A cute guy is alone on the cracked leather sofa, scrolling through something on his phone. His black hair is shaved short, much like Aaron’s, and he has on a pair of lemon-yellow sneakers that nearly glow in the dark. He’s hot. As if sensing my gaze, he lifts his eyes in my direction. He looks next to me and holds up his hand to Virginia. She returns the wave and then leans sideways to press her shoulder against mine, her voice low.
“That’s Micah Thompson,” she says. “He’s my favorite.”
“I can see why.”
Virginia sighs, and when I check her over, she seems better. Her earlier admission of her fears is seemingly forgotten. I think maybe this is what they all need. Time to live. Time to be free.
“Go talk to him,” I tell her, knocking her gently with my elbow. “He looks pretty happy to see you.”
She can’t hide the smile that immediately creeps over her lips. She turns, and Micah laughs, as if he just got caught staring. “We’re not like that,” she tells me, although the words sound like a repetitive verse. “We’re just friends.”
“Hmm . . . ,” I say in mock consideration. “Yes, I’ve said something similar myself. Just before I’d make out with said friend.”
Virginia closes her eyes and chuckles. Then she motions around the party. “Don’t you want me to introduce you to people? I thought I was the person to know at Marshall Senior High,” she jokes.
“I can introduce myself. You go have that fun we talked about.”
She hesitates, checking with Micah once again, and then, as if I’ve twisted her arm, she breathes out dramatically. “Why not?” she says. “Life is short, right?” And before I can think about the irony of her statement so soon after talking about teen suicide, she’s walking through the crowd and dropping down on the sofa next to Micah.
Once she starts talking to him, I head back toward the kitchen to get a drink. I’d be lying if I said these people didn’t all fascinate me. I observe everything—absorb it, even. As I pour a vodka cranberry, I listen to the guys playing cards.
“Has anyone seen Roderick?” a guy in a blue Nike shirt asks, picking up his just-dealt cards. “You heard about his girl, right?”
“Naw, what happened?” the kid across from him says. He’s wearing a U of O hat with a straight brim, his eyes shaded.
The guy in blue tosses his cards in front of himself, face down. “I’m out,” he says. Then to the kid in the hat. “She got locked up. They committed her, I think. My parents told me about it earlier. Can’t believe Roderick’s even having a party tonight. Those two were close.”
My hand tightens around my cup, the reality of their world in contrast with the party around them.
“Oh, shit,” the kid says. “Ari’s in the hospital? That’s too bad. She was cool,” he adds, as if she’s dead. He puts his cards down and leans back in his seat, stretching his neck to look in the other room, presumably for Roderick. “There he is,” he says. “In the corner. Poor dude.”
I can’t see from this angle, but the sympathetic expression on his face tells me that Roderick must be pretty distraught. So why did he throw a party? Just to go through the motions?
The dealer takes the pot of poker chips and starts shuffling for the next game, the conversation quieting now that they’ve darkened the mood. I take a sip from my drink, barely able to swallow it down since it’s warm. I head back toward the living room to join Virginia, and I find her and Micah talking in the corner of the sofa, another guy having taken up space on the other cushion.
Virginia doesn’t notice me, so I decide not to interrupt. I find a spot against the wall, still with the party but far enough aside that I can have a moment to think. I sip from the cup, watching everyone. I wonder how I fit in. If Arthur and Marie hadn’t brought me to Tom McKee, could I have been one of them? Could I have lived a normal life?
I take another drink. Would I have really wanted another life?
I think about Catalina Barnes—the girl I thought I wanted to be. But look what happened to her. She killed herself, despite how perfect her life seemed. What could have driven her to that? I feel like I’m missing something in her story. A missing chapter of a book. One that involves Virginia.
