“About two weeks.”
Emery tossed Kalo’s toy before smiling at me from where he sat on the edge of his bed, his hair still messy from sleep, muffin crumbs gathered in his lap. “Let’s do it, Little Penny.”
We weren’t in New Mexico very long before we cut right across the Colorado border, and finally, it felt like fall.
Actually, it almost felt like winter.
We didn’t have the top down anymore, and I was bundled up in one of the two sweaters I brought, my arms tucked tightly across my stomach to keep the warmth in. I’d never seen anything like that before — the mountains stretching up in the distance to our left, the prairies flat and dry to our right as we crawled our way to Colorado Springs. I didn’t know how Emery was keeping his eyes on the road with everything so beautiful around us. There was snow on the tips of the mountains, and I traced the outline of it in wonder as we drove.
“I’ve never seen snow before,” I said absentmindedly, petting Kalo’s head. She had crawled into my lap somewhere in New Mexico.
“Ever?”
I shook my head. “I’ve never been outside of Alabama.”
Emery glanced at me then, watching me for a moment before his eyes found the road again. “It’s pretty, if you don’t have to shovel it. I stayed with a college buddy once over winter break. His family lives in Pittsburgh.” He shook his head. “It was awful. We had to shovel so much snow, and you have to put on so many fucking layers when you go outside, and then peel them all off when you’re back inside. And everything is wet.” He grimaced before a soft smile found his lips. “But it was something, to see it fall from the sky. And it’s so soft at first. It’s pretty. And quiet, everything is so quiet when it’s snowing.”
“That sounds magical,” I said in awe, closing my eyes and trying to picture it. “I don’t think I would mind shoveling, if it meant I got to see that first fall.”
Emery scoffed. “You say that now. But if your feet were frozen numb and your hands raw and red from the shovel, you’d change your mind.”
My thigh started to tingle under where Kalo was resting, and I moved my hand under her fur, rubbing my thigh in small circles, my eyes still on the scenery as we passed.
“Do you have something for that?” Emery asked, nodding toward my leg. “For the pain?”
I shrugged, still working the muscle under my fingertips. “I used to. They gave me pain meds, but they just… they took all the light out of me. I started looking up more natural remedies when I was fourteen. That’s kind of what lead me to Bastyr, actually.”
“That makes sense. I don’t think I would want to be doped up all the time, either.”
He said it like he knew, his eyes softening under the weight of his brows, and my mind flashed to his journal entry, to the hydrocodone he took to try to end his life.
I swallowed.
“I was basically a zombie when I was on them. Pain relief is a hard thing to study when it comes to naturopathic medicine, though. I tried acupuncture, and that didn’t really work for me. I brew willow bark in my tea and that helps sometimes, but other times the pain is so severe that it almost feels like nothing will help.”
“And you just ride it out?”
I nodded. “Usually. I figure it’s my body’s way of reminding me what was once there, and sometimes I don’t mind having that reminder. Even if it is painful.”
Emery was silent a moment, his hands fisting the steering wheel.
“Sounds almost like that love you were talking about.”
I tilted my head. “How so?”
Kalo readjusted herself on my lap, huffing as if our talking was keeping her awake. I chuckled, petting behind her ear.
“Well, it’s like with my grams. Sometimes I smell something or hear something that reminds me of a time with her, and it hurts, but… in a good way. In a way that reminds me she was here, and alive.”
My chest ached with his admission, and I was tempted to reach for him, to wrap my hand around his own, but I kept petting Kalo, instead.
“Yeah. I think it’s exactly like that.” I paused. “Or like when you love someone and they break your heart. It hurts to remember them, but it would hurt worse not to.”
“You’ve experienced that heartbreak?”
I flushed then, eyes back on the road. “Well, no. But I think I can imagine what it would be like.”
“Have you ever been in love?”
I swallowed. “Not yet.”
“Ever had a boyfriend?”
“Not unless you count Trevor Baker in the fourth grade. He kissed me by the swings.”
Emery laughed. “I’m sorry, it’s just… I find that so hard to believe.”
“That Trevor Baker kissed me? Hey, I was a looker in the fourth grade. That was before I needed glasses.”
“No.” He laughed again. “I mean that you’ve never had a boyfriend, a real one.”
My heart squeezed, and I looked back out the window. “Yeah, well, no one in my town really wanted much to do with me once I lost my leg. Add in the fact that my family didn’t exactly have the best reputation and, well…” I shrugged. “But it’s fine. I had my books, and this fluff ball here.” I scrubbed Kalo’s head.
“What’s your favorite book?”
It was my turn to laugh. “You can’t just have one favorite book. That’s like me asking you to choose a favorite arm.”
“My right one, of course.”
I rolled my eyes. “I’m serious. I’ve read thousands of books, there’s no way I could ever pick a favorite.”
“Okay, well which one got you hooked on reading.”
Smiling, I reached into my purse by my feet, pulling out the worn copy of Catcher in the Rye I’d brought with me.
“No shit,” Emery said, eyeing the book. “You’re a Holden Caufield fan?”
“He was my first crush.”
Emery laughed again just as we rounded a corner to reveal another breathtaking view of the mountains. “Most girls were crushing on Leonardo DiCaprio, and you were lusting after Holden Caufield.”
“He’s a stud. He’s smart and witty, and foolish.”
“And you like foolish men?”
I shrugged. “I liked foolish boys. Past tense.”
“And now?”
I didn’t know why heat crept its way up my neck, or why I had to fight back a smile at him asking me what kind of guy I preferred. It felt like he was asking me another question altogether, one he’d asked with his eyes, already.
“I don’t know. I want someone I can laugh with, and go on adventures with. Someone who will challenge me to be better but also support me when I’m weak. I want someone who shares their deepest fears with me, shows me their scars willingly — someone who trusts me to heal them, just as I trust them.” I bit my lip. “And I want to feel a rush every time our skin touches. I want to lose entire afternoons with them under the covers. I want someone who I can’t wait to share good news with, and someone who I know will hold me when the bad news comes.”
I knew I was rambling, but I couldn’t stop. The want for a love I’d never experienced consumed me. My eyes were still tracing the mountains as my voice lowered, my hands finding my hair, braiding it over my shoulder.