Breaking by Danielle Rollins

Author:Danielle Rollins
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Chapter Nineteen

I wake the next morning with Jack’s kiss still painted on my mouth. Like lipstick I forgot to wash off before going to bed. I lift two fingers to my lips and let them linger there. Remembering. My fingers taste like salt and fire.

I roll over in bed, pulling my phone off the side table. We’re meeting again this morning, nine o’clock, same place. It’s Saturday, so we don’t have classes, but I have a shift at the clinic at ten thirty. I already find myself coming up with excuses to cancel. I wonder if they’d believe I have the flu …

I push back my comforter and crawl out of bed, careful not to let the mattress springs creak. I don’t want to wake Zoe. I pull open a drawer, cringing at the soft scrape of wood.

I frown. My clothes aren’t where they’re supposed to be. They’re still in the drawer, of course, but they’re all wrong. My favorite jeans sit on top of my school uniforms, but I know they were at the bottom of the drawer last night. A top I vividly remember shoving into a corner of the drawer is now nicely folded.

I glance at Zoe’s sleeping body. She must’ve gone through my things again.

“Bitch,” I whisper. Her eyelids flutter, but she doesn’t wake. I make a mental note to read her stupid love letter later. I tug on a pair of jeans and a sweater and duck into the hallway, pulling the door closed behind me with a barely audible click.

The morning is crisp. There are already a few security guards out, but they’re mostly milling around the site of the bonfire, looking for stragglers who didn’t make it home after the party. I slip past them easily.

I jog through the woods—just enough to get my blood flowing without making me sweat. I feel oddly energized, like I could run a marathon or climb a mountain. The air tastes like spring, and birds coo in the distance. It feels like I’m living inside a greeting card.

I reach the spot early, and Jack isn’t there, so I collapse against a tree. Sunlight tickles my face.

Something rustles through the bushes. I open my eyes a crack. “Jack? Is that you?”

There’s no answer, and the rustling goes still. Must be a squirrel. I’m about to close my eyes when something blinks at the corner of my eye, like a beacon. Look at me, it seems to say. I squint.

A bright yellow brick sits at the edge of the cove, next to a growth of weeds and dead grass.

That doesn’t belong here, my brain tells me. Ariel and I came here practically every day. I know every tree, every twig.

I take a step toward it and kneel to get a closer look. Someone has painted the rough surface of the brick in small, even strokes. I run my fingers over it, and a thrill of excitement shoots through me. Bananarama, the shade is called. I was with Ariel the day she found it.

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