to do so. “My name is Ember, ‘Em’ for short.”
“Em,” he repeated, a hint of that sunshine smile crossing his lips.
Hearing him say my name in this place didn’t sound right.
It wasn’t the same as hearing it in real life, but I knew that was something I’d never get.
My face crumpled again, and he gathered me close, pressing a kiss into my hair.
I felt him take a breath as if he were about to say something, but we were both startled when the world shifted beneath our feet.
I looked up, and my heart stopped in horror as I saw the outline of him beginning to fade.
“No!” I cried, choking on sobs. “Please, Trey! Please don’t leave me!”
“I love you, Em,” he said, his voice like a whisper of wind.
“I love you, too.” I tried to cling to him, but he was wisps of smoke and shadow. “I love you,” I repeated desperately, but he was gone.
I opened my eyes to see the dim morning light shining through the loft windows. I was lying on my mattress with tears streaming down my face.
What the fuck was that?
Was that supposed to be comforting? Was I supposed to be fucking grateful to get him back for mere minutes only to have him ripped away again? Was that my broken brain’s attempt at closure?
If so, it failed spectacularly. All it did was make this world—the one where Trey was gone—unbearable once again.
I decided not to bother getting out of bed.
After the morning bell rang, Wolf tried calling my name again. I didn’t answer, and he grew increasingly louder and angrier before going silent. I heard someone haul themselves up over the loft railing a minute later. A hand rested on my shoulder and shook me.
“Freckles?”
I opened my swollen eyes to see Lee leaning over me, his face worried.
“You okay?”
“I’m fine,” I mumbled, rolling onto my side and turning my back to him.
He was quiet for a few seconds before asking, “You want to come to breakfast?”
“No.”
Another pause. “Well, I’m gonna put the ladder down. Can you leave it down so we can bring you some broth?” I didn’t answer, and eventually, he continued, “I mean, I can climb up to the loft every time but can’t guarantee you’ll have much broth left by the time I get here.”
I wished he’d go away. I hadn’t felt this weight of grief since the first weeks after Trey died, and I did not have the energy to talk to him.
“Alright, well, we’ll be back, okay?”
I didn’t respond, and eventually, I heard him get up and lower the ladder down. Down below, a quiet, heated argument broke out. I closed my eyes and let myself drift away again.
Around noon, Wolf shook me awake.
“Em, you should eat somethin’.”
I stared at the rafters in the ceiling, hollow and heavy simultaneously. “I’m not hungry.”
“What’s wrong?” he asked hesitantly after a pause.
“I don’t feel good,” I muttered, rolling over and burying my face in my pillow to hide the tears gathering in my eyelashes. It wasn’t a lie. My entire body ached.
I couldn’t see him anymore, but he didn’t move or speak for a long time.
“Can I get you anything?” he finally asked quietly.
I shook my head, tears silently dampening my pillow.
“Okay,” he murmured, “well, maybe you’ll feel better after some rest.”
I slept all day, interrupted only when I had to use the bathroom or when Wolf or one of his crew would shake me awake and ask stupid questions.
Sable apparently handled all the patients who came in, which made me feel even more guilty, but I couldn’t do anything about it.
The weight of this grief crushed me into my mattress, trapping me.
Every time I fell asleep, I longed to and dreaded seeing Trey again.
It had been so real. I’d had plenty of vivid dreams, and this was different.
I felt the sun and the wind against my skin.
I smelled the flowers. He had been there.
He’d held me. I wanted to be back there, safe in his arms, but if he vanished again— when he vanished again, I wasn’t sure I’d survive it.
In the end, my fears were pointless because he didn’t return.
“Em, c’mon.” Wolf’s voice dragged me from sleep again. “You gotta eat something.”
I opened my eyes to see the single bulb lighting up the clinic, and the sky outside was dark. I didn’t roll over from where I faced the wall.
“We brought you some fresh broth.”
In the long silence, I waited for him to lose his temper, but his voice was even softer when he spoke again, which surprised me.
“You remember that time Dune tried to sneak one of those big orange lizards into our room?”
It was such an unexpected thing to say that I turned and looked at him. He was crouched next to my mattress, his elbows on his knees and a mug of broth in his hand. The corners of his mouth twitched up a little at the memory.
“You were probably three, so I don’t know if you remember. Dune was eight. I don’t know how the fuck it didn’t bite him. He’s lucky I found it before Pa did. He thought he could tame it and keep it for a pet. A fuckin’ venomous lizard.”
I didn’t remember that, but it didn’t surprise me. Dune loved all animals, no matter how deadly they were. I glanced at Wolf again to see him studying my face.
“You look so much like Mom,” he said when I made eye contact.
His earlier words seared painfully through my head. At least Mom isn’t alive to see what you’ve become. I swallowed hard and looked away. “Is Mac back yet?”
“No, they had some sort of situation come up.”
A sharp stab of anxiety cut through the fog. “What?”
“I don’t know the details, but Nemo said it wasn’t anything to be concerned about. They’ll just be gone a little longer than expected.”
I tried to push my unease back down.
“Em, what happened?”
The plea in his voice squeezed my lungs, and I hesitated, but I just—just couldn’t. “Nothing.”
He frowned but looked more sad than angry this time, and guilt seeped farther into my skin.
“Ember?”
Both Wolf and I turned to see Scar appearing from the ladder. She held up a hairbrush and smiled slightly. “Would you mind if I braided your hair? I used to be good at braids, but Sable won’t let me braid his hair, so I’m out of practice.”
Wolf snorted.
I surprised myself by sitting up. My hair was a mess, tangled around my face, and my back ached—the muscles stiff from lack of movement.
Scar nudged Wolf with her leg, “You git. It’s girl time. If you stay, you gotta let me braid your hair, too.”
Wolf rolled his eyes, but a genuine smile crept over his face as he got to his feet. Scar plopped on the mattress behind me.
“Any requests?” she asked.
I shook my head slightly.
“Oh, dealer’s choice,” she mused as she gently brushed out the tangles. “Alright. Let’s hope I remember how to do this.”
We sat in silence for a few breaths. Below us, I could hear Wolf speaking to somebody, but I couldn’t hear the words.