By Your Side(35)

I needed to get to the hospital. That’s where my dad had agreed I could go. That’s where I should’ve been. I turned and had just descended the two cracking cement steps toward my car when the door creaked open. The woman threw a crumpled piece of paper at me and immediately shut it again. She locked it as well.

I stared at the paper sitting on the porch next to the doormat shaped like a flower and a tipped-over green plastic watering can. I picked it up, smoothed it flat, and smiled at the address written there. I probably shouldn’t have been so happy about blackmailing information out of someone, but considering the victim, I didn’t feel quite so bad. I’d found him. And he never needed to know how.





CHAPTER 22


The group home caregiver was a tall black man with a pleasant smile, unlike Dax’s last foster parent. He also looked like he’d actually gotten ready that morning versus rolled out of bed. He had the early stages of a beard along his jaw, but his head was as smooth as could be.

“You’re here to see Dax?”

“Yes.”

He looked at his watch. “He’ll have to go over his schedule with you. Now is homework. He has free time after four.”

Dax would hate that, I was sure, his life scheduled to the minute. I checked my phone. It was 3:45. “Do I have to wait or can he get done a little early today since I didn’t know?”

“Just this once. Let me get him.”

“Thanks.” I clutched his sweatshirt in my hand. A moth clung to the wood around the door frame and I watched as it moved its wings without flying.

Dax came to the door, his hair disheveled, wearing a wrinkled tee and some athletic shorts. His feet were bare, and around his wrist was the black bracelet I had tied there.

My tight chest loosened. I wanted to push up the sleeve of my sweater and show him I was still wearing mine, too. I didn’t. I held out his sweatshirt. “Thought I’d return that.”

He took it and I had the strangest urge to grab it back, hold on to it, keep it.

“And my socks?” he asked.

“Oh. Right. I forgot about those. I’ll bring them next time.”

“It’s okay. You can keep them.”

“Did you happen to grab my shoes?” When he looked confused I added, “They were black ankle boot wedges.”

He laughed. “Because that clears things up.”

“You can’t picture them perfectly now?”

“No, I didn’t get them. They’re probably still at the library.”

Right. Still at the library.

Dax stood in the open doorway, as though ready to shut the door without a second thought. I searched my brain for another reason to keep him from doing that.

“So a group home, huh?” was the idiotic solution my brain came up with.

He looked at the door. “Dreams do come true.”

“You were supposed to leave.”

“What?”

“When people came, you were supposed to hide and then leave. It’s what we talked about.”

“You’re mad at me for waiting when you were passed out?”

I realized I was mad. He was here, where he didn’t want to be, and it was all his fault. “Yes. You should’ve left.”

He laughed a little. “Glad you think me capable of leaving a girl passed out on the floor.”

“I would’ve been fine. They would’ve found me. But now everything is a mess and you’re here and you’re miserable.”

“Autumn, stop. No need for guilt. I won’t be here for long.”

I wished I had his ability to read facial expressions, because his was so stoic I couldn’t tell if what he said was the truth.

“But I don’t understand, why would they punish you for helping me?”

“My foster mom said I ran away for the weekend so she wouldn’t get in trouble for kicking me out.”

“My dad didn’t know you were with me. He thought you came with the alarm.”

“I gave minimal information to the police. CPS doled out this awesome punishment.”

I groaned. “This sucks.”

He shrugged. “It’s fine.”

“How come you haven’t been at school?”

“I’ve been around.”

“I thought you could sit with us at lunch . . . if you wanted to.”

That was the wrong thing to say. His face went from the Dax I’d come to know, to closed off again. Like I’d pushed a reset button. “I don’t need you to set me up with friends, Autumn. I’m fine.” The hallway behind him was dark and seemed to be swallowing him up. “I better get back to mandatory homework time.”

I didn’t want him to leave feeling like however he now felt. I needed him to stay for just a little bit longer, so I blurted out, “Jeff’s in a coma. They won’t bring him out of it until he’s doing better.”

That stopped his backward movement again. “I’m sorry.”

“His mom thinks I am the key to saving him.”

“What do you mean?”

“She pretended I was his cousin and I sat by him and talked to him and she wants me to come back and do the same thing. Like I have some magic touch or something.” I laughed nervously, surprised I had told him that. “It’s no big deal, though. Maybe I can help.”