Chapter 27By the morning, Ray’s kiss felt like a dream, the stamp of its proof scrubbed clean from the back of my hand, as forgotten as the songs I’d paid to hear.
But there was far too much evidence of what had happened afterward to pretend Badger’s visit had been a figment. I straightened the line of my bangs with the n***d-feeling tips of my nail-less fingers and filled the tub with cold water so I could soak the bloodstain from my bedspread.
The weekend passed too quickly, gobbled up with housecleaning and the rearrangement of my meager furniture, with countless errands and the fussy shuffling of tiny scraps of cut paper against illustration board.
I felt out of sorts in my skin, unnerved and exposed from where I’d shaved, as though I were missing more than mere hair. The pull was g
