“Have feelings for me?” I offer in a burst of confidence.
Nick doesn’t respond for a moment, his eyes still trained on the highway, the wipers thrashing back and forth, barely clearing the water away from the windshield before we’re completely blinded by the rain again. My heart pounds, both for his response and for our safety.
Finally he speaks again. “I never expected I’d turn into the kind of guy who’s mourning his fiancée but kisses another woman.” He clenches the steering wheel harder. “God, this rain; I can barely see. I should pull over. But I’m afraid another car won’t see us and will hit us.”
I grip the door handle, fear suddenly taking over. If Nick is scared, then I should be too. The rain belts down harder, and I will the windshield wipers to catch up. The road to Hana is dangerous on its best day, and in this weather it’s formidable. Will this be it? Will we die on the same road they did?
I stay silent, letting him navigate the Jeep, and finally, after several miles, the storm begins to let up. One of the craziest things about the Hawaiian Islands is how rainstorms can come out of nowhere and disappear almost as quickly as they appear. Kind of like my confidence. I felt stronger after swimming in open water and hiking, but since I discovered Dylan had been pregnant, I’ve felt outside myself. Like I’ve had a white-knuckle grip on my own life all over again.
“It was wrong to kiss you.”
Hadn’t we kissed each other?
“I’m sorry,” he adds.
“Me too,” I say, but I’m thinking about how I was sleepwalking before Nick showed up at my doorstep. Yes, I’m hurting like hell right now. But at least I’m feeling something.
“Can we just agree our emotions were running high and move forward?” he says, and I nod. Because how can I tell him I’m not sure it had been a mistake after he just told me it had been?
“I’m going to stop here,” Nick says, and he squeezes my hand and pulls into the Halfway to Hana market that we’d passed earlier at mile marker seventeen. Before the rain, when we could see the lush rain forest, the trees bending over the road. The calm before the storm. The calm before the kiss. “I need something—coffee, probably stronger than that, but I’m guessing they don’t sell booze.” He reads a sign boasting that it’s the home of the original banana bread. “Or some of that. Want to come?”
It’s interesting how, in such a short time, I’ve learned so many of his tells. Like now, it’s subtle, but he’s tugging on the corner of his T-shirt, which means he’s holding back. Not saying everything. That he needs some time alone.
My phone buzzes. We must have cell service. Finally. It’s been spotty at best the entire trip today. Going from three bars to none in a single bend of the road. “You go ahead,” I say when I realize it’s Beth.
When I returned to my room last night, I called my sister and told her about Dylan’s pregnancy, and she cried with me as I lay in bed, grasping my pillow—and her voice—for comfort. “I don’t know if I can get over this part of it,” I whispered. It was one of my biggest fears since I found out he’d been in Maui with another woman. That instead of just being a widow the rest of my life, I’d be a victim. People say that’s a choice, and they’re right. But the thing is, when it’s your shit hitting the fan, it’s ridiculously easy to lean into the sadness.
“You can,” Beth said, and sniffled.
“I lost it tonight.”
“That’s understandable.”
“No, I mean, I really lost it,” I said, and confessed that I’d waded into the ocean and had thought about floating away.
“Jacks, you need to come home.”
“I don’t think I can. I have to see this through.”
“You’re freaking me out.”
“I’ll be okay. I have Nick.”
“I don’t even know who the hell this guy is, and now I’m trusting him to make sure you don’t drown yourself? I’m not comfortable with this.”
“I’m not coming home.”
“Then I’m calling Mom.”
That got my attention. The last thing I needed was our mother knowing where I was. What was happening. “You wouldn’t! Or have you already? Is that why she’s been calling me?” I thought about how I hadn’t answered her and had finally shot her a cryptic text that I wasn’t in the mood to talk. I knew I was going to have to face her soon enough. But now? Forget it. There was no way I could add her into this. It was already too complicated.
“I haven’t, but I will if I have to,” Beth said. “You’re not giving me much of a choice. Do you realize how hard this is for me? To be so far away and not able to help?”
I sat up in bed. “Okay, here’s the thing. I know how my story sounded—about wading out into the water. I don’t know how to find the right words to explain that I need to be here. I feel so empty. And right now, I need to fill that space with something.”
“Or someone? Like Nick?” Beth scoffed.
“What? No!” I lied, but my heart was pounding. I hated how my sister could always see right through me.
“Well, if that’s true, then why not just leave, come home, let us fill that hole? Your family?” She dragged out the last word, and our most recent Christmas card photo came to mind, the one we all took together: me, James, Beth, Mark, their kids, and Mom and Dad. I could see us, all wearing the same kelly green Mom had insisted on.
“I will, soon—promise.”
“Jacks—will you please be careful?”
“Yes,” I said, propping myself up against the pillows. “I just can’t come back yet. But I hear you. And you don’t have to worry about me. I’m going to be okay.”
I wasn’t so sure about that last part. But I knew Beth. She wasn’t going to stop until I convinced her.
“Okay,” she said slowly.
“Thank you for talking to me. I needed to hear your voice.”
I told her I’d call her the next day—today—but I haven’t been able to reach her the few times I got a couple bars of reception. I pick up her call as Nick walks into the market.
“Where have you been?” I ask in greeting. “So much for all that concern you had about me,” I tease as I hear rain in the background. “It’s raining in the OC? It’s June!” Rain this time of year is a rare occurrence in Orange County and usually the lead story on every newscast when and if it happens.
“Actually, funny story about that rain you hear . . . ,” Beth begins. “I just landed at the Hana Airport. Can you come pick me up?”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
DYLAN—BEFORE
“I finally got reception!” Dylan said, staring at her phone, waiting for the website to open. “It says here that there aren’t any guardrails!” She finished reading, arching an eyebrow at James. After they’d driven away from the general store, James had sprung on her that he didn’t want to stop when they reached Hana. He wanted to keep going. Around the back side.
James grabbed her cell and tossed it in the backseat next to her purse. “There was a reason I didn’t want you Googling this. What is it with women and their obsession with Google? Is this a phenomenon of some kind? Is the world going to end if you don’t know every single fact about everything?” James laughed, but there was something about its hollow sound that told Dylan he didn’t think it was funny at all.