Chapter Forty-two
Dallas
A heavy plume of smoke wafts into the sky as my truck makes the winding drive back to my cabin. Where’s it coming from? I haven’t stayed here since the day I drove Marti to see her family. I’ve been back, sure, but I slept at the motor lodge in town, making daily runs to stoke the fire so the thousands of dollars of wine inside wouldn’t freeze and turn to vinegar.
Staying there… sleeping there… wouldn’t be the same. Not after everything that happened. Not after every inch of the cabin reminds me of her—Marti, not Phoebe. Even the damn hobby room where we had our first real argument.
The plan was to load the truck and leave yesterday, but the local police wanted to talk to me about Abe. It was just one more excuse to put off the inevitable: me packing up and moving back to Calloway Creek.
Part of me knows it’s just another way of running. Only this time, it’s Marti’s memory I’m running from, not Phoebe’s. Oh, the irony.
Getting closer now, something just isn’t right. The smoke is dark and thick and much denser than what my one small fireplace should produce. When I make the final turn and drive over the small hill that brings my cabin into view, I slam on the brakes. Because what’s in front of me isn’t my cabin. It’s a smoldering mess of what used to be my cabin.
It’s… gone.
It’s just fucking gone. Burned to the damn ground.
I get out of the truck, approaching slowly. Heat still emanates, warming my face the closer I get. The ground is all rock and dirt for at least thirty feet in all directions, the snow having melted from the heat of the fire.
Water is visible in the pond out back, the ice now gone on the side closest to what was my home. And I can see the pond because there’s nothing standing between me and the rear of the property. Nothing but the godforsaken wrought-iron stove—the sole remaining relic and the likely culprit.
I sink to the ground. Did I do this?
When I kicked the stove the other day, did I somehow breach its integrity?
I contemplate calling the fire department, but what would be the point? The fire is out. There aren’t any flames. Just embers, smoke, and ash.
Still stunned, and with nothing else to do, I sit on the chopping stump and watch the smoke do its dance as it floats up and away from the burned remains.
Staring at the corner of the lot where the hobby room once stood, my heart sinks. All of her creations, all of their things, are gone. I look over to where the wall of wine and books should be. There’s nothing. Just… nothing.
Disappointment courses through me when I glance over near the woods and don’t see Snowman Abe. He, too, was a casualty.
I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. Because now, I don’t have a choice. I have to leave. Until this very moment, there was a question that lingered in the back of my mind of will I or won’t I. Now the decision has been made for me. The only difference is that I can’t take anything with me. I can’t take the only things that really mattered.
Hours later, after most of the smoke has cleared, I finally feel it’s safe enough to approach. I stay on the ground around the perimeter, not risking melting my shoes or falling on hidden embers. Not one of my over a hundred wine bottles are discernable. They must have all exploded, then melted, leaving reformed clumps of indistinguishable glass.
The charred remains of my kitchen appliances sit among the rubble, only recognizable because I know what and where they were. Some cookware and a few kitchen utensils are still clearly visible, though covered with soot, as I sift through the ash with a long stick.
The fireplace really is the only survivor, its intact iron chimney looking odd as it stands tall in the same way it had before, snaking up and through the rafters and roof that no longer exist.
Around the far corner of the lot, something catches my eye. I stride over, using the stick to move away the rubble, and find a ceramic sculpture. It’s a vase. Phoebe’s one and only attempt at ceramics. It’s sooty and gray. I touch it lightly to make sure it’s not too hot, then take it to the pond and dunk it below the surface, wiping all its edges. It emerges virtually unscathed, and I turn it over to see her initials still branded onto the bottom.
An engine behind me steals my attention and I turn to see the propane truck pulling up. The driver’s eyes go wide when he sees the state of things. The young guy gets out, looking between me and what’s left of the cabin. “So, I’m guessing you don’t need the refill?”
I don’t think it was meant as a joke, but I can’t help laughing at the irony of it. Of all of it.
“Dude, are you okay?” the driver asks at my unusual behavior.
“I’m fine,” I say, sitting back on my stump. “And no, I won’t be needing propane. Ever.”
“I’ll let the company know.” He hesitates, probably not knowing what to say. “I’m sorry.”
With that, he climbs back in his truck, circles around my truck, and leaves.
Belatedly, I think I should have told the guy not to bother with Abe’s delivery either. But it was the last thing on my mind.
I hold the vase and let my eyes rake over the complete and total destruction of everything. The ash that represents the past few years of my life. But when I look down at the vase, only one thought occurs—I wish I’d found something of Marti’s too. The book we were reading. The last bottle of wine we shared. Ah, fuck … the bracelet she left.
All of a sudden, I remember the dream. The dream that plagued me for two nights. The one where Phoebe and DJ walked into the fire. Jesus, that’s … I scrub a hand across my jaw… that’s fucked up .
I make my way back to the truck with only the vase in my hands, not bothering to look back.
There’s nothing left for me here.
It’s a fact I think I knew even before I drove up here four hours ago.
