Page 164 of Forget Me Not

He regards me with indifference, like he always does, puffing out a cloud of smoke and watching me.

“‘Bout time. I’ve been waiting out here for ten minutes.”

I step forward, feeling like I’m twelve goddamn years old again, waiting for the beating of a lifetime from my dad. I think that’s what drew me to Pap. He reminded me of Dad before the liquor got the better of him. He was never too emotional. He never yelled. But I could talk to him. After Mom died . . . so did he.

“You were waiting for me?”

“Saw you come up the drive,” he says, scooting over to allow me to sit beside him. I don’t want to sit. I want to find Nova.

“Where is she, Pap?”

“Well,” he pauses, pushing his horn-rimmed glasses up his nose. “She’s not here.”

“Fuck.” The world spins around me and for the first time in my life, I want to punch a wall. Kick something. Anything.

“Now, calm down. Take a seat.”

“I don’t want to sit.”

“I don’t care. Take a seat.”

Fuck.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

“Where did she go?”

“To find you, asshole.”

To find me?

“Yeah,” he murmurs when I stare at him blankly, crossing his arms over his chest and nodding his head. “Went to Alaska about three days ago. Haven’t heard from her.”

“Fuck,” I mutter, leaning forward and resting my elbows on my knees. The day I fucking left.

She came looking for me and here I am chasing her.

“She’ll be back. You’ve got to get your head straight, kid. What do you want?”

“Her,” I admit out loud for the first time.

“Well, then you better be ready because Nova is a force to be reckoned with.”

“I know.”

“You are too. You two are like the wind and the water, meeting in the middle,” he murmurs, shaking his head as he looks out over the ocean. Finally, when he turns to look at me, he’s got that knowing, forlorn look on his face, as if he can read me like a book. “Something happened out there. Scared you, didn’t it?”

I nod, following his gaze across the water to where one lonely boat floats along the coast.

“Kid fell overboard.”

“And?”

“And I jumped in after him.”

“Both of you could have died,” he says, so matter of fact. “A real wake up call, huh?”

I nod once, clasping my fingers. I feel like I’ve come to the ends of the earth and now I have no fucking clue where to go next. Will Nova come back here? Will she make it to Alaska and find out I left and just . . . give up?

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