Virginia hasn’t mentioned Catalina directly, but they knew each other. And although I don’t think Virginia herself is a threat . . . maybe her words are. Even during our short talk, I felt pressure closing in, helplessness. Is that what she fed Catalina? Is that what—
I stop, frozen in place, when I notice the guy in the corner of the room. Roderick, I think. He’s tall with shoulder-length red hair. His freckled skin is impossibly pale, especially against his navy T-shirt. I’m not sure why he stands out so much. Maybe it’s the rigidity of his posture or the fact that he’s all alone at a party, his party, staring straight ahead toward the sliding glass doors.
But I notice him.
I immediately assess his condition, see all the signs of complicated grief—only worse. And I’ve seen some pretty devastated people. Roderick is so still that it’s eerie, the way he doesn’t sway in a room full of moving bodies. A line of drool begins to slip from the corner of his lip, down his chin.
My stomach registers my panic, and I quickly dart my eyes over to Virginia to get her attention. She’s still talking, laughing, when suddenly there is movement from the corner. I swing back and find Roderick walking toward the balcony.
I stare, wondering where exactly he’s going. He bumps a few shoulders on his way, but it doesn’t deter him. Is he about to be sick? He doesn’t speak a single word to anybody.
He comes to the glass doors and slides them open. He walks onto the balcony without bothering to close the doors behind him, and then, without even a pause, he continues to the edge and puts his hands on the railing. The rain has started to come down hard again, and it soaks his hair, matting it to the sides of his face.
My heart jumps up into my throat. I’m transfixed, and then Roderick pulls himself up onto the railing. My eyes widen.
“Wait!” I call over the music, the cup of red liquid falling from my hand and splashing on the carpet. I start forward, but it’s too late.
Without a backward glance Roderick jumps headfirst off the fifth-floor balcony.
CHAPTER TEN
THERE IS A SCREAM SOMEWHERE in the room. I rush for the door, but the three guys from the kitchen are already out there, leaning over the railing and looking down.
“Holy fuck!” one of them yells. “Holy shit.” He continues swearing, running his hand through his hair, blinking against the rain.
Music still plays, but no one is dancing anymore. The sound is haunting amid the cries, like the ghost of a nightmare that still clings to you after you wake. I stare around, wide-eyed, my body shaking as I go into shock. Several people have their phones out, frantically calling 911. One kid runs into the kitchen and sweeps all the booze bottles into the trash can, but his attempts to hide the party are only halfhearted. He knows it doesn’t matter. Pretending it does helps him deal with the brutality of this moment.
We are all horrified, terrorized, wrecked.
Virginia suddenly appears next to me, our jackets in hand, and I look at her without fully grasping who she is. “We have to go,” she says. When I don’t move, am unable to move, she pulls my arm. Her expression is stoic, and her nails dig into my skin through the cloth of my shirt. “We have to go now, Liz,” she says more forcefully.
People have begun to crowd onto the small balcony, gathering in the rain. A girl wails from outside. Virginia’s steady gaze is not shocked, though. It’s fearful. I blink quickly, trying to sort myself out as Virginia shoves my jacket into my arms. I slip it on soundlessly and follow her to the front door.
People are talking and crying on each other, and we manage to zigzag through the crowd and get to the landing of the stairwell. We run down the steps. No one calls to us, asking where we’re going. We’re invisible; everyone is steeped in tragedy instead.
Virginia pushes open th
e door to the outside, and the metal handle smashes into the brick of the outside wall with a loud clank. I stop in my tracks, making Virginia lose her grip on me. I slap my hand over my mouth to muffle my screams.
Just down the sidewalk is a broken body. Blood has made a pattern on the sidewalk, sprayed on the car parked at the curb. Roderick is far enough away, and facedown, so I can’t see the details of the gore. It’s just a heap of clothes, I tell myself. But my mind tries to make sense of what I saw upstairs and begins to fill in the blanks. To form the shape of the broken arm, turned neck, broken hip.
“Liz,” Virginia snaps. “Don’t look!” She grabs me hard around the wrist, and then we’re running again, rain whipping our faces. We get to her car, and she opens my door and pushes me inside. When she slams it shut, I’m engulfed in heavy silence.
