A Safe Space (Someone Else's Fairytale Book 4) (27 page)

The longer we fly, the more useless I feel. I’m just costing extra fuel. When I try to scan the ground through binoculars, I get airsick, so I end up just scanning the ground with the naked eye.

After two hours, we turn back to Alice Springs, and while the pilot is polite, I can’t help but think I’ve been no use whatsoever. It’s hard for me to fathom why I’m even here anymore. My show needs me back, and I really, really wish I could see Devon, that he’d hold me again. I push that thought away.

“Hey, girl,” Kyra says over the phone. “How are things?”

“Fine, I guess. I don’t know. They still haven’t found her.”

“Right. I figured it’ll be on the news when they do.”

If they do,
I think. “They’re sending out a helicopter with infrared tonight. It was tied up in another search, but now they have it for this one.”

“Oh, good. That should work.”

If she’s still alive.
Yeah, I’m not in a good mood.

“So Devon gave me your car keys.”

“Uh-huh.” I wait for her to scold me.

“Dare I ask how things are with him?”

“I don’t know. I went to his place when I wanted a shoulder to cry on.”

I hear her take a deep breath. She no doubt wants to scream at me, but all she says is, “And?”

“He let me.”

“And?”

“And nothing. I don’t know. I told him I was interested in him, but he didn’t really say it back. I think he was being nice to me because of my situation and all.”

“Oh.”

“I was an idiot, okay? I spent the night with him—”

“You slept together?”

“Only in the literal sense. He barely let me touch him. I just cried and made an idiot out of myself.”

“Lizzie, don’t show up at a guy’s place in the middle of the night crying. Especially not a guy like Devon. You’re lucky he respected you.”

“I guess. Or he just didn’t want me.”

I hear the sound of typing on a keyboard. “Um,” says Kyra, “there’s a picture of the two of you kissing on TMZ.”

“Oh…”

“And then the picture afterward, he’s just staring after you. Aaaand, some pictures of you crying at the airport.”

I wince. I, of all people, know better. Doing those things in a public place was just asking for this. The world is not and never will be a safe space for a famous person.

“Guess I made a total fool out of myself.” Devon must really hate me now.

“Well, no. They just assume he’s your boyfriend and you’re crying over your mother.”

That actually sounds plausible. Relief washes through me. “You think Devon will see it that way?”

“Look, I just hope the press doesn’t interview him and figure out what a dog he is.”

“He didn’t say anything when he called this morning.”

Another pregnant pause. “He called?”

“He was just being nice.”

“Okay,” says Kyra, “not to be rude, but he’s not a guy who bothers to just be nice to people.”

“Yes, he is. To me he is.”

“If you say so.”

I bite my lip. The last thing I want to do is cry over him some more. “I told him I love him. I said it when I was there for the night and at the airport before I kissed him.”

“Well…okay.”

“You think I’m an idiot, don’t you?”

“No, I don’t. I just think you should be more careful.”

I sniffle. “You can be honest.”

“You do love him. I get that. I don’t get
why
, but whatever. You’d have a much easier time if you didn’t go telling him stuff like that.”

“Did he say anything to you at the gym?”

“No. You know what he’s like with me. All business. He just handed me your keys and explained that he’d driven you to the airport. Then he told me to drop and do pushups. I kind of hired him again while you’re gone.”

“Oh.”

“Devon and I are not and never will be friends. We don’t share stuff with each other.”

“Right.”

“Girl, I’m sorry. I feel so bad for you right now, what with your mom and all that.”

“Well, thanks. I’ll call you if they find her tonight.”

“Yes. Any time, seriously. Don’t even think about the time change. Just dial.”

“Thank you. I’ll be home as soon as I can.”

“Let me know the time you arrive. I’ll come pick you up.”

“Thanks.”

We sign off, and I take a deep breath of clean, evening air. It’s dusk here, and I am standing just outside the police station, leaning against the wall. The moon’s risen, and stars are starting to appear in the sky in their unfamiliar, Southern Hemisphere constellations. The air is cooling, which means that soon they can take the infrared helicopter out.

There’s a small crowd of people across the street who stand and point at me, but that’s something I’m so used to that I can just ignore it. Even when a flashbulb pops, I brush that aside. My being in Alice Springs while people look for my mother is not news. If people need photographic evidence, then fine.

A van whooshes down the road and comes to an abrupt halt. I watch it turn and slide into a parking space.

“Did you order delivery?” a woman calls out the window. “A big one?”

“Yeah, that’s me.”

She opens the door and hops down. “Right. It may take a few trips to get it all inside. Can I run your card first?”

