She smiled back. “That’s what best friends are for, right?” She reached over and squeezed her hand, then winced. “Circulation, much? Your hands are freezing.”
Emily wrapped her hands around her cup of cocoa as Gabby reversed out of Em’s driveway, barely missing the mailbox, as usual. Em felt her spirits lift a little. Normal. A normal beginning to a regular day. It was amazing how much she had come to crave the everyday, regular-routine stuff of life, and to appreciate it. Just like she had a new appreciation for the people she loved. Gabby had been inconceivably generous with her forgiveness during the past few months. First there was the fiasco with Zach over the holidays, when Em had betrayed Gabby in the worst possible way—by hooking up with her best friend’s sleazebag boyfriend. Then Gabby had to adjust to Em’s blooming friendship with Drea—a girl they used to make fun of together. And Em had waited some time before telling Gabby, her oldest and best friend, that she was in love. In love with her next-door neighbor JD Fount.
Honestly, Em had started to wonder if she even deserved a best friend like Gabby—who, even now, bounced her head back and forth in perfect time to the radio. Em took a sip of her hot chocolate, wishing it tasted as good as she remembered. But all this thinking about how she’d betrayed Gabby made her want to puke. And all for him. Zach.
He loomed like a specter over their friendship. Zach McCord, Gabby’s slimeball ex. He’d played both of them, cheating on Gabby and making Em feel superspecial, when really she was just another trophy for his collection. She had to admit that she was grateful he’d left school. There was a rumor that Zach had fallen prey to a mysterious illness or accident that left him unable to play sports, but really, Em was fine knowing as little as possible about Zach’s new life—she was just happy he was no longer part of theirs.
Em was still amazed at how she’d deluded herself into thinking she and Zach were meant to be. She’d been longing for love, but she’d been looking in the wrong place. And she’d ruined everything by being so stupid, so wrong.
How could it have taken her so long to see that JD was the one for her? The boy who’d challenged her to epic snowball fights when she was a kid, who’d sat and watched movies with her one summer when she had broken her ankle and couldn’t play outside, who’d made her laugh and knew all the words to her favorite cheesy musical, Guys and Dolls.
For the millionth time, she wished she could go back and do it all differently.
Gabby would be well within her rights to ditch Em completely—to advertise for a new co–queen bee. A new best friend. But Em was determined not to let that happen. She’d screwed up so much recently. Her chances with JD were almost certainly over; he believed she’d bailed on the pep-rally bonfire (and him) to meet some other guy at the Behemoth. He thought she was a selfish liar. And she had no way to prove that it wasn’t true. She couldn’t tell him what had really happened—she’d made a promise to the Furies, and she already knew all too well what could happen if she broke it.
And then there was her overwhelming guilt about Drea; it was impossible not to believe that her own safety from the fire had come at the price of Drea’s life, no matter what the counselor said. It was her fault. And Drea had been trying to save her, to exorcise her of whatever demons she believed were consuming Em.
She couldn’t—wouldn’t—let anyone else down. From now on, she would be the one to play heroine. She would save her friendship with Gabby. She would save Ascension from the wrath of the Furies, before any more deaths occurred. She would save herself.
It was up to her now.
? ? ?
“When did Skylar come back to school?” Em asked Gabby when they reconvened in the library during lunchtime and plopped down at the research table by the windows. With the Gazebo section of the cafeteria under repairs after the glass roof collapsed onto Skylar’s face, there was overflow during fifth-period lunch. Gabby, Fiona, Lauren, and a few others had taken to eating in the library, where they were often shushed but rarely bothered. That was another thing that had changed since the slew of tragedies had hit: Back in the day, the girls would never have missed the opportunity to be right in the center of the action. But now it didn’t seem so important.