Yet.
Do you believe in fate? Sometimes I want to. I want to believe that we all walk some path toward . . . something, and our paths intertwine for a reason. Like this, the way we’ve found each other. The way you told me the right story when I so desperately needed to hear it.
But that would mean my mother’s path was predestined to end in that cab on the way home from the airport. Or your sister’s path was predestined to end with your father. One simple change in direction might have led down a completely different path.
Or maybe one simple change of direction is what led them down the path they followed.
I begged my mother to come home early. She did. I know I didn’t wreck that car, but she wouldn’t have been in it if not for me.
I set her on that path. Me.
If I can’t blame fate, who else is left?
I’m blinking sleep out of my eyes, and it takes me a minute to realize that’s the end of her message. Like an idiot, I sit there swiping at the screen, hoping it will keep scrolling, but that’s all she wrote.
If I can’t blame fate, who else is left?
I know a lot about blaming myself.
I know what I did last May when I couldn’t take it anymore.
I swing my legs out of bed like I have somewhere to go. I don’t know her name. I can’t call her. I don’t even know where to find her for at least another ninety minutes—but even if I were reading this at school, there’d be over two thousand students to filter through. It’s only ten after six anyway.
I know this kind of desperation. It’s terrifying to sense it in her.
She’s asking me about fate yanking people apart, and I can’t help but wonder if this is fate’s way of doing exactly that.
I tap at my phone until I get back to the main part of the app.
A little green circle sits beside her name. She’s online. She’s alive.
The air rushes out of my lungs, and I flop back onto my pillows.
Then I roll over and start typing.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
From: The Dark <[email protected]> To: Cemetery Girl <[email protected]> Date: Thursday, October 3 6:16:48 AM
Subject: Don’t do that
If you’re going to write to me at 3:30 a.m., you can’t end it like that.
I’m not ready for fate to tear this apart, okay?
Now write back and tell me you’re all right.
My heart is beating fast, a light, unusual fluttering that’s almost painful in its strangeness. I didn’t realize how heavy my late-night email had gotten.
I can’t look away from that last line.
Now write back and tell me you’re all right.
He cares. About me.
My heart keeps fluttering, a butterfly trapped between cupped palms. Now that I think about it, I don’t mind it one bit.
In fact, I quite enjoy the change.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
From: Cemetery Girl <[email protected]>
To: The Dark <[email protected]>
Date: Thursday, October 3 6:20:10 AM
Subject: I’m okay
I didn’t mean to scare you. I wasn’t in a good place last night. I feel like everyone is waiting for me to get over her death. My own best friend started quoting a book about the stages of grief last week, like I should be on some kind of schedule.
In a way, I know she’s right. I’m stuck in this rut of anger and pain and loss, but the more people try to drag me out of it, the more I feel determined to dig my heels in and cling to the grooves in the dirt.
You never answered my question about fate. I sometimes wonder if we’re coming at this from different sides. You could have stopped your sister’s death, while I contributed to my mother’s.
I keep wondering which is worse.
Her statement hits me right in the gut. I throw the phone at my pillow and storm into the bathroom. I shove the shower faucet with enough force that it creaks, and for half a second, I’m worried that I’ve broken something and water is about to start spraying everywhere.
I haven’t, and it doesn’t. Steam fills the bathroom almost immediately.
I squirt toothpaste with a vengeance and attack my teeth, but that hurts, so I dial back on the fury.
It takes effort. She keeps wondering which is worse? Like this is some kind of competition?
I slam the toothbrush onto the counter and spit into the sink, then wipe my face on a towel. My eyes are dark and angry in the mirror. I almost want to punch the glass.
Her words make me feel like a failure.
You could have stopped your sister’s death.
I’ve told myself the same thing for the last four years. The words shouldn’t have so much power. Not anymore. To hear them from her, though . . . All of a sudden, something that felt so safe feels like another opportunity for disappointment.
The water burns my skin when I step under the stream, but I let the pain run in rivulets down my back. The faucet runs hot for a good long while, and I force myself to take it. The heat on my skin takes some of the edge off my anger.
When I finally emerge from the bathroom, I smell bacon, but that’s insane. Alan is usually gone by the time I go downstairs, and Mom always sleeps late. It must be a neighbor.
The scent wakes my stomach, and suddenly I’m starving. It doesn’t help stave off my irritation. I stand at the foot of my bed and stare down at my phone.
Food first.
I leave my phone and move through the house like a ninja, well practiced in keeping silent in the morning so I don’t disturb my mother. I slide into the kitchen to grab a granola bar.
Mom is sitting at the table with Alan. I stop short.
If they were talking, their voices were low. They stop and look up at me in surprise.
They’re both in robes.
Any rage the shower bled off is back with full force.
Coffee mugs sit on the table in front of them. Used pans are on the stove, and food-caked plates are stacked in the sink. I smell eggs and see a few pieces of bacon soaking into a paper towel.
They had breakfast. Without me.