Intimate

Part 15

“Riley please open your door.” Sam pleaded, “If you don’t, I will break it with an axe. Please, I need you.” I stayed silent underneath my covers, hearing the pain in Sam’s voice hurt, but I couldn’t bring myself to even speak. “Riley I haven’t seen you in days just open up; we need to talk about mum’s funeral.” Funeral. The word kept replaying in my head, mum has been gone for four days now, and tomorrow was the funeral. Tomorrow was my last chance to say goodbye. “Jace has been here looking for you. He’s going crazy worrying about you.” Sam spoke again, “Riley I need my big sister, I can’t do this on my own.” Salty tears dripped onto my pillow, some landing in my mouth. I wanted to let her in, I wanted to let her in so bad, but I had no energy to get out of bed.

After ten minutes of silence, I finally managed to pull myself up, and limp to open the door. My sister still stood there, her face blotchy, her body shaking with grief, tears racing down her already wet cheeks. “Sam…” It killed me to see her like that, even though I assumed I didn’t look much better.

“I told them about Daniel, he’s in custody and Lacey is safe. I felt that we had enough to worry about and needed him out of our minds.” Sam finally said, after staying silent for what felt like forever. I led her back to my bed where she sat down and I collapsed on my stomach.

“Is she here?”

“Yes.” I sighed with relief; at least something good came out of all this. Ashton came scrambling into my room, his black wiggly body jumped onto my bed, joining my sister and me.

“How does Jace look? Like has his cuts healed?” I thought back to a couple of days ago, Derek had a partner in crime and they both ganged up on Jace. Of course, Derek couldn’t be a normal guy who got super lonely in jail and talked to mice, but he had to make a crazy jail friend, who escaped with him. They tied him up and slit his arms deeply, and were going to leave him to bleed out. Thinking of that happening made another set of tears drip down my cheeks.

“I don’t know, I believe he got stitches, but his arms were wrapped and I couldn’t see.” She said quietly.

“Oh.”

“Riley you need to get out of bed, get cleaned up and ready for tomorrow.” Sam stood up and reached out her hand, I refused to take it. “Riley, I will pull you out of this bed if I have to.” I rolled my eyes and reluctantly took her hand. “Good girl. Now come on, you need to eat.”

“I’m not hungry.” I argued, tripping over my own feet.

“You haven’t left your room for four days, you have to eat.” I stepped out of my room and Sam led me to the kitchen where Lacey was placing ham slices on bread. “What would you like to have?”

“A glass of water please.” I walked over to the table and sat down, my energy already escaped.

“I mean to eat.” I kept my mouth shut, “Lacey can you make her a turkey sandwich?” The tall woman nodded and passed Sam the completed ham sandwich. “Thank you.”

I ate half my sandwich and excused myself after I couldn’t eat anymore. I ventured into the living room, and crashed on the couch. The television stayed off and I just stared at the ceiling until the front door opened, Jace.

“Riley.” He let out a breath of relief; I examined the boy who came running towards me. He had a fading black eye, and his wrists were wrapped to cover his cuts. “How are you?” The boy sat on the edge of the couch next to where my head lay.

“Okay.” I squeaked, my voice not used to being used.

“It’s great to see you.” He sighed, running his hand through my messy hair. Usually I would stop him, since I was always self-conscious of my knotty hair. “It really is.” I kept my eyes staring at the ceiling, unable to make eye contact. “Riley please talk to me.” I opened my mouth but nothing came out, “Your mind is somewhere else, and I don’t know how to get there.” I tilted my head back to look at Jace, whose attention was on me.