Most days I can be strong. Or at least strong enough to fake it. I didn’t have the strength to fake it today.

You’ll never read this.

I never want you to.

And I know that you’re doing something important to you and I’m proud of you. Really, I am. Maybe I’m being a brat but I hate it, Dylan. I fucking hate it. I want you safe. I want you home. I want you in our bed. In our home. I want you in your truck. I want the horizon with you. I want everything with you and I can’t have that if you don’t fucking come home.

Riley.

* * *

My leg aches, my lungs burn. Everything hurts. I don’t know how I manage to keep standing long enough to knock, but the second the door opens, I lean against the frame releasing my grip on the crutches. They fall to the ground with a loud crash and my eyes drift shut as I force another round of air in my beaten lungs. “Dylan, what are you doing?” Holly says, her hands on my upper arms as soon as she opens the door.

“Riley,” I breathe out, opening my eyes just long enough to look at her. “I need…” Breath. “…to see…” I try to swallow but my throat’s too dry.

“Riley!”

Riley

I jump out of bed and run straight to the hall, my eyes darting and my heart beating out of my chest. I check left, check right. And then I stop. So do my frantic eyes and my erratic heart. “Dylan!” I run toward him, getting to him just in time to wrap my arms around his waist before he falls. “What are you doing?”

His breaths are sharp, loud, filling my ears with fear.

“Go next door and get Sydney!” I order Mom, helping Dylan into the house and onto the couch. His hand’s on my wrist, and for as weak as he looks, his grip is strong. I look down at his hand, his knuckles are white.

“I need you, Riley,” he whispers. Slowly, I peel his fingers from my wrist, allowing the blood to recirculate.

“I’m here.” I sit on the couch, holding his face. His lids are hooded, his head heavy in my hands. “Do you need something?”

“You, Ry,” he breathes out. “I need you.”

Suddenly, the room fills with more bodies than the space can handle, I don’t look at them. I look at Dylan. His eyes squeeze shut as he tries to swallow.

“Water?” I ask.

He nods.

I start to get up but he holds me to him. I look at Mom. “I’ll get it,” she says, and then she’s gone.

Sydney’s in front of him now, her fingers on his wrist. “Did you walk here, Dylan?” she asks, her voice calm and so out of place with the chaos in my head.

He nods again, weaker than the last.

“What the hell were you thinking?” Sydney asks. Same tone.

Dylan laces his fingers with mine, squeezing once, before rolling his head back on the cushion and looking up at the ceiling.

For a moment, everything is still. Silent. Only Sydney moves. She checks his pulse, gives him the water Mom brought him, and checks his temperature. He’s sweating now, his chest heaving. His every movement, every breath is a struggle. He rolls his head to the side, his eyes on mine again. “I’m sorry,” he whispers.

Inside, I break.

Outside, I smile. “Shh.” I sit up on my knees, my arms around his head and I hold him to me, my chest soaking in the sweat across his forehead.

“Son,” Mal says, speaking for the first time. “Let’s go home, okay?”

“No!” I cry and hold him tighter. I look at Mom, pleading with my eyes. “He needs me! Mom, please!” All the emotions from the past few weeks finally catch up. I wanted him to need me. And now he’s here. And I need him just as much.

Eric says, “Holly, we can take—”

“No!” I shout at everyone, one arm around Dylan’s head and the other out in front of us.

Dylan’s arms are around me now, his head still lowered, his breaths slowing. “It’s okay,” he whispers. “I shouldn’t have come here.”

“Mom,” I cry, looking her in the eyes. I need her to see my plea, see the desperation we’re both drowning in.

“I didn’t take you away from him to keep you apart,” Mom says, sitting on the other side of Dylan. “Not like this, sweetheart.”

I look down at Sydney still kneeling in front of us. “He can stay with me, right? I can take care of him.”

“He’s overexerted himself. He needs to rest, Ry. Keep him hydrated and keep his leg elevated, okay?”

I nod quickly—my pulse resembling something like normal for the first time since Mom shouted my name, pulling me from the depths of my sleep. I had no idea it would end in this.

“Do you need anything, D?” Eric asks.

Dylan squeezes me in his arms, his head lifting just enough so he can look at me. “Riley. I just need Riley.”

Voices fade from outside my bedroom door as everyone but my mother leaves. A moment later she knocks, not waiting for a response before popping her head into the room. I turn from Dylan lying in my bed, his hands behind his head, his gaze on the ceiling like it’s somehow giving him answers to all the questions I’m positive are there. Not just in him, but in both of us. “Everything okay?” she asks, and I focus on Dylan’s leg wrapped in a cast as I place a pillow beneath it.

“Everything’s fine.”

She steps in and hands me a glass. “Keep it on his nightstand in case—”

“I got it,” I tell her.

She smiles. First at me. And then at Dylan. He doesn’t notice.

“I’ll check in in the morning.”

“Thanks, Mom.”

She smiles again then starts to leave the room.

“Holly,” Dylan croaks, and her smile falters momentarily. “I’m real sorry, Ma’am. For everything.”

He falls asleep right away, his arm around me, his hand settled on my waist when I turned into him. For hours, I lay awake, the endless questions swirling in my head. But the scariest one, the one I can’t seem to shake… And I realize—just as my eyes drift shut—that I’m terrified of the circumstances that will lead me to the answer.

How long will this last?

Fifty-Three

Dylan

I wake up, the sunlight filtering through the cracks of the blinds and for a moment, I forget where I am. It doesn’t take long for me to find my bearings, because even though the room may be unfamiliar, the girl in my arms is the only thing I know.

I take a few minutes to soak in the events of last night and try to settle my emotions. I look down at Riley sleeping peacefully in my arms and I wonder how it is I spent the past few weeks, months, years, my entire goddamn life without her.

Slowly, I pull her off me, hoping not to wake her and sit on the edge of the bed. I look around her room again. Everything’s changed—the pictures she had on the walls, the bookshelf, the desk, the nightstands which once held the speakers that led me to this room for the very first time. It’s all changed. Everything but the corner of the room where cushions are scattered and jars are filled with letters.

She’d brought all her jars with her when we moved out so these are new.

There are no names on any of them to indicate which one of us she’s been writing to and right now, I don’t know which would hurt less.