Page 2 of My Heart to Find

My eyes fall on a puddle of vomit near his feet. Revulsion pulls through me, and my skin starts to crawl. The OCD tries to tell me that the vomit’s on me, that somehow particles of it are in the air and now are clinging to me. I try to ignore the voice as best as I can.

Rob the Robber must see me staring at the vomit, because he grunts and steps away. “It’s those kids nowadays, they don’t know how to hold their drink.”

I look back at his face. Out here, in the near dark with one flickering streetlight, he looks more human, but older too. Late thirties? My stomach does a little flutter at that.

I hold onto my bag tighter—the little clutch bag I only ever use for this sort of stuff. Parties. Clubs. The things that aren’t me at all. Inside my clutch bag is a jiffy bag with my phone, keys, ID, meds, and debit card in it. Couldn’t put them straight in my bag. The OCD told me that’d be too dangerous.

Rob steps closer.

“What are you doing?” Alarm fills my voice.

He gives me a strange look. “Uh, how are we going to hookup if we stay ten feet apart?”

I step back. The back of my arm catches the rough brick wall, and I flinch. My sudden movement sends a serpent of pain down my left leg. “I’m not having sex with you.” Or doing anything with him! Is...is that what he thinks is going to happen?

He looks around. “Yeah, s’pose it’s not the nicest. We can go back to mine. Come on.”

“Uh... no.” I swallow hard. My eyes feel strange. This can’t be happening. Itcan’tbe.

Rob’s eyes narrow. “You’ve been leading me on?”

Leading him on? What the hell? I hadn’t even danced with him—or even met him five minutes ago.

But you did agree to come out here with him.

I look back to the club. I need to get back inside there. Need to find Jana and Anastacia and her friends. Not be out here alone with this man. And it’s not like we’re at the front of the club, on the road with easy getaway access. We’re at the back. A secluded vomit-splattered patio. “I don’t go back to people’s houses,” I say.

“People’shouses.” He snorts. His tone becomes slightly menacing. “I’m not people.”

“I don’t do this sort of stuff though.” My fingers are ice-cold. I take a step toward the door.

“Ah, you can have a bit of fun,” he says. “Come on, we’re both attracted to each other. You wouldn’t have come out here with me otherwise.”

I am not attracted to him—not at all, and especially not sexually. But there’s no way I’m telling him that—or that I’m ace. He could flip out on me; it’s happened before. I’ve got to put my safety first.

This was a bad idea. How stupid was I to think all going to a club was a good idea? Not just with my OCD but with being on the asexual spectrum too?

“Clubs aren’t just for finding hookups,” Jana had said earlier when I’d expressed doubt. “They’re for having fun.” And she’s always saying I need to have more fun. My stomach tightens. I wonder if she agrees with those comments left on my profile—that I’m boring.

And maybe I do need to have more fun, because my life is just one hospital appointment after another, one episode of OCD after another, one crying session after another.

But looking at Rob now, with that glint in his eye, makes me wonder what exactly I’ve let myself into by coming out to “have fun.”

My throat feels too thick and my mouth too dry, and suddenly I’m thinking about the woman who went missing two weeks ago. Marnie Wathem, a nineteen-year-old disappeared when walking some dogs. She’s the talk of the town, and most people are saying she’s just a runaway. That’s the stance the cops have taken too; it’s easier to believe nothing bad happens in Brackerwood, and also gives the police less work. But Marnie’s brother has been adamant the whole time that she was abducted—or worse. He tried to get media attention on his views to prompt the police to do something, but that didn’t work.

And I think he could be onto something. I mean, I read a lot of crime fiction, and so many of those books start with a similar situation where the town doesn’t even realize a crime has taken place until it’s too late. So many nights recently, I’ve thought about Marnie, let my half-dreaming brain conjure up all sorts of scenarios where, somehow, I’m the one who saves her.

But now, with Rob in front of me, I know I wouldn’t be brave enough to save Marnie. I’m shaking so much, and I’m freezing up.

“I’m sorry, I can’t do this,” I say, trying to keep my voice as unconfrontational as possible. Because bad things can happen anywhere. Was Marnie really abducted? And my head is spinning and suddenly I’m convinced that the man in front of me is responsible.

I’m going to be his second victim.

But then Rob nods. “Okay.”

He kicks at the gravel to the side of the patio, watches the stones cascade across the concrete slabs beyond, and then heads back to the club.

I breathe out a huge sigh of relief and follow. My heart pounds—did I really just avoid a dangerous situation or was that just my imagination? Hot air blasts back over me, and the music seems even louder than before. Rob’s gone, disappeared into a mass of bodies, and I hold my bag close, my fingers shaking as I search for my friend.

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