I’ve never seen anyone die before. I’ve spent my life playing dead people, all without ever seeing their bodies. I don’t know how something as natural as death can feel so jarringly unnatural.
The driver’s door opens, flicking on the overhead light again. Virginia asks where I live, and I tell her the name of the motel. She turns over the engine and squeals her tires as she pulls out into the road without checking the mirrors. Rain sprays the windshield. The wipers provide a timed scrape, then click before doing it again—like a damaged heartbeat.
“He just jumped,” I murmur. “He did it on purpose.” Tears sting my eyes, and I turn to Virginia. “Shouldn’t we tell the police or something?”
“There were other people there,” she says. “They won’t need our statement.” Her jaw is set hard, and her knuckles are white on the steering wheel. I can barely catch my breath.
“But I watched him do it,” I tell her. “I didn’t know he was going to jump. I—” My voice cracks.
“Listen to me,” Virginia says, looking over. “You didn’t see anything. We weren’t even there tonight. Do you understand?”
I stare at her, the first tears falling onto my cheeks. “What?” I ask.
Virginia doesn’t falter in her steady gaze. “You have to stay away from this, Liz. Stay ahead of it. It’s like I told you: Most people aren’t equipped anymore. We’ve been stripped of our coping mechanisms. We’ve been left vulnerable. The reporters will come tomorrow. Don’t read about any of it. Forget Roderick even existed.” But this time there is a flash of pain in her eyes, and she quickly turns back to the road.
She eases to a stop at the next red light, and when she looks at me again, tears have run through her makeup. “Don’t you see?” she says. “It’s hopeless.” Her expression goes slack. The light switches to green and the car moves forward. Virginia’s shoulders are slumped. Her grip on the steering wheel weakens.
I am stunned silent by the way she’s made me feel. Her words have scared me, because I almost believe them. Right now . . . I do feel hopeless. And it’s a dark place to be.
My thoughts turn back to Roderick, retracing my steps at the party to see if there was a point when I could have interacted with him. Stopped him. What if I had just talked to him? Maybe that could have been enough.
I’m nearly swallowed up by survivor’s guilt, and the next time I look outside, I see that we’re pulling up to the Shady Pines Motel. Virginia parks near the office, and when I reach numbly for the door handle, she calls my name.
“Can I ask you a favor?” she says. “If the next time I see you, I don’t remember this . . . remind me, okay?”
I furrow my brow and stare over at her. But it’s like I don’t have the ability to question anymore. To know any more.
Virginia presses her lips into a sad smile. “Please?”
I nod, although I don’t see how she could forget what happened tonight, no matter how deep her denial runs.
I exit the car and start across the lot, letting the rain soak through my clothes. I’m shaking in the cold, and my teeth begin to chatter. I hear Virginia’s car pull away, but I don’t turn around. I’m desperate to get out of my head.
I walk up the exterior stairs of my hotel, each step more exhausting than the last. I’m weak—nearly too weak to make it up to the next landing. If Marie were here, she’d tell me I’m in shock and that I should start with a hot shower. A cup of tea. It would be peppermint, of course, and then I’d tell her everything. All the truth. I’d tell her how much my heart hurts. My soul.
I wrap my arms around my chest when I get to the second-floor landing; my body feels like it’s collapsing in on itself. The image of a dead boy crowds my thoughts. I can’t push him away. All I can see is the splatter of the blood. All I can hear are the cries of his friends.
I pause, putting my hand flat against the exterior wall, choking on my sobs. My mind is like a black spiral pulling me toward darkness, making me obsess about the pain. Dig into it. I want to feel Roderick’s pain. My pain.
“Stop,” I whimper, squeezing my eyes shut. I’m slipping away.
