NOCTE (Nocte Trilogy #1)(74)

I gulp, because I can only imagine, and because all of it, the whole elaborate thing, was my fault. Then something else occurs to me, something horrifying.

“The pecans,” I breathe, my eyes wide and appalled. “Finn didn’t feed them to me. I fed them to myself. The hospital… I wasn’t there to visit Finn… I was there for me. They were watching me… to see if I’d try and hurt myself again.”

Dare doesn’t anything, but his silence is everything.

I stare around the room, at the empty, empty room.

“My brother is dead.” The words taste bitter.

Dare doesn’t say anything but he squeezes me tighter.

“You knew all along.” My words are hard. Dare looks down at me.

“I couldn’t tell you. The doctors said you had to remember on your own.”

“I’m so stupid.” Tears run down my cheeks and I wipe them away, ignoring my pounding heart because it hurts too much. “I’m insane.”

“You’re not.”

“Are you trying to convince you or me?” I ask painfully.

“You,” he says firmly.

I look out the windows, at the rain, at the cliffs. The wind, the rain, the clay… all of it blurs together with my tears and it all turns red, because red = dangerous.

My loss is overwhelming.

My brother.

The pain.

It’s all red.

“Ever since we were born, we were Calla and Finn,” I tell Dare blankly. “Who am I now?”

Dare holds me close, oblivious to the weather, oblivious to everything else but me. “I’m one half of a whole. Finn’s my other half. What am I supposed to do without him?”

My sobs scrape my ribs, cutting them, making them bleed because I’m red now. I’ll never be green again.

“I don’t know,” Dare admits helplessly. “I want to tell you it’ll be ok. I’ll tell you that I’ll do anything I can to make it that way. But I think… only time…”

“Don’t say time heals all wounds,” I interrupt sharply. “That’s a lie.”

“I know,” he says simply. “But with time, you can manage it. That’s all. The pain will become less and your memories will keep you afloat. That’s what I know.”

“He wanted saving… from his own mind, I mean,” I try and make my heart numb, but I know that’s dangerous now. I can’t hide from it anymore. I have to feel this for all of the miserable pain that it is. “In his journal… he asked over and over to be saved. He asked me to save him.” I look into Dare’s eyes. “I couldn’t save him, Dare.”

Dare doesn’t break our gaze. “He wasn’t yours to save, Calla. He didn’t die from his mental illness. He died from a car accident. There was absolutely nothing you could’ve done to save him.”

“Except I shouldn’t have called my mom during the storm. That would’ve saved them both.”

Dare grips my arms, forcing me to look at him.

“That’s simply not true and you know it. When’s it’s time, it’s time. We don’t get to decide. God does.”

I’m empty inside. I hear Dare’s words, but I can’t feel them.

“I need to rest,” I decide, curling onto my side in my brother’s bed. I close my eyes against reality, seeking comfort from the blackness. Dare doesn’t argue. He just lays down behind me, his arms holding me tight.

“You don’t have to stay.”

“I do.” His words are firm. “Your dad’s not here and I’m not leaving you alone. I’m not leaving you again, period.”

Tears streak my face and I keep my eyes pressed closed.

I turn into Dare, inhaling his smell, listening to his heart while it beats strong and loud and true. He’s alive, and I am too.

But Finn’s not.

“I don’t know how I’m going to survive this,” I whisper.

Dare kisses the top of my head, his breath a mere whisper.

“One day at a time.”

I look up at him, my eyes hot and red. “With you?”

He nods. “With me.”

The pain floods me and so I do the only thing I know to do.

I sleep.

And I dream.

Because all along, my dreams have been memories.





42


QUADRAGINTA DUO





“He’s gone, honey.”

I stare at the wall, my phone in my hand. I’d been waiting and waiting for Finn to call, waiting for his voice, waiting for him to be okay. Dare’s arms are wrapped around my shoulder, holding me up.

My dad stares at me, his eyes pale blue like Finn’s, and shocked.

“Calla?”

I turn my face to look at him, but looking at him makes it feel too real, so I close my eyes instead.

I can’t do this.

“Calla, they found his car. It’s in the bay. He drove off the edge… your mom was in the ravine, but Finn’s car plunged the opposite way. Down the rocks, into the water.”

No, it didn’t.

He couldn’t have.

“No,” I say clearly, staring at my father dazed. “He was wearing his medallion. He was protected.”