But there’s nothing in here except bitterness, accusation, and the fucking color white.
Terror slams through me as I realize I’m stuck. I’m trapped in here, surrounded by the pelting sound of rain, with flashes of lightning and the brutal sound of thunder that shakes the building.
I immediately bring a hand up to cover my nose so that I don’t smell the rain. I can maybe—and this is a tiny maybe—ward off the horrible memories that I associate with the sounds of a thunderstorm. But I can’t ward them off if I smell the rain.
Short puffs of breath hit my cupped palm as I breathe against my hand, my eyes bouncing from window to window. I can’t do this here. I can’t break down in front of these strangers. I don’t care if Taz and Nefta are my biological parents—they don’t belong in my emotional turmoil.
Dread fits on top of me like a second skin, which only seems to add to the hysteria I can feel floating to the surface of who I am.
A streak of lightning arcs through the sky, the electric tendrils looking like gnarled limbs coming to rip me apart. I slam my eyes closed and grit my teeth, but then another crash of thunder erupts in the air, shaking the very foundation of my soul. A strangled noise slips out of my throat, and memories, horrible memories push and pull and pinch at me, refusing to be ignored.
“Jeter, what’s wrong?” I hear Crux say, but I can’t focus on his voice or find his face in all the panic. All that exists is thunder and lightning and rain and pain.
“Take a deep breath, Delta,” Echo encourages, but I can hear the rain falling even harder, and I know that if I breathe deeply, I’ll smell it.
A sob slips out of my throat despite my efforts to swallow it back down, but I realize it’s too late. I’m too late. I have none of my usual tricks to stave off the panic attack.
The moment another crack of lightning splits in the air, the last of my resolve splinters. Memories slam into me like sledgehammers crushing me to a pulp. All I can do is relive it over and over again.
Thunder booms all around me, and the lights in the living room flicker. Sitting up on the couch, I lean over the back of it and push down one of the slats in the blinds covering the window and see the torrential downpour that’s going on outside.
My stomach growls, and I check the time on my watch again. Where are they? It’s already six, and dad promised we could grab pizza from Antonio’s tonight. I stare at the cordless phone charging on the wall and debate calling them again, but I’m too lazy to get up.
A flash of lightning catches my attention outside. I count one Mississippi, two Mississippi, and then the thunder rumbles through the walls of our house. A car turns onto the street, but I quickly realize it’s not my parents. It’s a cop car.
That’s weird.
I watch the black and white vehicle make its way slowly down the road, like the cops inside are checking addresses. It stops in front of the house across the street, and I narrow the gap in the blinds that I’m looking through so I don’t get caught spying like a creep.
I chuckle when the cops get out of the car and are immediately soaked through. It’s funny because they have these plastic covers on their hats, but it’s not doing much good for the rest of them. But my amusement immediately dies away when they don’t jog toward the McNeal’s house like I’m expecting. Instead, they run across the street and right up the sidewalk to my front door.
The blinds snap shut as I lean back on the couch, and my heart trips when the doorbell sounds off. Why would the cops be here? I push up from the sofa and look through the peephole just in case I saw things wrong, just as a firm knock reverberates through the door.
I open it, and the smell of rain slams into me along with cool wind as the storm works itself into a fury outside. Lightning crackles, lighting up the tree in the front yard to be an eerie bright white.
“Are you Delta Gates?” an older officer with a gray mustache asks me, his blue uniform soaked and dripping.
“Yes,” I answer, not sure what to think of this. Am I in trouble for something?
Nothing immediately comes to mind, but that doesn’t seem to stop the fear and adrenaline from kicking in. The mustached officer pulls a rain speckled notebook out of his pocket and flips it open. He thumbs to a different page and then squints slightly at whatever is written there.
“Are you the daughter of a Ray Gates and a Tanya Gates?” he asks.
“Yes...” I confirm, and suddenly the fear and adrenaline pumping through me isn’t for me anymore. “What’s going on? Are they okay?” I ask, worry soaking my tone like the rain did their uniforms.
“We’re very sorry to tell you this, miss, but both of your parents perished in a car collision that occurred approximately two hours ago.”
The officer keeps talking, but I can’t seem to hear him. All I can hear are the words both of your parents perished over and over again. A flash of lightning streaks across the sky, and a boom of thunder follows quickly on its trail. The other officer ducks slightly like he’s expecting the sky to fall down on top of him.
I push out of the door, past the officers and out into the storm. I don’t even know why. It’s like I’m searching for their car to be parked there,
