Wash Her Feet novel · Chapter 20 of 24

Chapter 20: Hold

I did not move.

My heart was going so hard I could feel it in my teeth, and I did not move.

The wind pulled at my hair and my dress, and the deck seemed to breathe under my feet.

Shelby stood beside me with her bare toes over the drop and her eyes on the weeds in the lot.

"You know how long I can hold this," she said.

I said nothing.

"I held it for nine hours once. In the dark. Behind a couch. The foster father was in the kitchen, and I could hear him breaking things." Her voice was flat. "I did not blink. I didn't even breathe through my nose."

I thought of her at nine.

I thought of Joan's hand on her head, saying hold still, mouse.

I held still.

The sun climbed.

A bird went by below us, and I saw the top of its back.

Minutes went by, and my thighs began to shake, and my fingers went numb.

Shelby's shoulders were rising and falling.

She was crying without a sound, tears running off her chin and falling over the edge.

I did not wipe my own.

I thought, If I speak, she wins. If I move, she wins.

I thought, If she wins, what does she get?

And I knew the answer, and I knew she knew it too.

She was waiting to see whether I would break first and prove she was right about everyone.

If I broke, she would get to step off the edge knowing nobody had ever held.

I let the tears run into my collar.

I kept my arms down, and my eyes on the lot, and my feet where they were.

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