The Tribuo - 69. Part V, chapter 22

- XXII -

When I woke up, panic flooded me so bad that my hands started to shake. I sat up in bed, knowing that she wasn’t there, that she was gone, or even worse -- I dreamt the whole thing.

She was asleep next to me, laying on her stomach, hugging the pillow, one of her knees almost by her chest. Jesus, I knew that pose so well… I lay down and carefully wrapped my arms around her. She murmured something in her sleep and moved closer to me without waking up. I wondered what time it was, but then just shrugged. Who cares. I buried my face in her hair, and soon enough, I was asleep again.

…I woke up because she was running her fingertips over my chest. I opened my eyes, and she grinned at me.

“All girls love to cuddle, deal with it,” she said, and I just pulled her on top of me.

*****

I was amazed that it was barely nine in the morning, when we finally got out of bed. It felt like it was noon or close to that. Rayne reached for her sweater, glanced on the bed, and grimaced.

“Oh, man,” she said guiltily. “We totally messed up the sheets…”

I looked down and winced as well. Yeah, Jess’ roommate was gonna have a hell of a nasty surprise when he showed up at home finally.

“I suppose you want to change them now,” I sighed when I saw the look on her face.

“That’s the idea,” she nodded solemnly. “I’m gonna go check on Jess. Can you pull all that stuff off the bed?”

“Yeah,” I nodded.

I caught her arm right before she headed out of the room and pulled her closer.

“Don’t even think about pulling another disappearing act on me,” I muttered.

“I won’t,” she whispered and kissed my mouth. “I will need to make a phone call though…”

“You gonna call that guy, huh?” I wouldn’t let go of her arm. “Seth or whatever his name is?”

“Yeah,” she murmured. “Seth.”

I buried my face in her hair and closed my eyes. I could spend the rest of my life just like this, holding her, inhaling her familiar scent, running my fingers through her hair…

“So, is he really your Uncle?” I muttered, and she slightly pulled away.

“I don’t have an Uncle,” she said seriously. “Really.”

“Then who is he?”

She was silent for several seconds.Then she gave me a small smile.

“He’s my father,” she said finally, and I just stared at her. “Really,” she nodded.

I just shook my head and let go of her arm. She laughed and unlocked the door.

“Be right back,” she said and left the room.

I pulled all the sheets off the bed by the time she came back.

“How’s my evil twin?” I asked and she sighed.

“Asleep... She’ll be sleeping a lot,” she added and picked up all the stuff off the floor. “I’m gonna drop this in the laundry basket.”

I nodded and followed her, determined to find Jess’ linen closet. It took us maybe ten minutes to get everything in order, and then we almost messed up the clean sheets again, but we managed to stop in time.

“Let’s go get Jess’ car,” Rayne muttered, slightly pushing me away.

*****

I was really glad that it finally stopped snowing. Everything was covered in white silent fluff. It looked like one of those Christmas cards -- sunny, sparkling, and almost majestic. Nothing melted, in spite of the bright sunshine. We got to some weird-looking place, and I saw Jess’ car. It looked like a giant snowball. I looked around. We were next to some old building that looked like it was begging to be put out of its misery. I almost asked why the hell did Jess leave her car in such a place, but then decided against it. Rayne would probably say, “It’s a long story,” again.

It took us almost half an hour to get all snow and ice off the car. Finally, it looked good enough to drive and Rayne handed me her car keys.

“Follow me, will you?” she said. “I need to stop by the hospital.”

“Hospital?” I frowned. “What for?”

“I’ll tell you later,” she sighed. “It’s a…”

“...long story,” I nodded. “I know.”

We got into the hospital almost forty minutes later. It was around noon when we walked into the lobby. Rayne came up to the receptionist’s desk and frowned.

“Crap…” she muttered. “What is his last name?”

“Whose last name?” I asked. “Or should I even bother asking?”

She was about to say something when somebody said with surprise:

“Rayne?”

