The Replaced

But I wanted to be the only important girl in his life.

There, I’d said it. So shoot me.

Tyler kept talking. “Would it make you think less of me if I admitted I was scared shitless when I woke up?” He grinned and regarded me sheepishly, the same look I remembered from before. “I had no idea where I was or how I’d gotten there,” he explained.

I laughed. “It totally wouldn’t,” I confessed. “I know exactly how that feels. One minute I was arguing with my dad over college, and the next I was waking up behind the Gas ’n’ Sip. At least that’s what I thought.”

“Dude. You woke up behind the Gas ’n’ Sip?”

I smirked. “Talk about weird, right?”

His grin grew. “Talk about gross.”

The butterflies were back . . . every time he smiled at me. I couldn’t help it. I remembered exactly the way those lips felt on mine. “So how much do you remember?” I asked, changing the subject before my entire body burst into flames.

Shrugging, he told me, “Just that. Me waking up surrounded by sand, and then Griffin and some of the other Blackwater Ranchers showing up with this crazy story.” He patted the spot next to him on the rock, and I didn’t hesitate to take it. Somehow the rock was still warm, but his arm, where our skin made contact, was even warmer. “I’m sure I don’t have to tell you I thought she was smoking crack when she first tried to tell me what happened. I mean, it’s pretty nuts, the whole alien thing.” I had to laugh, because we’d had this conversation before, only it had been me trying to figure out a way to explain it to him without sounding like I was on crack. It was funny to hear him being so whatever about it. “I guess it’s hard to argue with the healing thing, though,” he said as he nudged me again. “You know, I do it faster than anyone else.”

“Wait. What?” I bumped against him when I sat up straighter. “The healing? What do you mean faster?”

He gave me a you-should-be-impressed kind of look. “You heard me. Like, if you cut me, I heal faster than anyone ever has before. That’s what Griffin says, anyway.”

My knee-jerk reaction was to argue, because there was no way he could heal as fast as I could, right? But I couldn’t be sure whether my reaction stemmed from my competitive streak, or whether I was just in shock. Was it really possible there were two of us who could heal faster than the rest? And could it really be a coincidence that that person had turned out to be Tyler?

It took me forever to even come up with, “So, who all knows?”

“I haven’t told anyone, if that’s what you mean. Griffin told me not to. But I figured it’s okay to tell you . . . since we’re friends and all.”

Friends. The word felt like a knife through my heart. I didn’t want to be Tyler’s friend. I mean, I did . . . of course I did. It’s just that’s not all I wanted to be.

I hoped we could be so, so, so much more than just friends.

I nodded, either a Yes, we’re friends or Yes, you can trust me, I wasn’t sure which or whether it made a difference.

“Did she say why?”

Tyler’s mouth turned down when he shrugged. “Nah. She just says I shouldn’t let it get around. Not yet, anyway.”

“No. That’s probably a good idea.” I thought of the way Simon had kept the way I could move things from the others. I wondered if they hadn’t already known I could heal faster, if he’d have kept that from them too.

“So, I guess if you haven’t been back that long, you probably don’t know, then,” he said, his voice growing apologetic and kinda drifty. “About your parents . . .”

I shrugged, since I was still in that gray area—not sure how much I should admit—but I didn’t want to lie either. “No. I do. I . . . know,” I finally admitted.

He nodded. “I couldn’t go back to see mine.” This time his expression was downright pathetic, and I was reminded that at least I’d known I was saying good-bye to my parents. The last time Tyler’s parents saw him, Agent Truman had told them I was contagious and if he stayed with me, I would contaminate him. I wondered where they thought he was now. Tyler didn’t remember any of that. “Griffin says since we’re not safe to be around, it’s better for them to just think I . . . ran away.”

“What do you think?”

He cocked his head to the side, his eyes overbright. “She’s probably right. It just sucks, is all. I miss ’em.” Then he bumped into me again, this time not so much a nudge as it was a brush, like he wanted to connect with someone. He glanced down at me.

“I know what you mean. I miss my dad.”

“Who’d’a thought he was right all this time.” His eyes sparkled just a little. “I mean, after everything that happened, and everything everyone thought of him, turns out he was the sane one in all this.”

I lifted my eyes to his. “Well, I don’t know about sane, but yeah.”

There was a prolonged silence as I tried to decide if this whole thing was awkward or not, when Tyler reached over and picked up my hand. My heart tripped over itself as I watched him study it, almost like he was seeing something new . . . something he’d never seen before. Curiously he flipped it over and uncurled my fingers, flattening them until my fingers were splayed, and then he pressed his own against mine so our palms were aligned. His fingers dwarfed my own like I was only a child by comparison. “Do I look different?” he asked, his voice rough and low.