Rrrrrrroooooaaaarrrr.
The air seemed to explode, shattering with the punch of glass. She looked to the right, where a side-view mirror had webbed into a thousand pieces. She knew she’d done it, just as spontaneously as she’d done with Robby when she’d hurled him across a room.
“No more!” Her words stuck in her throat.
No more filling her spiritual vacuum with sex. No more chasing away rejection and loneliness with self-destruction. She was sick of everything, sick of herself.
Trembling, she sat up, faced the phone like it was him. And it was close enough, wasn’t it?
“I’m not letting you in again. Never again.”
It seemed like years passed in the aftermath of her eruption. Then, finally, he spoke, his voice naked of hypnotic power and steeped in something that sounded like actual sorrow.
“I’m doing what I have to, Dawn.”
Unwilling to subject herself to more, she hung up and shut off her phone, tossing it away. The air died in silence, as if buried by her anger.
But then something he’d said earlier spiraled across her conscience: I need you more than anything.
Without checking herself, she reached for the phone, sorry for what’d happened. But then she yanked her hand back.
Screwed up, she thought. She wasn’t going to keep being so screwed up.
She started the car, but didn’t even think of going to the office. What she needed to do was regroup and think, goddamnit. The Voice wasn’t enough to stop her from searching for her dad, even if she’d end up having to do it on her own. Which looked very likely right about now.
Damn him. Damn him to hell.
When she got to Kiko’s, the lights were on. She got even more pissed because he should’ve been resting. Couldn’t he get anything through his thick head, either?
His back brace lounged topsy-turvy on the floor as the TV muttered lines from an old noir movie. In the meantime, he was pacing while dialing his phone over and over. He didn’t even seem to know she was in the room.
“What’s this?” She shrugged off her jacket, then went to the back brace, picking it up. “What the hell is this, Kiko?”
He shoved the phone in the air in frustration, his voice slurred. “Can’ get through to Dancin’ with the Stars…gotta vote for Stacy an’ Tony.”
“You asshole, that season ended a long time ago.”
She wanted to kick him for being so obviously stoned out of his mind. It was another betrayal because he knew what he was doing to himself. He knew it was wrong and he knew it hurt Breisi and Dawn and, yes, probably even Jonah.
She slumped, tired. Too tired. “Why do you keep taking that crap when they mess you up so bad?”
Kiko lowered the phone. “I hurt tonight, Dawn. Don’t yell at me for hurting.”
Damn him, damn him for being so weak. She hated weakness.
She sank to the floor, unable to conjure anything, not even her own tears. She’d been crying more lately from exhaustion, stress, and emotion than at any other time in her life. Tears were beating her up because she’d come to care too much, so she wasn’t going to allow them anymore.
But…she’d betrayed Kiko, too, hadn’t she? He’d been so proud of her for supposedly containing herself with the men, and she’d failed him just as much as he’d failed her, so she had no right to be angry or sad.
“Dawn? Dawn?” Kiko scooted over to her, patting her back. “Hey. Hey, guess what?”
Jesus, he was trying to cheer her up with that idiotic game they’d fallen into way back when they’d first started out.
She stared straight ahead, wanting to look at him, but not doing it because that’s when she’d start to cry.
“Guess what?” he repeated.
She gave in. “The apartment upstairs has been flooded by black goo and…”
He kept patting her back, and her throat just got more raw, overwhelming her chest with sharp, quickened pain.
“Cool,” he said. “Dark Water.”
At his correct answer, she sobbed once, but bit back another one. Rage and sadness surged, taking her over.
And that’s when Kiko gasped and drew back his hand.
For a second, Dawn didn’t think anything of it. Not until she realized she was wearing Frank’s T-shirt.
Sucking in a breath, she turned to her psychic friend.
His eyes were foggy and she didn’t know if that was because of the drugs or a vision.
“In one of the two red fingers pointing up to the sky,” he mumbled.
Dawn got to her knees, taking him by the shoulders. “What’re you talking about?” High, he was just high. “Damn it, Kiko, you make me…”
She pushed back from him, balling into herself, chasing away the ache in her stomach, in her chest. No crying. If it was the last thing she’d do, she wouldn’t cry anymore.
And, ten minutes later, when Breisi called to let them know that there’d been another murder, it was easier than ever to ice herself over.
Because that’s what she needed to do. Ice every tear.
Cope until she didn’t have to anymore.
SIXTEEN
BELOW, ACT THREE