Page 111 of The Second Kiss
It’s good to be home. Good to have Jacob beside me and my family around me. I wish I could make this moment last. But I have to get Jacob alone. I didn’t drive five hours for a family dinner.
When we’re done eating, I start to clear the table. “Leave those,” Mom says. “Today you’re a guest. I can take care of the dishes. Why don’t you and Jacob go sit and talk in the living room, or take a walk outside?”
“It’s raining,” Dad points out. “Besides, I wanted Jake to look at that old muzzleloader I’m restoring. You can come too, Jess.”
“I’ll help Mom and then I’ll be there in a little while.” I can feel Jacob’s eyes on me as I walk into the kitchen.
I don’t help Mom with the dishes, and I don’t go check out the muzzleloader. Instead, I slip outside and past the shed where Dad is telling Jacob about the newest gun in his collection.
I stand in front of the barn door again and catch my breath. Maybe the whole idea of recreating a moment from the past is over-dramatic, but I’m counting on Jacob to come find me.
fifty-six
Now or Never
Even in the daylight the barn makes me nervous. I stand at the door for a long time, not sure I can make myself go inside. Dad boarded up the broken window and propped the door open with a fence post. The opening looks like a wide, gaping mouth. Beyond it is a wall of black. I can't see inside.
I take a deep breath, and I force myself to walk through the door.
The creak of the stairs to the loft sends an icy shiver up my spine. I keep pushing myself forward. When I reach the top, I breathe a sigh of triumph or maybe just relief.
The loft is clean. I’m not sure who cleaned it, Mom or Dad. Maybe they made Tyler do it for leaving a loaded gun in the barn. Almost all the markings of the struggle are gone. I pick out a few brown spots, drops of blood that soaked into the old wood floorboards—blood from me, or Brad, or Jacob. I don’t know. The floor in the corner where I shot Brad is scrubbed and bleached white. I don't know how much he bled.
It makes me sick to think about it.
I kneel next to the opening of the grain bin. The crate that was there is gone. I duck down to see inside, run my fingers over the marks my fingernails made in the wood when Brad dragged me out. I can’t make myself go inside.
I can save that moment for another time.
Rain clatters on the tin roof. I close my eyes and breathe in—remembering—dust and musty hay. If I’m brave enough to do this, I have to do it right. I have to go back. I step into the corner where I put the locket. When I pick it up, it feels like an old friend; every dent and scratch is familiar. I trace it with my fingers, brush it across my lips.
The stairs creak with another set of footsteps. My heart races.
“Jess, are you up here?” he calls.
This time I answer. “I’m in here, Jacob.”
I turn around and watch his face emerge through the trapdoor. He crosses the room to me. I slide the necklace into my pocket before he sees it.
“Hey,” he says. “You disappeared. What are you doing up here?”
“Thinking,” I turn my back on him and go to the window, wipe the condensation from the glass, and gaze outside.
He stands behind me. “What are you thinking about?”
I slide my fingers into my pocket and trace smooth silver. “I used to have a lot of good memories of this barn.”
“I did too.”
I look out on my backyard—the multicolored leaves on the hills, the long driveway pockmarked with puddles, my house, my bedroom window. Home. I slide my fingers across the locket, looking for courage.
I turn around to face him and hold it up for him to see. “Do you remember this?”
He takes it and turns it over in his hand. “It's the locket I gave you when we moved. You were wearing it on prom night.”
That catches me off guard. I didn’t think anyone had seen it. “How did you know that?”
“You touched it when I handed you the corsage. I could see it through the fabric of your dress.” He rubs it between his fingers, the way I used to. He smiles mischievously. “If I remember right, when I gave it to you, you promised you’d never take it off.”
