Chapter 90
Quill
Setting Sun
Old Friend (feat. CLOVES)
Robin Schulz, CLOVES
It wasn’t until we’d been driving on the highway for a while that I realized we hadn’t taken the exit to Maplecrest, but instead were heading in the opposite direction.
“Where are we going?”
A smile played across Davian’s lips, and it was as if a faint glimmer flickered in his eyes.
“Ticking something off my bucket list.”
Surprised, I tried to put two and two together, but it wasn’t until Davian drove onto one of the bridges over Chesapeake Bay that it clicked.
The sun would set in a few hours, already bathing the ocean in a sea of golden-orange shimmer.
Excitedly, I turned my head toward Davian.
“The message in a bottle?”
“Better…”
Had he expanded his bucket list?
Euphoria washed over me, making me forget that tomorrow would be Christmas, that everything would be different.
Davian pulled up in front of a beach restaurant in a town I didn’t know, told me to wait in the car, and returned ten minutes later with a huge pizza box and two cups of hot cinnamon chocolate.
A storm of moths raged in my stomach as he closed the trunk and got back in the car, where he secured the cups in the cup holders between the seats.
“What are you up to?”
He just smirked and started the car.
“Davian, tell me what you’re up to.”
I shook his arm, and he grinned at the road before we pulled into a beach parking lot.
“Get out and let yourself be surprised, or do you want me to throw you into the water?”
This time I had to grin.
The water had to be freezing. It was December.
We got out, and I was ready to head to the beach when Davian pulled a blanket out of the trunk and suddenly… climbed onto the roof of his car.
What on earth?
As it dawned on me, I watched as he took the pizza, a glass bottle of water, a plastic clamshell of blueberries, the steaming cups, and “A radio?” out of the car and set them up there with him.
Davian climbed onto the trunk lid, held out his hand to me with a soft smile, while the coastal breeze tousled his hair and blew his open coat backward.
He looked like a lord from Wonderland.
I didn’t hesitate any longer, took his hand, and climbed onto the car roof, where he pulled me down next to him onto the dark blue blanket into a cross-legged position before turning to the radio.
With my heart pounding, I gazed into the distance, toward the setting sun.
This place was beautiful.
Suddenly, a crackling sound came from the radio, followed by a melody that sounded more than familiar to me.
Heaven by Bryan Adams
Heaven
Bryan Adams
My eyes widened and my head snapped around.
“Oh my God, Davian. Don’t tell me you’re really doing this with me right now,” I laughed, and he gave me an amused smirk.
He was so handsome when he was carefree…
And the fact that he wanted to work through his bucket list with me was the final straw.
Davian opened the pizza box and handed me a slice dripping with cheese.
“This was long overdue.”
I bit into the steaming slice of pizza and smirked at him.
“A car roof isn’t a roof.”
“A roof is a roof.”
My grin widened.
“Admit it, you were already jealous of Lara’s cool friend back then.”
He looked into the distance, and I watched the sun in his eyes.
“Maybe…”
I gave a crooked grin and kept eating, leaning my head against his shoulder, and Davian rested his head against mine.
“What’s the craziest dream you’ve ever had?” the question came out of nowhere, and I immediately went through all the dreams I could still remember. Lots of nightmares.
“I was on a ship, and an architect taught me how to write.”
At thirteen, I’d had many of those dreams. Dreams of Wonderland. Dreams of women in elaborate dresses and men in elegant suits. All in nineteenth-century fashion. Intense dreams. Of the coast, of my never-friends.
Another way my mind had probably tried to process my childhood while simultaneously escaping it.
Davian gave a soft chuckle.
“That an author dreams of being illiterate…”
Grinning, I looked up at him sideways.
“What’s yours?”
He hesitated, looked back out at the horizon.
“I died in the arms of a humming angel. Over and over again. Night after night.” He looked back at me, smiled. “Until I finally found my angel.”
My heart clenched.
All this couldn’t possibly be real.
We had each other. Finally.
But what did that mean? What was it allowed to mean?
I sat up as Davian handed me the cup of cocoa and drank from his own, studied the handsome man who had strayed into my life.
He set the mug down, pulled out a small black velvet box, and I held my breath as he opened it and looked up at me.
Confused, I stared at the silver pen nib he pulled out on a thin silver chain and handed to me.
I remembered it.
“Is that…”
“The nib I used to write on you.”
In disbelief, I looked up at Davian, who smiled cautiously.
“Turn it over.”
With trembling fingers, I turned the nib and discovered the delicate engraving on the inside.
Your Ink. My Veins.
Incapable of breathing, I stared at the words he had whispered to me that night.
His hand closed around mine, enclosing the necklace.
I had never seen a more beautiful piece of jewelry.
“I wanted to die.”
I looked up into his ocean eyes.
“Now I want to live. For you, Feather.”
Unable to say anything in reply, and with new tears in my eyes, I turned and let him place the necklace around my neck until his lips touched my ear, he wrapped his arms around me, and his soft, masculine voice sent shivers down my neck beneath my coat.
