Total pages in book: 99
Estimated words: 91560 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 458(@200wpm)___ 366(@250wpm)___ 305(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91560 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 458(@200wpm)___ 366(@250wpm)___ 305(@300wpm)
It takes her a minute or two to get back to me, but she does send me his number. Then sends a follow up.
Wren: Please, just take it easy tonight. We’ll figure this out. But don’t make any big decisions.
I’m not sure what she thinks I’ll do. Maybe she figures I’m suicidal. Maybe I am, since I’m actually considering calling Tucker, of all people. Even as drunk as I am now, I wonder if this is a good move.
But I need to feel something, and he is the only one who’s made that happen in as long as I can remember.
That’s why I make the call, dropping onto the foot of my bed, remembering what happened here. There’s wariness in his voice when he answers. “Yeah? Who is this?”
“It’s Maya. Don’t hang up,” I add before he can end the call. “I’m in trouble.”
“And I’m supposed to care because…?”
“Because it’s so easy for you to climb in my window. I’m trapped in my house.”
“Give me a break,” he groans. “Trapped in your house. What are you, a princess in a fairy tale?”
“Do you think I would call you if I wasn’t serious? My dad found me packing.” I’m slurring my words, but I can’t help it, no matter how hard I try. “He took my keys and set the alarm. He’ll know if I leave, and he’ll send the cops after me. I’m stuck here. I don’t know what else to do.”
After pausing for a beat, he murmurs, “Sounds like you’ve been doing some drinking.”
“Yeah, so? I’ve also done some bleeding.” Looking down, I find the blood has congealed.
He can’t come up with such a quick response to that one. All I hear is a heavy sigh on the other end of the call. “What do you want?” he eventually asks in a flatter voice than before. Almost defeated.
“I don’t even know,” I admit. “I guess I want you to come over. I’m sitting here alone, and I don’t know what to do, and—”
“Fine, fine. You don’t need to tell me everything again.” He groans, muttering to himself, while I chew on my lip and wait for him to make up his mind. “I’ll be over. Just stay where you are, in your room, and wait for me. And don’t cut yourself again,” he adds. “Don’t do anything.”
He ends the call, but before he does, I catch him mumbling something about going too far. Like he almost cares, which I know he doesn’t. I’m not that drunk.
Somehow, I manage to clean myself up and put on my pajamas, though it takes longer than it should with me stumbling around and losing my balance when I try to find the leg holes in my shorts. I’m just pulling them up when a car crunches on the gravel in the driveway that runs next to the house, under my window.
I open it, looking down and wishing I hadn’t when wooziness takes hold of me. I have to grab onto the windowsill for balance as I watch Tucker climb out of his truck. “He’s not going to send the cops here, is he?” he asks, looking up at me once he finds me watching.
“I don’t think so. He won’t know this window opened.”
“I would tell you I could help you climb down, but you’d probably break your neck.” He’s probably right—as it is, he’s doubling in front of me, and my head is spinning. I have to lean back into the room and sit on the bed with my feet on the floor until the room stops spinning. By the time it does, he’s climbing through, breathing only a little harder than before.
“Thank you for coming.” Even to my drunk ears, that sounds like a lame thing to say, but it feels like I should thank him. “I… I don’t know what to do.”
Scrubbing a hand over his hair, he eyes my suitcases. “You should’ve waited until you knew he was gone,” he mutters, shaking his head, sliding his hands into the pockets of his shorts. “You need to be smarter.”
Obviously, since I had made the move of calling him in the first place. “If you’re going to give me shit, you can leave,” I decide, flopping back on the bed and regretting it when my head spins again. “Ouch.”
“Damn. How much of this did you drink?” He picks up the bottle I left on my dresser, now only a third of the way full. I turn my head to the side to watch him take a deep gulp straight from it before he smacks his lips. “Not bad. He’s got decent taste.”
“Oh, and you’re an expert?”
“You get pretty mouthy when you drink.” Taking another sip, he caps the bottle and sets it down. “I go out of my way to come over here and risk my neck climbing through your window, and all you can do is give me an attitude.”