Chapter 9 Skylar
Skylar
I stop screaming when we fall into a ditch. My chest slams into the seat belt as we jerk to a halt, but the airbags don’t deploy.
The car’s headlights are buried in snow, and it’s dark with only the dash lights visible. But the rhythmic whack…whack…whack…of the wipers slowly grounds me.
Pike’s arm is across my chest, as if he planned to keep me from vaulting through the windshield himself. “Skylar, are you okay?”
I put my hand over his. “I’m okay. Are you?”
A beat. “Yes.”
We stay there for an eternity, just breathing.
“I’m sorry,” Pike says. “That guy wasn’t in his lane. I don’t—” He inhales deeply. Exhales again. “I’m just glad you’re okay.”
“Let’s go back to your mom’s.” Twenty minutes ago, staying over seemed like the worst thing that could happen. Now, it’s dying in a freak storm in Middle of Nowhere, New York.
“Agreed.”
But we get no traction. The wheels spin and spin, and Pike lets out curse after curse.
“Can we call a tow truck now?” I ask.
“Let me take a look first.”
“You don’t think you can, like, lift us out, right?”
“I do not. But maybe something’s stuck.”
“The front of your car is stuck.”
“She’s a big girl. She can get out.”
I peer into the dark void of his car. “Do you have a shovel back there?”
“Wouldn’t you think I was a murderer if I did?”
He has a point. “What about a snow safety box?”
“The hell is that?”
“You know…it has an electric blanket, a flashlight, a foldable shovel, some sort of weapon…”
“Oh, a winter survival kit? I had one for backcountry boarding, but there’s civilization around here. Hang on, why is there a weapon?”
“You never know who you’ll meet while stranded.”
His eyebrows draw together. “I have my cane.”
“True, that ice tip is stabby.”
“I’m going to check the situation outside,” he says. “I can’t shovel. My back.”
I crawl around in the dark, finding my phone wedged between the seats. No service. Perfect.
I can’t open my door, so I climb over Pike’s seat and tumble out next to him. I hold up my phone to get closer to a tower, but it only gets my screen wet.
Pike is on his butt by the driver’s side front wheel, scooping snow with his gloves. I suppress an annoyed noise. Maybe he knows what he’s doing.
“Do you have service?” I ask.
“Nope. Never do out here.”
Panic rushes down my spine. I had service before—spotty, but there. Is it the weather? I go back inside and toggle my phone’s airplane mode until Pike eventually joins me.
“Is it fixed?” I ask, and his silence shifts me from panic to survival mode. “I’ll go flag someone down.”
“No, I’ll go. You’re not wearing pants.”
“If I get cold, I’ll come back. You keep digging or…whatever you were doing.”
I sink all the way to my upper thigh as I climb up the bank. “Oh, wow, that’s cold, aah.”
There’s smothered laughter behind me. I’m too busy half shrieking to yell at him.
My toes go numb under my mostly-for-cuteness-and-not-warmth boots. At least I wore my compression stockings underneath. The wind whips my hair into my face. I can’t blame Pike for not having a snow safety box when I didn’t wear a hat or gloves. We are both terrible Rochestarians.
Ten minutes later, I’m an icicle and Pike is trying to coax me back to the car. “We can take turns waiting,” he says. “Please. You’re going to get sick.”
Reluctantly, I return to the car to warm up. But the heat feels like air-conditioning, and the engine keeps making this revving noise.
Pike comes back after a while, all grimaces.
“We’re going to freeze to death,” I say.
He mutters “no” like a mantra. “I’ve gotten caught on mountains before. There are ways. We’ll turn the heat on and off intermittently. And there’s always…” He trails off, his eyes flitting over me, then away. “Never mind. Just take my jacket and try to get dry.”
I take it, enveloped in that same clean scent that’s hung around him all night. Pike gives me his hat and gloves as well.
“We’re going to be fine,” he says, more to himself.
Now that I’m slightly less frozen, I can think more clearly. “We are,” I announce, “because I’m going to get help.”
Walking in a snowstorm is worse than staying in a car without heat, but at least I have a destination. There are restaurants, shops, and homes along the route. It’s probably only a fifteen-minute walk to the closest inhabited building.
I’ve lost feeling in every part of my body except my face and thighs, which sting like fresh cuts. Pike keeps offering me his outerwear. I only let him lend me his hat for a few minutes at a time. I have my own coat, and he needs his gloves. His hand is always exposed with his cane.