I hand over my credit card and she slips it into her portable card reader. Once she’s received her payment, she beckons me over to the back of the van, where there are four large bags of food.

“You’re an actress, aren’t you?” the woman asks. “Aren’t you famous?”

“I’m an actress, yeah,” I reply.

“What’ve you been in, then?” she asks.

“Children’s television,” I dodge. “Just kids’ shows.”

We each heft two bags of food to carry them inside.

“Oh, right,” she says.

We enter the station through the side door and make our way to the conference room. “Dinner!” I call out. “Everyone, there’s a lot of food here. You need to eat it.”

Heads poke out of office doors and footsteps sound in the hall behind me. People converge on the conference room as we unpack the bags and set out the sandwiches, salads, and drinks. Officers and staff grin at me.

It isn’t much, and I still feel useless, but it’s something at least. It’s too bad they don’t have Pie Pops in Australia yet.

“Tell Miss Warner we found her mother,” comes the voice over the radio. “She’s a little dehydrated and sunburned, but she’s all right. Had dingoes raid her camp while she was in it and they ran her off. Got her lost.”

I startle awake. I’d dozed off in my chair.

“You hear that, Lizzie?” the officer on duty says to me. She’s a tiny woman with short, graying hair.

I nod and know I should feel relieved, but I feel dread. Already I can imagine my mother telling me off.

N
INETY MINUTES LATER
, I’m at the hospital and my mom’s stretched out on a cot with an IV in her arm and a cup of ice chips at her elbow.

“I can’t believe you flew all this way,” is the first thing she says. “What about your show?”

“Well…my mother went missing and…people kind of think that’s a big deal. I had to do something.”
No one deserves to feel abandoned at a time like this
, I remind myself. I did the right thing. “I couldn’t just stay where I was, could I?”

My mother glares at me, indignant. “I’ve been exploring the outback longer than you’ve been alive. I can take care of myself.”

I don’t bother to point out how her skin’s deep red and blistered and her lips are so dry they’ve cracked. Like me, she’s a blonde. We just aren’t made for sun.

“Mom, I care. Is it all right that I care?”
And that’s why I came
, I think.
Please understand this. Please
someone
accept my love.

She pats my hand. “Of course it is. But you can’t just walk out on your responsibilities. People depend on you.”

“Mom—”

“I never got why you were so sentimental, Lizzie. Look at you. You aren’t going to cry, are you?”

I swallow around the lump in my throat. “How’d you like it if I disappeared into the wilderness? For
four days
.”
That we know about
, I add in my mind.

“I know you can handle yourself.”

I can’t. I’m no naturalist. I’m not even sure I know how to read a compass, and I definitely can’t pitch a tent.

The woman who smiles at me isn’t being cruel. She’s just distant. A stranger. We have the same eyes and the same shape hands, but that’s all we share these days. She wouldn’t come running if I needed her. She never has.

“It’s good to see you,” I offer. “How did you survive? I bet that’s quite a story.”

“Have you booked your flight back yet? If not, do it right now.”

“No, I have.”

“The producers must be having kittens.”

Do. Not. Cry.
I think. She’ll rip me to shreds if I do.

She picks up on my delicate emotional state anyway and rolls her eyes. “You’ve got to pull it together.”

Rather than tough it out, I get to my feet and leave the room. Tears pour from my eyes the moment I enter the hallway and I just sob and sob. I’m
so
tired of crying, but I’m also tired of holding it all in.

I get out my phone and take Kyra at her word.

“Hello?” she answers.

I have no idea what time it is for her, and I can’t be bothered to figure it out. “Hi,” I whisper.

“You all right?”

“No. No, I’m not all right. They found my mother and she just chewed me out for taking time off from my job. She could’ve died out there and she’s mad at me.”

“Whoa, really?”

“That’s how she always is.” I cry harder.

“Hey, well, that’s sick. Totally messed up.”

“I just wish I had a family. I came here to try to be family, but that’s not working out so great.”

“Well, you’ve got me. Will I do for now?”

“Did I wake you up? Or are you missing class? Or—”

“Who cares? Girl, some perspective please?”

I lean back against the wall and slide down it until my butt hits the floor.

“I know I’m not who you really want right now,” she says.

“No, you are. You are way less complicated than…all that.”

“Yes, I am.”

I take a deep breath and start to talk.

She listens to me rant and whine and cry for who knows how long. According to my cell phone, it’s two hours and forty minutes. Most of it is incoherent, me trying to talk about my childhood with a mother who just wanted me to work and laughed when I suggested I take Thanksgiving off.