Her eyes snapped to the floor.To the blood.
“What the—” Her voice tremored.She pointed, like maybe if she didn’t get closer it wouldn’t be real.“Did he do that?”
“It’s fine,” I said.“My fault.I’m fine.”
“You’renotfine!”She dropped to her knees in the dirt beside me.Her hands closed around my calf, careful and shaking, like she could will the bleeding to stop if she just held on tight enough.
I didn’t move.Didn’t even flinch.
“What’s wrong with you?”Anger and fear tangled in her voice.She yanked a towel off the stall door, dunked it into the water bucket, and scrubbed the blood away.“Hold it!”
I did.Because she told me to.Because it was easier than deciding anything for myself.
She worked fast, scavenging supplies from the feed room, wrapping my leg with more competence than I’d expected.When she finished, she sat back on her heels and stared at her handiwork.
“It needs stitches,” she announced.
“There’s no one to drive me to the hospital.”The words landed between us, heavy and final.
“Can you ride a bike?We can go up to the urgent care on 64.”
* * *
It took nearly an hour to reach the urgent care on our bikes, rain soaking us through, my shorts plastered to my legs.By the time we made it inside, the cut throbbed deep and insistent.I wanted the pain.I didn’t deserve relief.
We sat in the waiting room with a handful of strangers, the air sharp with disinfectant.I kept my eyes on the floor.I didn’t want Erika to look at me too closely.I didn’t want her to see that this—all of this—was my fault.
She slid her hand over mine.Over the hand where the knuckles weren’t busted.
I stared at our hands instead of her face.Mine had grown bigger at some point.I wasn’t sure when that happened.Hers was tanner, warmer, the skin familiar in a way nothing else was.
“I’m fine,” I said, my voice cracking.“You can go.You don’t have to stay.”
She didn’t answer right away.She just squeezed my hand, firm and steady.Then she let go only to wrap her arms around me, pulling me into her like she was afraid I might disappear.
“You’re my always and whenever, Josh,” she said quietly.“I need you.And you need me.Been that way since third grade.Going to stay that way.”
I breathed her in when every part of me wanted to run.Or vanish.Or turn into dust and let the wind carry me somewhere Brian couldn’t drown and I couldn’t fail him.
I should’ve been the one who died.I was the useless one.
But Erika needed me.
I pulled back just enough to look at her.The intensity in her eyes scared me more than the blood had.It made everything real.It mademematter.
All the stupid things I’d done for her over the years rushed back—how I’d stood up to kids who picked on her, how I brought extra snacks to school when I knew she wouldn’t have enough for lunch, how I’d sat with her for hours helping her read through her dyslexia.Things I’d done without thinking, like they were nothing.
She reached up and unclasped the locket from around her neck, pressing it into my palm.“It’s magical,” she said, like it was the most normal thing in the world.“My mom gave it to me last year.She said it brings luck.You need to borrow it today.”
My fingers curled around the cool metal.As long as I had her, I wasn’t alone.I was needed.
* * *
Josh: 19
Erika: 18
JOSH
