“Well, you two certainly make a cute couple,” one of the hosts said.
“They do, don’t they?” the other one added.
Luke laughed. “It’s not like that,” he said. He looked at Hannah and smiled. “We’re just friends. Really good friends.”
But when the camera panned back to Hannah, her cheeks were bright red, and I wasn’t sure she felt the same way.
She recovered quickly. “Yes, we are.”
She smiled at him.
And he smiled back at her with this look in his eyes that told me why he’d confided in her and not me.
She’d listened to him.
There was a knock on my hotel-room door. I opened it and found Luke standing there holding up a bag of gummy bears, a Snickers bar, a Twix, and two bottles of Coke. “I robbed the minibar. Want to get wasted with me?”
“Please.” I opened the door wider, giving him room to step inside.
After our appearance on Good Day LA, Mornings on Six wanted us, too. I thought Luke would refuse when Dad asked him if he wanted to stay another night, but he actually seemed a little excited about it.
He flopped down on the bed next to me and dropped the bag of gummy bears between us.
“Who are those for?” I asked.
“Both of us.”
That reminded me of Emory. Whenever we’d have a sleepover, she’d bring the microwave popcorn and I’d bring the gummy bears. One time, I dared her to eat a handful of both at the same time. “That’s kind of tasty,” she said as she chewed. Then she started laughing hard and got up to spit it all into the trash can. “Kidding. Ugh. That’s disgusting.”
I ripped open the bag of gummy bears while Luke held the two candy bars out in his open hands. He balanced his hands like a scale. “I’m thinking you’re a Twix girl.”
“Aw, how did you know that?” I popped a bear into my mouth.
“Oh, it’s all part of being a ‘cute couple.’ I’m required to know these things.” He handed me the Twix. “Lucky guess.”
I picked up another gummy bear and chucked it at Luke’s head. “Too bad I don’t think of you that way.”
“Oh, but clearly you would think of me that way if you weren’t already thinking about someone else that way.” Luke raised his eyebrows at me.
I felt my face get hot, just like it had on camera earlier. “No, I’m not.”
When the hosts called us a couple, all I could think about was Aaron and that day he’d told me he was jealous of Luke. And then we’d kissed. We’d kissed for the longest time that day, and no one interrupted us. Thinking about it made me blush.
Luke laughed. “You’re a terrible liar. Come on. Who is he?”
“No one.” I tried keep a straight face, but he was making it really hard when he kept smiling at me like that.
I couldn’t do it. No one knew about Aaron. I wasn’t even sure why I’d reacted that way onstage earlier. I hadn’t talked to him since that day in Dad’s office, even though he kept texting me, apologizing and begging me to reply. I’d deleted each one the second it arrived.
“Tell me.”
I played with a loose string on the comforter, twisting it around my finger. “He’s this guy.”
“Excellent start. And?”
“And…he’s this guy I hated. But then I got to know him, and I started to like him. But then he blew it, and now I…” I started to say hate again, but I trailed off. Hate was too strong a word. I didn’t hate Aaron, I just didn’t want to hear anything he had to say. Not yet.
“Classic rom-com material. I like it. Go on.”
I flopped backward onto the bed and kicked my feet up to the ceiling. “I never should have liked him in the first place.”
“Ooh…taboo, too. Now we’re talking. Why can’t you like him?”
“I can’t like him for so many reasons, I don’t even know where to begin.”
“Pick one,” Luke said as he stretched out next to me. He unwrapped his Snickers bar, propped himself up on an elbow, and took a big bite.
“Fine. He works at the church.”
“Which is also your school.”
“Yeah.”
“So, hot janitor?”
I laughed. “No.”
I could practically see the puzzle pieces clicking together in his mind as he chewed. “A teacher?”
“Sort of.” I squeezed my eyelids shut while I waited for him to figure it out.
“Have I met him?” He asked the question in a way that made me think he already knew the answer.
“Maybe.” I tried not to react, but I must have failed, because Luke reached over and punched me lightly on the arm.
“No wonder you wanted Aaron to shoot the video. This is all making sense now.”
I was still blushing as I told Luke about working with Aaron on the testimonial videos for Admissions Night. I told him how the two of us had talked one day, and then started texting each other late at night. “And one day, right after your accident, the two of us were alone in the sound booth and I kind of kissed him.”
My hands felt clammy and the room felt even warmer.
“And?”
“And he kissed me back.”
“And?”
“And then my dad knocked on the door, and things got super awkward. Aaron apologized to me in a text that night. He said he felt horrible for letting it happen, but I didn’t. I wanted it to happen again. And then when we were editing your video, we…kind of…kissed again.”
Luke was grinning at me. I reached over and smacked him on the arm that time. “Stop looking at me like that.”
“Like what?” he asked, still smiling.
I chucked another gummy bear at his head, but he buried his face in the comforter and it flew over him and hit the wall instead.
“Okay. But I still don’t understand why you can’t like him. Aside from the fact that he’s a lying sack of shit and you’re way too good for him.”
I’d listed all the reasons I couldn’t like Aaron in my head, but for the first time, I said them out loud. Too old for me. Practically a teacher. Works for my dad. Alyssa called dibs. Has a girlfriend/almost fiancée.
