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“I didn’t know if you...”
“I always thought you and Anthony...”
We break off, weary laughter chasing our words. “We’re kind of slow on the uptake, I guess,” I say.
“You’re telling me—I just found out my information is off byabout five years,” she says. “And here I thought I was a keen observer of the human condition. But seriously, why didn’t you say anything?”
“I guess I was scared,” I admit.
She laughs. “Come on. You? Miss Nerves of Steel? You’re the only one of us that’s managed to keep it together in the face of doom, gloom, and six-story stag-men, and you’re saying you were scared of me?”
“I was scared of losing you as a friend. I thought it would make things too awkward,” I said. “Also, I’m completely terrified and I have been the entire time.”
“You don’t show it.”
“It’s not that hard to hide your emotions, once you get a little practice,” I say.
“For you, maybe. I can’t even fake being excited about my grandma’s weird Christmas presents,” Mel says with a shake of her head. A smile sneaks its way into the corner of her mouth. She tries to smooth it out and just ends up with a grin, as if to prove the point. Finally she clears her throat, shakes her head, and manufactures a neutral expression. “So what does this mean?”
“I don’t know,” I say. Part of me wants to ignore everything around us—hold her, kiss her, laugh with her up here and let the road wait. But the dark water lurks outside, and I can’t bring myself to forget it. “I don’t think I can sort through anything I’m feeling right now. I mean, Trina, and... It’s all too much. But as impossible as it is to feel happy, I did. I do. So I think... I think in a while, when we’re home, and we’ve had like a hundred years of therapy...”
“Dinner?” she suggests. “Movie?”
“That’s a start,” I say. I let my hand brush hers, and her fingers hook around mine as we look out over the dark ocean. However much we might wish otherwise, there isn’t room, in the grief and the fear, for more than that.
But it’s something.
“No therapist is going to believe this,” Mel says.
“No one’s going to believe this,” I say.
“Someone will. If this is real, other things must be real,” Mel says. “And other people must have encountered them. People who can help us. If we can even get home.”
I frown, a memory faint at the back of my mind. My fingers tap out a rhythm on my thigh. “Count the crows,” I whisper, almost to myself.
“What?” Mel asks.
“Nothing. I don’t know.” I rest my fingertips against the glass for a moment, frowning out at the water. “We’re going to get home,” I promise. She nods, and the look in her eyes is bright with faith. With hope. With, for maybe the first time, anticipation of what might be waiting for us, when we get back. Some scrap of joy at the end of the road. I try to mirror her expression, but it feels false.
I didn’t slip up this time.We, I said, instead ofyou. But I haven’t failed to notice—there are five of us.
Which means at least one of us won’t be getting home.
SUPPLEMENT A
Text messages between Andrew Ashford and Abigail Ryder
May 9, 2017—Day of interviews
Ashford | Abby
Are you done reviewing Miss Donoghue’s written statements?
Mostly.
You’ve had them for over a day.
She wrote a _lot_.
