The Girls I've Been(77)

He says it like it’s a revelation instead of the guiding truth of my life, and then I’m the one laughing.

“He was always going to find me,” I say. “But today was the day I learned I was ready for anything. Even him. So thanks. I’ve been feeling kind of insecure. But now I know: It wasn’t just luck last time. I’m good.” I smile, one of those sharp almost-snarl smiles I know creeps him out. “I’m great.”

“You’re dead,” he says, but there’s a thread of defeat as sirens wail and the spray of gravel kicks up against the barn wall, brakes squealing to a halt.

I shake my head. “No. I’m just getting started.” They come bursting in then. Jessie and Lee, who has the kind of wild eyes I haven’t seen in five years.

Safe.

The relief sucks all the fight out of me, and I’ve got to dig my heels into the ground to fight the undertow. More deputies arrive and it’s a blur of noise and action, my ears fading in and out, blood trickling down my side from the road rash. I hand the gun to Jessie as the sheriff snaps handcuffs onto Duane and then Lee is blotting out my view.

“Where’s Wes?” I demand.

“He’s okay,” she says. “He helped get everyone out. They’re all okay.”

My eyes almost roll back in my head in relief. I sag against her, my knees liquid for a second before I’m straightening again, searching for Iris. I don’t see her.

Duane’s still laughing as they lead him away, the sound floating up to hook around the barn beams like cracked horseshoes, the worst kind of luck.

Lee’s arms wrap around me so tight I yelp because it hurts. And then she’s yelling for paramedics and snapping her fingers at people with one hand while the other keeps hold of me and shakes so minutely I can’t see it, but I can feel it.

“Iris,” I say, but I get flanked by Jessie and Lee, half supported, half walked out of the barn. The ambulance lights are flashing in the distance, and I come to a total stop when I see the stretcher the EMTs are wheeling toward us.

“No way,” I say.

“No arguing,” Lee says back, and she pushes me on the stretcher and I go, even though I was planning on protesting more. I fall back like I need to, and who knew my legs were that numb? I didn’t.

The world swoops and fades a little, but I can hear Lee the whole time, so I know it’s safe. I close my eyes. Just for a second. Then I’ll sit up and pay attention.

But I don’t sit up. I fade out completely, because I know Lee will be there. And Iris. And Wes. Everyone’s safe.

I know that when the world sharpens again, I’ll have to face the truth I’ve been running from: that I was never safe.

That I’ll never be safe.

Not until I tilt the ground back to me . . . for good this time.





Part Four





. . . it’s just another thing to lose.


   (August 8–30)





— 62 —


1:20 p.m. (38 minutes free)

2 safe-deposit keys (hidden in jeans pocket)



I come back to earth fast when the nurses at the hospital start cleaning out the road rash. Even with the lidocaine, it stings and throbs. They dig bits of gravel and dirt and debris out of my shoulders and side, and Lee keeps trying to hold my hand while I keep telling her to go check on Iris and Wes: Go find them, go check on them, please, Lee, please. I need to know where they are.

“Please,” I beg, but she shakes her head, just as stubborn.

“I’m gonna find them, then,” I threaten, but when I try to resist the nurse, she pins me to the bed, not with her body, but with a look that could have been honed only by an emergency room full of that particular Northern California flavor of people.

“You want this to get infected?” the nurse asks me.

“I want my friends,” I say, not to her, but to Lee.

“She always this way?” the nurse asks Lee.

“She’s a tough one,” Lee says, a note of pride sparkling in her voice.

“She’s right here and doesn’t need to be talked about like she isn’t,” I say grumpily.

“Sorry, hon,” the nurse says with a smile. “You did a great job today. Heard the deputies talking about it.”

“Please go find Wes and Iris,” I say to Lee.

“Drop it, Nora,” she says, and my mouth shuts with an annoyed click, because she never uses that line unless she means it. She’s stark white still, like she’s just figured out how to breathe again.

“Are you okay? Should they check you out?” I ask, and oh, that was so the wrong thing to say. The sarcastic eyebrow arch I get back is so quelling that I almost fall into line then and there.

“I’m going to grab some more gauze,” the nurse says, and as soon as she leaves the room, Lee’s shoulders set.

“Do we need to go?” she asks me.

She keeps rubbing her fingers against her thumb, skittish in a way she rarely is. One wrong word from me, and I’m going to end up across the ocean before I can talk my way out of it.

I shake my head. “We’re good. It’s all good.”

She sags in relief, and I should feel terrible, shouldn’t I?

All I feel is a different kind of relief, even though adding to the pile of secrets I’ve kept from her is not ideal. She’ll catch me someday, and it’s going to be a reckoning I’ll never be ready for.