As I rattled them off, they didn’t feel as important as I’d built them up to be. Until I got to the last one.
Beth.
He was still with her. He’d never said a word about breaking up with her. I had no idea if he was planning to. I couldn’t imagine he’d told her about us.
Everything had happened so fast, and it wasn’t like Aaron and I were planning a future together or anything, but he had a girlfriend. A serious girlfriend. My stomach twisted into a tight knot.
What was I doing?
“Have you talked to him since we left town?”
I shook my head. “I don’t want to talk to him. Not yet.”
“Emory won’t talk to me either.”
I couldn’t really blame her. I hadn’t wanted to come to LA with him—that made it seem like Dad and Aaron had been right. Like they’d won. And I knew the second I climbed into the passenger seat of his car, I’d make things between Emory and me even worse than they already were. But Luke begged me not to make him go on TV alone, and after a lot of convincing, I’d reluctantly agreed. I figured I’d gotten him into this mess in the first place; I should probably stick with him until it was over.
And I couldn’t wait until it was over.
“I miss her,” Luke said out of nowhere.
“You’ll be home tomorrow.”
“No. I mean, I miss her miss her. I miss the way we used to be before the accident.” He stared down at the pattern on the comforter. “I got my life back that night. But I lost Emory. I never meant for that to happen.”
I remembered the card I found in his car after he’d been whisked away in the ambulance and I thought he was dead. He’d listed all the things he loved about her. Seeing her onstage. Seeing her in his jersey. The way she looked at him like he was the most important person in the room.
“Have
you told her everything you just told me?”
He shook his head.
I grabbed his phone off the nightstand and handed it to him. “Go. Right now.”
“Right now?”
“Right this second.”
He was smiling to himself, like he was already plotting his words.
“Now who’s the glue?” he said as he typed.
I smiled, remembering that night in his car, when Luke told me to keep my voice in his video so Emory would hear it. I didn’t think the glue analogy had the same meaning, since I was the one who broke them in the first place, but I wasn’t about to tell him that.
“If you could do something dangerous knowing there wasn’t any risk, what would you do?” Tyler pulled up to the red light at the intersection a few blocks from my house and turned to Charlotte and me.
“Free-climb the face of Half Dome,” Charlotte said.
“Jump out of an airplane,” I said.
“Swim with great white sharks,” Tyler said. “If you had a hundred dollars to give away, would you give it all to one person or ten dollars to ten people?” he asked.
“Ten dollars to ten people,” Charlotte said.
“Five dollars to twenty people,” I said.
“A hundred to one,” Tyler said. Without skipping a beat, he asked, “Favorite Muppet?”
“Kermit,” Charlotte said.
“The Swedish Chef,” I said.
“Yoda,” Tyler said. “The original one, not the CGI one.”
“Ha! Sing!” I sat up straight and pointed at him. “Yoda’s not a Muppet.”
Tyler looked over at me. “Sure he is. He has legs. Look it up!”
“He’s still a puppet.” I slammed my hand on the dash, laughing. “Oh, you’re so singing.”
“Hey, easy on the Prius.”
We’d been playing all night at the diner with the rest of the cast. By that point, we might have been a little punchy.
I reached for my phone and did a quick search.
“Yes! Right here. ‘It is a popular misconception that Yoda is a Muppet,’” I read as Tyler pulled up to a stoplight. I twisted the screen so he could see the article. “You’re wrong!”
“So?” he asked.
“So, sing,” I said.
“Sing,” Charlotte echoed from the backseat. I lifted my fist in the air toward her and she gave it a bump.
Tyler sighed. “Fine,” he said as he pulled into the intersection.
Just as I leaned down to stuff my phone into my backpack, a message appeared on the screen.
Luke: There are five things you need to know
In the background, I could hear Tyler rapping something from Hamilton, but I was only half listening. I was too busy reading the texts as they rolled in.
Luke: 1. Hannah and I are just friends.
Luke: 2. I’m a complete asshole.
Luke: 3. I am so sorry for everything.
Luke: 4. I should have told you, not her.
Luke: I don’t know why I didn’t tell you.
Luke: See #2.
Luke: 5. I miss you so much.
Luke: I feel horrible about opening night.
Luke: I’ll make it up to you, I promise.
Luke: Okay, I guess that was eight things.
Luke: Are you there? Please answer me.
Luke: Em?
I tucked the phone under my leg.
Tyler finished his penalty song and jumped right back into the game. “Which celebrity do people say you resemble?” he asked as he took a left on my street.
“Charlize Theron,” Charlotte said.
“Emma Stone,” I said.
“Chris Pratt,” Tyler said.
I laughed. “Yeah, you wish.”
I waited for him to ask another question, but he didn’t speak. And then he finally said, “Your turn, Emory.”
I looked at him. “For what?”
“No commentary. Sing, Kern.”
“Oh, look. We’re here.” Tyler stopped in front of my house. I tried to open the door, but every time I did, he’d hit the master switch and lock it again. “Stop it!”
“I’m not letting you out of the car until you sing,” he said.
