I knew what he meant. They’d told me the exact same thing, over and over. It didn’t help. Not one single bit.
“At first I didn’t believe them. I begged them to try again, to do something. But then the paramedic who pulled you—I mean Maddy—from the car came over and told me he’d done everything he could but she was already gone when they got there.”
He paused and swiped his arm across his eyes. He wasn’t crying but his eyes were heavy, and the hitch in his voice said he didn’t want to relive this memory any more than I did.
“You know what I did, Ella?” I shook my head, and he continued. “I stayed there. I refused to leave. I sat there on the floor next to you—next to Maddy’s body—until your parents arrived so you wouldn’t be alone. Even then, I wouldn’t go.”
“Mom and Dad were so happy to see me when I woke up,” I blurted out. “Everybody was. Alex was. I have never seen them like that, Josh, never seen any of them so scared and excited and relieved to see Maddy.”
“You’re kidding me, right? You based your decision to become your sister on your parents’ reaction to seeing you? On Alex’s relief that you were alive? I sat there for four hours holding Maddy’s cold hand while Alex sat in the waiting room. In the waiting room, Ella! Being coddled by Maddy’s friends. I was the one who was there with you … with her!” He waved his hand in the air, pissed. “It was me, not him, with you the whole time.”
“But you didn’t see my parents,” I said, remembering Mom’s tears, her whispered words about how she couldn’t lose Maddy, too. “You didn’t see Jenna or those people in the hall. Her friends. They were so happy that it was her who survived. I couldn’t tell them it was a mistake, take back the one person they had begged fate to let live. Plus, I owed her. I’d killed her, Josh. My own sister. I killed her, and I owe her my life in return. I owe her that much.”
Cursing my tears, I brushed them away. “She’s the one they love. She’s the one they were praying would survive.”
“Is that what you think?” Josh asked, and I flinched at the fury I could hear in his voice. His entire body was vibrating, the tears I had seen earlier gone, replaced with pure, unadulterated anger.
“Answer me, Ella! Do you honestly think that your parents didn’t … don’t love you? That our group of friends wouldn’t have spent two days in the hall waiting for you? That if everybody had a vote on who died that night, they would have chosen you over Maddy?”
I nodded. What else was I supposed to think?
Josh stood up and slammed his fist into the wall. Then he laughed, this broken cackle that had my emotions doing a complete one-eighty … going from guilt-ridden and confused to as irate as him.
“What’s so funny?”
“You are.” His amusement faded, the resentment I’d seen seconds ago slipping back into place. “They had to sedate your mom when she found out you were gone. That’s why Alex was sitting with you. Not because he loved Maddy or wanted to be there, but because your dad made him, told him not to leave your side until he could get your mother under control and could come back and sit with you himself.”
“That’s not true,” I said. There was no way that could be true. Mom adored Maddy. She went to her field hockey games, every one of them. She had pictures of Maddy lining her bureau and went out of her way to buy the healthy crap Maddy insisted on eating.
“And you know that how? You were out of it, Ella. For two days. You have no idea what went on. Take a good look at your mother now. You think she’s happier believing Maddy is the one who survived? Are you saying that if she had a choice, your mom would’ve chosen your sister over you? If you honestly believe that, then you’re an idiot.”
“She did everything, everything for Maddy!” I yelled.
“Because you wouldn’t let her do anything for you.”