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“Sawyer, it’s me! It’s Finn. I’m not going to hurt you.” His voice trailed off. “I would never hurt you.”
I slowly opened my eyes and when they finally focused, Finn’s face appeared above me, but the panic was still there, right under the surface like a boiling pot with a flimsy lid.
“Finn,” I stated simply. “Let me up.”
Finn watched me curiously as he slid off me. “He’s gone.” He leaned in to run his hand down my face, but I tore my head away before he could touch me.
When he tried to help me up I flinched. “I can do it,” I spat. Finn took a step back and allowed me room to get to my feet.
I stumbled and lost my footing. Finn caught me and again I struggled to free myself from his grip, but this time instead of stepping back he only held me tighter, spinning me around and searching my eyes.
“I’m not him,” Finn said, calmly and assertively.
“I know you’re not Sterling,” I said, wriggling from his grasp. He dug his fingers into my arms.
“No. Not Sterling. You know who I’m talking about,” Finn said. “I’m not him.”
I closed my eyes. “It doesn’t matter. It’s over.” I wanted to disappear. From Finn, from the memories. I needed to be alone. To think.
“I don’t know where you went back there, but I know you weren’t here.” He pulled me in tighter. “I’m not him,” he growled, louder this time like he was trying to push the words into my soul.
“Just let me go!” I begged. “Please!” I didn’t want to face it.
Any of it.
“Sawyer, say it. Tell me. Look at me and say it!” Finn shouted.
Wanting to get whatever it was he was trying to do over with, I opened my eyes, glared into Finn with everything I had and screamed, “You’re not hiiiiim!”
After a few seconds of Finn and I staring at one another, I felt the words sink in. “You’re not him,” I whispered, just as I felt the fight inside me turn from bright to dim to dead.
I collapsed forward into Finn’s arms and made no attempt to get away this time. I felt exhausted. Drained.
Finn spoke into my hair. “Are you hurt?”
“No,” I answered, my teeth chattering.
Finn eased back so he could look at me, keeping his hands lightly on my arms. “Where did you go?”
I sucked in a breath. “Home. I went home,” I answered, feeling confused and shaken up. My heart still racing and my head pounding.
Finn raised a hand to smooth some hair from my face but stopped again when he noticed his knuckles. His eyes widened and he dropped his hand.
“It’s okay, now,” I assured him. I reached out and grabbed his hand. I blew air over his wounded knuckles.
“I’m sorry I scared you,” Finn said softly.
“Me too.”
Finn bent at the waist and lifted me off the ground with one arm behind my knees and the other supporting my neck. He held me against his chest and carried me out of the woods and back to the clearing.
“When I kicked opened your door,” Finn started, “You were laughing. Why?”
“Because, I knew you’d come,” I said, hearing and feeling Finn’s heartbeat quicken against my temple. “I knew you’d save me.”
“You did?” Finn asked, his voice broken.
I nodded and closed my eyes. “I did. He can’t hurt me here. I’m in my safe place.”
“Your safe place?” he questioned as we approached my house.
“Outskirts. He can’t hurt me when I’m in Outskirts.” I sighed deeply as I echoed my mother’s words from the past. “No one can.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Finn
She knew I’d come.
“My mother told me when I was younger that no one could hurt her while she was in Outskirts. That’s what I was remembering. When I zoned out.”
“Did you ask Critter about her?” I asked.
“Yes, I asked him about her. Described her. He said he didn’t know her.”
“Maybe he was getting his wires crossed. No one has been in this town in the last fifty years that Critter didn’t know in one way or another. Maybe there’s a record of her somewhere in the library. That’s where they used to store all the City Hall stuff before City Hall moved to the mayor’s back guest room-slash-home office. I’ll ask around for you.”
“You will?” Sawyer asked, perking up.
“Yes. But are you sure you’re okay?” I asked Sawyer. “You’re surprisingly calm after what just happened. It’s kind of freaking me out.”
Sawyer chuckled and rested her head on my shoulder. “I’m sure. I promise.” We were on my porch, sitting on the old porch swing listening to the bugs chatter in the otherwise silent night.
“I hate that you’ve been so used to being beaten that Sterling trying to assault you hasn’t affected you the way it should.” I felt a new pulse of anger surge through me.
“I hate that too. But I can’t change the past. I can only change my future. And I told you, Sterling didn’t hurt me.” Sawyer met my eyes. “Because of you.”
I wish I’d had the kind of faith in me that Sawyer had just shown. I had faith in her too.
It was about time I showed her just how much.
My hands shook when I pulled the picture from my wallet and handed it to her.
“This is Jackie, right?” Sawyer sat up and examined the picture.
I nodded.
“She’s beautiful.”
“She was,” I agreed.
“Tell me about her,” Sawyer said without a trace of pity in her eyes. I lifted her legs so they were draped across my lap.
I thought for a moment. “Well, when I first met her we were both all elbows and knees. Just a couple of lanky kids. She had more energy than a power plant. Always buzzing around and getting into something. We were just friends at first. We had a lot of fun together.” I chuckled at the memories. “Got in a lot of trouble together too. Especially with Josh and Miller.”
Sawyer laughed with me, and the sound was like the best part of a song, the kind you always wanted to sing along to even if you didn’t know any of the other words.
“Jackie was one of those people that walked into a room and every single head turned, and not just because she was beautiful, which she was, but because she had this thing about her that made people want to be around her. Made ME want to be around her.”
“People orbited her,” Sawyer chimed in.
