AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The letter was from my parents.
19
I knew it was completely ridiculous, but I couldn’t bring myself to open the envelope. I mean, I knew they were dead.
I had been there.
I’d been spending the night at my friend Jessica’s house, just down the road, and we’d still been awake in the small hours of the morning when the fire trucks went by with their screaming sirens, waking half the neighborhood. We’d gone outside, curious, and for as long as I live I’ll never forget the exact moment I realized it was my own house sending up black plumes of smoke into the sky.
The memory got hazy then, but I remembered running past the firemen and straight into the house, ignoring the shouts from behind me. I’d seen my parents, in their bed at the rear of the house. I’d been coughing so hard my eyes were watering at that point, so the fact that they weren’t coughing—or moving—seemed like a bad sign.
I remembered the screaming, and only belatedly realizing it was coming from me. I remembered the heat. It had been more intense than I could have imagined. I remembered the fireman coming up behind me and pulling me away, and I’d fought him and fell only to catch myself on the burning footboard of the bed. The sheer intensity of the pain in my arms had wrenched yet another scream from my throat before he’d dragged me backward out of the house.
They’d loaded me onto a stretcher despite my hysterics and clapped an oxygen mask over my face. I’d seen the other two stretchers loaded into the other ambulance, but no one was sitting up and breathing on those.
There was no doubt that my parents were dead. So how were they writing me letters?
I gripped the envelope tightly as I paced the narrow length of my room, back and forth, back and forth. Logically, I knew the only reasonable explanation was that they’d sent the letter before the fire, though that still didn’t answer the question of why it’d been addressed to me, at my aunt’s house. Nothing made any sense.
The air was stifling in my room, and the memories crowded my head. I had to get out of there.
I grabbed my coat where it hung from my desk chair and dug my keys out of my backpack, throwing on my shoes and leaving the dorm. There was only one place to go.
It was bitterly cold outside, and the sky was clouded over so there was barely enough light to see as I headed down the shore toward the woods. I pulled the hood of my coat up over my head, wishing I’d thought to put on extra clothes underneath, but I’d been dressed for bed in pajama pants and a thin tank top. I hadn’t even thought to put on socks under my shoes. But there was no way I was going back—not with all these thoughts swirling in my head. I had to get to the one place where I felt calm.
It was dangerous in the woods, almost pitch black, and the brush was so thick underfoot it was difficult to see the trail. I pulled my phone out of my coat pocket and used the flashlight to illuminate my path. I followed the shoreline, and it wasn’t long before the beam glinted off of the smooth surface of my rock.
I scrambled carefully onto the frigid surface and sat, shutting off the flashlight and jamming my phone back into my pocket. I waited for the tightness in my chest to ease, trying to recapture that sense of peaceful calm I’d felt in this same spot just earlier that day.
It didn’t come.
Instead, all I felt was the freezing surface of the rock seeping through the thin fabric of my pants to chill my skin. The icy wind bit at my ankles and hands. It was stupid of me to have come out here.
I stuffed my hands into my pockets to keep them warm and felt the envelope. I pulled it out, looking at it in the dim light of the moon through the scudding clouds.
The sight of my mom’s handwriting, so painfully familiar, stole my breath.
Just open it, I told myself. Just read it.
But I couldn’t. It wouldn’t bring them back, and as long as I had this piece of them, unopened, unread, it was like they still had a way to speak to me, something left to say. It seemed likely that the letter was part of their will, maybe even written years beforehand. Possibly sent from their lawyer when the estate had been liquidated. But it didn’t matter. As long as I had it, I wouldn’t have to say goodbye. Not again.
I didn’t even realize I was crying until the tears burned down my cheeks, surprisingly warm against my chilled skin. I wiped them away, then again, until they came too fast, streaming down my face as I let the sobs burst free. It was the first time I’d cried—really cried—since that night.
I wrapped my arms around my knees, the envelope clutched in my fist as I curled into a ball and let the emotions rise up and overwhelm me.
Eventually, my tears dried up and the cold became an increasingly pressing issue. I knew I had to head back. I was halfway to my feet, my toes numb and legs shaky with cold, when I heard a shout in the distance. I turned reflexively toward the noise, and my breath caught in my throat.
Two men stood near the beach on a rocky outcropping overlooking the water, far enough away that I couldn’t quite make out their words, but close enough that their figures were clear in the moonlight that had chosen this moment to shine free of the clouds.
One of the men had his arms raised, and was gesturing threateningly at the other man. His voice was raised, the jeering tone clear even if the words weren’t, and though his back was to me, his blond hair gleamed clearly in the moonlight.
Drew.
I crouched down on my rock, trying to keep out of sight even though I knew there was little chance anyone would see me out here.
The other man had his arms folded across his chest, and even without the glower it was obviously Garrett. It was clear from his tight posture, all his restless energy trapped inside as he held himself still and didn’t react to the other man’s taunts.
There was no way I could leave the woods; I’d have to walk right by them. But what the hell were they doing out here? It had to be nearly two in the morning, if not later. I shivered, wrapping my arms tight around my body, and hoped they’d hurry it up.
