How I Fall (32 page)

It’s seriously a stressful thing—caring about—watching after—worrying about this beautiful, amazing girl to the point it physically makes your heart ache like mine is aching now.

Despite the words hanging on the tip of my tongue, I dial myself back down. I’m not her parent, not her teacher or anything but a friend who has no right to lecture anyone on how to keep themselves safe.

So, I do what I do best. I decide to smooth over the fight that just happened and change the subject.

“Looks like the wood is all set up for tomorrow’s bonfire.” I point down the beach, checking out the giant pile of logs stacked where the beach curves toward the back of the clubhouse.

“Hmm.”

“I’m supposed to help set the wood into a giant fire pit later with my dad. It’s kind of fun, hauling whole trees around. You going to the bonfire tomorrow?”

“No.”

“Have you ever been to it?”

“No.”

“Want to go?” I ask, hopefully.

“Can’t.”

I glance back, catching her last ‘no’ head shake, taking in her profile and slumped shoulders. She’s staring down at her phone so I can’t quite read her expression because half of her face is hidden by her hair. It’s obvious she’s only pretending to look at the shots we took because she’s breathing all raggedy. I already know the one word answers, in girl-language, means she’s probably trying not to cry. My mom does this all the time. Her hand is also kind of shaky which confirms my suspicions.

I wish I could get inside her head and instantly fix what’s making her sad, but I know I can’t. With girls, I’ve learned you’ve just got to wait it out.

Give them space.

I walk to the farthest edge of the grove and pretend to examine the bonfire set-up again, wishing she and I were close enough friends that I could walk over and hug her, beg her to understand that all of us acting crazy around her is something none of us can control. I want to explain that I
do
understand. Try to make her see that just like the CP is not her fault, our reaction to her is not our fault, either. We act this way because wanting to protect her is more than just about her body being fragile and off balance. It’s that she’s so sweet and nice, and the way she acts so tough and stubborn, that she sets everyone off on obsessive safety tangents.

I wonder if she knows that right now, with the wind picking up again, she seems to be waving back and forth. She actually looks as light as any of the leaves blowing around her. With every small gust my adrenaline is spiking, because I now must battle and focus in on something I can’t even see or predict that might knock her flat. She’s actually made me hate the wind!

Could I ever explain that when I’m around her, every inch of me becomes poised and ready to throw myself in her direction? All for the sole purpose of ensuring her a softer landing should she fall? Could I ever admit—could I ever explain—that in the last five seconds, I’ve actually begun to track each and every branch moving around her in the off chance that one might snap?

No. Because all the above sounds crazy.

And now that I’ve thought that
branch-snapping
thought—I can’t stop myself from looking up above where she’s standing—because as unpredictable and sucking the wind might be right now…gravity has rules that never fail.

I’m beginning to despise all physics in general.

My eyes shoot above her head. One solid branch there…the one next to it looks decent but, that third one looks sketchy ! I need to get her to move out from under there.

Now.

She saves me by stepping away herself. “Would you mind grabbing the other duct-tape baskets?” she says hoarsely, pausing to look over at me with a sad but now resigned-looking smile firmly in place.

If I didn’t just witness her all shaken-up and half crying I’d believe she was just fine. But now I know for sure this girl is simply a master at throwing on masks.

“Did you bring the Nikon?” she asks.

“It’s there.” I point to the bag I’d set by the tree when I first arrived and head in the opposite direction to collect the baskets.

“Good. I wonder if I should make a larger duct taped basket for it as well.”

“I’d appreciate it. Could protect it from banging around.”

When I get that her smile has turned genuine because of talk of cameras and duct tape, I’m freed up to breathe almost normally but I can’t ditch the feeling that I need to stay on my toes. When I’m sure she’s not looking, I watch her carefully as she releases her hands from one tree and shifts her weight expertly until she can balance herself using the branches of the next. As she moves slowly toward the goal of getting to my bag, my gaze soaks up every movement like I’m seeing the CP part of her for the first time. And, I just can’t look away. I want to stop tracking every puff of air around her, stop seeing every rope waving in the wind above her head, and I would like to stop hating even the leaves that now dare float too near her! But I can’t, not after already witnessing her close call with that rope.

