Page 104 of Waking Olivia

My entire life the nightmare was faceless, blank, something purely evil and inhuman. And now, in a single second, it’s standing before me — and I remembereverything. Where I’ve seen him so many times, the part of my dream I could never recall in the morning.

My mother toldme to hide in the closet. She told me not to watch, but I did. I saw him grab her arm and twist, heard the bones snapping. He had his knife, the one he used to gut fish. It dove into her, sinking into her soft flesh, and when I ran from the closet to stop him, throwing myself onto her as if I could do anything at all, the knife went into my back and I slid to the floor. My mother began screaming at me to get up, to run. She had something hidden under her leg—scissors—and the last thing I saw was her pulling them out.

I scrambled off the floor and ran, expecting that he would chase. I ran hard, I ran so hard that the world seemed to close in on the edges and even the moonlight was squeezed out of my vision.

I woke up in the dirt. My mother wasn’t there. She didn’t come to get me. That’s when I knew I should never have left her.

I’ve been livingwith this in my head for nearly 15 years, with him, this monster I was scared to look in the eye. And I will now be what Will lives with. He’ll think about my death a million times, the way I have my brother’s. The image will never leave his head, and though it has nothing to do with him, he will blame himself for it. Erin’s going to tell him why I left when it all comes out, and he’ll see blood on his hands for the rest of his life.

My father bridges the distance between us and wraps his hands around my throat. They are gentle, though, almost a caress. “You went to the police, didn’t you?”

“No,” I whisper. I’m not following the rules. Don’t apologize, don’t show fear. I can’t help it. Desperate people apologize and show fear, people without another option, and right now I’m one of those people.

His hands tighten, ever so slightly. “But you told someone something, didn’t you?”

I grab my father’s wrists and attempt to pry them off, but my grip strength is no match for his. “Let go,” I hiss. Instead, they tighten further.

I think of him breaking Daisy’s neck…

And Matthew’s neck…

I pull harder at his hands, just enough to drag air through my throat, to push it back out. And to scream as loud as I possibly can.

75

Will

Iarriveat the strip club, scared that I will find her on stage, or worse, and I leave trying not to smile over the fact that she punched a customer.That’s my girl.

The cab driver has left, and I’m too anxious about her to wait for another. I start running, still carrying the backpack I brought on the plane.

I hear her screaming just as the apartment complex comes into view. I thought, at that moment, that I couldn’t be more scared, but I was wrong.

The scariest moment was when shestoppedscreaming.

I run harder than I’ve ever run in my life. I fling the door open and find her there—silent, limp, her hands swinging by her sides and her father’s hands around her neck. He starts to turn just as my fist makes impact, crushing the side of his face.

The two of them fall together. They lie crumpled on the floor. Lifeless.

I drop, pulling her to my chest, but she is boneless and still in my arms. Terror invades my chest, so acute that I struggle to breathe. I want her back — not this shell, butOlivia, with her smart mouth, her bad attitude, her wary smile. I want everything back, everything I had and took for granted, all of the bad, all of the good, and I’m shouting at her, pleading, knowing it’s too fucking late and that the moment I stop shouting I will have to accept it.

And then she gasps.

There has never been a sweeter sound than her gasping inhale.

I lower her just enough to see her face. She’s confused for a moment, as if she’s just coming out of a deep sleep, and her small smile, the pleasure on her face when she sees me, breaks my heart a little. The fact that I’m capable of putting that look on her face amazes me, and I’m even more amazed that I ever thought I could ask her to wait. That I thoughtIcould wait. I know only now that nothing matters more than keeping that look on her face, and nothing ever will.

And then she looks at her father, still unconscious, and seems to remember everything, all the things that wouldn’t have happened if I’d just pulled my head out of my ass a few hours sooner.

The smile fades.

I pull her to my chest and cling to her. I’m not even trying to comfort her. This time, she’s comforting me. “Fuck, Olivia. I thought … fuck.” I can’t even say it. I just know that I don’t ever, for the rest of my life, want to feel that kind of terror again.

“I’m fine,” she whispers.

“You could have died,” I reply, choking on the words, realizing how close we were to that being true. “I’m sorry,” I murmur into her hair. “I’m so fucking sorry.”

Her voice is raspy, barely intelligible. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

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