From Beginning to End

Chapter 8

"Jake?" I stared up at him in shock. "What the hell are you doing here?" my voice rose to accommodate the storm outside. Jake didn't even seem to notice. He was looking right at me, but I got the distinct sense that he wasn't seeing me at all.

"I'm sorry," he was so quiet I had to lean in to hear him. "I know it's late, I just…" I continued to stare at him, unsure of exactly what was going on. A tremor raced through him, but he didn't seem affected by it at all. Truthfully, he didn't look all there, which greatly worried me. I opened the door wider, wordlessly inviting him inside. He took the invitation, stepping over the threshold and immediately dripping all over the floor. He was soaking wet and I looked over his shoulder, peering through the rain. There wasn't a car outside. Incredulous, I stared at him. Had he walked all this way?

"Jake, what's going on?" He didn't answer me. Instead, he stared at some point over my shoulder. I sighed and led the way into the kitchen, sitting him down in the nearest chair with a guiding hand. Water dripped from his hair and down into the collar of his jacket. I wondered how long he had been outside; the rain had been nonstop all day, but the storm didn't start getting bad until a few hours ago. I continued to eye him, unsure of how to approach the situation. Finally settling on giving him a few seconds to himself, I murmured something about going to get a towel and disappeared upstairs.

When I returned, he was still seated in the same place. In fact, I was fairly certain that he hadn’t moved an inch. It was scary; I had never seen him like this—aimlessly staring at nothing, not speaking, not his usual joking self.

A nice sized pool of water had accumulated underneath him and I handed him the towel. It took him a moment to react, but when he did he moved slowly, his movements delayed as though his joints had rusted over. For a moment I stood their awkwardly, waiting for him to start drying off. He didn’t. He simply held the square of fluffy cotton in a loose grip. My brow furrowed and I took the towel from him. It slid, unrestrained from his cold fingers. At a loss for what to do, I began clumsily patting at his rain-drenched hair.

"Take off your jacket," I instructed. To my surprise, he complied without hesitation, unzipping the water resilient fabric and peeling it off of his arms. It fell to the ground with a loud plop and I saw that his shirt was just as wet. It clung to him like a second skin, clearly outlining every ridge and dip of his torso. My mouth fell open in shock; he had to have been standing in the rain for a long time to end up soaked through like that. “Jake, what…” The questions began bubbling up, but I resolutely choked them back down. He showed no outward reaction to the fact that I had just spoken and I could tell by his vacant expression that now wasn’t the best time. When he wanted to talk, he would talk.

I sat down in the chair beside him, avoiding the growing puddle at his feet. The storm continued outside, an occasional burst of lightning flashing bright white in my kitchen. I began rubbing his arms briskly with the towel and still, he said nothing. I worked in the silence of the kitchen; the only sound in the background was the steady drumming of the rain against my house. After a minute, he put a stilling hand on mine, laying it heavily over the towel to stop me. When I realized that I couldn't move, I looked up at him. His eyes were downcast and he still didn't speak. Almost as a reflexive gesture, his hand lifted and lowered, patting my wrist. He did it twice more, each time slower than the last. Then suddenly, he stopped, simply holding tightly to my fingers.

I swallowed hard, unsure of what to do. The silence was so unnerving. I wasn't used to him being this way. Usually, he would have made several jokes by now; we would have been laughing or talking or something. I didn't know who this was sitting in front of me, clinging desperately to my hand.

To my shock, he slowly leaned over and laid his head on my shoulder. The strap of my tank top slid down, but I ignored it, trying to figure out what was going on. I didn't dare breathe. The towel laid forgotten on the table as I lifted a hand to his shoulder, still trying to figure out what to do. I felt a warm drop of water from his hair drip onto my arm and run into the v of my shirt. Before I could move to wipe it away, another trailed down the same path. Suddenly, there were a lot of the tiny drops sliding over my skin. When I heard an intake of breath, it dawned on me that these weren't just drops of water and my chest clenched painfully.