“I can’t,” she says. “I’ll send them an email. I can’t get them on the phone. I won’t be able to go through with it.”
“Say the same things I said,” I tell her. “I want him thinking we’re here, not there. I want him thinking we’re doing all the things we’d normally do. I figured a riverboat cruise was something you’d like. The massage is my usual deal. We’re not doing any of that. When we do get home, we’ll go to the cops. Tell them everything—tell them someone out here saw Charlie.” Aubrey nods, typing quickly on my iPhone. She flashes the screen at me when she’s done.
I’m safe, it says, after the other stuff I told her to write. I’m flying home Thursday. There’s so much to talk about when I get home. I love you both.
It’s just a few lines, but when I’m done reading, I nod in approval.
“I had a million emails from them,” she says. “They’re so worried.”
“They must be good parents.”
“They are,” she says. “When I called them the one time from London, I told them I’d be gone for a while and asked them to trust me. I don’t really deserve it, but I think that’s what they’re trying to do.”
I nod. My parents have always given me a lot of freedom; but by now I know that Aubrey’s are more helicopter style.
“So we’ll just lie low?” she asks. “In, like, random places?”
“Fuck, no,” I tell her. “We’ve got to go to places he’d never expect us to go. Charlie expects us to be scared and to hide right now. But I’m not going to let him do that to me. We’re going to see this city and do all the things I’d want to do if this were actually the last night of my life. Because it’s not,” I clarify. “But if it were . . .”
“It’s not,” Aubrey says firmly, handing my phone back to me. “I like this plan.” My bravado is mostly show, and I know she can tell I’m scared. But I’m determined not to give in to it. I do a quick scan of my own emails and notice a hello from Carey in Paris. I open it and read quickly—he’s dating a new guy, wants to tell me about it. My heart sinks; it’s been so long since I’ve messaged him. Carey’s always been the better friend. But messaging him now would be too risky—too traceable. I pocket my phone, vowing to focus more on him when this whole mess is over.
“Still, nothing like the threat of death to push a girl outside her comfort zone.” I stand up and brush my palms on my jeans. They’re dotted with little indentations from the gravel on the sidewalk. There’s this nagging voice inside me that says, This might be it. I can’t explain what it’s doing to me. I can’t explain how it makes me feel, other than reckless. I just know that I’m infused with adrenaline, and I’m going to live this night like it’s my last. Because maybe it is.
“I can think of a couple things he’d never expect,” Aubrey says, taking a big breath. I look at her, and I feel myself breaking out into a grin. She meets my eyes and grins back, and my heart expands.
“How much money’s left on that credit card?” I wonder aloud.
“Enough to make this the best night we’ve ever had,” Aubrey says.
“That’s what we’re going to do. For tonight, let’s let it be just about us. About living and doing all the things two girls our age are supposed to do when they find themselves semi-stranded in Bangkok.” Aubrey giggles at this.
“I don’t know what life I’ve entered,” she tells me, “but it doesn’t feel like mine anymore.”
“It’s your new life,” I say. “Our new lives. So here’s the plan,” I continue, before I get too sentimental. “You’re going to walk up to that guy over there,” I tell her, pointing at a random scruffy backpacker in board shorts and flip-flops who’s standing at the opposite side of the road. “Ask him what his favorite thing to do here has been in the past twenty-four hours. Then we’re going to do that thing.”
“I like the way you think,” Aubrey says, her blue eyes lighting up. “I’m going for it.” I watch as she picks her way across the street, her shoulders squarer and her posture straighter than I remember it being. It’s like I’m watching a different version of Aubrey, one this trip has born, and I feel a swell of pride, because maybe in some small way, I’ve rubbed off on her. I like thinking of a more fearless Aubrey returning to sleepy Illinois, then blowing it apart. Aubrey nods, and the man scribbles something on a piece of paper, handing it to her with a friendly expression.
Aubrey skips back over, her face dimpling in a mischievous smile. I grin in return; it’s like we have a tacit agreement not to talk about what might happen. For today, it’s like we’re just girls on a backpacking trip. Still, the urge to run anywhere, everywhere, is almost overpowering. I discipline myself. I force myself to wait.