“It’s okay, it’s okay,” I said, holding up my hands. “I’m not gonna hurt you.”
The guy pushed himself up onto his elbows and immediately swayed like the motion hurt him. I reached forward to steady him, and he scuttled backwards, like a crab, kicking up sand and stones as he went.
I let him go. It wasn’t like he was moving very fast, and when he leaned over and puked three seconds later, expelling what looked to be about half the Atlantic Ocean, I was glad I hadn’t followed too closely.
“I’m really just trying to help,” I said, raising my voice to be heard over the roar of the waves, but not moving any closer. My sweatpants were getting damp from where I knelt in the sand. “You don’t look so good. If you come with me, I can get to a phone, call 911. Or someone else, if you’d rather—”
The guy opened his mouth like he was going to yell, and his face convulsed in pain. He lifted a hand to his throat, and I winced in sympathy. He’d lived through something awful, and sure, I wasn’t the biggest fan of people in general, but I couldn’t help feeling bad for him. He shook his head, pushed onto his hands and knees, and began to crawl away.
“Please,” I said, not sure why my stomach twisted at the thought of him leaving. “You’re hurt. Just let me help you.”
He looked back in terror, then began crawling double-time. His movements were uncoordinated, jerky and gangling. It would have almost been funny, his determination to get away contrasted with how slow he was actually moving, except it wasn’t funny at all.
Whatever was wrong with this guy, he needed help. He looked about two seconds from collapsing again, and if he did, there was a good chance he’d drown right there on the beach when the tide came back in. I didn’t want to scare him even more, but I wasn’t just going to walk away when someone needed my help.
I couldn’t have another death on my conscience.
“Look,” I said, standing up and making my way towards him. “I don’t know what happened, but I swear I’m just trying to help.”
When I was still six feet away, the guy looked up and saw me. His face blanched. Well, blanched more. He was already pale to begin with. He staggered to his feet, his right hand going to his left shoulder like it pained him, and began to run.
He made it three steps before his toe caught on a piece of driftwood, his ankle twisted, and he crashed back down.
“Fuck,” I growled, sprinting to catch up.
I reached for his arm, bracing for resistance as I put my hand on his shoulder. My stomach dropped when I was met with none.
I rolled him over to see that his eyes were closed again. Not wanting to touch his neck when it seemed to be the source of so much pain, I held my hand over his mouth, sighing with renewed relief when I felt him exhale.
He was alive, thank God. And clearly in need of help. And just as clearly terrified—of me, and possibly everyone. Still, I couldn’t just leave him.
Which meant there was only one thing to do.
3
Ari
The first thing I was conscious of was that my head hurt.
Scratch that. My everything hurt.
It was like the worst hangover I’d ever had in my life, worse than—actually, I couldn’t remember feeling worse than this. Casting my mind too far out in any direction felt impossible right now, and it was so foggy in my brain that I couldn’t even remember where I was.
I did have an overwhelming sense of dread, but maybe that was just part of the hangover. Or bad dreams, perhaps.
Maybe if I could get back to sleep, I’d have better ones, but a persistent buzzing was making that impossible. Like someone was mowing their lawn two feet from my head. Or running their mower over my body, more like, because there was pressure on my chest, and little jabs of pain too, and honestly, who was so rude that they’d decided to mow my not-very-robust-to-begin-with chest hair without notifying me first?
With a groan that hurt my throat, I cracked an eyelid, then blinked both eyes open a second later. It wasn’t a lawnmower. It was a cat.
A big, fluffy gray cat with a smushed-in face was sitting on my chest, making biscuits with his little paws.