Page 30 of The House on Haven Way

I sit up straighter, blinking. “No?”

“No. Apparently not. Johnny,” her voice is heavy. “I have plenty of questions about everything that happened to you. I don’t know what to believe. If what Manny says is true, Harry Rogers didn’t hurt you, and he considered you a real friend. Nancy didn’t come, because... well, because she had a crush on Harry first, and when he came over to give her the bad news, they sort of clicked. In their grief, you know?”

I nod, jerkily, chest tight.

“Do you remember taking something called syrup of ipecac?” Amber asks, taking my hand in hers and rubbing slow circles on my knuckles, her soft, warm skin flirting with seeping into my room-temperature form.

“I had to. To get the poison out. Or whatever it was.”

“Only, you were already feeling sick before, right?”

“Nerves. I was about to propose.” And no wonder it felt wrong. Nancy wasn’t mine. Just like Harry said.

“Yeah, see, that’s a good explanation. Unless you were also being poisoned by the guy you ate lunch with every day, a guy who worked in a hospital and had access to drugs that might be fatal. Or... You could have been suffering from an inflamed appendix. And while I was waiting for my appointment today,” she swallows, “I went on my phone and looked up some things. If you already have an inflamed appendix, you should not take ipecac. It causes violent stomach contractions and puts so much pressure on the appendix that it can burst. When it bursts, it dumps tons of bacteria into your body, and peritonitis can set in—fast.”

I go cold. See-through. Misty. I’m just a shadow next to Amber as a harsh possibility sets in.

I was already feeling sick that week. Off and on. Every time I thought about marrying Nancy, asking her—going all the way and making it legal... My stomach roiled, and I had the nagging little thought that love should feel different.

But then the pain didn’t go away. It got worse. And it got worse the closer I got to proposing.

Yes, because the nerves were worse.

Or, your appendix was getting closer to bursting.

What makes one burst? Gotta look that up.

But not now.

“Johnny? This is just what pieces I’m putting together. If Harry Rogers poisoned you, he’s still at fault. You took the ipecac because of him.”

“Or because I thought he’d do that—even though he was an Army medic who’d saved hundreds of lives. Even though he never raised a voice or a hand to me. Even though up until that day, I would have told you I would have trusted him with my life. Jesus H. Christ,” I whisper, and it’s a broken prayer. “What did I do? Did my suspicious mind kill me?”

“No! I don’t... I don’t think so. There are some pieces missing. Who’s to say he didn’t clean up evidence when he came with the ambulance after Manny called them? And why didn’t Nancy come? And what’s the cause of death? That’s the real answer we need! A person can say anything, but the doctor’s examination will tell us the truth. We still won’t know if poison prompted the inflammation. You know, I’ll go look right now—” Amber rises.

I pull her back, solid in a blink of an eye. “Don’t go tonight. Don’t go looking any more tonight,” I whisper.

My head droops. I start to fade again, but Amber leans into my shoulder, and her living, heart-beating warmth unfreezes my tongue. “What if this was all a stupid mistake?”

She squeezes my knee, and for a blinding moment, only the pleasure of her touch matters.

“I used to say that a lot. Not, ‘What if this was a stupid mistake?’ but ‘This is a stupid mistake.’ One car accident. One driver looking at his phone. One careless moment from some rich teenager—” Amber’s voice shakes with anger, then breaks and crashes down, almost tearful, “ruined years and years of study and work. Wrecked my body and my health. My happiness. My relationship.”

“I know, hon.”

“But if I hadn’t been in that wreck, I wouldn’t be here, with you. And... Without your mistake, you wouldn’t be here with me—if it even was a mistake. I have more research to do. And I know being with me for a week or two doesn’t balance the scales, but maybe it helps. A little. You help me. A lot.”

I squeeze her fingers between mine, and I’m solid enough not to melt into her, or pass through her. Just buzz against her, our nerves singing together.

“You do help, sweetheart,” I murmur, but I’m torn up inside. When I think about the past, what I just learned—that’s a mess. When I think about Amber, and about how someday she’ll want me to go, or she’ll want a boyfriend, a man who can make her moan for real, a man who can give her kids and all of those pretty white picket fence dreams? It feels worse, somehow. “My past is a mess now. And the future? I don’t know if it’s much better.”

“Then maybe we could live right now, in the present?” she suggests, snuggling into my side.

Live. I know she doesn’t mean to toss that word out, and yet, I’m not upset at it. The last week with Amber has made me feel alive again, like time isn’t stuck in a loop, but moving forward.

“Yeah. The present. How’re your legs, kid?”

“They’re sore. Doc Kevin is a mean one.”