I looked to Charlotte to back me up, but I could tell by her expression that she wasn’t on my side. “Come on,” she said. “Tyler did it.”
“Fine.” I leaned on the console, right in his personal space. And then I sang the first song that popped into my head. “Five hundred twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes. Five hundred twenty-five thousand moments so dear.” It sounded off-key and horrible, but Tyler clearly didn’t care. “Five hundred twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes. How do you measure, measure a year?
“Can I go now?” I asked.
Charlotte leaned in between the seats. “In daylights, in sunsets, in midnights, in cups of coffee.” She was even more off-key than I was.
“In inches, in miles, in laughter, in strife,” Tyler sang. He actually sounded good.
“Five hundred twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes,” the two of them sang together. I just stared at them. “How do you measure a year in the life?”
The lyrics reminded me of the 300 days of Luke-isms I’d captured so far, and the 137 blank spaces I still had left to fill. If Luke wasn’t ready to stop counting, I wasn’t either.
I took the next line. This time, I belted it out. “Measure in…love…”
Luke answered on the first ring.
“Em?” He sounded surprised.
“Hi.”
“Hi. Wait. Hold on.” I could hear him shuffling around. A door opened, and then closed. “I’m heading back to my room.” I wanted to ask where he was, but I bit my tongue. “Okay, I’m alone now.”
I assumed that meant he’d been with Hannah.
“I got your texts,” I said.
He sighed. “I meant it. I’m sorry. I’m just so sorry.”
I bit down hard on my lip. “I’m sorry, too.” We were both quiet for a long time. “I saw you today. You were good.”
“Thanks.”
I thought back to what he’d said during the interview. I remembered how his words had caused something to shift in me. It was the moment I realized I was no longer angry at Hannah for being there for him, and angry at myself because I hadn’t been.
“You said you felt like you couldn’t talk to anyone. That everyone wanted you to go back to normal. Clearly, you were talking about me, and I just wanted you to know that I’m so sorry I made you feel that way.” My voice hitched.
“It’s okay, Em.”
“No,” I whispered. “It’s not okay.” He was quiet, so I kept going. “Will you talk to me now? Please? I’ll listen, I promise.”
And then I stayed silent. He didn’t say anything for a long time, and I fought the urge to speak. I waited and waited.
“I’m obsessed with death,” he finally said. “Death. Near-death experiences. Everything that has to do with death.” I heard him pull in a breath. “You keep asking me what I’m doing alone in my room all the time…I’m watching videos of all these other people who have experienced death.” Once he started talking, he couldn’t seem to stop. I tried not to breathe too loudly for fear of interrupting him. “There are thousands of stories out there, and I swear, I think I’ve watched every one of them. In that week after the accident, I barely slept at all. I stayed up all night, reading articles, watching videos, and listening to all these supposed ‘experts’ talk about life after death, desperately trying to figure out what happened to me. That’s why I made the video with Hannah. And it helped. Talking about it, even to a camera, helped. It didn’t wipe it out completely, but that night, I slept, and I had normal dreams, and I didn’t wake up thinking that I was dying all over again like I had every other night. And since then, it’s been gradually getting better. I’m not afraid to go to sleep, not like I was at first.”
“That’s why you said yes to Admissions Night.”
“Yeah.”
“I think it’s the only thing keeping me sane right now.”
I resisted the urge to tell him I thought he might have PTSD, and that was totally okay and understandable, and that I’d help him find someone he could talk to—a real doctor, not Hannah’s dad. “And talking about it helps.”
“For some reason, it does.”
He made it sound like I was supposed to run screaming once he admitted everything, but none of it changed how I felt about him. Not even a little bit.
“I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve watched the video you made,” I said. “I taped every interview you’ve done this week, and I’ve watched each one, multiple times. And I can tell you one thing I’m certain about: I’m as in love with that guy as I was with Foothill High’s star midfielder. Nothing’s changed.”
I could tell he was smiling, even though I couldn’t see his face.
“It is called a midfielder, right?” I asked.
“Yeah.” He laughed under his breath.
“Good.”
“I should have told you sooner,” he said.
“I should have let you.”
It was still dark when I stepped out of the hotel doors, and downtown Los Angeles was unusually quiet and still. I pulled one foot to my hip and stretched, and then switched legs to loosen up the other one. I shook out my hands, rocked my head from side to side, and then I took off running.
My music was loud in my ears, and I synchronized my footsteps in time with the beat. It felt good to race past unfamiliar buildings and turn down new streets. I had no idea where I was going, and I didn’t care. I was happy to be outside and alone, feeling my soles on the cement, pumping my arms, widening my stride.
I hadn’t quite hit the three-mile mark when I spotted a small park. I took a sharp left and followed the path around the baseball diamond and swings, looking for a rock that could substitute for the one back home. I didn’t see one.
I circled around toward a tall wooden slide near the park entrance. When I reached it, I stood there, staring up, feeling the sweat on the back of my neck. It looked peaceful at the top, so I climbed the ladder and looked around. I was alone and I felt safe, hidden by the wooden slats, so I sat and folded my legs in front of me.
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