Page 138 of Past the Broken Bridges

I know the second she sees the two words in red under the specialty notes.

Cancer patient.

Her breath catches as she stares, as if she read it wrong somehow. When she turns back to me, her eyes go to my hair, then down to my face.

Then she says, “Your skeletons.”

I release a breath before closing my eyes and fighting back the tears. “We all have them. Some of ours are just bigger.”

She starts sniffling, so I reach out until she takes my hand. We hold on so tight that I can’t feel my fingers, but I don’t care. It’s what we both need.

I don’t know how long we stay like that before I whisper, “I’m sorry about Dawson. I know you…cared. I did too.”

Her lip quivers.

Then I say, “I told Banks I should have chosen Dawson. But I…I didn’t mean it.”

She stares at me.

“He deserves more than me.”

She swallows.

“You all deserve more than me,” I whisper.

Dixie shakes her head, her mouth starting to open.

But I don’t let her argue. “He’s going to need you.”

Her mouth parts again and then closes.

All I whisper is “Someday.”

Chapter Thirty-Five

Banks

It’s been days since the accident, and the apartment building is too quiet—void of the people who made it so lively. I wish I’d taken my father’s invitation to stay at his place, but I couldn’t risk his mood shifting when we’re finally, and maybe sadly given the circumstances, in a better place. Not a healthy one but…better.

It’s always temporary, anyway.

Walking past the second door on the first floor has been painful knowing that there’s nobody behind it. I’ve been tempted to break in. Dawson showed me how to pick a lock once, but I was never as good as he was. The more I thought about seeing the things he hid behind that door, though, the less I wanted to see.

People are already talking.

The school sent out emails for grief counseling if anybody needed it, along with numbers for those who might needotherkinds of help. The help that Dawson needed.

But I didn’t want to think about that pointed dig orthink about how the girl across the hall hasn’t been back since the day I was arrested.

I waited.

And waited.

And waited.

Then I went to the hospital, where I was told the same thing each time I asked where Sawyer Hawkins was, whose last name I finally learned when I asked the professor to give me any assignments that I could pass along when she was better.

The hospital turned me away three days in a row.

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