Just make it inside, I think. I force myself off the wall and take the key card from the back pocket of my jeans, my fingers shaking. I get to my door, and the first time I swipe the card, there’s only a red square. I sniffle and then take a steadying breath.
You’ll get through this. You always get through.
I swipe the card again, and the door lock turns green. I shove the door open, turning my back on my room as I close it and throw the security latch. I lean my forehead against the door, letting the card fall from my hand to the floor with a quiet thump.
The temperature in the room is warm, but my wet clothes keep me chilled. My heart hurts too much. You could have saved him, it says. Maybe I could have.
There is a sound behind me, the high-pitched creak of my mattress springs. Fear snaps over my skin like electricity, and I spin around, my breath caught in my throat. I see a figure across the room. I slap my hand along the wall until I find the light switch and flip it on.
Deacon sits on the edge of my bed, his eyes downcast as if he can’t bear to look at me. His brown hair is disheveled, sticking up like he’s been pulling his hand through it. His clothes are wrinkled, and I imagine he spent last night on the streets. But it’s him. He’s here, exactly when I need him most.
I stumble forward a step, my palm over my heart at the absolute relief. “Deacon,” I breathe out.
He lifts his head, and when he catches sight of my condition, his sorrowful expression falls away, and he jumps to his feet. I walk over and immediately wrap myself around him. My comfort. My tether to reality.
“I could have saved him,” I sob, burying my face in Deacon’s neck, my fingers clutching his shirt. The smell of his skin pulls me back from the darkness. Takes me away from the death.
And I don’t even realize how desperately I need him when he tentatively puts his arms around me, laying his cheek on the top of my head, and whispers, “Quinn, I have to tell you something.”
PART II
HOW NOT TO DISAPPEAR COMPLETELY
CHAPTER ONE
THE FIRST TIME I REALIZED I was in love with Deacon was after we’d been dating for three months. The discovery was purely accidental—shocking, really, since I’d never been that close to anyone. But something about us just clicked and locked in place.
Deacon and I had already been working together for a while, so when we started dating, we did so carefully, neither of us going all in from the start. We were closers—we had to be cautious. Our entire livelihood revolved around not getting too attached to the families we helped. That easily bled into our personal lives as well.
But Deacon was everything back then: funny, smart, gorgeous. More than that, he was kind. I hadn’t known another closer who cared as much as he did. As much as I did. His compassion drew me to him more than anything. His ability to predict what others needed to hear.
We were in my backyard, contemplating the best way to get out of cutting the long-neglected grass, when I play tackled him to the ground, burying us in the knee-high blades. He laughed, and we rolled around until he b
ested me and got to his knees and straddled me. Once there, he smiled and leaned down to kiss my lips quickly.
He was about to climb off when I grabbed him by the bottom of his T-shirt and pulled him to me. I’m not sure what brought it on, but I had this sudden loneliness that only he seemed to fill. Maybe it was that he accepted me as myself, as a closer.
Deacon read the expression and hummed out his mutual feelings as he lay down next to me, propping himself up on his elbow.
“Love this face,” he said adoringly, tracing his finger over my lips before kissing them.
I closed my eyes as his hand trailed over my jaw, down my neck. It was the heat of the day, the smell of the grass, the feel of his touch—they all conspired to cloud my better judgment.
I love him, I thought dreamily. The words startled me, and I turned to Deacon, feeling vulnerable and stripped down, like he knew what I was thinking. And maybe he did. Because he stilled, his expression unreadable. And then he leaned over and kissed me fiercely, the kind of kiss that made me moan into his mouth, clutch at his clothes.
To this day Deacon has never said that he loves me. But he shows me sometimes, like now, when he holds me in this dingy motel room and lets me fall completely apart in his arms.
“I have to tell you something,” he whispers against my hair.
And all at once, the safety of his arms feels anything but safe. I stumble back, slapping his hand away when he reaches for me. My vision is blurry with tears, but my grief and horror are set aside for rage.
“Quinn, calm down,” he says.
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