The rain is cleansing.
Maybe it’ll wash away the crazy.
Because I don’t know what to do about it anymore.
Maybe Finn has gotten to a place where I can’t fix him anymore.
The thought terrifies me, paralyzes me, and I find that I’m rooted to the ground outside of the Carriage House, my feet enmeshed in the ground, unable to move, unable to carry me one step further.
The rain soaks me and my hair is dripping. My teeth start to chatter, but still I can’t move. The panic, the desire to run far from my home, cements my feet to the ground. It’s insane, but I still can’t move. My feet are stones, too heavy to lift.
The front door of the Carriage House is suddenly thrown open, and Dare darts out, jogging down the cobblestone path.
Without a word, he covers my head with a jacket as he pulls me into his home. His t-shirt is black, his shorts are black, his eyes are black as he rubs my arm with a towel, pushing me into a living room chair.
“What are you doing out in the rain, Calla?” he asks, his hands massaging my arms through the terry cloth. I lean into him, my forehead pressing against his muscle, against his solidity.
I love his solidity.
He’s strong and real, unmovable.
“I don’t know,” I murmur. “I just… I didn’t want to go home, I guess.”
Dare pauses, gazing down at me, a hundred things wavering in his eyes. “Any reason why not?”
I shrug. “I don’t know. Just a feeling.”
A sudden overwhelming feeling. The funeral home felt ominous and huge and I couldn’t go there, not with Finn’s issues hanging over my head, not with my mother gone forever.
“We’ve been looking for you,” he continues, eyeing me, rubbing the cold off my skin.
“You have?” I ask, confused. “But I haven’t been gone very long.”
He pauses, and I think I see concern in his eyes, but he quickly conceals it.
“You’ve been gone since this morning,” he says calmly.
Isn’t it still morning?
I look at the clock on his wall.
Six p.m.
My heart pounds, loud and heavy, as I look again.
It’s still six p.m.
How can that be possible? I was so immersed in worrying about Finn that I lost hours of time?
“I think I might be going crazy like my brother,” I blurt out, my cold hands grabbing at Dare’s warm ones. His eyes soften and he stops, his hands so warm and dry and strong.
“You’re not,” he assures me. “You’ve just had a lot to deal with. Anyone would struggle. Trust me.”
Anyone would lose several hours out of their day and not even realize it?
“Did you?” I demand. “When your parents died, did you struggle?”
“Of course,” Dare assures me, cupping my hands now, enveloping them in his own. “Everyone does. And you have more to deal with than the average person. Calla, you’re surrounded by death here. The funeral home, your mom… it’s hard. Let’s just put it that way.”