Page 39

“Alright, Creature.” Xed kisses her cheek before nudging her out of the frame. “Go check on the timer, but don't touch the oven.”

Hannah skips off, and then it’s just me and Xed again. His eyes keep scanning my face like he’s trying to see what I’m not saying.

“You look like you’re about five seconds from running away,” he says slowly.

A deep, heavy sigh leaves my lungs. “I already did. Everything followed me.”

“Well, how far are you willing to go?”

Something tells me we're not talking about running anymore.

He means the kind of distance you can't measure in miles, but honestly, I don’t have an answer.

Truth is, Logan’s the one who ran away first.

Chapter

Fifteen

Logan

I really hate Ohio. Even more than Kentucky, but at least the food is good.

After tossing the trash from the fried Oreos I inhaled during the show, I walk alone toward the campsite with my head down. My feet scuff the dirt as I twist the wedding band on my finger repeatedly, lost in thought.

Music plays somewhere behind the rides, twangy and too upbeat for my sour mood. Lights from the Ferris wheel blur at the edges of my vision and I pause briefly to watch it spin round and round. Over and over. Day in, day out, the same rotation until it eventually breaks down and turns to rust, which seems to be a pretty accurate representation of my life, if you ask me.

I, too, am broken and falling apart. Put me out with the trash.

Salem’s avoiding me. She iced me out during the entire show. I noticed the way she ran to hide from me earlier, too, and I can’t say I blame her. I wouldn’t want to be in the same state as me, either.

“No, Taylor, our insurance doesn’t cover shooting you from a canon.” Her loud, full-bodied laugh reaches my ears, sending a jolt of pleasure through my body and straight to my crotch. I flick my gaze up ahead to find my wife smiling at Tay before they disappear behind a curtain of vendor tents with the rest of our group. Her red hair catches the glow of a neon sign for all of two seconds before she vanishes again.

Out of reach like she’s always been.

My stomach twists bitterly as I mourn what I lost and what I never got to be.

I’m almost past the game stalls when someone calls out to me, “Hey, man. Yo!”

Seeking out the voice, I blink at a guy in a hoodie holding up a tiny plastic bag with a goldfish swimming inside.

“You want it?” he asks

My brows slam down. “Uh…What?”

“Won it like five minutes ago, but my girlfriend just dumped me. I’m allergic.”

All I can do is gape at him and then at the fish floating inside the bag because did he just say he's allergic?

The guy seems to get frustrated, shrugging as he huffs out a breath. “Look, if you don’t take it, I'll probably just flush the thing, so do you want it or⁠—”

I snatch the bag from his fingers before he can even finish. “No. I'll, uh, keep it. I guess.”

“Thanks, man.” He claps my shoulder before disappearing into the night.

I'm left staring down at this tiny creature swimming in circles around the bag. Over and over. It stares back like it seriously hates the monotony of its life.

“Same, buddy,” I murmur because, apparently, I talk to fish now. “Same.”