Page 81 of Secondhand Smoke
Barrett’s heart rate spiked and plummeted at the same time. “Okay, okay. Hold on.” He flicked on his blinker to pull to the side of a nearly empty back road. Nothing was around them but a field on one side and the woods on the other.
“Please, please, please.” Her voice pitched higher, her words breaking in pieces that resembled the same word said a million different ways. Her hands, which had been gripping her jeans, now covered her ears. Her cheeks started to glisten with tears.
Nell didn’t seem to hear his reassurances as he swerved quickly off the main road into the dirt on the side, alarmed by her state. She whimpered as the van bumped and pebbles kicked up more commotion. He apologized rapidly, but she probably couldn’t hear that either.
He was almost at a near stop when she moved, grabbing the door handle, flinging it open with all her might, and leaping to the ground below.
Barrett yelped, his heart stopping as she disappeared.
He shifted into park before the van was still. He jumped out and rushed around, cursing and praying that she was alright.
He rounded and froze, his feet unwilling to cooperate in the gravel that felt like quicksand.
He’d seen a lot of things before. Things he shouldn’t have.
But nothing had ever stuck to his brain the way that image did, ingraining itself into his very soul to become a part of future memories and thoughts.
Nell had fallen to her knees, her legs dirtied, her elbows cut and red. Her body quaked, and her forehead pressed down to the ground like she was praying, with her hands grasping the back of her skull.
But she wasn’t praying. She was screaming.
She was screaming words. Words that didn’t appear because she’d scraped her elbows or cut a knee.
They were stories, secrets.Confessions. Words that cracked from her like she’d been shattered and unable to hold anything in anymore.
“I did it. I did it,” she sobbed into the dirt. “I shouldn’t have driven so fast. I knew the roads were slick. I knew I was going too fast. And I did it. I didn’t look at the road. I just . . . lost control.” She pressed her hands into the side of her head like she was squeezing the memories from her head. “I can’t get any of it out of my head. The blood, the smells. The glass is everywhere. I can’t get it out. It’s like it’s a part of me now. The lights, the sounds. Everything. Everything. Their faces—oh god—their faces.Idid that. I’m a murderer.”
She screamed and screamed and screamed.
Barrett stared, his hands frozen and feet held firm to the ground.
He wasn’t equipped for this. He didn’t have the wisdom or experience to relate. He wasn’t masterful at soothing broken hearts. The little he knew of loss and grief was so aged and faded that he barely felt it to be of any use anymore.
But this was Nell. As little and insignificant as he was to this world, he could never go on letting her think the same.
Functions returned into his body as another piercing sob shook Nell, and he managed to step forward and fall to one knee, crouching in front of her.
His first words came out in a sigh of breathless air as if he had run a million miles to get here. “Listen to me.” He wasn’t sure if she could hear him, but he tried anyway—louder than before. “Listen. I didn’t know them, not really, but I do knowyou.”
His hand took over, reaching out and pulling her away from the ground until her face rested in his palm. Her cheeks shinedwith tears, and her expression twisted in pain as her blue eyes jumped to his. A shuddered breath brushed against his thumb.
He almost didn’t have the strength, almost didn’t have the willpower, to continue without his heart breaking or exploding, but she needed someone. So what else could he do but try?
Somehow, he managed the smile on his face, leaning closer. “You’re not a monster. You’re not a murderer. You’re just human. There’s things we wish we could do, and we do things we wish we hadn’t. I can’t say I know how you feel because I don’t, but you have to know they don’t want you to suffer. You don’t deserve to feel like this. If they . . . cared for you the way I do, then they wouldn’t wantthis. They’d never want you to hurt yourself like this, Nell. Never. You’re so much more than that.”
Her shaking sobs lulled into cries as her gaze held him in place with an intensity that burned him from within. Those cries hushed into unsteady breaths as his chest ached in the limbo between pity and unrelenting affection.
She didn’t move. He didn’t move.
He would crouch there on that gravel shoulder until his knees were bloody if that was how long it took.
“They loved you, Nell. They want you to be happy. I know they do. I want you happy.”
She blinked slowly, and he finally recognized that dreamy, disconnected look in her stormy blue eyes. They glittered far away as another tear fell and some sort of puzzle piece in her expression found its place.
He heard the air change direction. The salty tears on his cheeks went sweet. He sensed the rapture in the universe the moment before it happened.
Nell fell forward and captured his exhale with her lips.
