Page 104 of The One
But I replied, “Yes! I need help! Call the Coast Guard right now!” My hands had frozen while I responded, but they were back to pulsing against her chest. “Four. Five. Six.”
There was more red.
It wouldn’t stop.
It just kept coming.
“Seven, eight, nine,” I counted.
“Mayday, mayday, mayday,” the same voice said. “This is vessel …”
“Pen,” I said, tuning them out, “help is coming. They’ll be here soon.”
Ten, eleven, twelve.
“Pen!”
PART 2
When I finally had the courage to close my hand, eliminating the spaces between each finger, I knew.
I’d never have to reach for nothingness again.
I’d never have to clutch empty air.
Beautifully broken.
But in love.
THIRTY-TWO
Lainey
One Day Ago
Ilifted a few strands of Penelope’s hair and twirled it around my finger. In the thirty-three years I’d been alive, my hair color had changed many times. The palate cleanser was the light brown with golden highlights that I’d been born with, returning to it between my adventurous attempts of red and black and even platinum blonde. But Pen’s color never changed. Neither did her style. Straight, the frizz controlled with loose beach waves that hung low down her back.
“What’s going on in that head of yours?” she asked.
I smiled, looking down. “Nothing.”
“Bullshit. I know when nothing is bothering you, and I know when something is bothering you, and I know when everything is bothering you. In this case, it’s something.” She shook my shoulder, causing me to glance back up. “Spill it.” She gazed toward the kitchen. “Or I’ll just get the bottle of vodka that’s in the freezer, and that’ll get you to confess it all.”
I grabbed the pillow that was behind me on the couch and tossed it at her. She caught the fluffy cream-colored square and held it to her chest, wrapping her arms over it.
“Vodka isn’t the answer to everything,” I said.
“It isn’t?”
“Okay, you might have a point there.”
She stretched an arm across the back of the couch. “This something wouldn’t have anything to do with the date you went on last night, would it?”
“What makes you think that?” I tried to pull my brows out of their furrow.
“When I asked earlier if you had a good time, you mumbled something incoherent and walked into the bathroom and shut the door. If you’d had a good time on the date, I would have expected more. A smile. Some excitement. Anything.”
“It sucked.”
