Chapter 2
Hyacinth
Well. That sucks.
Lily screams in frustration and anger, stomping her foot in protest. “Ow!” She stomped on a rock. Figures.
“Did you roll your ankle?” I ask, hoping to the heavens that she hasn’t. I can’t carry her, and I can’t leave her here while I go for help. I’ve read enough novels to know that won’t end well for either of us.
“No, but I probably bruised my heel.” Her statement is a sniffly whine. Oh, please don’t cry.
“Okay! Well, we need to pick a direction to walk in.”
“Walk? Walk where?” Oh yeah, the tears are starting. I have to calm her down. We have to conserve every ounce of liquid we have. The sun is still high in the sky, still hot as fuck. I can feel the skin on my shoulders and arms heating already.
Stepping towards Lily, I put a hand on her arm and plaster the fakest smile I can manage onto my face.
“Look, we can’t stay here. Our best bet is probably to walk back the way we came.
I imagine we’ll find more traffic the closer we get to Las Vegas, yeah?
” She sniffles and nods. “Okay, try not to cry, let’s not get too dehydrated.
” I pull her into me to hug her, let her know we’re in this together.
Our childhood is a series of her assuming she is the center of the world, and me trying to ground her in reality so she doesn’t get hurt, then put her pieces back together when she inevitably does.
Our dad always said I was her anchor. I hated that analogy when we were teens, bristled against it.
Tried to ignore that need to be that for her.
But always, in the end, I’d be there for her.
It was like that all through college, too.
And it’s exhausting. Right before finals, I was up all night—not studying like I’d planned to, but consoling her after another boyfriend broke her heart.
It helped that we no longer live in the same town. Yes, I chose a job in another state so that I couldn’t be her daily anchor anymore. And for most of seven years, it’s worked in my favor.
It’s shameful to admit, but I hoped that in marrying Patrick, he’d be the one to take that role over from me. But it’s possible that I—that we—overestimated Patrick. Because either he doesn’t know how to check Yelp reviews before sending his fiancée out into the desert wilderness, or…murder vibes.
Either way, it’s going to be a long road back to recovery.
Once we reach our hotel, that is. I’m not sure I’ve ever regretted my shoe choices more than at this very moment.
Heat has permeated the foam sole of my flip-flop, and now the bottom of my feet are just as hot as the tops of my toes. I’ve never sunburned my toes before.
This is going to be a day of many firsts.
Our first fight is swift and fast. I want to walk the way we came. Lil wants to walk after the limo. “That’s our ride!”
“Yeah, but our ride left us in the middle of nowhere! I wouldn’t trust him now.”
“But Patrick paid for the tour. And my phone is in the limo!”
“So you want to walk after a car that’s driving at least seventy miles per hour down a highway? In a direction where we don’t even know where it goes?”
“There’s probably a town just over that rise,” Lily says, pointing with her cup, sloshing what’s left of her margarita. I have to pinch myself to keep from snapping at her not to waste the liquid, even if it is alcohol. It’s better than nothing, right?
“Maybe. But millions of people visit that town,” I say, pointing in the direction of Las Vegas, the oasis in the desert.
“Statistically speaking, we’re more likely to find people toward the city that people go to.
Not whatever po-dunk ghost town is that way.
” I really can’t fathom that she actually wants us to follow the limo driver who dumped us here like garbage!
With no explanation. Not, ‘I’m tired of my job,’ or, ‘your fiancé hates you and wants to get rid of you,’ or even, ‘you’ve been punked. ’ Nothing.
“You and your statistics,” Lily growls at me. Now we’ve transitioned into argument number two. “Don’t gamble, Lily, the house always wins.” She makes her voice high-pitched and nasally to make fun of me. “Statistics show that you’re just wasting time and money.”
“You know what? You come with me back towards Vegas, and I will personally pay for you to play blackjack for the night.” I hold my arm out in the direction of Vegas.
Part of me wishes we could see the lights from here; a beacon of hope.
But then I realize that eventually the sun will set, and we will be here in the desert. Alone. At night.
I have to punch down my panic to keep it from bubbling over. We have to start moving.
“No. I know you think I’m crazy. But I feel it in my bones.
This is the way we are supposed to go.” Her earnestness gets me.
Again. This is the way it is with her. It’s as if she only has to tug at our sister bond to get me to do her bidding.
Even if it’s the stupidest solution. Even if it feels like possibly a death sentence.
“Fine,” I huff out. “Lead the way.”
The sun is lower in the sky, hallelujah. As long as I don’t think about what might be lurking in a desert night, I’m fine. But other problems are present now. Problems that not even Lily can ignore.
“My cup is empty.” She says it without a trace of a whine, though I know she wants to—because I want to. I just nod my head in agreement. I keep bringing the cup to my lips and tipping my head back, as if magically more melted ice will appear. It does not.