I wanted him to stay in the car while I got help, but he wouldn’t.
Now we’re silent. Which is bad, I think. Everyone died in Titanic when things got silent.
I loop my arm through Pike’s non-cane arm. “How are you doing?”
“Fine. Great.”
Not this again. Everything about Pike’s posture radiates pain: pinched forehead, lips in a permanent wince, and an increasingly pronounced limp.
“Interesting. I feel like letting the Abominable Snowman claim me, and I didn’t even have surgery recently.”
Pike shakes me off his arm. “Your pace is throwing me off-balance.”
“I’m not asking because I think you’re fragile. I’m asking because I’m worried.”
“We’re going to be fine.” His voice muffles as he tucks his chin into his collar. “What else do you want me to say?”
“Something real.”
He grunts. “I think my nuts are getting frostbite.”
I laugh, which makes my head throb more, and I wonder if the blackness creeping in on my peripheral vision isn’t the night around us but the pressure on my optic nerves.
“I won’t be able to walk tomorrow,” he continues. “Potentially not for a week. But we’re almost in town. Look.”
There are streetlamps ahead, and beyond them, houses. With lights.
I whip out my phone.
Nothing.
“I like when you laugh.”
I look up at Pike. “What?”
“Something real,” he says.
I fall behind him, a little stunned. I did force him to respond. I do that sometimes. Get pushy. He sounded genuine, though. Which—no. It’s sweet, but the poor guy probably just wants me to shut up.
By the time we reach the heart of the village, I couldn’t say anything even if I wanted. The devil’s Tic Tacs have made breathing too laborious. It’s Pike who pushes me to keep going past a dark flower shop and an empty café. He holds my hand, murmuring that we’ll be warm in a few seconds.
When we finally reach a house, Pike bangs on the door. It cracks open, and a white man in his fifties leers at me from the shadows. My mind flashes to horror stories of people getting murdered in scenarios like this. I slink behind Pike’s massive body as he details our troubles.
“Can we sit inside while a tow truck comes? We can pay,” he adds.
“That won’t be necessary.” The man ushers us inside.
The warmth of his home makes my nose run. I sit on a bench, shivering, as Pike speaks to him, then announces, “David’s offered to let us stay the night. He has a guest room upstairs.”
David smiles at me from behind Pike, and my stomach churns with unease. He’s probably nice, but I’m not trading warmth for being murdered.
“Let’s c-call the tow truck and g-go—” I take a few breaths to steady my clattering teeth. “To your mom’s.”
Pike’s snow-covered brows draw together, his expression tightening with worry. “We need to get warm. Rest. It’ll be midnight before we can get anywhere in this mess.”
“Your mom—”
“—was drinking. She can’t drive.”
David’s still smiling at us. At me.
“Can I speak to you in private?” I hiss.
“Sorry, David, just a sec.” Pike drags me into a hallway. “Skylar. Please. My body is on the brink of collapse. Now that I know we can rest, I can’t keep going. I physically can’t. We’ll sort out the car tomorrow.”
I knew his body was giving out. Mine has shut down as well. But I don’t want to sleep here. “Maybe I can get an Uber. You stay, and I-I—”
“If you find a ride, I’ll go with you. But first, we need to warm up if we don’t want to end up in the hospital.”
“I want to get warm, too, but how do we know it’s safe to stay with him?”
Pike’s brown eyes soften in understanding. “I’ll make sure he only interacts with me.” His voice drops to a whisper. “I’ll keep you safe, I promise.”
The next few minutes whir by numbly as Pike and David arrange things. I find David’s Wi-Fi and update the girls about the tow truck situation.
everything’s going to be okay, Emy writes. we’ve got the address bookmarked.
Hopefully this isn’t weird, Analia says, but here’s my phone number. If you give me yours, I’ll add you to my favorites so my phone will ring even when I’m asleep.
Emy shoots hers off too.
Despite my icicled face, the corners of my eyes grow wet as I share my number. I’m so grateful for their friendship. I still don’t have service, though.
Then we’ll stay right here in the group until you’re settled, Analia says.
We search for rideshares, but the closest one is in Canandaigua, and when they don’t accept my request, I follow David up his rickety Victorian stairs.
Pike is in so much pain he has to scoot up backward.
David leads us into a room with a paisley rug and an adjoining bathroom.
