Page 83 of Swept for Forever
Out on the street, two boys pedaled past on bikes, yelling about dinner. A scruffy dog trailed them, its tongue lolling, ears flapping.
So simple. That kind of moment probably wouldn’tregister anywhere. But it made me wonder if the universe kept records of things like that, like an archive.
“Huh…” I muttered, thinking about my own archive.
It was mostly full of courtroom scraps and childhood debris. And now, maybe memories of her. Or maybe I’d just clear it all when I was done. Like emptying a cache.
Cache.
I froze. Therewassuch a thing online. Why hadn’t I thought of it?
I opened my laptop again, my fingers moving faster now. I searched cached versions of group albums and swimming club galleries, digging through the corners of cyberspace most people didn’t even know existed.
There.
I found two photos. They were not tagged and not linked. But one caption read, “Autumn, you crushed it.” And the other said, “Pool days with Autumn.”
There was no last name. No location.
But her face?
Undeniable.
That smile, those taut swimmer’s shoulders, the swing of blonde hair I’d seen vanishing into the river, and those eyes. Even frozen in a photo, they hit me dead on.
Both shots were poolside. There were no obvious landmarks, no banners strung up, and no team names stamped across swim caps.
But then something drew me in. It was hidden in the background, close to the edge of the frame, blurred and small. The kind of detail most people would miss, unless they were looking for something.
I leaned closer.
“Okay, Otter. You left a trail.”
22
AUTUMN
Back in Idaho Falls, everything felt smaller and quieter. Like I’d stepped into a place frozen in time while I had been the one to change. That was the irony. Buffaloberry Hill wasn’t even half the size of my hometown, yet somehow it had felt bigger, fuller.
Mom thought I was still heartbroken over Jimmy. She never said it outright, but I caught it in the way she watched me, how she tiptoed around the subject of swimming, and how she carefully brought up the club meets.
I let her believe it. Because it was easier than explaining the truth, which was that I didn’t care anymore. That somewhere between being abandoned on a trail and finding my way back, I’d stopped needing Jimmy Van Beek’s validation. Competing, training, winning…it all felt hollow now.
Besides, I had bigger things to worry about. Like missing Dom. Or the bigger problem nipping at my heels: Stiff-Neck.
I still wore the berry-print T-shirt Dom had given me and slept in theIBuffaloberry Hillone most nights. As if holding the fabric might pull him closer. As if I could trick myself intothinking I was still there, still wrapped up in something I hadn’t been ready to let go of.
The journey home had been punishing. I kept catching glimpses of Stiff-Neck everywhere, in every passerby, but they always vanished into nothing. I was circling rock bottom, every mile I traveled costing me like a toll. Alone, scared, and barely holding myself together, my mother’s calls were the only thing that kept me grounded. And even though it meant risking everything, I had no other options. So I went home.
Fortunately, the news about me being on the wanted list, or at least the sketch of me, hadn’t made it to Idaho. Here, everything seemed normal.
Mom knew better. She saw that my injury wasn’t just an accident, and my extended stay wasn’t just about healing. But she never asked. She never pushed. Instead, she trusted Lulu to keep me safe. She even believed it was fate I found her, after I convinced her no one was out there looking.
Then, this morning, Jimmy Van Beek showed up.
I almost told Mom to send him away and left it at that. But something in me paused and turned it over. Why not hear him out?
I didn’t owe him anything, and I sure as hell had nothing to prove. But that didn’t mean I couldn’t take a little satisfaction in facing him.
