Chapter 16 #3
The hospital. I hadn’t been ghosted; something terrible must’ve happened.
A vision of IK, VA, and SI lying on white sheets, unconscious, broken bones, blood—I flew upward and unzipped my backpack in record time, flipping open my laptop, turning it on, and bouncing my leg as I waited for it to power up.
Adrenaline surged through my body, and the tech couldn’t keep up with my sudden impatience.
Click, click. I searched yesterday’s car accidents in the state.
I didn’t even know if they were on vacation, but it wasn’t that time of year, so I just assumed they were local.
The results had my stomach bottoming out.
A crash that killed one and injured two.
Head-on collisions: a car hit a tree, a car went over a cliff.
Police were investigating a deadly crash where a drunk driver had blown through a stop sign.
What if they were dead? What if he was dead, and I’d never told him how I felt?
Tears rolled down my cheeks. I slammed my laptop shut and rushed out of the room with my stuff.
I ran to my bike, working the combination lock about twenty times before it finally popped open. My hands were shaking badly, and my vision was fuzzy. I pocketed the lock and rode home like a maniac, hardly able to see past the tears in my eyes. I needed privacy during my imminent breakdown.
My heart pounded as if it were going to explode out of my chest. IK couldn’t be dead! He couldn’t!
I flew into the house and straight to my room, where I turned my computer back on. I needed to check. There would be a message waiting on my account; I just knew it. Charisse flew into the room after me. “Molly, what is it?”
My eyes were glued to the screen. There were no new messages, and none of them had logged in—still.
They wouldn’t stop playing the game altogether just to play a joke on me.
IK was a friend of one of the devs. Or so he had told me.
But their armor and skills were all top quality; you couldn’t lie about those things.
And everyone knew who IK was. He was a legend.
Legends didn’t just appear to play a joke on a single girl.
“Molly!” Charisse grabbed my shoulder as if to shake me out of whatever trance I was in.
My head swiveled, and the intensity of her eyes drew me in.
She looked haggard. I probably looked worse, and my manic behavior wasn’t helping.
This wasn’t me. Why was I so out of whack because I hadn’t heard from a guy in less than a day?
What on earth was wrong with me? Maybe they had just forgotten.
I sometimes missed appointments, and the doctor didn’t assume that I was dead in a car accident.
My walls crumbled. I fell into Charisse’s arms, sobbing.
This hurt just as much as when Mom and Dad told me they were divorcing.
It hurt just as much as that time Mom forgot to pick me up from the dentist and my mouth ached from having my braces tightened.
It hurt worse than when Dad canceled Christmas.
I couldn’t breathe. My worries and fears were out of control, and I didn’t know how they had slipped from the reins.
“Shh. It’s okay. Whatever is wrong, I’m here for you.
I should have known something was going down when you snapped at me last night.
You’re always patient with my silliness.
I thought I had just pushed you too far.
But you’re not like that. Is it your mom?
Your dad? Did you get kicked out of school? ”
Her hand stroked my hair as she cradled me awkwardly against her.
How did I tell her I was panicked because my online friends hadn’t shown up to a meeting last night? I would sound ridiculous. I was ridiculous. But I trusted her.
When my sobs slowed enough so I could breathe, I sat with her on her bed and laid it all out. How IK and I had been meeting separately, how my feelings had grown, how I was planning on asking him to meet, and how he hadn’t shown up. How I had freaked out.
“Why? What’s wrong with me?”
“My dear, you’re in love,” Charisse replied softly.
“That’s not possible. I don’t even know him. For all I know, he’s an old lady who thinks I’m the highlight of her week.”
“You say that, and I agree—we need to have a discussion about online safety and keeping secrets from your friends. But right now, your heart thinks differently. Do you know what the difference between love and tragedy is?”
She didn’t wait for my answer before continuing with her thespian psychology. “The tragedy is never trying. Never taking a chance. Never following your heart.”
I searched within. Could it be true? I looked deep into the areas I usually kept shut, where I pretended everything was okay. What I saw shocked me.
Apparently, I was in love with a voiceless, faceless guy. Ni made my body react, but IK owned my heart more completely than even I had realized. The question was...would I ever be able to meet him? To tell him? To find out if he loved me too?
A ping echoed through the room, and I abandoned Charisse to peer at the screen.
He’d messaged me.