Chapter 29

“How’s she doing?” Kal asked Hana quietly, just outside Melissa’s room. Between Kaylie, Hana and himself, they’d been taking shifts sitting with Melissa or just being available if she needed them. So far, she just sat there, hugging her legs, staring into nothingness.

Hana shook her head, her brows knit with concern.

“Its not as bad as last time,” she said softly, pulling in close. “We were afraid she was going to hurt herself when you disappeared. Right now ... she just seems ... lost.”

“Like when Ms. Aberdeen passed?”

“Yeah.”

That had been a dark day for them all. One day she’d been fine, the next morning, she just hadn’t woken up. It had been Hana who’d found her. It took days to finally sink in. They were alone. Set adrift on an ocean of despair they couldn’t navigate. They’d only had each other.

“Just ... be there for her, okay?” Hana said with a soft squeeze of his arm. “She needs to know we’re still here. That she’s not alone.”

“Yeah. Of course.”

A deep silence lingered in the room, not even the drone of the heater to mask their breaths. Melissa sat up on her bed, legs folded beneath her, staring out the window, her eyes unfocused. For nearly an hour, she’d just sat there, unmoving, even as Kal had sat by the ledge.

Several times he’d tried to say something, but nothing had come out.

What even could he say? Condolences were just words, they hadn’t meant anything when Ms. Aberdeen had passed, and they wouldn’t mean anything now.

Looking at Melissa, it was like she was a shadow of herself. Like she wasn’t even in the room. There was nothing to her, not even a flicker of emotion in her dull eyes. Even her scent seemed off. It had always reminded him of honeysuckle with a hint of cinnamon, that spiciness defining who she was. But now ... all he could smell was her shampoo. Not her.