But it’s too late. Nothing I can do will turn back the clock. Deep breath. I scribble a quick note to my mother and leave it on the kitchen counter. And as the sound of my parents’ voices arguing gets louder, I quietly head out the front door of the apartment.
It’s cool outside. A soft breeze rustles through the fronds of the palm tree outside our house. I jog down the front steps, hiking my purse higher on my shoulder. It’s so much lighter than the backpack. I almost miss its weight. Almost.
Half the stars have disappeared out of the sky. Like the universe just swiped a hand and erased them. But as I’m walking, a pale white streak appears, and I hope Lennon is watching it with Avani. Miles away, but the same starry sky.
I head toward the left apartment in the blue duplex across from our house. Lights are still on in the windows. The Mackenzies have always been night owls—another thing my dad points to as proof of their hedonism. But I’m not thinking about him now as I ring the doorbell and wait. In fact, I’m not thinking or planning anything past this moment, and when Sunny’s oblong face appears, and she’s blinking into the porch light, I say the first thing that comes to mind.
“I’m sorry to bother you so late. Can I spend the night here with you and Mac? My parents are having problems.”
She stares at me, surprised, standing in a pair of pajama bottoms printed with tiny cartoon trolls. “Of course you can, baby. Come on inside before you freeze to death.”
Then she pulls me over the threshold, past the photos of Lennon and his dad dressed in Halloween costumes. Their house smells just like it always has, like vanilla frosting and old books. And when I see Mac curled up on their worn living room sofa in front of the TV, looking up at me with welcoming eyes, I feel as if I’m finally home.
27
* * *
When I wake the next morning, I’m completely disoriented. It takes me several seconds to realize that I’m not in a tent with Lennon; I’m sleeping in his empty bed, and the sheets smell like him, freshly laundered and sunny. So good. For a moment, anyway. Then I spot his dastardly wall of reptiles, including Ryuk, who’s staring at me through his lizard habitat.
“Sorry, buddy,” I tell the bearded dragon. “Your dark master is not here.”
And he won’t be for several hours. Mac got a text from Avani last night before I showed up. Apparently, Lennon’s phone is still dead, and she informed them that he was safe and would be riding home with her today.
I hope he’s okay.
Sitting atop a pile of gruesome graphic novels, the clock on Lennon’s beside table says it’s half past nine. I smell bacon and coffee, and my stomach leaps with joy. Even though I showered here last night before I dropped dead in Lennon’s bed, I didn’t eat, and my body is more than aware that the last meal I had was freeze-dried stew yesterday afternoon when Lennon and I were hiking toward Condor Peak.
Part of me wants to hibernate in Lennon’s room among the stacks of horror comics and DVDs, but I know I can’t linger here forever. So after checking the state of my hives—not great, but not out of control—I dress in the clothes I stuffed in my purse last night and head down a short hall to the Mackenzies’ main living area. Sunny and Mac are already dressed and sitting at the dining room table, browsing news headlines on a tablet with a cracked screen.
“Good morning,” Sunny says brightly. “How’d you sleep?”
“Like the dead.”
“Excellent,” she says, getting up to head around the kitchen counter. “How about some sustenance?”
“Yes, please. I’m starving.”
Mac squints at me. “You haven’t developed any new allergies to eggs or pork, have you?”
“As long as no one’s cooking shrimp scampi, I’m all good.”
“Ugh,” Mac says, pretending to be exasperated. “Will I ever live that down?”
“Bad shrimp,” Sunny calls out cheerfully from behind the stove.
I exhale deeply and take a seat next to Mac. “I’ve missed you guys.”
“We’ve missed you too,” she assures me, bumping her shoulder against mine.
Sunny brings me a plate piled with eggs, bacon, and toast, and I help myself to the pot of coffee that’s sitting on the table. “Any word from Lennon this morning?” I ask, hopeful. I charged my phone overnight, but there were no messages from him.
Mac lifts her coffee cup. “Avani said she’d text when they were leaving today. I told her to let him know you’re here with us.”
I’m glad, but I also feel left out and unconnected from him. It’s weird to be on the other end of the no-phone-service problem. I liked it better when I was the one without reception.
I’m not sure what it is about civilization, but now that I’m here, the nagging urge to stay connected has returned. If I can’t have him in front of me, I need him to be a text away.
Resisting the urge to double-triple-quadruple-check my phone, I instead answer Sunny and Mac’s questions about the trip. They’re curious, asking questions, and I tell them a lot of things . . . but not everything. I get the feeling they know exactly what Lennon and I have been doing in the woods; they’re smiling a lot, and it’s making me a little uncomfortable, so I just focus on the life-and-death parts of the trip, not the sexlaxation parts. The doorbell rings as I’m telling them about the lightning storm, and when Sunny answers it, she talks to someone for a moment and then calls me quietly into the hallway.
“It’s for you,” she whispers.
I glance down the front hall toward their cracked front door. “Is it my mom?”
She shakes her head. “Go on. It’ll be fine. And we’re steps away if you need us.”
With trepidation, I shuffle to the door and open it. The face staring back at me is familiar, yet unexpected: a handsome Korean man in his fifties with short hair that’s gray along the temples, black in the back.
“Grandpa Sam?” I say, utterly confused.
“Zorie,” he says, enunciating carefully. Then he launches into a string of incomprehensible sentences that sound urgent and decisive.
“You know I don’t understand Korean,” I tell him. I can say hello (Annyeong-haseyo) and please (juseyo) and a few choice words that my mom uses when the man who owns Pizza Delight tries to overcharge us for extra toppings. Occasionally, I can figure out what the actors in my mom’s favorite K-dramas are saying after we’ve binged several episodes in a row, but that’s about it.
Grandpa Sam, on the other hand, understands most English. He just doesn’t speak it well. He says “okay” and “yes” and “no,” but he doesn’t bother with much of anything else, which is why emojis are his preferred way of communicating with me.
Right now, he lifts his head and mutters to the sky. Then he sighs heavily and motions for me to come with him. “Okay?” he says.
“Okay, hold on.” I run back into the house and get my stuff, and when Mac asks what’s going on, I tell her, “I have no freaking idea.”
They tell me everything will be fine, and I head outside where Grandpa Sam is waiting. He silently guides me across the cul-de-sac, one gentle hand on my back. He’s still talking to me in Korean, but now he sounds less upset. He’s trying to assure me of something, but when I see my mom sitting in the backseat of his shiny Audi sedan, parked in front of our apartment, I have a horrible feeling.