My imagined scenarios of making out with a guy never involved jiu-jitsu.
Not that my imagined scenarios ever went very far.
Now they are. Going that far, I mean. Kind of. I don’t have any experience to speak of. But I’ve seen Game of Thrones.
Great. Now I’m blushing in the grass. I want to hide my face. Thank god Rev’s gaze is trained straight up, at the stars scattered in the sky above us.
Our fingers are laced together again, his palm warm against mine. Texy is flopped out in the yard somewhere nearby. My lips are swollen, my hair is a mess, and grass prickles my arm, but I don’t care. I’m thinking about the feel of his arms wrapped around me, of those brief moments when he would go still, and my world tunneled down to touch and breath and my heart beating so hard.
I will never stop blushing.
He rolls up on one elbow, eliminating half the distance between us. Looking down at me, he blocks the moonlight, and his face is in shadow, his eyes catching nothing but starlight. Our faces are less than six inches apart. “What are you thinking?”
I bite my lip. I’m thinking my cheeks are going to burn right off my face.
“Come on, Fearless,” he whispers. His eyes are so intense, dark and shining. His hand lifts, his fingers brushing a piece of hair out of my face. His touch is featherlight, but hits me like a bolt of lightning. Every time we break to breathe, I think it’s a good thing, but then he touches me, and I want more of it, all at once.
His thumb brushes across my cheek. My whole body warms again, just from that one touch. My lips part, almost of their own accord.
Texas barks.
I jump a mile. I sit up like a shot. Our heads knock into each other.
Ow. Hello, awkward.
Somehow I manage to catch Texy’s leash, but she drags me through the grass before I get her under control. She was ready to bolt after an elderly man walking a tiny Yorkie. The man glares at us but continues walking.
I rub my forehead and look at Rev. He’s doing the same thing.
“Do you believe everything happens for a reason?” I say.
He smiles. “ ‘Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.’ ”
“I might need that one translated.”
He shifts closer and leans in, as if to whisper in my ear. I shiver at his closeness. “It means,” he says softly, “things happen when they’re meant to happen.”
His cell phone chimes. Twice.
He straightens and sighs. “Like that.”
When he looks at his phone, he laughs. “Dec wants to know if I left him in front of a church on purpose.” He slides his fingers across the phone to reply. “I should mess with him and say I don’t know what he’s talking about.”
I smile, then pull out my own phone to check it, too. The ringer has been off, but I don’t expect much. Mom probably didn’t even notice I was gone, and even if she did, she never worries when I have the dog with me.
To my surprise, I’ve missed twelve messages. All from Ethan.
He started at 8:30 p.m.
Ethan: Have you logged on to OtherLANDS lately? Something is going on. You need to get to a computer.
Five minutes later.
Ethan: OK, there’s definitely something going on.
Four minutes later.
Ethan: There are signposts in all of your lands. I’m looking at one right now that says Azure M is a cunt.
Every ounce of warmth generated by Rev has been replaced with ice. I can’t breathe.
Ten minutes later.
Ethan: Emma, please check your messages.
Do you have any info on the guy who was sending you those e-mails?
I looked for his earlier accounts but they don’t exist.
Was he on 5Core? I know people who can track him down.
I’m shaking.
Eight minutes later.
Ethan: It’s worse.
Look.
There’s a picture of what must be his computer screen. Right in the middle of my tavern, the gathering place for new characters, is a huge pornographic image. It’s blurry on the phone, but I can make out a woman on her knees.
A small sound escapes my mouth.
Ten minutes later.
Ethan: Emma. I’m so sorry.
The last message was sent fifteen minutes ago.
“Hey.”
I look up. My fingers are shaking on my phone. Rev is studying me.
“Are you okay?” he says.
“I don’t—I don’t know.” I read Ethan’s messages again. He’s going to get a read receipt on all of them at the same time. He must be sitting there staring at his phone, because I see him begin to type another message.
“Is it your parents?” says Rev.
“No—it’s just—it’s a guy I game with sometimes.”
“Nightmare?”
I swallow. “No. Ethan is a friend. But something happened. He—I don’t know what to make of these messages.”
“Can I see?”
I hesitate, then hand over my phone, just as a new message from Ethan appears. I can’t see what it says.
I almost don’t want to see what it says. The first screenshot is enough.
Rev reads for a moment, then looks up at me. “Emma. You need to—to call the cops or something. This has to be illegal.”
“I need to go home. I need to shut down the game. I can block him—”
“Don’t you think this has gone beyond blocking someone?” He scrolls through the messages again. “Does this Ethan guy know who’s doing this?”
My cheeks redden. I grab my phone back. “No.”
“He says he knows people who can track him down. Do you think this is someone at school?”
“No—Ethan doesn’t go to Hamilton. I don’t—he’s just a friend in-game. I don’t know him in real life.”
Rev frowns. “But he has your cell number?”
“Yes!” I snap. “And thank god, because otherwise I wouldn’t know this was going on at all.” This is terrible. I need to get home. I need to shut down OtherLANDS.
I’m a breath away from crying.
Texy shoves her nose under my hand, and I rub her ears absently.
“Can you fix it?” says Rev. “What can I do?”
I look down at my phone.
Ethan: Can you get home? I can help you find him.
“Nothing,” I say. I look up at Rev. “I need to go home.”
“Okay. Let me just take Dec his keys—”
“No. I need to go fix this.” I swallow. That filthy image is burned into my eyeballs. I want to cry. I want to punch someone. I want to scream.
He takes my hand. “Emma—it’s okay. I’ll go with you.”
I jerk away and glare at him. “Are you kidding?” I demand. “Did you see what he did?”
“Yes. I did.”
I’m wasting time. I start walking. “I need to go home,” I say. My voice breaks. “Okay? Just let me go.”
Rev frowns. “Emma. You need to tell your parents. Please, I’ll go with you—”
“You think I can tell my parents? Are you kidding?”
“This is not just some Internet troll,” he says, his voice fierce. “Why won’t you let anyone help you?”
“Because I can handle this, Rev. You don’t understand.”
“Emma.” He’s still following me. “I trusted you to help me. When I needed to tell my parents about my father’s letters—”
“No.” I round on him. “You told me to go away. And I did.”
He stops short. He knows I’m right.
“I can handle this,” I say. “You told me that if someone didn’t want your help on the mats, that you wouldn’t help. That you wouldn’t interfere. This is me telling you. It’s my turn to tell you to go away.”
Those words stop him in his tracks. I regret them immediately. It’s like I can’t control what comes out of my mouth.
“Okay,” he says quietly.
I wish he would follow me. He doesn’t.
I slip into the darkened shadows along the road.