It took a second for me to understand what he meant. Then another to get that he was serious. A third second to do something about the first two seconds, which was to sit down.
“I’ve thought a lot about this,” he began. Then he stopped. Like he had to mince words—with me of all people! Like I had a temper or something. “And I think I know what you’re going to say, but before you say it, you need to hear me out. Just hear me out, okay? If Walker’s telling the truth, we’ve got four days until the pod arrives and he leaves to do his thing. That’s more than enough time for me to get there and back.”
“To get where and back, Ben?”
“I won’t go alone. I’ll take Dumbo with me.”
“Okaaaay. With you where?” Then I got it. “The caverns.”
He nodded quickly, relieved that I understood. “It’s killing me, Cassie. I can’t stop thinking about them. Maybe Cup caught up with Ringer and—well, maybe she didn’t. She might be dead. Ringer might be dead. Oh, hell, they probably are dead—or maybe they’re not. Maybe they made it to the caverns and Ringer came back to the hotel to get us, only there was no us there to get because there was no there to come back to. Anyway, alive or dead, they’re out there. And if they’re alive, they have no clue what’s coming. They’ll die unless someone goes back for them.”
He took a huge, shuddering breath, the first since he blasted off the verbal launching pad.
“Go back for them,” I said. “Like you went back for Sam. Like you didn’t go back for—”
“Yes. No. Oh, shit.” His face was red and it wasn’t from standing too close to the fire. He knew what I was saying. “This has nothing to do with my sister . . .”
“You ran away and you’ve been trying to go back ever since.”
He stepped toward me. Away from the firelight, his face plunged into shadow. “You don’t know a damn thing. I know that really bothers you, because Cassie Sullivan knows everything, right?”
“What do you want from me, Ben? I’m not your mother or commanding officer or whatever. Do what you want.”
I stood up. Then I sat back down. There was nowhere to go. Well, I could go to the kitchen and make a sandwich, except there was no bread or deli meat or cheese. I don’t know the particulars, but I’m pretty sure there’s a Subway on every corner in heaven. Also Godiva stores. On our second day here, I found Grace’s stash of forty-six boxes of Godiva chocolates. Not that I counted them.
“I’m having a bad day,” I told him. My little brother hated me, my human-alien personal security guard confessed he doesn’t know compassion from compost, and now my old high school crush informs me he’s embarking on a suicide mission to rescue two missing and probably dead people. Plus I wanted a sandwich that I could never have. Since the Arrival, I’ve been beset by more cravings than a woman pregnant with triplets, and always for things I’ll never taste again. Chocolate ice cream cones. Frozen pizza. Whipped cream in a can. Those cinnamon rolls Mom made every Saturday morning. McDonald’s french fries. Bacon. No, bacon was still a possibility. I would just have to find a hog, slaughter it, butcher it, cure the meat, then fry it up. Thinking about the bacon—the potential of bacon—gives me hope. Not all is lost if bacon isn’t.
Seriously.
“I’m sorry,” Ben said. “I shouldn’t have gone off like that.”
He came over and sat down about two inches too close. I used to fantasize about Ben Parish sitting with me on the sofa at my house while we shared a blanket and watched old horror movies until one A.M., holding a big bowl of popcorn in his lap. It was a Saturday night and he was missing about six killer parties populated by people way cooler than me, but he wouldn’t be anywhere else; the pleasure of my company was enough.
Now here he was, only there were no killer parties, no TV, no blanket, and no damn popcorn. The world used to contain two Bens—the real Ben, who didn’t know I existed, and the imaginary Ben, who fed me popcorn with buttery fingers. Now there were three. The first two and the one who was sitting two inches too close, wearing a tight black sweater and sporting stubble that made him look like an indie rocker taking a break in the green room between sets. That’s a lot of Bens to hold in your head at once. I should give them different names to keep them straight: Ben, Has-Ben, and What-Might-Have-Ben.
“I get it,” I said. “But why do you have to go now? Why can’t you wait? If Evan can pull this off . . .”