To Dance With Wolves ▪Liam Dunbar▪

✓ | 11. He's a Lost Boy

It was cold in my room when I woke up the next morning. Outside my window the clouds were barely starting to turn pink. By the time I finally slipped out of my bed though, the sun had already risen above the trees at the end of the street. After running a brush through my hair and pulling on my sneakers, I slipped out of the house without a sound. I didn't quite know where I was heading until I looked up from the sidewalk and saw a familiar front door. I stared wearily up at Liam's house in the growing light, and tried to figure out if I was actually going to walk up the steps and see if he was home. Just as I decided it was way too earlier for such a ridiculous idea, the door swung open and I froze.

"Emily, you're here awfully early. Is something wrong?" Liam's step dad said after startling at the sight of me on the sidewalk.

You have no idea, I wanted to say. "Is Liam home?" came out instead, and I stood there waiting for bad news.

He shook his head, "I think he spent the night at Mason's. I never saw him come home."

My heart dropped into my gut. I didn't want to think about what Liam not being home meant.

"I'll have him call you when he shows up if you want." he suggested.

I shrugged halfheartedly, knowing that it probably wouldn't matter. "Yeah, thanks."

I waited until Mr. Dunbar had collected his morning newspaper and disappeared back inside before I started walking home. I didn't know for sure that Liam was dead, but all the evidence pointed in that direction. It was hard to find enough hope inside me that he might still be alive. I could barely find the strength to move, let alone care about anything besides that fact that he was almost certainly gone for good. 

By the time I got home though, I'd managed to fight through my wallowing and access the rational part of my brain again. Once reason kicked back in, I decided to just call Liam. If by some miracle he did pick up the phone, then I could end my suffering through the unknown right away. I had no such luck. 

The phone rang and rang until it went to voicemail, and the only thing I was left with was his voice telling me to leave a message and an uncomfortable lump forming in my throat. I tried again and again and again, until after five or six tries with no results, I finally gave up and called Mason instead. Maybe Liam's dad was right and he had stayed the night at his house. When Mason picked up I tried to keep my tone steady and calm.

"What's up, Em?" he asked with the same tired voice he usually had during the morning bus rides we shared.

"I was wondering if you'd seen Liam since he vanished yesterday. I need to know where he is so I can kick him for ghosting us."

"No," Mason laughed. "He still hasn't responded to my texts or anything. I was gonna go over to his house and ask him what his deal is later, if you wanted to join. I'd love to watch you kick him in person."

"Oh okay. Sounds really fun but I uh . . . I think I'll pass. I can just kick him on Monday." I choked out the last few words and hung up the phone before Mason could hear me burst into tears at the bitter truth behind the lie I'd just told. 

I threw my phone down onto the carpeted floor and wiped furiously at my eyes, doing everything in my power to hold myself together. My best effort wasn't even close to enough.

It was happening again. Another person I cared about had been ripped away from me, and if history was repeating itself, then things were somehow only going to get even worse. I wasn't sure I could handle worse. I felt like a shaken soda can; like there was so much crap bottled up inside of me that I was going to explode if I didn't release some of the pressure. I wanted to break glass against the wall or throw china at the kitchen floor. I wanted to scream until I threw up or cry until I couldn't breath. 

If I was five years older and hadn't seen up close the terrible things that happen to people when they're intoxicated, I might even have wanted to numb myself with alcohol, but I was fifteen and scarred, and even the thought of vodka burned like hell.

In the end, I opted for the one option that would've followed all the others anyway. I slid down the wall, put my head on my knees and let the tears burning my eyes fall away. I thought that all the emotion inside me would come out in a way that would leave me a shaking, sobbing mess, but that wasn't the case at all. I barely made any noise at all as I clutched my legs to my chest and simply let the fabric of my sweats soak up all the salty water dripping onto them. I didn't have the energy left to do anything more.

I stayed curled up by the wall crying for what felt like hours, but was probably only a few minuted before I was startled from my pain by a loud knock at the door beside me. I jumped up shakily and tugged my sleeves over my face, wiping away the wet spots on my cheeks. I drew in a deep breath and opened the door.

I might have screamed a little when I saw who was standing on the top step.

His hair was messy, and he looked tired beyond measure, and he was alive. A rushed 'ohmygod'  fell from my lips, but as soon as my brain was able to process the fact that Liam was upright and breathing and only about two feet in front of me, nothing else mattered. 

I threw my arms around his neck and the force almost knocked him over. I buried my head in his shoulder and squeezed my eyes shut as my mind flooded with relief. He only hesitated a moment before wrapping his arms around my waist. Almost instantaneously, all the weight on my chest dissolved and I felt like I could breathe again. 

"Are you okay?" he asked nervously once I pulled away.

I let out a choked sound that was somewhere between a laugh and a sob. "I guess that depends on your definition of okay. I spent the last fifteen or so hours knowing your life was in danger, and there was nothing I could do to help. This morning when I went to your house, your step dad said he hadn't seen you since you since yesterday morning, and Mason said the same thing. Then when you didn't answer your phone either, I thought you were dead. Oh, and I only got about two hours of sleep last night. Are you okay?"

Liam stared at me, stunned for a full thirty seconds before he found the words to answer. "I, uh, I'm still alive I guess. How did you know I was in trouble?"

"Long story," I said, even though it wasn't quite true. I just wanted him to keep talking so I knew he was still really there. "What happened to you yesterday after Garrett got you?"

"After he knifed me and gloated for about ten minutes, he hit me over the head with something from the back of his truck and I blacked out. I wasn't out for very long though, because I woke up pretty quickly after he dumped me in a well out in the middle of the woods. Falling thirty feet into a pool of freezing water will do that." Liam explained to the floor.

"So how did you get out?" I asked.

"Scott found me."

Thank God for Scott McCall. I thought to myself in the brief silence that fell over the room before I spoke again. "How'd he cure the wolfsbane?"

"How do you know about . . . nevermind. I was pretty delirious, but I'm pretty sure Scott brought me to a supernatural doctor, because apparently those actually exist. I'm not sure what happened after that, the wolfsbane fogged up my memory pretty bad. All I know is that after all that, I woke up in a vet's office this morning. That's the whole, ridiculous story."

"I'm just glad you're okay now," I said softly.

"That's the thing, Em. I'm not actually sure I am."

When he raised his head up to look at me, I saw that his eyes were just as glassy as mine. He started to say something more, but changed his mind and just wordlessly pulled me into another hug. 

His arms wrapped around me so tightly that I didn't know if he would ever let go, and I wasn't sure I even wanted him to. I could tell that this embrace was more for his own security than mine, like our last one had been. This was the same type of silent emotional support I'd needed from my own friends after the incident, and I wasn't going to deprive Liam of it. I knew a thing or two about lingering trauma, and I knew this wasn't something he would get over easily, but I was going to do everything possible to help him through it. That's what you do for people you care about, and damn, did I care about him.