Lily’s bottom lip trembles. “Crying will only dehydrate you more,” I warn. She nods and sucks her lip in, turns back around and begins walking again.
A few minutes later, who knows how many, she turns back around and says, “There aren’t any animals out here. No lizards. No roadrunners. No coyotes.” She pouts a little and then starts walking again.
“Roadrunner? Coyote? Are you in a cartoon?” I can’t help it. Her complaint is absurd. We’re lost in the desert, stranded, and she complains about the lack of Looney Tunes’ characters?
“Ugh, no. You wouldn’t understand.”
“Try me. Not like I have anything else going on.” I hate that we’re fighting, but it seems completely reasonable to me that both our tempers are fried at this point. I wonder how many brain cells we’ve torched under the sun today.
“I thought this tour was stupid, okay. But Patrick arranged it, and I wanted to believe that he had some grand romantic plan, so I went along with it. I mean, I knew you would like it. You’re nature-y.
But who the hell wants to see coyotes? Or boring artifacts?
Or a ‘wilder side’ of Vegas?” She uses air quotes on ‘wilder side,’ it makes me smile.
“Vegas is wild enough as it is. I didn’t pick here for the cultural education.
I came to have fun, let loose, savor my last minutes of freedom before I marry Patrick. ”
Oh. That was a lot. Lily huffs out, her shoulders slumping, and I see how much she was holding this in. “You know, you aren’t going to prison. You’ll still have freedom.”
She shakes her head in frustration. “No. I mean, he’s great. But he doesn’t really get me. I feel like I have to perform and be on my best behavior when we’re together. Frankly, it’s exhausting.”
Several minutes pass, the only sound the crunch of rocks under our feet. I open my mouth to attempt some sort of wisdom, instead of yelling run far away from him, which is what I want to do, when she lifts an arm and points into the desert.
“What’s that?”
A billowing cloud of dust rises up in the distance. “A dust devil?” I ask, not really knowing what that is supposed to be.
“No, it’s something coming this way. Maybe a truck?” There’s a spike of hope in my chest. She’s right. It isn’t just a tornado like tower to the sky of dust, but rather a trail of dust. A car down a dirt road? It will pass close to us, but it doesn’t look like it’s headed to the highway.
“Let’s catch it!” Lily says. And before I can ponder if we even can, she takes off.
Into the desert. Impressed at her ability to run in flip-flops, dodging rocks and thorny bushes and cacti, after walking however long we have, I roll my eyes and sigh.
I should be glad she has energy and enthusiasm, but I lack either. Trudging, I take off after her.
Thankfully, it doesn’t take long for her pace to lag. Soon we are walking together again, her panting a bit, cursing herself that she is so thirsty. My first reaction is to hand her my cup, but it’s bone dry.
The closer we get to intersecting what we hope is a giant pick-up truck with a full back seat, full blast air conditioning, and a fat cooler filled with iced drinks, the smaller it becomes, and the more my hopes dry up.
I try not to let my disappointment take over.
Maybe it’s a dune buggy. An ATV. A horse.
I’ll take anything at this point. It’s clearly big enough to have a human associated with it.
I don’t think it is just a horse, with no human attached.
We’re close enough now to make out the snaking tan line—the road it’s on.
A feeling of relief floods me, but I squish it down. No floods yet. No relaxing yet.
“We’re saved,” Lily says, almost a whisper, as we watch what I think is a man stalk his way toward us. No longer is there a trail of dust behind him. But how was there a trail? This seems to be beyond my intellect. There’s no animal or machine with him.
His stride is long. Legs thick with muscles.
Dusty blue jeans hug his lower half in a way I’d like to emulate.
He’s black t-shirt is plastered to his chest, abs, tight around his bulging biceps.
The man is a bronze god. And while I am not into dating and love, I’d happily worship at his feet.
He’s wearing a cowboy hat—of course he is!
—and while it’s low, covering his eyes, I can make out his stern jaw line.
His fingers flex as he comes closer. That simple gesture, not meant for us to see, untwists something inside me, a yearning that I didn’t know I had.
I have to close my eyes and count silently to ten.
It’s just that I’m dehydrated and suffering from heat stroke.
It’s just that all of Lily’s wedding talk makes me feel lonely, even though I know I’m better off alone than settling for someone like her Patrick.
It’s just that I’m utterly exhausted and in need of saving—a reality I hate to admit even to myself.
I will not swoon over the cowboy. I will not lust after the gorgeous man who is hopefully going to save us and not leave us to the coyotes. I will not.
With a deep breath, I open my eyes. He has almost reached us—which in and of itself feels like a miracle.
The dust is thick around his fucking cowboy boots, and everything about him, from his gait to the way his thumb is looped through a belt loop oozes smug and stern at the same time.
Lick my lips, clear my throat, I open my mouth to holler at him.