Page 52 of Girl Between
In this moment of stillness, I feel a strange kinship with her. We are both pawns in a game much larger than ourselves, each of us playing our part in a grander design.
The sound of footsteps pulls me from my reverie. He is approaching, his presence a reminder of the delicate balance I must maintain.
I steel myself, ready to face the next phase of our endeavor. The path ahead is fraught with challenges, but I am resolute.
Whatever it takes, I will see this through to the end.
50
New Orleans weatherwas as fickle as a woman’s heart. Or at least that’s what the locals claimed.
Today, Dana agreed with that statement.
When she’d left Hotel Monteleone for her evening run it had been a blistering ninety-degrees, with humidity so thick she felt like she was swimming through it as soon as she laced up her running shoes. But by the time she was crossing the streetcar tracks by Jackson Square, dark clouds rolled in, foreboding and fast.
Determined to run off some of her frustration, she ignored the metallic rumble of thunder in the distance and climbed the worn stone steps to the Moonwalk. The nearly 3,500-foot riverfront pedestrian path along the Mississippi River had become her sanctuary these past few weeks. With the river on one side and the historic skyline of New Orleans on the other, Dana found enough peace to clear her head.
But today, it seemed no amount of running could get her far enough ahead of the dark thoughts swirling through her mind. Claire, Meredith, Jake … they were always with her, whether she wanted them or not.
Carrying that much grief made it impossible to think clearly. Howcould she even consider taking on another case when so much of her was still ensnared in the one she’d barely escaped?
Her pounding pulse served as a reminder that she was indeed here, alive and not stranded in the woods, standing over lifeless bodies even if that’s what she saw every time she closed her eyes.
Pushing herself harder, Dana tried to escape the chaos in her mind. Tried to escape the wildness in Claire’s eyes, the terror in Jake’s, and the nothingness in Meredith’s. But each time Dana’s eyelids slipped closed, the awful memories came back like an endless slideshow of horrors.
It's why she ran. She couldn’t sleep. Not when a mere blink could bring her right back to those awful final moments in the woods. Closing her eyes was an invitation to her nightmares. One she planned to refuse as long as physically possible.
So, she ran, then she drank. Together the potent combination was enough to exhaust her into a state of oblivion which kept the darkness at bay and allowed her to function. Moderately, if she was being honest.
It’s why she couldn’t take George up on his invitation to help with the Casquette Girls case. She wasn’t in any shape to help like this. It was getting harder to ignore the purple hue beneath her eyes that greeted her each morning.
Even now, she could feel the edges of nightmares bleeding into her waking hours as her body begged her to give in if it meant a night of sleep. But just the thought of what lurked in the shadows of her dreams was enough to stir bile in her gut.
Dana stopped to heave the empty contents of her stomach onto a sparse patch of grass that had muscled its way through the asphalt. A sudden gust of wind kicked up off the Mississippi, making Dana shiver. Sweat coated her skin, chilling her to the bone as the temperature continued to drop. She forced herself to move, running again, the threat of rain driving her on.
The storm was mere minutes behind her. She could smell it nipping at her heels, the air heavy with the mossy scent of earth, jasmine, coffee.
In just a few weeks, Dana had learned to navigate the Crescent City on scent alone. A whiff of powdered sugar and fried dough: she knew she was near Café Du Monde. A fragrant bouquet of jasmine: she was nearing the Garden District. But today, thanks to the strong wind, she smelled the unmistakable aroma of burnt sugar coming from the Domino facility all the way in Chalmette.
Dana stopped running to get her bearings. Her stillness gave the storm all the time it needed to catch up and overtake her. She shivered as the cold rain consumed her. She’d lost herself in her run again, but the literal ice bath from above brought reality crashing down around her.
If this wasn’t a sign, she didn’t know what was. She could run as far and as long as she wanted, but the storm would always catch up. More than that, Dana knew if she didn’t stop and face her issues, they too would eventually catch up and consume her.
Tenting a hand over her eyes, she took in the neighborhood her run had carried her to. Dana might not know how to heal, but when she realized where she was, she had a hunch she’d found a safe space to begin.
Letting her body take control, she crossed Chartres Street and jogged past Elizabeth’s into the now familiar Bywater neighborhood. In no time, she was in front of George’s brightly colored shotgun home.
51
George crackedhis first beer of the evening. He’d just touched it to his lips as he pushed open his front door, planning to enjoy it on the porch while watching the storm roll through. But the soaking wet woman on his doorstep changed things.
“Does your dinner invite still stand?” Dana blurted out.
It was rare for the cat to catch his tongue, but George stood slack-jawed for a moment as he took in Dr. Dana Gray in all her dripping wet glory. He’d be lying if he said he hadn’t noticed she was an attractive woman. But clad in soaking wet spandex, she was currently replacing all his previous fantasies.
“Oh,” she said as if just realizing she was drenched so thoroughly she was leaving a puddle on his porch. “Maybe a rain check?”
Her sudden embarrassment forced him into action. “Nah,” he said. “I was raised better than that. Come on in and dry off.”
