Both of them looked at her expectantly, as if she hadn’t humiliated herself, as if she hadn’t failed them, as if they still thought she could help and wasn’t a liability. They were looking at her as if nothing had changed between them at all.
Tears pricked Claire’s eyes, and her throat felt clogged. No blame. No pity.I don’t deserve it, she thought. “I should have been able to keep myself together. Sometimes... I can’t.”
Mariana squeezed her shoulder. “You’d just had a knife to your throat.”
“But sometimes it happens for no reason at all,” Claire said. “My brain just keeps spinning and spinning and won’t stop.” She held a fist to her head as if it were the enemy. “I didn’t want you to see me like that. I didn’t want you to know... I’m weak.”
She waited for them to agree. Or for them to pity her.
“Broken,” she finished.
Loudly, too loudly, Reyva said, “Bullshit.”
All of them glanced out at the rain as soon as the word burst out of her. They waited, but no one jumped out between the trees in response. They heard nothing but the drumbeat of drops on the trees, rocks, and ground.
Reyva said, quieter, “I don’t know who told you that broken means weak, but that’s bullshit. You are the smartest, most capable person I’ve met. And just because your body doesn’t behave the way you want it to all the time does not mean that you aren’t strong.”
She stared at Reyva and then at Mariana, who nodded fiercely.
They weren’t going to... They weren’t angry? Or disappointed? Claire took a ragged breath and then another. She looked at Reyva’s arm. “Let’s splint it.”
“Great,” Mariana said. “So... how do we do it?”
And just like that, they were past the moment that Claire had been dreading since she’d boarded that boat with the two of them. Her secret was out in the open, and they were miraculously moving on.
“You’ll need to find two pieces of straight wood as long as my arm from elbow to fingers,” Reyva said. “And then something to tie them together around my arm.”
Claire noticed that Mariana still had her flannel shirt tied around her waist. She nodded at it. “That’ll work, if you don’t mind, Mariana.”
Mariana unwrapped it. “Happy to sacrifice it. Maybe whatever is left over can work as a sling? After we have the splint attached?”
Claire nodded. “Good idea.”
Reyva made a sound that was almost a hiccup.
Kneeling next to her, Mariana said, “Reyva? Are you okay?”
Lips pressed tight together, Reyva nodded.
“Are you crying?” Mariana asked.
“Just rain,” Reyva croaked.
“It’s okay to admit you’re having a normal reaction to pain,” Mariana said. “Didn’t you listen to a word you literally just said to Claire?”
“Yeah, okay,” Reyva gritted out.
Claire patted her shoulder, very lightly so as not to hurt any part of her. “We’ll get you fixed up. We can do this.” She felt an overwhelming need to prove she wasn’t a deadweight. As broken as she was, she could still help. She nodded at Mariana. “Stay with her?”
“Of course.”
Stepping out into the drizzle, Claire breathed in deeply. She’d never expected to find friends who would just accept her like that. Completely and unquestioningly. She looked up at the sky, wondering if the stars would be out soon. If she saw one, she’d wish for all the universe to keep them safe.I’d do anything to get them out of here, she thought.
The wind was moving fast, shifting the clouds away and showing patches of matte gray. It was near sunset. Or maybe sunset had already happened. Without open sky, she couldn’t tell. Either way, they wouldn’t have much time before it was too dark to see anything.
On the plus side, there also wasn’t much daylight left for Jack to be able to find them.
She’d never hoped for darkness before.
