Page 72 of Finding Him
“Niall.”
I don’t know what to think. I don’t even know if I can remember how to breathe properly.
“You should go, Molls. You don’t wanna get in trouble for being in here.”
“JJ was close with your dad, Niall told me that,” I say, as she finishes up my last nail. “Maybe... maybe when Nova died, it felt like he was losing your Da all over again. Does that make sense?”
“It does,” she nods, capping the nail polish. “‘Cause he was the one who got her for him, so it was like one more living piece of him... gone.”
“Exactly,” I agree. I watch her brush her bleached-blonde hair behind her ear, putting the nail polish back into the big clear drawer she has filled with different colors. I wonder howshe manages to be so sunny every day. The effort of it must be exhausting.
“Anyway!” she chirps, the clouds revealing the sun yet again. “Now you do me. Yellow and Pink. Alternate nails, like a battenburg cake.”
??` ?? ?´?
HIS HANDS RUNup my sides, the coldness of his skin a stark contrast to his hot breath.
Tap-tap-tap.
“You’re so perfect, you know that?” he whispers, his lips going places they shouldn’t be.
Tap-tap—Thunk.
I bolt upright in Claire’s bed, my lungs burning as I fight to drag in air. My nightshirt was damp with cold sweat, and for a horrible second I was still at Camp Clearwater, waiting for the pain to subside.
Thunk-thunk.
I stay frozen, listening. That noise wasn’t part of my nightmare. Claire was dead to the world beside me, face down in her pillow, but Comet shared my sense of alarm from the end of the bed. He lets out a low growl, followed by a softruff, then looks at me.
I slide out of the bed slowly, and Comet stays right on my heels as I tiptoe for the stairs. I’ve reached the bottom, my hand going out to feel for the light switch I know is here somewhere—only I connect witha hand.
I scream.
The handscreams.
Comet barks.
“What are you doing?!” I snap the light on, squinting at JJ Biggs as my eyes adjust to the light.
“Me? What are you doing Creepy-Mc-Something-Else- thats-creepy!? Tryin’ to hold my hand in the dark and scaring me likethat,” he scoffs, as if that were in any way what I intended to do. “Shame on you.”
“Yes, shame on me, now why the hell are you making such a racket?” I demand to know, crossing my arms over my chest.
“He could barely walk from Fitzy’s truck to the curb, so forgive me for making a ‘racket’, but I was trying my best.” He gestures behind him to the floor, where Niall was laying. He was mumbling something I couldn’t make out through the thickened accent and the simple fact that his words didn’t make any sense put together.
JJ abandons our argument, shuffling to Niall’s side. “Niall... hey, mate, you're gonna begrand. Ya hear me?”
“What’s wrong with him? What happened? Where have you guys been?” My concern spikes as I watch Niall mumble about scaring someone. Comet whines, pacing the floors like he doesn’t know what to do.
“Shh, quiet or you’ll wake Claire. He doesn’t want her to see him like this. Get his legs.”
I’m tempted to remind him how he wasn’t really being quiet before, but the desperation in his face made me shut up and do what he’d asked.
“Okay, okay. Jesus JJ, are you even lifting?” I groan as I pick up his legs, Niall feeling more like five-hundred pounds of dead weight than the one-eighty or so at most that he must weigh.
“Oh,excuse meMiss Americana. Sorry I’m not the fucking Incredible Hulk. My bad, my bad. Let me leave and go bulk up and come back when my strength is at your standards.”
I roll my eyes, trying to focus on the task at hand instead of on bickering with JJ. “Okay, just like that—turn, turn. The steps are right here.”
