Page 2 of Cross My Heart
Dexter: My house. Now.
Trevor: On my way.
Lanie - Present Day
Chapter 1
“Lanie, wake up!Lanie!”
I feel small hands on my shoulders, shaking me.Don’t make a sound, Lanie, stay quiet for Max. Don’t let this asshole find him.Wait…small hands, female hands, that’s not Zachary’s voice. It's Julia’s. My best friend, Jules. She can’t be here.
“Lanie, Jesus Christ, wake up!”
Wake up. Wake up.I’m dreaming. Slowly, I open my eyes. Nothing is in focus. I jump back and my head hits the headboard. Headboard. I’m not on that filthy floor. I’m in bed.My bed, right?But it’s so dark. Jules turns the flashlight on from her phone and I glance around.
The light coastal-themed bedding Julia picked out for me right before I moved in is pooled at my legs. The pale grey walls covered in pictures of Julia and me, artwork that little Charlie has made, along with all the random stuff I’ve been able to collect since college. A second-hand aqua-colored armchair and an antique white desk I found at the only antique shop in town sits under the window. This is home. I'm safe.
“Lanie, it’s me…it’s Jules. The power went out again. You’re okay.”
“I’m okay. Yes, I’m a survivor. I’m a protector. I’m okay. Julia is here.” I say, obviously more for my benefit than Julia's.
“Julia? I’m so sorry. I didn't wake up Charlie this time, did I?” Charlie is Julia's ridiculously cute toddler. I love him like my own, but he is another of my failures. It's my fault he will never know his dad.
“No, Lanes, you didn’t.” I see her shake her head with sad eyes. “Are you alright here for a minute while I go get the flashlights? Here, hold my phone so you have some light. I’ll run to the kitchen and be right back.”
“M-hm, thanks, Jules.”
Julia retreats, her shoulder-length brown hair swaying behind her. She and I couldn’t be more opposite. Where I am six feet tall with dirty blonde hair and blue eyes, she is barely five-foot-two with dark chocolate hair and green eyes. The only similarity between us is our Irish skin and the smattering of freckles covering our faces. Regardless, I had promised her this wasn’t happening anymore.
Fuck. I want to string together every four-letter word I know but refrain myself. Peeking around the room with the phone light I try to determine what could have alerted her other than the power being out.
The freaking power.Will I always be afraid of the dark now?I look next to me and realize another bedside lamp has bit the dust. I lean over the bed and see it smashed to pieces.
Well, shit. Maybe I need to go to HomeGoods and see if they have any wooden lamps or perhaps something made out of concrete, preventing me from breaking another one. This makes the second broken lamp this month, not to mention I’ve lost a couple of picture frames as well. If only we didn’t lose power so often up here in the mountains.
Jules is going to want to talk. Maybe she’s right. Perhaps I do need to get out of here.
Interrupting my train of thought, Jules walks in with a battery-operated lantern and two sleeves of thin mints.Yup, she wants to talk, alright.
“Don’t give me that look, Lanes. It’s my turn to take care of you for a change. You have been watching out for me since wretched old Mrs. Ford yelled at me for picking up my pencil too early on the first day of school.”
“Ugh, she was the worst. She had it out for you just because she couldn’t ever teach you anything you didn’t already know!” I’ll never forget that day. Mrs. Ford was horrid to Julia, her only crime was being smarter than the teacher.
Julia swings her hair over her shoulder and climbs into bed with me. “That’s true! That old hag seriously had it out for me, but you never let her get to me again. I swear you probably should have been expelled for the torment you caused her.”
“Hey! I was just taking the heat off you.”
“I know that, Lanes…just like I know it was you who gave Amy Warback the swirly after she told the basketball team I had herpes.”
“She deserved it,” I grumble.
Jules is the friend I needed when I was a poor kid from the wrong side of town and the friend I still need to this day. She has saved me in more ways than I can ever repay her for.
"Lanes?” The nickname she gave me in fifth grade when we started running track to get out of gym class with the mean girls always makes my lip curl up into a smile.
“Yeah?”
“We need to talk about this,” Jules says. “You promised me this wasn’t happening anymore, but I’ve seen the broken lamps on the curb in the recycling. I know you’re trying to hide it, so I don’t worry, but you can’t live like this.”
