Pulling out an old favorite, I headed back to my bed and plopped down. I dropped the book on the bedspread and picked up my hot cocoa, wishing I’d had the foresight to grab some of those tiny marshmallows.
I tried getting into the book, but I found myself reading the same paragraph two or three times and still having no idea what I was reading. Flopping onto my back, I placed my arms over my face and groaned. I wanted to cry, to scream, to rage, and to shove my head under a pillow.
In a weird way, it felt like a year had passed since I’d left for Snowshoe. So much had changed in such a short span of time. Had it really only been last week that I’d briefly considered seeing if Paul was interested in me? Was it only a week since my heart had been slightly bruised but completely whole? Now I couldn’t even think about going out with anyone.
And my heart was utterly demolished.
What was I supposed to do from here? Try to pretend like nothing happened? That wasn’t going to work. Avoid him? That would be so hard, almost impossible to consider. I squeezed my eyes shut against the tears. How could I avoid him when he was such an intricate part of my life?
What if Kyler now thought I was as frigid as Nate had claimed?
Rolling over, I shoved my face in the pillow. I was going to drive myself crazy, because I didn’t have answers for any of this. And there’d be no—
Tap.
I lifted up onto my elbows and frowned. Had I already gone crazy? Because I’d swear I thought I’d heard a—
Tap.
Pushing onto my knees, I twisted, scanning the room. I didn’t see anything that could have made that noise.
“Okay,” I whispered, sliding off the bed. I walked to the center of the room and stood completely still.
Tap.
I jumped.
Oh my God, what if my house was haunted now? Or what if I was about to pull some Black Swan shit? What if—
Tap.
I whipped toward the window. Aha! It was coming from my bedroom window…two floors off the ground. What in the world?
And then it hit me. The sound—oh, holy-baby-Jesus-in-a-manger—the sound was familiar. It wasn’t a ghost, but insanity was still an option, because it couldn’t be what I thought it was.
Years ago, Kyler used to throw rocks before he’d climbed the massive walnut tree outside my bedroom window. So cliché and ridiculous, but he did it up until middle school.
It couldn’t be.
My legs shook as I took a step forward, and then two. I reached the window, and hands trembling, I parted the filmy white curtains. A second later, a small rock smacked off the thick glass of the bottom part of the window.
I froze as my heart sped up, and then I lurched forward, unlocking the tiny latch and lifting the window up. I slid the screen up next and leaned out into the freezing December air.
And my heart skipped a beat.
Kyler stood below, next to the lit wire reindeer, a knit cap pulled low, one arm raised. He let go a second before he saw me. “Oh shit!”
I jumped back as a small pebble zoomed past my face. Holy crap. I put my hand over my racing heart and gingerly approached the window again. I leaned out.
Kyler waved his arm. “Sorry about that!”
“It’s okay.” This was really surreal. Maybe I was dreaming. “What are you doing, Kyler?”
“Talking to you.”
“I can see that. Why…why didn’t you call me?” Because that seemed like the easiest way to talk to me.
He shuffled from one foot to the other, huddled down in his jacket. “I needed to talk to you face-to-face.”
The porch light came on and I winced. A face-to-face conversation was so not possible with him standing outside and with obviously one, if not both, of my parents awake. “Kyler—”
“Hold on,” he called out. “I’m coming up.”
I’m coming up? Then I realized he wasn’t using the door. Oh, dear Lord, he was climbing the tree. He was going to kill himself! I leaned out the window, my breath puffing small white clouds in front of my face as he shimmied up the trunk. “Kyler, are you insane?”
“No. Yes.” He pulled himself up on the first thick limb. Straightening, he glanced down with a frown. “Well, this is harder than I remember.”
My mouth dropped open. “Maybe you should just go back down and use the front door, like, I don’t know? A normal person would?”
“I’m already halfway there.” He got his foot in a groove and propelled himself up to the limb closest to my window. Wrapping his hands around it, he looked at me. His cheeks were rosy from the cold and his eyes glittered in the moonlight. “If I fall and break my neck, will you say something nice at my funeral? Like ‘Kyler was usually more graceful?’”
“Oh, my God…”
Kyler chuckled as he pulled himself up, so he was crouched against the massive trunk, holding onto the tree above him. “Don’t worry. I got this.”
My gaze dropped to the snow-covered, hard ground below. I wasn’t so sure about this. “Why didn’t you just knock on the door?”
He cocked his head to the side, like he hadn’t thought of that. “I didn’t think you’d answer.”
“I would’ve answered,” I said.
“Too late now.” He winked, and my heart tumbled. “You might want to move back.”
Backing up, I held my breath as he eased out on the limb, causing half the tree to rattle like dry bones. Oh God, I didn’t want to watch this. I wanted to close my eyes as he crawled near the edge, stopped, and then peered down. He lifted his head, appearing to judge the distance.
My heart seized up. “Kyler, don’t—”
Too late.
Kyler half-jumped half-threw himself toward my open window. I was wussy. Closing my eyes, I balled my hands up near my chest and let out a little shriek. There was a sound of flesh hitting wood and my eyes flew open. He came through the open window, landing on his feet like a damn cat. He stumbled though and banged into my desk, causing books and my computer to shake.
He held his hands out to his sides and looked around slowly before his gaze settled on me. “I am awesome.”
I could barely breathe. “Yeah.”
A knock sounded on my bedroom door a second before it opened. Dad popped his head in, eyes wide. “I’m just making sure he made it up here alive.”
I nodded and Kyler flashed a grin. “I’m in one piece.”
“That’s good to see.” Dad started to close the door, but stopped. “Next time, use the front door, Kyler.”
“Yes, sir,” Kyler said.
Shaking his head, Dad closed the door, and Kyler and I were alone in my bedroom. It wouldn’t be the first time. When we’d been home over fall break a few months ago, he’d been in here, but now?
It felt completely different.
Having him in here, so close to the bed—and with me not wearing a bra or panties under my clothes—made my skin flush. This spelled trouble.
Kyler pulled off his knit hat and then he paused halfway through taking off his jacket. “Do you mind?”
I shook my head as I pulled the edges of my cardigan closed.
Lean muscles flexed as he stripped off the black jacket and draped it over the chair at my desk. Then he turned to me, and the air leaked out of my lungs. He had never looked so…unconfident and vulnerable. His throat worked several times, and then he sat down on my desk chair and let out a long breath.
“We need to talk,” he said, resting his hands on his knees.
“I know,” I whispered, because there was no point in lying or delaying the inevitable. I couldn’t sit, so I stood. “I’m sorry about how I left Snowshoe without saying anything. I just needed to get out of there.”
He nodded. “I can understand that.”
I thought about what Andrea had said about Zach and what he’d done. Guilt burned like acid in my belly. “I…I shouldn’t have said some of the things I said to you about Zach. That wasn’t your fault. Not really, and it was low of me to put that on you, so I’m sorry.”