Read Verum for Free Online Page B

show weakness. To hold up Finn.
    But Finn wasn’t real.
    He was gone all along.
    I don’t have to be strong anymore.
    Sabine nods and she gazes into the flames.
    “I know,” she says. “I didn’t know your brother, but I miss your mother. She used to brighten my days, child. Whitley can be dark. Your mama was a light.”
    For some reason, her words only make me sadder because that light has been snuffed, and there’s only darkness here now.
    The fire warms my knees and my bones, and I cup my hands to my chest. I block out my emotions, because emotions only hurt.
    Instead, I want to know about Dare.
    “Dare grew up here?” I ask, trying to sound casual. “He must’ve been a light for you, too.”
    Although even now those words sound ridiculous. Dare is beautiful, Dare is my heart, but Dare isn’t a light.
    He’s my darkness.
    Sabine smiles and her smile is sad.
    “Dare did grow up here,” she confirms. “He was mine, as much as Laura was. He still is, child. I couldn’t help him once, but I’d protect him now with my life.”
    She looks at me now defensively, as though she has to protect him from me.
    I’m confused, and I want to ask why, but I can’t.
    Because Dare himself finds us.
    “Sabby,” he says as he crosses the room, but his eyes are on me. “Jones needs you.”
    She stares at him knowingly. He has come to save me once again, to rescue me from this situation and Sabine knows it. She creaks out of the chair and shuffles away.
    She doesn’t look back.
    “She loves you,” I offer, without looking up.
    The flames are red and they lick at me.
    “Yes,” he agrees simply and he takes her vacant seat.
    He takes my book from my hands, staring at the cover.
    “Jane Eyre,” he observes and he sifts through the pages. “Interesting choice. Are you my Jane, Calla?”
    I swallow and look away.
    Because that would make him Mr. Rochester.
    “Jane saved Rochester, you know,” Dare continues, his voice smooth like the night. “Eventually.”
    “I can’t save anyone,” I tell him helplessly. “Because I don’t know all the facts.”
    Dare closes his eyes and he seems to glow from the flames.
    “You do.”
    I just can’t remember them.
    He opens his eyes again, and the expression knifes me in the heart, because I’ve seen it before.
    It’s hurt, it’s vulnerable, it’s anxious.
    It’s hiding something.
    Something I know.
    Something that scares me.
    Save me, and I’ll save you.
    “I don’t like it here,” I murmur.
    “I know.”

----
    I write my dad a letter , and I give it to Sabine.
    “He’ll want to know I’m ok,” I tell her. She nods because of course he will.
    She hands me a cup of tea.
    In England, tea fixes everything.
    “Is Dare here?” I ask casually, because even now, he’s the sun and I’m the moon. I need his light to live.
    She shakes her head. “No. He’ll be back though, child. He always comes back.”
    What a strange thing to say.
    But I don’t dwell on it.
    Instead, I think about light.
    I think about how the moonlight is really a reflection of the sun, of how the moon doesn’t create any light at all. So a thing that seems to radiate silvery, ethereal light is really the darkest of the dark.
    I’m the moon.
    And I have no light of my own.
    I need Dare for that.
    But if he’s the sun, he’ll burn me.
    And my metaphors are making me sick.
    I retreat to the gardens, where I’m surrounded by flowers and silence.
    All I have are my thoughts here, and my mind is a scary place.
    I close my eyes and will my memories to return,
    But all I can see is the past.
    The past I know.
    Not the things that I don’t.
    My mother’s screams haunt me.
    Finn’s headstone, my tears.
    His journal, which I left at home.
    I wish I’d brought it.
    At least I’d feel closer to him, even though his words were crazy.
    I picture a page filled with scribble, with his familiar handwriting and scratched out words.
    With perfect clarity, I remember it.
    Calla will save me.
    Or I will