Page 61 of Praying for Rain

But I already know what it is.

A black-and-red banner.

With a demonic silhouetted horseman in the center.

And a date at the top.

Today’s date.

I swing my head left and right, listening for hooves, looking for Wes. But I don’t find him in the forest. I find him when I look back down at my reflection.

Is that what I look like? I wonder, reaching up to touch my stubbly jaw, but my reflection doesn’t copy me.

Instead, it beats on the surface of the murky water with a closed fist, eyes wide and full of panic.

“Wes!” I reach out to touch his face in the water, but the surface is as smooth and hard as glass. I pound on it with both hands, but they bounce right off.

Wes’s eyes are pleading. Huge bubbles leave his mouth and break against the barrier between us as he tries to tell me something.

“Wes! Hang on!” I wrap the banner around my fist and punch as hard as I can, but my blows land like pillows against the unbreakable water.

As I stop to catch my breath, I realize that Wes isn’t fighting anymore. His face is calm now, and his eyes are full of remorse and acceptance.

“No!” I scream at him, pounding the surface again. “No, Wes! Fight!”

But he doesn’t. He presses a hand to the glass as his face sinks away from me. His eyes lift to something over my shoulder just before they disappear into the black.

I don’t have to turn around to know what he was looking at. I can feel the horse’s hot, hellish breath on the back of my neck. I bow my head, ready to accept my fate, and feel the wind from a swinging mace ruffle my hair. I squeeze my eyes shut and brace for impact, but the spiked ball doesn’t connect with my skull.

It shatters the glass beneath my hands.

Without thinking, I plunge into the cold, murky water, looking, reaching, grasping for Wes. But I can’t find him. I swim deeper but never hit bottom. I swim to the left and right but never find a wall. I don’t come up for air until my lungs begin to burn. I kick furiously to get back to the surface, clenching my teeth and holding my nose to keep from inhaling water in my desperation to breathe, but just as I prepare to crest the top of the water, I hit my head on it instead.

No!

Looking up, I pound on the glassy surface, sucking in lungfuls of water as the mace-wielding horseman watches me drown. From this angle, I can see that he does have a face under that hood after all.

A beautiful one with soft green eyes and full, smirking lips.

I bolt upright, clutching my chest and gasping for air. Every breath makes my raw throat sting. When I open my eyes, I find myself staring at a toilet. My toilet. There’s a pillow on the floor by the door, which is letting a little bit of daylight in around the edges. A few candles on the counter provide the rest of the light. I recognize them from my room.

I rub my pounding temples as I try to figure out how I ended up on the bathroom floor.

The smell of vomit lingering under the vanilla is my first clue.

The man watching me from the bathtub is my second.

Wes is lying down in the tub, fully clothed. His muddy boots are propped up on the ledge, and his head is on the opposite corner. His eyelids are heavy, like I just woke him up, but his blown-out pupils are alert and trained on me.

He doesn’t say anything at first, and neither do I. We just stare at each other, both waiting for the hammer to drop, and when we finally speak, it’s at the exact same time.

“You slept almost all day,” Wes says.

“You’re really here,” I blurt out.

Wes nods, and the look on his face isn’t happy.

It’s sad and sympathetic.

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