Runaway ✔

040 • Dana

Happy entered the hotel room with a few boxes from the Chinese take-away and put them down on the small table. The room was actually suited for two persons, and even though they'd booked an extra room, they would all stay here tonight.

The first thing Happy had done today, was visiting the coroner to make sure there wasn't an indication for foul play. When it turned out there hadn't been, he'd had conversations with the notary and the pastor, while Dana had searched for memorial stones, coffins and the contents of the memorial online. 

It all felt very unrealistic, and often her thoughts shot to Casper. Not so long ago Maddox had done the same for him. Maybe he'd even visited the same websites.

A shiver crept down her spine, and quietly she ate the food Happy had brought with him. 

In four days her mother would be buried, then everything needed to be perfect. The three of them had made a checklist of everything they still needed to do. Most things still had to be done by Happy, since she couldn't show herself in public. She couldn't even inform her own family. It made her feel sad that she would have to act as a stranger on the funeral of her own mother. That Happy would give a goodbye speech in which he stressed how sorry he felt that his little sister couldn't be around. 

She would just be Opie's girlfriend. That was all. 

There would be nobody who encouraged her, nobody who would noticed her. 

"Do I really have to stay inside all those days?" Dana asked, sighing.

The walls were already choking her. Since she'd fled from Maddox, walls easily had that impact on her. 

"We could go to a florist together," Opie suggested. "To see what flowers you like. Seein' them in real life ain't the same as on pictures."

Dana looked at her brother, waiting for his approval.  After a short hesitation he nodded. 

"Fine. Go there tomorrow."

 💀  

That night Dana took a long bath. The bathroom was the only place she could be alone for a minute. She hoped the hot water would clear her head, but that didn't happen. 

Self-recrimination buzzed through her head. The realization that she could never see, hear and touch her mother again, slowly started to sink in. It was eating her away.

Around ten she crawled under the blankets from one of the two beds that stood next to each other. Opie would keep the first watch and Happy the second. She sat down with her back against the wall and took her cell from the nightstand. She'd called with Cherry and Kip for a while, who hadn't been around this morning, and she had texted nobody else. 

Now she was staring at the screen, that was glowing brightly since she'd touched it. She wanted to call Juice, just to hear his voice. She however wasn't alone, and the last thing she wanted to hear were mocking comments from her brother. 

Should she text him? But what should she tell him? That she missed him? That was no lie, but she still had to figure out how she thought about a relationship with him. Was that something she wanted? Was that something that was even possible? With all the danger they were in? She had to think about that, and at this moment her head was already flowing over. Until she knew what she wanted, she didn't want to give him false hope. 

Still she wished he would step into this room now, that he had ignored Happy's comments and had followed them anyway. That he would hold her in his arms, pulling her so close that it felt as if their skin melted together.

Of course that didn't happen. He was probably at the bar now, talking to the other guys and not even thinking about sending her a message to ask how she felt. And why would he? She felt miserable. He knew it, and she knew it. There were no messages needed. 

And still her chest felt heavy, making her wish he'd done it anyway.