Immediately, I regretted judging him in my head. "I'm sorry."
"Thank you." He glanced at me. "I had a hard time dealing with this when I was younger, so my adoptive father helped me come up with a coping strategy that didn't require me to talk to other people to air my thoughts."
"What's that coping strategy?" I studied the bottle on the backseat again. The ship looked like a lot of work had gone into it. Had Jared put it together by himself? I could just so picture his large hands holding the small pieces, handling every delicate part with the utmost care…
"My dad used to build these boats," Jared said, pulling me out of my thoughts. "Like the one in the backseat. My little brother and I would always ask to be allowed to play with them, but he'd never let us." A faint smile showed on his lips as he talked. It made him look ten times more handsome than he already was.
Down boy,I told myself. This was not the time to be thinking about how hot Jared was.
"So now you build your own boats?" I asked, if only to distract myself from how much I wanted to kiss him again.
"One every year," Jared confirmed. "I write a letter to my family and stick it into the bottle with the ship. Then I let it sail on the anniversary of the fire."
I studied Jared's face, the solemn expression on his face, then I looked at the boat once more. For a moment, I didn't know what to say, awed that he was about to share something that intimate with me. Suddenly I felt weirdly out of place, inadequate. "I don't see a letter in the bottle," I mentioned, my eyes still stuck on the boat. How many hours must have gone into putting it together?
"I'm writing it when we're there," Jared said as if it was no big deal. "I have a second bottle too. There's no boat for it, but I thought maybe you would like to write someone too."
My stomach twisted, then dropped. "What would I write?"
"It's up to you."
Tearing my gaze away from the boat, I stared straight ahead.
"It might be helpful," Jared added, but that was the last thing he said until we reached the beach. I didn't say anything more either. My thoughts kept spinning around the bottle and the idea of writing a letter. Jared hadn't mentioned whom I should address the letter to, but it was obvious, wasn't it? He wanted me to write to my sire.
I didn't know if I wanted that, though, or what I should put in the letter.
Every time I tried to think of something, I felt strangely empty on the inside. Empty and slightly nauseated. As if I'd had too much of the wrong kind of blood.
What did you say to someone whose death you were partly responsible for?
What did you say to someone whose death you were supposed to mourn…but whose death also set you free?
Before I could come up with a response to any of the questions in my head, Jared parked the car at the beach. Drizzit jumped out as soon as I opened the passenger door, untouched by the heavy dread that was weighting me down.
Jared stepped out of the car and took the bottle and a bag with some other things—maybe the second bottle?—with him as he walked toward the beach. I followed a few feet behind. The beach was mostly empty at this time of night. Sandy ground lined the shore, interspersed with thin patches of grass. In the dark, the gentle waves that rolled up to the shore looked ominous, even to my vampire eyes. There was just something about black water that gave me the creeps. Liquid darkness, ready to swallow you up and carry you away.
I was glad that Jared didn't walk up to the water. He stopped a good way away, plopping down on a patch of grass. Sitting cross-legged, he pulled a flashlight out of his bag, stuck it into the sand and powered it on so he had enough light to write by.
He probably didn't usually do this in the dark.
He had changed his tradition for me, hadn't he? He'd even said that he was late. Also because of me, no doubt about that. The least I could do was to play along, even if I didn't think it was going to help.
I sat next to him and was rewarded with a smile. It wasn't a big smile, but that wouldn't have suited him anyway. Besides, I was coming to enjoy his half-smiles. They were never just for show or because he wanted to make me feel better—or to fool me. They formed on his lips in moments when he just couldn't help a smile, always genuine. I liked that.
Really not the time to be thinking about his smiles,I reminded myself, even as the sight of Jared untangled one of the knots that had formed in my stomach.Feeling stupid, I exhaled. What good did it do me to nurse a crush on someone while I was still bound to my sire?
It was just as pointless as Michael's crush had been. Maybe being turned into a vampire hadn't changed me all that much after all. A bitter smile formed on my own lips. It hadn't been the turning that had changed me anyway.
Jared pulled out two books and two sheets of paper. He handed one of each to me, along with a pen. Then he started to write.
I watched him for a while, unsure what to do. I kind of wanted to ask him what he was writing, but that was personal, wasn't it? So I tried to focus on my own piece of paper instead, putting it on top of the book to have a solid surface to write on.
'To Nicolai,' I started, then stopped.
There were so many things I wanted to say, and at the same time, I didn't want to say anything at all.
What would you say if you had one last chance to speak to him?a voice inside my head prompted. Closing my eyes, I tried to picture it. The hairs stood up in the back of my neck. Nicolai would punish me, for what I'd done. There wouldn't be much talking.
