“Take Headlight here over to Ferry Park and let her run around,” Metal Pete said. He gave me the assignment the same way he’d sent me on scavenger hunts in the Yard, with the confidence that I could do anything.
I leaned across the cab and opened the door. Without being told, Headlight hopped onto the bench beside me and lay her head down on my lap. Her foxlike ears pointed at the sky as Pete told her to be good for me.
“I’ll be right back,” I told him.
He nodded. “Call if you get stuck.” He tapped the hood twice, granting permission for me to leave.
I had to call.
I had to call the next day too.
The road and I were not yet friends, but we had more than ten hours on Thursday to get acquainted.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Some Emails to Max in El Salvador From: [email protected] To: [email protected] Date: May 29
Subject: One year Max,
One month from today it will be a year.
Love,
Sadie
From: [email protected] To: [email protected] Date: May 29
Subject: RE: One year Max,
No, I think we should do something he’d love.
<3
Sadie
From: [email protected] To: [email protected] Date: May 29
Subject: RE: cemetery visit?
Max,
Honestly, I haven’t been back to the cemetery. I haven’t driven by the scene. I haven’t even been out to see the plaque they put up at Coast Memorial. But if you want to go, I will go with you.
Love,
Sadie
From: [email protected] To: [email protected] Date: May 29
Subject: Willit Hill Max,
It’s not the places that scare me. It’s letting him go. That sounds so stupid, because I know he’s already gone. But he isn’t. Not to me.
Love,
Sadie
From: [email protected] To: [email protected] Date: May 29
Subject: the music of Trent Max,
I miss his voice. I wish I didn’t have that “Hold on. Hold on. Hold on” chorus in my head.
Love,
Sadie
From: [email protected] To: [email protected] Date: May 29
Subject: <333
Max,
I’m sure your call cost a million dollars, but for tonight, I have your sweet voice stuck in my head now. This year took away many things, but it was generous, too. I have you, and I’ll never be sorry about that.
<3 <3 <3
Sadie
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
The morning of the anniversary I woke up with a tank on my chest and shrapnel in my brain.
I’d spent most of the night flipping over and over in bed, unsettled and restless, so tired my eyes wouldn’t close. Four hundred games of phone solitaire later, I’d fallen asleep and awakened with a jolt an hour later. Anticipation and sleep were sworn enemies.
I turned on the light, thinking I might read. With all my tossing and turning, I’d knocked Big out of the bed. When I leaned over to pick him up, a piece of paper fell out.
Gray Garrison is my one true love.
The timing on that one was from early sophomore year. I remembered how sharp and focused that feeling had been. He’d sent me a whole bunch of YouTube links to Peter and the Starcatcher. It wasn’t a huge gift; it was the way he understood me and my passions.
Gray had agreed to go road-tripping with me today for the same reason.
I removed the next piece from Big and then the next and the next until he was empty, and I’d worn memory lane into a dirt path.
These paper memories were a time machine, but they weren’t for a time I wanted to revisit. I’d come through them, and I didn’t want to go back. Because Gray’s vase was a relic from the same time period, I put the papers inside and set Big on my shelf, not quite ready to let an old friend go. It felt wrong to keep the vase in my room, so I padded down the hallway to the closet and put it inside.
That wasn’t far enough away. I wanted the papers gone-gone, and I knew the perfect place to put them.