“The fact that I have balls of steel is now unarguable,” he announces with a grin. “And I’m never nervous. Not even about ghosts. Also, since I gave you one answer, turnabout is fair play, right? So… have you ever seen a ghost?”
I’ve not seen one, but the ghost of my mother is here… present in every picture, pile of clothing and memory of this house. But of course I don’t say that.
I shrug instead. “I’ve never seen one. As far as I’m concerned, there is no such thing.”
“Really?” he answers, sounding doubtful. “That’s disappointing.”
“You’re going to be in the Carriage House anyway,” I tell him. “There aren’t any dead people out there. I mean, I assume you’re renting it, right?
Please be right.
He nods. “Yeah. Thanks for letting me know about it. It’s just what I’ve been looking for. A nice little space with gorgeous scenery.”
As he says the words gorgeous scenery, he stares straight at me, with purpose.
I’m his gorgeous scenery. I suddenly can’t breathe enough to even try to ask him why he wants to be in Astoria in the first place.
“Kismet,” I manage to eke out.
He nods. “Kismet.”
Dare stares at me, long and hard and dark, and I manage to take one deep breath, then another.
“So I’ll be seeing you,” he says, abruptly ending our conversation by standing up.
“When are you moving in?” I ask, suddenly panicky at the thought of him leaving. He brings with him an air of comfort, of excitement, of something charged and dangerous and new. I don’t want to let that go just yet.
He grins.
“Now. I brought my bag.”
His bag? I follow his gesture to see a duffel bag strapped to the back of his bike. One bag.
“That’s it?”
“I travel light,” he answers, heading back to the Carriage House. To his home, which is now only a hundred feet from my own.
“I guess you do,” I murmur. I watch the way his wide shoulders sway, and the way the breeze flutters his dark hair. He grabs his bag and ducks into his new home and I realize that I forgot to ask him something.
How long he’s staying.
***
Dinner feels different tonight, mainly because I know Dare is a hundred yards away.
I serve up spaghetti, which is the easiest meal on the planet to prepare, and garlic bread and corn. My father eats with gusto, while Finn, as usual, pushes things around on his plate. His meds make him lose his appetite.
We’re eating late, because my father worked late.
At the thought of his ‘work’, I can’t help but glance at his hands. I know he washed them several times when he came upstairs, but just the thought of what he’d been doing with them, what he’d been handling, grosses me out. I know that a scant hour or so ago, he was jamming a needle into a dead person’s neck and replacing all of their blood with chemical fluid.
And now he’s eating with those same hands.
It’s gross and it’s hard to swallow my blood-colored spaghetti sauce.
“So, how was your day?” I ask Finn, trying desperately to think of something else. I hadn’t seen him all afternoon. He shrugs.
“Good, I guess. I finished going through my closet. I’ve got a few boxes for Goodwill, dad.”
My dad nods, but I see something on Finn’s face, something flicker, and I widen my eyes. Don’t do it, I try and tell him telepathically. Don’t mention mom’s stuff. Don’t.
And he doesn’t. Instead, he looks at me.
“Actually, I have something I want to tell you guys.”
We both look at him, waiting. My breath catches because he looks so serious.
What the hell?
I see him swallow hard. Not a good sign.
“I’ve decided to go to MIT after all.”
My stomach plunges into my shoes and the silence in the room is heavy. I look at my dad and he looks at me, then we both stare at Finn while I try and remember how to speak so that I can argue.
“No,” I manage to say. “You can’t go alone. Finn.”
He feels the pleading in my eyes and looks away, at the walls, out the windows.
“Please don’t try and talk me out of it,” he tells us, but he’s mostly telling me. “Cal, I want to go with you. I do. But this is for the best. It’s something I have to do. I have to be alone, and figure out how to be alone. How to stay sane alone. Do you understand?”
No. A thousand times No. A millions times NO.
I’m shaking my head, but my father leans over and puts a hand on my shoulder. A warning to be silent. I stare at him helplessly.
“I think that’s good,” my father says. “Your mother and I…” his voice trails off like he’s in pain and he pauses for a second. “Your mother and I both thought that was for the best. Some separation so that you can grow independently. This is good.”
My dad sounds so proud. Like Finn is doing something heroic, like he’s saving a kid from a fire or moving a tortoise off a free-way. But it’s not heroic because he’s being self-destructive. I can see it in his eyes, and the way he holds his shoulders and won’t look at me.
Put me out of my misery.
The words in his journal are all I can see when I look at him.
But when he looks back into my eyes, his are filled with something else. Pleading.
Let me do this. Let me go.
Let him do what?
Learn to live alone? Shoulder things alone? I take a shaky breath and Finn still stares at me. And stares. And stares. And finally I break under the pale blue weight of it.
“Ok.”
The word comes out like an exhale.
Finn raises an eyebrow. “Ok? No kicking or screaming?”
I shake my head. “No. Not if you’re sure. I fought mom and dad over it, but I’m not going to fight you.”
I feel resigned and sad and panicky, and I already feel alone. But what can I do? It’s Finn’s choice. His gaze softens now.
“You’re not fighting me,” he points out. “You’re doing what I know needs to be done. And you know it too, Calla.”
No, I don’t. I know just the opposite, actually.