Ripple

ignoring the pain on my skin and in my heart.

He steps back just a bit and tilts my head upward with one finger. My eyes snap shut as his lips crash into mine. In a mass of kisses and limbs, we tumble back onto his bed.

Something’s different this time. The wall Cole put up whenever we used do this . . . whenever we went this far . . . is somewhere left behind. We’re twisting and grabbing, pieces of clothing dropping to the floor. His lips are everywhere, my hands sliding up and down his body.

We can’t get enough. Is it a near-death experience, driving us to act like this? Our breaths come in loud, heavy rasps. Cole moves to his nightstand to reach for something, and I nearly yank him back to me. But then he’s back and settling on top of me; and when finally, there’s nothing between us, his entire body against mine, hot skin on skin, our eyes lock.

“I love you,” I whisper, my fingers raking across his bare back. I hadn’t planned to say it, but the words float out with a sigh.

He leans down, rests his forehead against mine so that our eyes are so close, all I can see is a mass of brown and green swirling together, intense with emotion and need. “I love you, too.”

I shut my eyes to keep the lone tear from escaping.

For the first time in my life, I’m not lonely.

I jolt awake.

Awake.

I gasp and spring upright so fast and clumsy that I twist and fall out of bed, yanking the blanket with me in one big puddle of limbs and sheets.

My breath and heart race so fast they compete, and I can’t hear anything but the freight train in my ears. I blink over and over, trying to see in the darkness.

Cole is at my side in an instant, hauling me to my feet. “What’s wrong? What happened?”

My voice comes out so quiet, so low, it’s barely enough to call it a whisper. “I slept.”

“What?”

“I slept,” I say, louder this time, though still shaky. Cole guides me back to the bed, and I sit, perched, on the edge of it. I glance at the clock on his nightstand.

It’s three forty. I slept over three hours. I wiggle my shoulders, flap my arms around, swing my feet off the edge of the bed. I feel . . . better. Some of the achiness has gone away. The sandy feeling behind my eyelids seems to have dissipated. The weight on my shoulders feels like someone removed a few bricks.

“I slept!” I say, louder now, throwing my arms around him. Heat warms my face. We’re both still naked.

I twist around, start scooping clothes off the floor before my cheeks burst into flames. I’ve never been naked in front of a boy before, not like this.

Cole tosses me my shirt and then pulls on his own. “And this is newsworthy?” He’s confused but relieved, too, as he realizes nothing is wrong.

I yank my borrowed boxers up over my hips. “Yes! You don’t understand, Cole. Normal people sleep. People who don’t have curses. I do not sleep, at least not for the last two years. I swim. I go up to the lake.”

He blinks rapidly. Understanding dawns. “So . . . he wasn’t lying? You don’t have to swim now?”

“I don’t know! I think so?” I sit down on the edge of his bed, deflated a little. “I did swim last night, a little. Maybe that’s all this is. But then . . . that really doesn’t explain why I slept. Just why I didn’t need to swim.”

What if this is meaningless? What if I’m just worn out from fighting off Erik all night, and this is just . . . temporary? A heavy silence falls around us. We stare at the ground, sitting side by side on his bed, neither of us speaking.

Hope builds. It might actually be possible. What if this whole time all I needed was to fall in love? With someone who knew the truth and somehow... loved me anyway?

Maybe that’s why Erik went after Cole first. He wanted me to kill him. Make sure I never got what I wanted.

“It can’t be this simple,” I say, more to myself than to Cole. “It can’t possibly be this simple.”

Cole grips my hand. “Occam’s Razor.”

“What?”

He turns to look at me. “It’s usually the simplest answer that’s the right one.”

Nervous, I stand up abruptly and walk to the window, pushing the curtain open. The moon gleams over the ocean, the waves rolling gently to shore. I stare at it for a long moment in silence, waiting to feel that familiar hunger, the strong pull of the ocean. But I feel nothing.

I twist around. “You really think it was you, all along? That trusting you . . . falling for you . . . was the one thing that could undo this whole mess?”

I want to laugh and cry all at once. If it’s true... everything with Erik was for nothing.

Cole stands, shrugging as he walks up to me, pushes a stray, tangled strand of hair over my shoulder. “I don’t know . . . but . . . it could be, right?”

I swallow and nod.

Yes, it’s possible.

Yes, it seems too good to be true.

“We need to go outside. I need to stand on the beach. But if I make one move, if I so much as dip my toes in the surf, you plug your ears and run the other way. No matter what I do. Got it?”

“Yeah. Let me get dressed.” He pulls his pajama pants back on and goes to the closet, taking a hoodie off the top shelf. Then he tosses one at me, and I’m so deep in thought I barely manage to catch it.

He holds the door open for me as I slip into the sweatshirt, my arms lost inside the sleeves. It’s warm and soft and smells like the woodsy scent I’ve missed these last few weeks. He told me he liked going to Tillamook Forest. It must be why he always smelled like the woods.

Cole steps up beside me and reaches for my hand. I surprise myself by pulling away. “Can you just ... stay, like, thirty feet away? I’m afraid if we’re touching and I want the ocean, I’ll drag you in.”

He furrows his brow. “Lexi, you’d never—”

“I don’t trust myself. And right now, you shouldn’t either. Just do it.”

Cole sighs and steps away from me, trailing a dozen yards behind as we reach the beach. My shoes sink as I make my way across, until I’m standing at the edge of the moist, compact sand, just a few feet shy of the line of foam left behind by the waves.

Cole stops where he is, watching me.

I turn to the ocean and stare outward, waiting. Nothing happens. I peer down and push the button on the side of my watch, illuminating the display. 3:57. I should want to swim right now. I should need to swim right now, in the darkness of night, standing on the beach in the middle of the night.

But it’s like waiting on the tracks for a train that never comes. Nothing happens.

I glance back at him again, and then out at the sea.

And then before I know what’s happening, I’m crying, and Cole is standing beside me, pulling me close.

Moments later, when he tips my chin up, I don’t resist.

I just kiss him.

Chapter Thirty-Three

A week later, I step through the gates of Seaside Cemetery, my sneakers crunching on the leaves that line the paths. I pull Cole’s sweater tighter around me as a sharp October breeze bites through. It’s a brisk, chilly walk to Steven’s grave, a walk I’ve made so many times before. But this time is different.

This time I’m not alone.

We navigate between the headstones, the world silent around us except for the sound of our shoes on the frosty grass. We make our way to the stone with the football engraved in the middle, a meticulous piece of solid-