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Wes is missing, and Carter’s smiling.
I take a step back, too. “Does anyone know where he went? We have to find him, Carter. What if he’s hurt?”
“He’s not fucking hurt,” Carter huffs, turning to walk toward the fountain. He leans over and lifts something off the ground. It’s about the size and shape of a small boulder.
“I found this tonight while I was patrolling.” He points a finger at the south hall. “Just inside the main entrance.”
Carter hands me the large bundle. It’s heavy in my arms and rough against my skin, but it’s not the feel that tells me I’m holding my own backpack; it’s the smell. The subtle scent of Daddy’s cigarettes and Mama’s hazelnut coffee that used to linger on everything it touched in the house. It hits me like a sucker punch, stealing my breath and making my eyes burn.
“It’s full of supplies.” Carter’s tone is smug and accusing. “I knew it was yours because of the keychain hanging from the zipper. At first, I thought you must have dropped it off for Quint before you left, but since you’re still here—”
“He left it for me.”
Carter has the decency to shut his mouth as I hug the overstuffed bag to my chest.
It’s fitting that it’s so full. It’s as if everything I’ve lost is crammed inside.
My parents. My home. My old life.
My Wes.
I smell them on the canvas, feel the weight of them in my arms.
But they’re not here.
They’re gone, and they’re never coming back.
I make it to the edge of the fountain before my knees buckle. Curling my body around the backpack, I slide to the floor, holding on to it for dear life as I rock back and forth.
My eyes are fixed on nothing, and that’s exactly what I feel.
Nothingness.
It is deep and wide and dark and damp.
It smells like stale cigarettes and morning coffee.
It swirls, like cemetery fog, around me. Clouding my vision. Numbing my pain.
None of this matters, it whispers. It always knows just what to say.
But then I feel something else wrap around me. Something warm and solid and wonderful.
He is heavy, like the backpack, but grounding.
He smells like home too, in his own way.
He is real, and he is here, and when I look up at the tender concern in his eyes, the fog lifts.
And the pain comes. It rips through me like a rusty machete as I bury my face in Carter’s T-shirt, as my emotions decide they’ve found a safe place to go and flee my body in torrents.
I cry and mourn and twist my fists in the soft cotton while Carter shushes me and pulls me closer.
Which only makes me cry harder.
Not because of everything I’ve lost.
But because of the one thing I actually got back.
