Page 49 of That's Not My Name

Wayne reaches out and brushes some hair from my face. His fingertips are ice cold. “Are you feeling okay? Do you need to go lie down?”

“I guess, yeah.” I start to turn away, but my gaze lands on his bare forearm and I frown. “Where did your jacket go?”

He looks down at his T-shirt. “Oh. Must have left it in the car. I’ll get it later.”

I could have sworn he was wearing it when he got out of the van. This stupid Benadryl is wrecking my brain. “Wake me up when dinner’s ready?”

“You got it, kiddo,” he says, firing more wood into the stove.

I close my door to block out the noise and kick off my new shoes beside the bed. The heavy blankets lure me in, and when I fold them over me and sink into the mattress, it’s the closest to content I think I’ll manage for the rest of the day. My eyes close, but my brain won’t stop.

“Did you eat the eggs?” Wayne asks, before he tells me I’m allergic to the wrong thing.

“Large, please,” he says, as he orders me more of something that’ll cover me in hives before the last batch has fully faded.

I want to sleep, but the confusion weighs on me.

I couldn’t prevent what happened today, but he could have. I mean, what else might I be allergic to? How can I keep track of food allergies when I can’t remember what they are? And how can I trust him to do that when he keeps proving he’s not up to the task? I get the feeling I’m used to advocating for myself with him, which I can’t do until I remember what I’m supposed to be advocating for.

How many hits am I going to take in the meantime? How manydays am I going to lose to a drug-induced haze of exhaustion while I figure out what isn’t safe for me to eat and drink?

I stare up at my irritatingly happy beach poster and find myself wishing he were better at this whole dad thing. But the guilt is immediate.

He’s done so much for me the last few days. So he got one allergy mixed up. It sucks, but it’s not the end of the world. He probably hasn’t been sleeping much since my car crash. It doesn’t mean he’s incapable of taking care of me. We’re both adjusting to this new normal.

I take a deep breath and try to relax. My gaze drifts to Officer Bowman’s wrinkled business card. Still propped against my lamp.

“I’m okay,” I whisper, closing my eyes. “Everything is fine.”

I hear the front door open and close again as the Benadryl yanks me under.

FOURTEEN

MARY

DAY 4

My breath comes out in annoyed puffs as November tries to sink its claws into me. I grip my dinner bowl tight and kick off the ground to move the river swing again. It’ll be full winter soon—well, aswinteras Oregon ever gets anyway, which is mostly freezing rain and a constant chill from the moisture in the air. Soon I’ll have even more reason to be cooped up in that cabin.

The thought makes me so anxious I could claw all my skin off and throw it into the river.

It’s beenfourdays since I woke up in that ditch, but it feels like months. I don’t know if it’s the endless uncertainty, the Benadryl fog, or Wayne watching me every single second, but it’s exhausting.

Yesterday’s nap quickly morphed into a nineteen-hour sleep marathon. I woke up late this morning with ghost hives still dancing across my skin and a deep-seated hesitation to eat.

I knew bread was safe, so I ate toast for lunch, but nothing about this taco salad tempts me to roll the dice. I focus on the calming sway ofthe swing, and not the fact that I’ve been analyzing every single ingredient in this bowl for an hour, wondering if I’m also allergic to the tomatoes or the cheese or the romaine…

The last thing I need is three allergy attacks in four days, and there appears to be nothing Wayne or I can do to prevent it. Both of us seem to have the same amount of information about my allergies. Which is decidedly nothing.

I scowl at the tomato on the end of my fork, setting the bowl on the seat beside me. Thatnormalteenager feeling I had in Waybrooke feels laughably out of reach, and I want it back more than anything. Now everything feels suffocating and wrong.

The sound of Wayne chopping wood echoes in the yard behind me, but I don’t look back at him. I know he’s keeping an eye on me. God forbid I sit within six feet of a slow-moving body of water. I might drown from the proximity alone. I roll my eyes and push myself a little higher.

“Mary, be careful on that swing. It’s not as stable as it looks,” he calls from the other side of the woodpile.

Mary. My name rings in my ears, like my brain won’t allow it in.

I throw a hand above my head and wave in acknowledgment.

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