Page 101 of Things I Wish I Said
“She’s in her room,” she tells me, worrying her hands in front of herself. “She’s not expecting you.”
I nod in understanding, absorbing the words she’s not saying.
Ryleigh didn’t want me to come.
The thought stings.
She opens the door farther, and I step inside, ignoring the urge to demand she tell me what the hell is going on. Whatever it is, I want to hear it from Ryleigh.
Her door is closed, so I knock on it lightly before pushing it open.
She’s sitting on her bed, curled up on her side. A pillow is tucked to her chest, eyes glued to the television screen on her dresser across the room.
She doesn’t even turn my way when I enter, so I follow her gaze to the soccer game on the screen.
A girl in a green jersey, number twenty-six, sprints across the field.
Two long chestnut braids hang down her back, her cheeks rosy from exertion as she moves with the dexterity and confidence of someone who knows just how good they are.
Her feet are like lightning as she dodges several blue jerseys, closing in on the goal. A flick of her foot and she scores a goal I can only imagine would be impossible for anyone else.
The camera pans to a close-up of her face, and my heart skips in my chest, pounding in a painful rhythm, because it’s her. Ryleigh.
Tan and flushed from the game, she glows as she jogs back to the other side of the field and talks with her teammates, the picture of casual ease.
This is a different Ry, I realize.
One I’ve never known. One I’ll never get to see—the same, yet different.
The girl on the screen has a fire in her eyes which I realize is missing from Ryleigh’s sharp hazel gaze. There’s a purpose in her stride I haven’t seen before in the girl lying on the bed, a confidence that surpasses what I’ve seen from the spitfire I’ve come to know in the last few weeks.
I swallow over the ache in my throat and press closer until my knees hit the side of the bed. Only then do I alert her to my presence, and when she peers up at me, her expression remains vacant before she turns back to the television.
For a minute I think she might ignore me entirely, pretend I’m not here, but then she says, “What’s ten feet long and bald?”
“Ry . . .” I sigh. I don’t know whether to be relieved or frustrated as hell that she’s telling another one of her jokes when it’s become clear her scan results weren’t what she was hoping for.
“The conga line at the cancer ward,” she answers for me.
My jaw tightens. “What’s going on, Sinclair?”
“You shouldn’t be here,” she says in a dead tone.
My chest squeezes. No, I probably shouldn’t.
My ambiguous feelings toward Ryleigh are dangerous enough, and I’m certainly not equipped to handle . . . whatever this is.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
“What’s it look like I’m doing?”
I exhale, wondering how to approach her in a way she won’t shut me out when she won’t even look at me.
Maybe she’ll call off the wish.
The thought fills me with both anger and relief. Mostly anger.
“From where I’m standing, it looks like you’re having yourself a little pity party.”
