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“You have to,” I say with too much insistence. “I’m too nervous to go alone.”
Fiona frowns hard at my first words. She really doesn’t like being told what to do. I usually find her stubborn streak endearing. She was such a fearful, broken thing when we met. Now, she stands up for herself.
My confession over my nerves erases her frown. She wants to protect me like I do her. No longer goofing around to avoid getting ready, Fiona slides on her shoes.
She’s dressed in baggy jeans and a long-sleeved gray shirt. The softer, stretchy protective gear isn’t noticeable under her clothes. Fiona wears her black gloves and a matching knit hat with earflaps. She looks sloppy casual like the girls I see from the women’s college.
“Don’t let them laugh at me,” Fiona says when we get into the SUV. “I’m being brave by leaving the house. I’m not afraid at all.”
“I love you,” I blurt out when imagining how badly today might go. “I’ll never leave you.”
Fiona takes my words wrong and begins crying. “I’m going to ruin everything for you.”
“No,” I say and take her hand. “We need to stop stressing out, or I won’t be able to drive.”
Hiding behind her glasses, Fiona sighs. “I don’t like cranberries.”
“You won’t eat them.”
“They’ll think I’m rude.”
“They’re bikers. I seriously doubt they’ll care.”
“Do you plan to get a tattoo?” Fiona asks as I wait for the main security gate to open.
“No. It’s painful.”
“Did Eagle tell you that?”
“He said his eagle tattoo took fourteen hours to complete. It took days to finish.”
“Do you think he cried?”
I laugh at the sincerity behind her question. “No. He was stoned at the time.”
“I want to be stoned.”
“Well, I’m not sure that’d work with your meds.”
“I think we should research it. My life might be better if I were stoned.”
“We’ll see.”
Fiona falls silent after putting on Kaleida. The music also calms me. Soon, I can only see Eagle’s smile. I recall the way he kissed me the first night we met. I’d been consumed by need. I don’t know how I was able to walk away. Only the woman in the passenger seat gave me the strength to leave Eagle that night.
Tension suddenly rips through me. Eagle and Fiona are on a collision course. They are bound to butt heads. She’ll see him as an interloper. He’ll view her as a burden. I’ll be stuck in the middle.
Steve’s voice returns to me from that night in the car. The bitterness he felt wasn’t only directed at me. He resented Owen, too. The boy trapped him in a life he didn’t want. I’d dug so deeply into my mind that night that I hadn’t even noticed when the car lost control. If I had been sharper, I might have avoided getting knocked out. Could I have saved Owen?
“Don’t cry,” Fiona says as we sit in the gravel driveway filled with cars. “I won’t mess up your chance. I’ll be good.”
“It’s not you.”
“That’s not true.”
“It’s me. I lose what I love.”
Fiona frowns, unable to find a response. She finally does what I do whenever I can’t give her words of encouragement. Her hand grips mine as I regain control of myself.
