Inland by Kat Rosenfield

Author:Kat Rosenfield
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Penguin Group US
Published: 2014-06-12T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 20

THOUGH HE HASN’T SAID SO, it’s obvious that my father expects the worst: depression, desolation, the kind of weeks-long relapse and brutal, strangling attacks that a change like this would have brought in the past. He’s scheduled an appointment with Dr. Sharp for later this week, telling me that it’s “for safety’s sake.” As though the air itself might turn toxic, now that Nessa is gone.

I can feel his worried eyes, looking me over, as I say good-bye to my friends and exit the school gate to where his car is waiting. I force myself to smile breezily and wave.

I wish I could explain to him—tell him that it’s my heart, not my lungs, where it hurts—but he wouldn’t understand.

—

The good-bye was hard. For what it had been worth, in the months that Nessa was here, we’d become a family, if a flawed one. At the airport, even my father had leaned in, so stiffly and reluctantly that I half expected his joints to make a creaking sound, and given her a real, actual hug.

“Thank you for all your help, Nessa,” he’d said, then grudgingly added, “I actually don’t know how we would have managed if you hadn’t shown up.”

“You’re more than welcome, Alan,” she’d replied, and then met my eyes over his shoulder and discreetly mouthed the words, Holy fucking shit. When she wrapped her arms around me a moment later, I couldn’t stop laughing even as my eyes swam with tears.

I thought of the last time we’d said good-bye, the way that I’d buried my face in her skirt and the way that she’d somehow predicted the miserable future ahead of me. God knows how your daughter will suffer, she’d said. But this time was different, both of us older, more stoic, bolstered by the promise of future visits on the horizon. When we hugged, the tawny curve of her shoulder came to rest just under my chin.

“I’m really going to miss you.” I gulped.

She squeezed me tighter, bringing a hand up to stroke my hair. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw my father cast an uncomfortable look at us—clutching, crying, the kind of sloppy emotional mess he could never quite understand—and feign a sudden interest in an advertisement for tanning lotion on the wall ten feet away. The sight of him, the knowledge that this would be the sum total of my family with Nessa gone, made me start laughing again, made me cry even harder.

“Shh,” she whispered, combing her fingers through a tangle just over my ear. Her voice broke. “Oh, Callie, don’t cry! If you cry, I’m going to cry, and then your father is going to think we’re hysterical and call the police.”

“Just take me with you,” I joked, still sniffling. “Put me in your suitcase. Your purse. Your pocket. Anything.”

She shook her head, pulling me close with all her strength, and said, “You know I would if I could.”

“Now.” She smiled, stepping back to hold me at arms’ length. “Let me take a good look at you.

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