“How’d you sleep?”

Because he doesn’t usually.

He’s an insufferable insomniac. His mind is naturally more active at night than the average person’s. He can’t figure out how to shut it down. And when he does sleep, he has vivid nightmares so he gets up and crawls into my bed.

Because I’m the one he comes to when he’s afraid.

It’s a twin thing. Although, the kids that used to tease us for being weird would love to know that little tid-bit, I’m sure. Calla and Finn sleep in the same bed sometimes, isn’t that sick?? They’d never understand how we draw comfort just from being near each other. Not that it matters what they think, not anymore. We’ll probably never see any of those assholes again.

“I slept like shit. You?”

“Same,” I murmur. Because it’s true. I’m not an insomniac, but I do have nightmares. Vivid ones, of my mother screaming, and broken glass, and of her cellphone in her hand. In every dream, I can hear my own voice, calling out her name, and in every dream, she never answers.

You could say I’m a bit tortured by that.

Finn and I fall into silence, so I press my forehead to the glass and stare out the window as he drives, staring at the scenery that I’ve been surrounded with since I was born.

Despite my internal torment, I have to admit that our mountain is beautiful.

We’re surrounded by all things green and alive, by pine trees and bracken and lush forest greenery. The vibrant green stretches across the vast lawns, through the flowered gardens, and lasts right up until you get to the cliffs, where it finally and abruptly turns reddish and clay.

I guess that’s pretty good symbolism, actually. Green means alive and red means dangerous. Red is jagged cliffs, warning lights, splattered blood. But green… green is trees and apples and clover.

“How do you say green in Latin?” I ask absentmindedly.

“Viridem,” he answers. “Why?”

“No reason.” I glance into the side-mirror at the house, which fades into the distance behind us.

Huge and Victorian, it stands proudly on the top of this mountain, perched on the edge of the cliffs with its spires poking through the clouds. It’s beautiful and graceful, at the same time as it is gothic and dark. It’s a funeral home, after all, at the end of a road on a mountain. It’s a horror movie waiting to happen.

Last Funeral Home on the Left.

Dad will need a miracle to rent the tiny Carriage House out, and I feel a slight pang of guilt. Maybe he really does need the money, and I’ve been pressuring him to give it to Finn or me.

I turn my gaze away from the house, away from my guilt, and out to the ocean. Vast and gray, the water punishes the rocks on the shore, pounding into them over and over. Mist rises from the water, forming fog along the beach. It’s beautiful and eerie, haunting and peaceful.

We arrive at the hospital early, so we decide to get coffee and breakfast in the cafeteria while we wait.

I grab my cup and head to the back, slumping into a booth, while Finn buries his nose in a Latin book.

I close my eyes to rest for a minute longer because the perpetual rain in Astoria makes me sleepy.

The sounds of the hospital fade into a buzzing backdrop, and I ignore the shrill, multi-pitched yells that drift down the hallways. Because honestly, I don’t want to know what they’re screaming about.

I stay suspended in my sleepy dark world for God knows how long, until I feel someone staring at me.

When I say feel, I literally feel it, just like someone is reaching out and touching my face with their fingers.

Opening my eyes, I suck my breath in when I find dark eyes connected to mine, eyes so dark they’re almost black, and the energy in them is enough to freeze me in place.

A boy is attached to the dark gaze.

A man.

He’s probably no more than twenty or twenty-one, but everything about him screams man. There’s no boy in him. That part of him is very clearly gone. I see it in his eyes, in the way he holds himself, in the perceptive way he takes in his surroundings, then stares at me with singular focus, like we’re somehow connected by a tether. He’s got a million contradictions in his eyes…aloofness, warmth, mystery, charm, and something else I can’t define.

He’s muscular, tall, and wearing a tattered black sweatshirt that says Irony is lost on you in orange letters. His dark jeans are belted with black leather, and his fingers are long and bare.

Dark hair tumbles into his face and a hand with long fingers impatiently brushes it back, all the while his eyes are still connected with mine. His jaw is strong and masculine, with the barest hint of stubble.

His gaze is still connected to mine, like a livewire, or a lightning bolt. I can feel the charge of it racing along my skin, like a million tiny fingers, flushing my cheeks. My lungs flutter and I swallow hard.

And then, he smiles at me.

At me.

His eyes are frozen on me as he waits in line, so dark, so fathomless. This energy between us… I don’t know what it is. Attraction? Chemistry? All I know is, it steals my breath and speeds up my heart. I feel like I’ve seen him before, but that’s so stupid. I would remember something like that.

Someone like him.

I watch as he pays for his coffee and sweet roll, and as his every step leads him to my back booth. There are ten other tables, all vacant, but he chooses mine.

His black boots stop next to me, and I skim up his denim-clad legs, over his hips, up to his startlingly handsome face. He has a slight stubble gracing his jawline and it makes him seem even more mature, even more of a man. As if he needs the help.

I can’t help but notice the way his shirt hugs his solid chest, the way his waist narrows as it slips into his jeans, the way he seems lean and lithe and powerful. Gah. I yank my eyes up to meet his. I find amusement there.

“Is this seat taken?”

Sweet Lord. He’s got a British accent. There’s nothing sexier in the entire world, which makes that old tired pick-up line forgivable. I smile up at him, my heart racing.

“No.”

He doesn’t move. “Can I take it, then? I’ll share my breakfast with you.”

He slightly gestures with his gooey, pecan-crusted roll.

“Sure,” I answer casually, expertly hiding the fact that my heart is racing fast enough to explode. “And I’ll take a bite. I’m starving.”

“Perfect,” he grins, as he slides into the booth across from me, next to Finn, ever so casually, as though he sits with strange girls in hospitals all of the time. I can’t help but notice that his eyes are so dark they’re almost black. He cuts his roll into two and offers me half, and I chew the bites.

Finn barely even glances up from his book because he’s so absorbed, but this strange boy doesn’t seem to mind.

“Come here often?” he quips, as he sprawls out in the booth. I have to chuckle, because now he’s just going down the list of cliché lines, and they all sound amazing coming from his British lips.

“Fairly,” I nod. “You?”

“They have the best coffee around,” he answers, if that even is an answer. “But let’s not tell anyone, or they’ll start naming the coffee things we can’t pronounce, and the lines will get unbearable.”

I shake my head, and I can’t help but smile. “Fine. It’ll be our secret.”

He stares at me, his dark eyes shining. “Good. I like secrets. Everyone’s got ‘em.”

I almost suck in my breath, because something is so overtly fascinating about him. The way he pronounces everything, and the way his dark eyes gleam, the way he seems so familiar and I swear to God I know him. But that’s impossible.

“What are yours?” I ask, without thinking. “Your secrets, I mean.”

He grins. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

Yes.