“But … I thought you’d forgiven me.”
He shut his eyes and shook his head. “It’s not a matter of forgiving; I’m choosing not to hang out with you. I can’t do this to myself, Mi. I can’t.”
“Am I that awful?”
“You were someone incredible. You were my best friend. And now?” He shoved his hands in his pockets and closed his eyes again. “The way you’ve handled your cancer … Who are you?”
“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m just trying to survive.” Hillary’s acid voice had nothing on mine. “If I’m not the perfect person while dying from cancer, that’s okay with me.”
“If I’ve noticed? I was there every day this summer! Did you forget? I was the only one there. I’ve seen how awful and painful this is, and how terrified you are. But when this is over—because you will beat this—who are you going to be? Regardless of whether or not you have cancer, you’re not someone I want to know anymore. My Mia Moore wouldn’t just give up.”
“Well, lucky for you, you won’t have to know me much longer.”
His eyes sparked with fury, then glazed with tears. He walked into his house without looking back. It felt like Jinx had been the last link between us, and now that was severed.
I sat on the front porch and curled into myself, trying to breathe.
I was still there when Mom drove up. “Oh, kitten, I’m so sorry …,” she began.
At the sound of my nickname, I began to wail.
If I couldn’t hold Jinx, I wanted to be held, so I called Ryan.
“Where were you? I called your phone and your parents and the hospital.” His voice was a tangle of panic, anger, and relief.
I gulped a breath and tried to answer.
“Do you know how freaked I was when you were gone at the end of the day? I thought you were …”
“Will you come over?” I sounded five years old.
“I need some space.” His panic and relief had faded, leaving frustration-coated anger. “Now that I know you’re okay, I need to, I don’t know, breathe and calm down.”
“Later?” I asked.
“Let me take a drive, clear my head, then I’ll come.”
But he didn’t. He called later, but I was already two hours into a sleeping pill. Apologies, explanations, and kisses waited until the morning. Exchanged with forced smiles. My chest ached, my pulse pounded in my temples, and the hallway focused and unfocused as I blinked past tears.
“We’re okay, right?” Ryan asked, raising our intertwined hands and brushing his lips across my knuckles.
I swallowed and coughed before I could answer. “We’re fine.”
We had to be.
Chapter 45
I sat in the kitchen and stared out the window. Tapping my nails on the counter while I pretended to listen to Mom’s pre-dance blather. Gyver came out of his house carrying a trash bag; I bolted out the door and cornered him on the driveway.
“Gyver!” I paused and caught my breath. “Wait. Please?”
He replaced the trash can lid and turned toward me with an impassive face.
“Can we talk?”
“Talk.” He gave me a palms-up, go-ahead gesture.
“I’m sorry! I’m so sorry! I miss you.” So much so I’d found myself sobbing at three a.m. when I discovered Mom washed his sweatshirt and it no longer smelled like him. It had been three awful days since Jinx died. Three days of Gyver acting like I didn’t exist.
“I miss you too, but it doesn’t change things.” He raked his hair into chaos and hooked his thumb in his pocket.
“Will you forgive me?” I ached to reach for him, so I clasped my hands behind my back.
“It’s not forgiveness. It’s self-preservation. God, Mi—don’t you get it?” He hesitated, then walked over to his car. He reached in the driver’s door and fumbled in the console before pulling out a battered envelope. “I’ve been carrying this for weeks. It’s a mix for you.”
“Thanks.” I tried to sigh, but my chest was too tight, my lungs crowded by the hammering of my heart. I didn’t want a CD; I wanted him back in my life.
“Listen to it.” And he left.
I flipped the CD around in my hands. I could more or less decipher the title. He’d written it in all caps: it was “MUSIC FOR …” and a scrawl of my name.
I slipped the CD in my car as I pulled out of the driveway to go to the nail salon. The first song was an oldie. I twisted the volume, and the lyrics to a Stevie Wonder song filled the car:
Very superstitious, the writing’s on the wall.
I frowned but continued listening:
When you believe in things you don’t understand, you suffer. Superstition ain’t the way.
I punched the advance button; the next song was familiar; we listened to it every year at cheer camp. It was the “I’m sexy, I’m cute,” song from the beginning of Bring it On—a movie Gyver loved to hate.