“Don’t say that, Archie.” I made him look up at me. “When someone really cares about someone else, they’d want the other person to be fine.”
“You think so?”
I took Archie’s face in my hands. “Yes.” I looked for Dougie in it but saw only Archie. “Yes. All of a sudden, I know that, for sure.”
“It would be hard.”
“Yeah, but listen.” I brought him down, putting his ear to wet skin. “Listen.”
Archie marveled, as if he was hearing something he hadn’t expected.
“Thump, thump, huh?”
“Yeah.”
“See?” I said. “I’m here. I’m fine.”
“I’m glad.” Archie kissed me, long and passionately, deep and loving.
Then, the phone call.
“I have to go.”
There was no room to run up on the bank, so I sprinted through the water.
“You have to?”
“Yes,” I said back over my shoulder, outrunning Archie. “There’s