The whole time Mr. Nash’s words about her being in danger and
breakable
are tumbling through my own tangled thoughts:
No…no…she has no idea…how sweet…how beautiful she is…what I’m going through. What we all see when we see her…that she’s beautiful and special and…and…and that the world is just not safe…not safe…not safe…not safe at all for her!

Struggling to push back my thoughts even more, because they’re actually bringing on some sort of irrational panic attack, I manage to act like I’m thinking about the project as much as she is. “Because the light’s going to start to fade some, should we do the branches farthest from the lakefront first and hope the reflections off the lake will allow us more time closest to the water later?”

“Okay. Yes. Good idea. Whoa.” She gasps as the wind surges harder than the gust that brought down the rope earlier and she starts to go down! My heart skips beat after beat and somehow my feet are flying in her direction before I know they’re moving. I’ve got my eyes on every swinging cord around her, then I’m tracking the direction her feet are pointed, because I’m trying to determine the direction she’s going to fall so I can get there.

Her left foot catches on a root and her hair whips off her face. I’m watching pure fear spike through her coal-black eyes. She tilts, but I’m still too far away, helpless and watching as she manages to grip a low hanging tree branch.

“Ellen!” I’ve shouted her name and now I wish I hadn’t because somehow, that little branch and her skinny good arm is holding her upright just fine.

I pull in a long breath as she turns to look at me. Her black eyes are half hidden behind her long bangs. This time, she can’t quite hide everything from me because I’m beginning to know her pretty well. “What?” she answers, voice questioning and careful.

We’ve both heard the small tremor that came from somewhere in the back of her throat.

She’s afraid. She knows I’m afraid for her, too.

She feels all of what I’m feeling and more because she lives this. She’s the one going through these small but treacherous and nearly fatal moments—probably many times—every day. I also sense she doesn’t want me to see her this vulnerable and exposed, but after the fight with Nash and now this, there’s no going back.

If only she could read my mind a little deeper, if she would just trust me a little more and if I weren’t such a mind-stripped idiot, I could try to explain…but explain
what?

How much more I like her today than I did yesterday? I’m a freaking mess.

“I—I—nothing.” I sigh. “Can we sit and wait for this wind to die down?” It takes all of my effort to ratchet the fear off my face and turn away to grab at one of the ropes flying by, hoping she did not notice how I tried to execute some sort of ridiculous tackle move to try and save her.

“Worried about your Nikon?” Her voice moves from trembling to that low, raspy-catch sound that makes me insane.

I breathe a sigh of relief because she doesn’t bring up my awkward failed interception at all. Avoiding her gaze, I bite my lip, clinging to her words as an excuse. “Yes. Blowing sand will murder that thing and freeze the automatic lens. And, honestly my legs are killing me after that game. I’m—tired.”

“All right. You win. I’ll sit. Liar.”

“What? I’m serious. This is all me, not you.”

“You are quite possibly the world’s worst liar. This is all me.”

“Please. You can’t know anything about me on that level,” I challenge.

She pulls her mouth into a straight line and says in a wry, attorney voice: “Let the record show, when Cam Campbell lies, he bites his lip and looks sideways at the sky. Every time.”

“Damn.” I laugh. “Let the record show, Ellen Foster is some kind of mind reader. And it’s not a whole lie. I am tired, but quite honestly I don’t think I could survive watching another rope whip down and almost kill you, okay?”

“Well, I could survive it just fine because I survived the last one.”

“I know. I know.” The wind whistles through the branches above. “But…please?”

She looks up to where the ropes are hanging and walks over to sit by the tree nearest my backpack which seems to be out of any sort of dangerous drop zone. “Meet me over here, then. It’s the only rope-free zone.”

I tie the ropes nearest to me down solid then I head to where she’s now sitting and I wonder if things between us could get any more awkward. She’s got her back snug-up next to the tree, probably a protective move in case another giant gust comes through. Thankfully she’s let her mask slip back off again.

As I sit near her she smiles, but her gaze is tentative—guarded. “I guess…if we’re going to be working together so closely, I’m not going to be able to hide myself from you like I want.”

“What’s to hide? And you’re not the only one with secrets, you know? I’ll try to share some of mine, if it helps?”

“The only thing that could help would be if I didn’t need help, or a cane, or have CP and you can’t deliver that so please don’t even try to go there.”

“Okay. Fair request. I won’t.”