“Come with me to Seattle. Write with me. Help me work through the bucket list. Extend it until it has a thousand reasons to stay with me.”
Hot tears fought their way down my cool cheeks.
I let myself fall against him, sank into his arms, and looked up.
“From the beginning, I’ve only needed one reason, Davian.”
He knew it, knew that he was the reason. And he let me feel it, with a kiss in my hair, then another.
For a moment, I felt that we actually had something like a chance.
“I’ll go wherever you go,” I said eventually, as I felt his tear drip onto my cheek, and nestled closer against him.
Davian pulled me closer, letting me snuggle up until I was lying in his lap, looking up at him and watching the setting sun in his eyes. My reflection.
He lifted my hand toward him, kissed my knuckles first, every single one, then pushed my sleeve down and began pressing his papyrus lips against my skin, kissing his way up and down, slowly, over and over…
“What are you doing?”
He closed his eyes, smiled against my wrist.
“I’m kissing all the scars that will never be invisible to me.”
A flutter shot through my chest, and the lump threatened to fall out of its place.
There were so many emotions inside me that wanted to burst out, but the only way out was through tears.
I shed quite a few while he continued to caress the spot, and we stayed snuggled up on the roof of his car, listening to more Bryan Adams songs until the sun kissed the sea on the horizon, unaware that it would drown in that ocean.
“I promised you something.”
I pulled away from him, watched him slide off the car roof, before he helped me down and took something out of his trunk.
With a knot in my stomach that kept growing, I stared at the gun in his hands.
“Let’s finally get this over with.”
His words seemed to have triggered the same thought in both of us, and we stared at each other for a moment before grinning, as if we weren’t holding a murder weapon in our hands. One that still gave me nightmares.
“That would be the only way I’d want to die,” he said, a smile on his lips. “With you. In your arms.”
The mere thought broke me. But he was right. If our lives were ever to come to an end, I wanted to die with him, wanted to go with him. I couldn’t imagine a world without him. I didn’t want to imagine it.
Old Friend (feat. CLOVES)
Robin Schulz, CLOVES
“Come.”
He took my hand, led me through the dunes, across the partially frozen sand, to that spot where the sea reached longingly for the beach but never quite managed to grasp it.
He stared down at the pistol.
“It belonged to your brother.”
“If he knew that Troy died from one of his bullets,” I laughed quietly.
Davian looked at me. “He’ll never find out.”
I nodded.
“We’ll bury him here, along with this gun.”
Again, I nodded.
Davian held the pistol out to me.
“Do you want to?”
I shook my head.
“You should.”
He smiled, staring down again.
Carefully, I let my hand slip into his, and he immediately clasped it, seeking my gaze.
“Thank you, Quill.”
I smiled encouragingly at him.
With one last glance at the pistol, he lifted it, swung his arm back, and threw it far away toward the sunset, where it plunged into the sea somewhere in the distance.
We stared out at the horizon for a while.
And there it was again. That intense feeling of déjà vu. As if we had already looked out at the sea together. Accompanied by a deep, insatiable longing that made me want to step into the icy-cold waves.
“And now?” I asked eventually.
“We’re going home.”
Davian turned to me. This time he was the one who smiled encouragingly before taking my other hand, and we both walked back toward the parking lot.
I stopped between the dunes.
“Davian… I’ve never had anything like Christmas.”
He smiled. “Then you’ll get to know it.”
With the corners of my mouth tentatively curling upwards, I looked down at our intertwined fingers, feeling the now-warm nib of the fountain pen against my décolletage beneath my sweater, where it had slipped into.
“I don’t know how it’ll be this year, but next year we’ll celebrate together with Monica and Lara. Maybe even Tony. Though I think I’ve ruined our friendship. He’ll never speak to me again.”
I looked up, remembered the conversation with Monica, and my stomach turned.
Davian didn’t seem to know yet…
I swallowed.
“I’ll talk to him. Monica will talk to him…”
“Monica won’t understand what’s between us.”
And Tony even less so.
I should be sad. But there were too many reasons to finally put most of my worries to rest.
I placed my hand on his cheek.
“Then so be it. Sooner or later, she’ll understand. And even if no one understands us, I couldn’t care less, as long as we understand each other.”
He returned my smile, but it lasted only a second before it gradually faded and he looked down at our hands.
“I think I have an idea of how we can ruin Joseph without putting you in danger.”
There it was again. The knot in my stomach.
Maplecrest was pure poison. No one would find peace in this criminal town. But we both knew I wouldn’t go anywhere until my father got what he deserved.
I nodded, determined to finally cut all the last ties that still bound me to my old life. For Davian.
“Then let’s ruin him.”
I Know The End
Phoebe Bridgers
The following chapters deal with sensitive topics in a detailed and explicit manner. I recommend that you find a quiet, comfortable place where you can finish the rest of the book without interruption.
M A E Z O S
Richter Gala
Because we both breathe letters and bleed ink.
– Leaking Batteries Diary