~ ~ ~
Nobody’s home when I arrive, but I know the code to the front door. I doubt my parents will care very much if I crash here for a while. In fact, I’m fairly sure they’ll be happy about it.
Bex greets me as soon as I walk in.
“Hey, buddy. Where is everyone?”
When he doesn’t answer, I go back to the room that used to be mine. I sit on the bed thinking how it’s changed. Long gone are the race car posters that once lined these walls. The signed swimsuit photo of Gigi Hadid that, as a fifteen-year-old, was my most prized possession. The binders of Pokémon cards I used to trade with my grade school friends. Everything about this room is different. I lie back and close my eyes.
They snap open when a familiar vanilla scent swirls around me. I sit up and look around, half expecting Marti to be standing in the room, wondering if I even want her to be. Knowing I do.
But she’s not here. Just the ghosts of my childhood fill the room… and vanilla. I swear I can smell her. My nose is playing tricks on me.
I lay back and close my eyes again, but the silence is disrupted by the rumble in my stomach. Why didn’t I stop for lunch? Or breakfast for that matter? Thinking back, I haven’t eaten a thing since yesterday and it’s almost dinnertime.
Bex runs into my calves when I stop abruptly in the kitchen doorway. My coat is hanging on the back of a kitchen chair. And not the coat I was wearing when I arrived. It’s the one I loaned to Marti. The one she never returned.
Again, I look around as if she’ll appear out of thin air.
My heart stops when someone comes around the corner. It restarts again when I see it’s just Allie.
“You’re home!” She runs over and wraps me in a hug.
I pat her on the back. “Yeah, well, I didn’t really have a choice.”
“What does that mean?”
I shake my head, not wanting to delve into it quite yet. “Where is everyone? And how in the hell did this coat get here.”
A sinister smile grows up her face. “Marti brought it.”
Thump thump thump.
“She’s here?”
“Was. Not anymore. Left this morning.”
“Um… what… why?”
“If you don’t know why then you’re not as smart as I thought you were, Dallas. That girl is obviously in love with you. She came under the guise of returning the coat.”
I nod. “She thought I’d be at the party.”
“She said she completely forgot about the party. But she did end up going. Along with Charlie and… Asher.” She sighs like a schoolgirl with a big-time crush.
I cock my head and give her the side-eye. “What aren’t you telling me?”
She smacks her lips. “Promise you won’t go all big brother on me?”
“No.”
Her eyes roll. “I may have hooked up with him last night.”
“Marti’s brother? Are you fucking crazy?”
She gives me a hard stare. “Says the pot to the kettle.”
I hold out my hands. “Fine. Fine. But they went to the party? And they stayed… here?”
It makes total sense now, why my old room smells like her.
My mind reels over what might have happened had I been here. Had the police not needed to talk to me and I’d come home to find her here. In my old house. In my old room .
Would it have changed anything?
Or was the police interview some sort of divine intervention that kept me from coming home earlier?
Allie shoves her phone in my face. “We got some great pictures. You missed a heck of a party.”
I push it away, not wanting to see any reminders of her . Of them .
“You’re an idiot,” she declares.
“Never said I wasn’t.” I grab the coat. “I’m going to go lie down.”
~ ~ ~
A hand rubbing my arm wakes me. For a moment, my heart pounds. Is it her?
My mother looks down on me with a sad smile. “You okay, honey?”
“Yes. No.” I sit up. “To be honest, I have no idea.”
“You’ve been through a lot in the past few weeks. Asher and Marti told us everything. It’s understandable you’d be shaken up. Especially after what happened with Charlie.”
“So he’s okay?”
“He’s more than okay. He’s a very special little boy,” she says, getting that look in her eye.
“Mom, don’t start on me too. It’s been a long day.”
She sits on the edge of the bed just like she used to when I was a kid. “I’m here for you no matter what.”
My head slumps and I rub my eyes over and over. “It’s gone. It’s all gone.”
“Oh, honey, you haven’t lost—”
“I mean my cabin. It’s gone. Burned to the ground along with everything in it.”
Her eyes widen in horror. “Are you injured?”
“I wasn’t there. I couldn’t go back after… Well, I just couldn’t. I was staying at a hotel in town. When I showed up this morning to pack my stuff, it was all smoke and ash.” I nod to the vase on the desk. “That’s literally the only thing left.”
She scoots up onto the bed and wraps her arm around my shoulder. “Thank God you weren’t there. I’m so sorry about the cabin, Dallas, but maybe in some strange way it’s for the best. You needed to move on. You’re like the Phoenix rising from the ashes.” She touches my heart. “And the only memories you really need are safe in here.”
I don’t respond. Because I can’t. Everything I want to say is tied up in a ball of fucking phlegm in my throat.
“Take some time,” she says, sweeping a piece of hair out of my eyes. “Figure out what you want.”
“And then what?”
“And then maybe go after it.”
“It?” I look up.
“Therein lies the problem,” she says with a shrug. “You’re the only one who can figure out what it is.”
She kisses my forehead and exits the room, leaving me and the vase swirling in a pool of vanilla.