Bait (Wake, #1)(94)

I drove to the hardware store and bought red paint and other supplies that I thought I might need to get the job done.

I dragged out the old stereo from the basement to the shed and set it up. I'd need some tunes for my job. I turned on a modern-rock station and let it set my pace.

The wood was bare, but it was in pretty decent shape. I probably should have done more in terms of preparation, but I was focused solely on making the damn thing red.

The shed wasn't too far from the house, only a hundred feet or so, and I began on the side that faced it. The back side met up to the tree line, so who would care if by the time I got to the back, my handiwork was less than stellar? I relented that if I could singularly paint an entire fifteen by thirty foot shed, I didn't really care how perfect it looked.

I trimmed around the big door and decided I would get white paint the next day and do the trim, if I finished the entire structure that day.

The morning was hot, but I didn't stop. I pulled my shirt over my head and ran it across my almost bare scalp to remove some of the sweat. I tucked it into the back of my tattered cargo shorts and continued.

At about two, I went inside and grabbed some water and a handful of strawberries.

I continued to paint. My mind went where it usually did on standby.

Blake.

I hadn't spoken to her since our fight before her wedding. Before I watched her stroll down the aisle and begged God that she'd stop and leave.

Chalk that up to another unanswered prayer.

I was too far away to see her face or hear her voice as she said her half of the vows, but I couldn't tempt myself by going that close. It would have been too difficult to not make a scene or object, like in the movies.

I surrendered and let it happen. As if I’d had any control over it at all.

The thought still made me a little sick.

Then, like my wandering memory liked to do, it tortured me with flashbacks of her and me together. Random glimpses of happiness and pleasure which only felt like anguish and pain in hindsight.

The way her hair would stick to her face when we were both covered in sweat.

Her laugh and the way she hummed before she fell asleep.

Her pink nose. Her smell. Her taste. Her.

“Looks like you've been busy.”

I really was losing my mind, because I started hearing her voice. It was like she was speaking to me. My arm burned as I rolled the paint high on the last of the exterior shed walls. I'd just started the final side and the blisters I'd given my hands were raw.

I could feel the heat radiating off my shoulders from the hours in the sun. I was thirsty and thoroughly tired.

That had to be why my mind had finally cracked. Her voice was only a figment of my imagination a reprieve my consciousness gifted to sooth me.

“Casey?”

There it was again. The sound was almost clear enough and bright enough to believe. I ignored it. I wouldn't let myself turn around only to learn I really was going mad. Then I felt a cool hand on my leg, as I stood on the lean-to ladder resting against the almost red building.

The fingers stayed in place and I felt my eyes close. Either I was certifiable or it was real. I was afraid to find out which. I held my breath as fought my mind to tell me the truth.

Was I fooling myself?

Was it really her?

Had I brought her out of the thin air by concentrating on her so hard?

Then she said, “Hey.”

I finally allowed myself to look down at my leg. There was a hand. And it belonged to my honeybee. She was really there. On the ground at my mom's house.

I rested my head against my arm and tried to calm my breath. I didn't know what to say. Excitement at the thought of seeing her ran quickly through my veins. Then, I realized seeing her now would be one more memory I'd have to hide from later.

“What do you want, Blake?” I sounded tired and beaten.

She didn't answer, only retracting her touch from my leg.

I was past the point of tip-toing around her feelings. She didn't mind stomping all over mine in her wedding shoes.

One shaky foot after another, I climbed down off the wooden ladder.

“I don't want anything, Casey,” she answered softly.

“From me, you never do.” Stepping away from the last rung, I dipped down to grab the last water bottle I'd brought down with me. I took a long drink, tipping the bottle back, and I got my first good look of her, that I’d had in months.

Her hair was the same, but she looked thinner and more tired than the Blake of my memory. When I'd got my fill of water, I poured the last little bit over my face, dropping the bottle onto the ground when it was empty.

I ran my hands back and forth over my buzzed hair and the water came off the short strands in a mist that felt good on my hot, sunburned shoulders.

“I just wanted to come and see how you’re doing since…,” she paused not knowing how to word the obvious, “…well to see how you're doing.” She looked over the paint job avoiding my eyes. “This looks nice.”

I didn't have any fight in me, not at that moment. “It does,” I said, and walked a few feet away to the shade and sat down on the long grass.

It needed a mow.

I brought my knees up and leaned back on my aching arms.

“Look, Blake. I'm not in the mood for your shit right now. If you came here to play the concerned lover, or friend, save it. I don't want to hear it.”