We turned around at the same time. It was some blond guy.

“Russ,” she smiled at him.

Russ? Hmm, I suppose this is Jess’ roommate.

“What are you doing here?” he asked and glanced at me.

And then he took a step backwards and shook his head.

“Oh, Jesus Christ…” he muttered. “Okay, this is not funny anymore…!”

Huh? What is his problem?

“This is Matt,” Rayne said quickly. “Jess’ brother… Twin brother,” she added, and the guy’s expression slowly turned back to normal.

“Oh,” he said. “Okay, the actual twin… I see… I thought it was some weird… Oh, never mind,” he shook his head and stretched out his hand. “I am Russell.”

“Matt,” I shook his hand.

“How’s Lex?” Rayne asked.

“He’ll be fine,” the blond sighed and rubbed his eyes. “Scared the crap out of me, but he is okay now. Sleeping. And I am on my way out for a smoke.”

“I drove your car here,” she said and handed him the keys. “I had to use it last night, sorry…”

“No problem,” he shrugged and took the keys. “Thanks for driving it here. I totally forgot that I didn't have any transportation right now…” he hemmed.

“Umm,” Rayne said carefully. “Jess might stop by later today… To check on Lex…”

The blond’s eyes immediately darkened.

“Go easy on her,” Rayne muttered. “She…”

“If he wants to talk to her, it’s fine,” the blond said evenly. “If not, then she'd better stay away from him…”

Okay, I don’t care how long the damn story is. I want to know all of it as soon as we get the hell out of this place.

“He probably will,” Rayne said softly. “They are best friends after all…”

“Right,” he snorted. “Best friends…”

“Russ…”

“As I said,” he interrupted her. “If he wants to talk to her, it’s fine with me.”

“Right,” she sighed. “Well, we gonna go, okay?”

“Yeah,” he nodded. “Thanks again!”

“No problem,” Rayne smiled. “See you later.”

“Hey, it was nice meeting you,” the blond looked at me.

“Yeah, nice meeting you too,” I muttered and he walked away. “Okay,” I looked at Rayne. “Tell me the damn story!”

She sighed.

“Starbucks first?”

“That works,” I nodded. “But seriously, I am tired of going, 'Huh?!' every time someone says something…”

“I know,” she grimaced. “Let’s go.”

We went outside and she pulled her phone out of her pocket.

“Hey,” she said after a minute or two. “It’s me… We need to talk… Huh? Of course, you do…” she muttered with a tiny smile and rolled her eyes. “Why doesn’t it surprise me? Anyway, I’ll see you in a couple of hours or so, okay? I know that! Okay, see you…”

She turned the phone off and shoved it back into her pocket.

“Coffee,” she breathed after she looked at me. “Then everything else.”

…Jess’ car desperately needed snow tires. Good God, we were sliding all over the damn road! A soft chiming sound made me look at how much gas there was left.

“Crap!” I said in frustration. “The tank is almost empty, great!”

“There is a gas station over there,” Rayne pointed forward. “You can’t see it because it’s around that corner…”

“Ah, yeah,” I grumbled. “Leave it to my sister to never fill up her tank…”

I carefully switched lanes and risked moving just a tad faster. The car sped up, and thirty seconds later, I hit a patch of ice that was hiding underneath the snow.

“Shit!” I muttered through my clenched teeth when the tires acted like a newborn giraffe trying to walk.

I let go of the gas pedal and tried to steer off the road.

“Watch out!” Rayne said sharply when I ended up in the wrong lane.

I jerked the wheel to the right and the car spun in the opposite direction. Then I heard a very loud honk, and when I looked up, I saw a decent-sized pickup truck flying towards me from around the corner. I thought that the driver of that truck looked almost comical with his white face and huge, terrified eyes, when that truck slammed into Jess’ car full speed. I thought that the damn thing was now totaled, and that Jess would be pissed. And then everything turned black.