At least I won’t have to exit once inside.
There’s only one bed, I report.
i want updates! Emy says. ur spending the night with brandon fucking pike!!
A different kind of apprehension shoots through me. But even if David offered two different rooms, I’d still stay here with Pike.
Time starts fading in and out. My ears are so plugged I might as well be cruising at thirty thousand feet. My head wants to split open. This is why I don’t overexert myself or exercise. It raises my intracranial pressure.
“Skylar?” Pike asks. “Skylar?”
He takes my phone from me before I even know it’s happening. “Hey!” I protest, but he turns on the video feature in my private chat with the girls. We’ve never used it, and another nervous surge twists my stomach.
Pike angles the camera at his face. Analia answers, adjusting her screen as her long bangs fall over her eyes, the purple highlights of her inverted bob catching in her camera light.
In her pictures, she often wears dramatic makeup, but tonight her face looks soft and shiny, like she just completed her bedtime skincare routine.
“Oh,” she says, her cheeks tinging red at the sight of Pike. “Hello.”
Emy answers next. She’s already in bed, her long raven hair swept into a high bun against her pillow.
“Evening, ladies,” Pike says.
“Brandon Pike,” Emy purrs. She waves with a flick of her fingers, showing off a flash of silver nail polish. “To what do we owe this pleasure? Everything okay with our girl?”
Emy has an accent. How did I not realize this? Only a slight one, but it’s still there despite her fluency.
“Skylar?” Analia asks. “Are you there too?”
Huge black glasses accentuate her green eyes. I’ve only ever seen pictures of her without them, so maybe she only wears them at night. Which reminds me.
“I don’t have my glasses,” I whisper. My contacts need to come out when I sleep. What am I going to do? I can barely see a foot in front of me without them. I don’t have my sleep meds either.
Pike moves the screen so they can see me.
Analia’s expression fills with worry. She sits up straighter, the sleeve of her zip-up hoodie falling down her shoulder to reveal a bright plaid tank top. “Skylar, are you okay?”
“I think she’s in shock from the cold.” Pike tugs me closer to his side. “Just wanted you to meet me so she can have some reassurance. She’s scared of being stuck in this house. Probably of me too.”
“No,” I murmur. “Pike’s not scary.”
“Well,” he says, “at least now you know what’s going on.”
Emy smiles like the Cheshire cat. “That’s very thoughtful of you.”
“We really need to get out of these wet clothes and get warm. My only motive here is keeping the two of us safe.”
“Stay on your side of the bed,” Analia commands.
Emy tsks, her brown eyes still glinting. “Unless Skylar’s cold.”
Pike chuckles, but it sounds muted. Distant.
The lights burn too brightly, and the video’s making me dizzy.
I’m watching the world through falling snow, every detail blurred and unreachable.
I want to see the girls, but if I don’t focus on anything, the spinning is less intense.
My eyeballs drift to the walls to balance me out.
On bad days, I always wonder if the rest of my life will be like this. Muted. Never fully capable of experiencing everything as it is. A blank wall for a view.
“Have you ever taken NyQuil?” I ask.
“Huh?”
It dawns on me that Emy’s winding down from a joke, and my eyes flicker to her animated face. The room tilts. I focus elsewhere.
“Or a sleeping pill?” I ask.
“Skylar, are you okay?” Analia repeats.
Am I ever? Will I ever be?
“I feel like I’m taking NyQuil. Like it’s in my veins, dosing higher and higher until I can no longer stay upright. Except I’m not tired.”
Silence fills the room.
Wrong moment to share. I interrupted Emy’s joke, though I can’t remember what it was. Fuck, the spinning.
Pike’s freezing fingers come to my chin, forcing my eyes up and to the side. My entire body cascades over an imaginary ledge. I grip his jacket.
“Do you need to lie down?” he asks.
“I’m okay.” Emy and Analia are on video. They’re meeting Pike.
“Skylar,” Analia starts, “are you sure—”
“I’m fine.” I barely recognize my own croak of a voice. “I’m great.” Oh gosh, I get why Pike says this kind of thing now. “We should get warm.”
“Let me give you my cell just in case.” Pike leans heavily on his cane as he recites his number. He stands on his left leg, the right lifted off the floor.
“Get warm, Skylar!” Analia calls.
“And have fun,” Emy chirps.
And just like that, we’re alone.