She sighs. “But I love secrets. If you want to spit some out, I’ll never tell.” She turns her face to the lake. The sunlight’s all peaches and whites and it’s hitting the edges of her face, making it and her hair shine so bright and beautiful that my heart stops beating for myself. Completely. It’s hers. Whatever she wants to do with it. Simply hers, because I’m so in awe of how this girl never feels sorry for herself.

Every damn day…how…how does this girl do this balancing act and then never complain? How? And…how can I make her like me back?

“Candy?” I dig deep into my pocket, suddenly realizing how hard it is to keep the conversation going without Laura London flinging glitter all around us.

Ellen nods at the caramels I’ve produced. “Sure. I’ll take one.”

Without thinking, I toss one up high into the air and then quickly realize my mistake. Her eyes have widened, and her arm has twitched like it was going for the catch, but the candy, of course, never reaches her. It just falls into the sand between us.

Her cheeks instantly color bright red. Before I can tell her how stupid and sorry I am, she breaks my heart straight down the middle when she whispers, “Sorry,” and pulls the arm that failed behind her back. “I’m—you know—slow reactions.”

Hating myself now, I try to cover for both of us. “It was a crap throw. I can’t aim anything that’s not egg shaped. I swear. You should see me try to throw a basketball.” I go for a quick grab at the candy, not realizing that she, in her own way, is in the middle of doing the same with her other hand, so our heads bump.

“Sorry,” she whispers again, leaning back into her tree and rubbing at the red spot I’ve made on her forehead.

“Pretty sure I’m the one that is beyond sorry,” I say quietly. “I’m clumsy and an idiot, and
yeah, I do want to die for failing at everything when it comes to me interacting with you.”

She’s biting her lower lip like she’s trying not to laugh or cry. “No. That would be me.”

I recover the abandoned candy from the ground
an
d brush off the wrapper then work to unwrap it. “Do you ever find yourself wishing life could be like those movies or books where the character gets to travel back in time and quickly do over moments or days until everything goes right?”

She blinks at me. “Since the day I was born. Literally.”

I hold out the candy, but she doesn’t move to take it. Her eyes are going over the caramel like she wants it, but then with a sigh, she shakes her head. “When I’m nervous or upset nothing on me works quite right. You go ahead and eat it. I don’t think I can chew, let alone take it out of your hand at this point—not even with my good arm.”

“Is it me, making you nervous?”

She shrugs. “Yeah. Can’t lie. It’s your eyes. They kind of startle me because they’re so cool looking.”

“They do? They are?”

She nods. “I get stuck trying to separate the colors. I do that with everything I see. It’s a habit, but with your eyes it’s become sort of an—obsession.”

I laugh. “Really.”

“Really. And…well…because despite the lies you tell me otherwise about your coordination, I know that everything on you works so well and everything on me just doesn’t. So when you’re around I’m really aware of how different we are. I think, because of all that, I try to be extra graceful around you, which is why I manage to fail on a higher level every time you are near me.”

“Pretty sure I almost fell all over you on the bleachers this morning. That was not me faking coordination! That was pure clumsiness, because you also have very interesting eyes—so opaque and dark that I’m always trying to figure a way to read your thoughts. Those peepers of yours give nothing away. And the part where you smell like some sort of flower shop throws me off as well. So it’s you making me incredibly nervous also. See?”

She smiles. “Please. I almost fell off the whole bleacher when you sat next to me—in case you don’t remember that? Because I do. And I almost ate sand in front of you just now. And you smell like some sort of candy store all the time!”

“I do?”

“Yes.”

“It’s because I’m addicted to sugar. Which probably adds to my clumsiness.”

She blinks and bites her lower lip. “You won’t win this contest. Don’t even try. I’m already a gold medalist in the falling and awkward department. Sugar shakes are the worst excuse ever.”

“Oh, it’s a contest now, is it?” I grin. “The part where I tried to take your eye out by chucking random candies at you has us officially tied at least.” I lean my head against the tree and a small laugh slips out as I go on, “And while we’re still battling for first place, I take credit for the part where I just head butted you so damn hard! Or, does the lump on your head not hurt because mine does.” I hold the candy out again. “Don’t make me eat this thing. If we really tally the scores here, you’ll see that I’m on track to accidentally get this caramel caught down the wrong side of my throat. I’ll wind up passed out in front of you just to win. I will.”