NOCTE (Nocte Trilogy #1)(75)

My father, the strongest man I know, turns away and his shoulders shake. After minutes, he turns back.

“I want to see,” I tell him emptily. “If it’s true, I need to see.”

My father is already shaking his head, his hand on my arm. “No.”

“Yes.”

I don’t wait for him to agree, I just bolt from the house, down the steps, down the paths, to the beach. I hear Dare behind me, but I don’t stop. There are fireman and police and police tape and EMTs congregated about, and one of them tries to stop me.

“Miss, no,” he says, his voice serious, his face aghast. “You can’t go over there.”

But I yank away because I see Finn.

I see his red smashed car that they’ve already pulled from the water.

I see someone laid out on the sand, someone covered by a sheet.

I walk toward that someone calmly, because even though it’s Finn’s car, it can’t be Finn. It can’t be because he’s my twin, and because I didn’t feel it happen. I would’ve known, wouldn’t I?

Dare calls to me, through thick fog, but I don’t answer.

I take a step.

Then another.

Then another.

Then I’m kneeling in the sand, next to a sheet.

My fingers shake.

My heart trembles.

And I pull the white fabric away.

He’s dressed in jeans and a button-up, clothing for a concert. He’s pale, he’s skinny, he’s long. He’s frail, he’s cold, he’s dead.

He’s Finn.

I can’t breathe as I hold his wet hand, as I hunch over him and cry and try to breathe and try to speak.

He doesn’t look like he was in a crash. There’s a bruise on his forehead and that’s it. He’s just so white, so very very white.

“Please,” I beg him. “No. Not today. No.”

I’m rocking and I feel hands on me, but I shake them away, because this is Finn. And we’re Calla and Finn. He’s part of me and I’m part of him and this can’t be happening.

I cry so hard that my chest hurts with it, my throat grows raw and I gulp to breathe.

“I love you,” I tell him when I can breathe again. “I’m sorry I wasn’t with you. I’m sorry I couldn’t save you. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

I’m still crying when large hands cup my shoulders and lift me from the ground, and I’m pulled into strong arms.

“Shhh, Calla,” my dad murmurs. “It’ll be okay. He knew you loved him.”

“Did he?” I ask harshly, pulling away to look at my father. “Because he wanted me to go with him, and I made him go alone. And now he’s dead. I called mom and they’re both dead.”

Dad pulls me back into his arms and pats my back, showing a tenderness that I didn’t know he possessed. “It’s not your fault,” he tells me between wracking sobs. “He knew you loved him, honey. Everyone knew. Your mother, too.”

My mother. I choke back another gasping sob.

This can’t be happening.

This can’t be happening.

This isn’t my life.

I shake off my father’s arms and walk woodenly back up the trails, past the paramedics, past the police, past everyone who is staring at me. I walk straight up to Finn’s room and collapse onto his bed.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see his journal.

I pick it up, reading the familiar handwriting written by the hands that I love so much.

Serva me, serva bo te.

Save me, and I will save you.

Ok.

Ok, Finn.

I close my eyes because when I wake up tomorrow, I’ll find that this was all a dream. This is a nightmare. It has to be.

Sleep comes quickly and when I wake up, I’ll save Finn.

I wake up with a start, the memories from that night so vivid, so awful, so paralyzing.

Sunlight floods my room, exposing every corner, every empty corner.

I shudder and climb from bed, looking out the window. Dare and my father sit on the porch below, talking earnestly.

I throw some clothes on and slip out the back door and toward the road. When it starts to rain, I pull my hood up, but I keep going.

I have someplace to be.

I pick up the pace, jogging until I get to the cross and ribbons.

Gulping, I stand at the side, looking down at the ravine, at the broken trees, at the black marks and bent limbs.

My mother died here.

But I always knew that.

Turning, I cross to the other side, to the side facing the ocean.

Living things are broken on this side too. The bracken and bushes and trees. They’re bent and broken but still living. They thrive on the side of the mountain, coming back from the brink.

The viridem.

The green.

It’s still here, but Finn isn’t.

His car flipped down the side of this mountain and plunged into the water.

Staring out over the glass-like surface, you’d never know that Finn died there. But I do. I know it now.

And it’s too much to bear.

It’s too much.

I sink to my feet and pull my knees to my chest, closing my eyes, feeling the hot tears form beneath my eyelids. Focusing hard, I picture Finn’s face. I picture him sitting right next to me, right now.

“Hey Cal,” he would say. “Do you know that the sloppy handwriting of physicians kill more than 2,000 people each year—from getting the wrong medications?”