Page 93 of Edge of Unbroken

I’m used to fractured sleep and waking up several times at night, usually because of the nightmares that have been an almost nightly occurrence since I woke up in the hospital last September. But tonight, I wake up when I feel movement behind me.

I startle, still half asleep, when I feel Miranda’s freezing-cold hand on my bare back.

“Are you awake?” she whispers, already lifting my blanket to slide underneath it behind me.

“I am now,” I grumble. “Your hands are like fucking ice.”

“Sorry, I had to wander two miles through the snow, uphill, to get here,” she says with a quiet giggle.

I scoot over to make room for her. “What are you doing here?”

“I couldn’t sleep.”

I huff. “And so you break into my room to crawl into my bed?”

“Yep. Just like old times.”

“Except we’re not kids anymore, so this is a little different,” I say, acutely aware of her nearness and the fact that I’m only wearing my boxers.

“Relax, big boy, I’m not going to make a move on you,” she says, but still slides in closer to me, then rests her hand on my bare chest. She shivers against me, pulling the blanket up. “I definitely underestimated how cold it is.”

“So, what’s got you unable to sleep?” I ask, forcing myself to relax.

Having Miranda in bed with me is something we used to do all the time when we were little. I met her when I was only ten and she and her dad had just moved to Montana from Wyoming after her mother died. Miranda’s dad, Father Jackson, was hired as the new pastor of my grandparents’ small church, and my grandparents had offered them a place to stay until the home they were going to live in had been fixed up. We bonded immediately and became close, spending most of our days together while we both lived on the ranch.

She’d regularly climb in through my bedroom window, which I’ve always had a habit of leaving at least cracked—even during the deepest winter months—and sleep in bed with me, especially on nights when her dad was drunk or yelled at her. Nobody knew of his affliction, but Miranda quickly confided in me. I, on the other hand, didn’t tell her about my mother’s abuse for years.

“I don’t really know,” she says with a sigh. “I just can’t seem to shut off my brain tonight.”

“Did anything happen with your dad?”

She shrugs against me. “Nothing out of the ordinary. Same old shit, I guess. I don’t really know why I even head over there to check on him anymore.”

“Because you still care, that’s why.” I know exactly what that feels like, and it’s one of the most confusing things—to still feel compassion, maybe even love for the person who has been hurting you all your life. It makes you feel like you’re losing your mind.

“I guess, but it’s dumb. What did Einstein say? The definition of insanity is doing the same crap over and over again and expecting a different result?”

“Not sure he used the word ‘crap,’ but I think you got the gist of it,” I grumble sleepily.

She tips her head up to look at me, her blue eyes gray in the darkness of my room. “Do you still care about your mom?”

I exhale noisily. “Why the fuck do you always have to get back to that topic?”

“Because you keep refusing to talk about it, and if I remember correctly, you’re here to cope with exactly that.”

“Yeah, but not in the middle of the fucking night. Jeez, Randi,” I groan and run my hand over my face.

“Rony, it could be high noon and you still wouldn’t talk about it. You never do unless I force you to.”

“Is that the real reason you decided to sneak into my room at”—I glance at my watch—“fucking one in the morning? So you could force me to talk about what a loving, peaceful, and utterly nurturing relationship I had with my mother?”

“Not really,” she says, scooting even closer and hitching her leg over mine, rubbing her cold foot against my shin. “I really couldn’t sleep. And I was lonely.”

“You know I’m going to have to tell Cat about you sleeping with me.”

“Why? Won’t that freak her out?”

“Probably, but if I don’t I’m going to feel like I did something wrong, and I hate withholding shit from her,” I say, missing her so deeply my heart threatens to break apart. I wish it was her body pressed against mine right now. Maybe if I close my eyes I can pretend for a second that Miranda is Cat.

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