Page 115 of Hunt Me

Nico makes himself comfortable in my office, digging through my snack drawer while I grab a couple of the books I wanted to take home with me.

I make sure everything’s tidy, put together just the way I like it.

Nico waves to get my attention. ‘Why did you get into Deaf-Ed? This school lets Deaf teach anything.’

I shrug. ‘I didn’t learn sign until I was older. My family is hearing, so I was mainstreamed. CIs as a baby.’

His nose wrinkles. ‘The ASL accent.’

I fucking hate when people tell me my signs have a hearing accent, even though I know they do. But it’s a reminder that I came to this late. That some people—the most snobby elite—still think quietly that I don’t belong.

I let that roll off me. I know Nico doesn’t mean it that way.

‘Majoring in Deaf Studies seemed easy,’ I tell him as I grab the half-full rubbish bin to take to the front desk for housekeeping. ‘It ended up being harder than I thought, but I was so far in it, I didn’t want to take up something else, so I leaned in.’

He nods, then goes back to snooping around my top drawer, and I reach for the door handle to walk up to the front desk. The door swings open, and just before I take a step into the hallway, a man appears.

A familiar man.

‘Byron,’ my lips start to form. My heart begins to hammer in my chest so hard I think I might be having a heart attack.

His lips stretch into a dangerous smile, but before I can make a sound, his arm lifts, he leans forward, and something crashes into the back of my head. I have no time to scream, and before I hit the ground, everything goes numb and black.

29

ARCHIE

The road tripwith my dad isn’t as bad as I thought it would be. It is, in fact, worse, especially because we’ve now been gone two days longer than we originally planned in spite of being only a few hours from town.

It doesn’t help that I hate being cooped up in the car with my father, driving farther and farther away from Denver. Objectively, I know he’s safe, but still. The distance is not making my heart grow fonder.

It’s making me feel desperate.

I can’t help but flap my hands slightly, stimming to keep me from falling over the edge.

My dad wouldn’t like me having a meltdown. I can tell the hand flapping is making him uncomfortable from the way he keeps peering over at me, and I brace myself for him to tell me to stop. For it to be like every other time when I was a child.

“Archie.”

I stop flapping and start rolling the hem of my shirt between my fingers. It’s a compromise.

“I’m sorry.”

My whole body stills, and I peer over at him. I’m not used to hearing those words come from his lips. Blinking, I try to come up with words, but this close to a meltdown, I can’t.

“It shouldn’t have taken me this long to figure out what you need. You don’t have to stop doing that. I know this is hard for you.”

I swallow thickly, then raise a shaky hand. ‘Why?’ I’m hoping that one single sign conveys what I’m trying to ask. Why now? Why bother?

What changed?

He lets out a heavy breath. “Nico’s spent a lot of time with me recently. You know how he is. He’s never hesitated to call me out when I’m being shit. But after you boys left, he warned me that if I didn’t get my head out of my ass, I was going to lose you. And after losing your mom…”

He’s silent, and I can’t figure out what he’s trying to say. After losing her what? We’re the last pieces he has left of her? It’s a nice sentiment, but it still doesn’t mean he gives a shit about us. Only what we represent.

“I couldn’t live with the grief of losing you three too. Your mom and I agreed we’d never bring kids into this life. But the day she took that test and found out she was pregnant with Percy, we knew we were going to be selfish. So all we could do was hope that you three would end up finding out who you were outside of all this.”

“I am who I am,” I rasp.