Misty rain still drizzled from the sky, and the dull rumble of thunder sounded in the distance as if the clouds were hungry. I crossed my arms, impervious to the droplets that were turning my skin cold and slick. “Further proof that you’re not very good at statistics.”
He scrunched his forehead, and it was as if his retinas snapped into focus and he was seeing me for the first time. “Is that blood?”
I swiped my hand across my brow where the blood was beginning to coagulate. “Don’t worry, it’s not mine.”
Owen disappeared from the window. I heard rummaging around, bedsprings squealing, sheets rustling, car keys jangling. “And that’s supposed to make me feel better?”
His foot shot out the window, followed by a leg and then the rest of him.
“Well, it’s definitely not supposed to make you feel worse.” It was only when we were halfway back to the car that I realized we’d left his window wide open. I didn’t mention this to Owen, who was trying to keep up while at the same time hopping on one foot and attempting to wrestle on his second sneaker. The presence of another person made me feel more calm and in control. I took quick strides around the front of the car and dropped into the driver’s seat. Time was of the essence.
Owen stood slack-jawed outside the passenger-side window. “Um, Tor…” He was seeing my car for the first time. Jagged cracks branched out from a crystalline puncture wound in my windshield, and my hood looked like the site of a meteorite crash. “Are you sure you’re all right?”
“I am fine. Now can you please get in?” My mind spun with echoes of imagined sirens. As I closed the door and moved the sole of my foot to the gas pedal, I knew that the truth would color Owen’s view of me. Maybe forever. He’d look back and remember that I’d been calm—too calm. But this had always been a problem for me. I’d never acted like people wanted me to. I didn’t cry or get weepy when I was exhausted. I didn’t wonder why I hadn’t been invited to so-and-so’s birthday party. I didn’t doodle boys’ names in my notebooks. Instead, I pulled the tails off lizards and observed them until they grew back, or pinned dead beetles to corkboards so I could label them with their proper scientific names. That was my thing.
Still, I knew the whole morbid tale would sound so much better when I told it to Owen if only I’d been trembling and sobbing from the moment I showed up. I thought about this as he made a show of clicking his seat belt into place and checking the tension in the strap across his chest. I swallowed hard. I was too focused on the end goal now to revert back to quivering girl in distress. He’d probably love a quivering girl in distress. All guys did. Even Owen, I bet.
A few houses down, I had to make a three-point turn to go back in the opposite direction. A single thud sounded from the trunk. Owen twisted to stare into the backseat. “What the hell was that?”
I flipped the windshield wipers on, but the blades got stuck on the fractured glass. I didn’t reply.
Owen flattened his shoulder blades to the seat again. He raked his fingers through his hair and flicked on the cabin light. I felt his attention square on me. I set my jaw and drove faster down the glistening pavement. The neatly hedged community gave way to a long stretch of road where telephone poles stood like sentinels and thirsty grass unfurled over long stretches of flat land. The heat of the small cabin lamp warmed my forehead.
“Have you seen yourself?” Owen asked. I glanced sideways at him. His eyes pinched at the corners, betraying a look of genuine concern. “Because you look like you’ve just survived a bombing or something. Tor, I think you should pull over. I think you may be going into shock.” He reached his fingertip out, and I flinched when he dabbed at the streaks of blood caked at the edge of my hairline. “Did you hit a deer?” He sank back into his seat. “God, you could have died.”
Shock. That was a good one. Perhaps I could be going into shock. I tried that on for size, remembering the feeling of numbness that came over me when I’d … when he’d … God, maybe Owen was right.
“I didn’t hit a deer,” I said. I snuck a glance in the rearview mirror. A knotted nest of hair formed a clump about an inch above my left ear. Then there was the blood. More blood than I’d remembered. It was much worse than the stains left from when I’d swiped my hand over my brow. I must have gotten more on me when I’d put my face to the boy’s chest. Now, his blood smeared over my cheekbone like blush.
I reached up and clicked the light off, bathing the cabin in darkness. We were getting closer to home. The houses got smaller and squatter, though farther apart, and instead of trimmed bushes there were crooked mailboxes and sneakers dangling from the telephone wires.
“Owen,” I said, tightening my grip around the steering wheel. “Something bad happened.” I stated this in the same way a counselor might gently break bad news to a child. “There … was an accident. I’m okay, but…”
This took a moment for Owen to register. His cheeks drooped. His mouth fell open. He turned in his seat again and looked at the backseat as if he had X-ray vision. Then he shook his head. “You…”