“You know, partying and whatever,” he says.
“Partying?” I say, like I have no idea what that could mean. Like I haven’t been worried about the exact same thing.
“Cassie was getting way too wasted, way too often.”
“And you’re morally opposed?” I try not to sound snide. And totally fail. I go on, trying to pretend that’s not what I meant. “I mean, you go to parties all the time.”
“Yeah, going out and being out of control are two totally different things.”
“And Cassie was out of control?”
I want to hear him say it. Like it’ll be some key. Because if Cassie turned on Jasper for telling her the exact same thing, doesn’t that prove I was right?
“Cassie was way out of control,” he says. “And it was scaring the crap out of me. Didn’t you see that?”
He sounds confused now, like he’s afraid maybe he imagined Cassie going off the deep end. And as much as I kind of like us going back to a world where Jasper gets that I know Cassie better than he ever will, this doesn’t seem like a good time for that kind of lie.
I nod. “I saw it. And it scared the crap out of me, too.”
We drive on in silence, for what feels like the whole of the length of New Hampshire, the exits slowly clicking up to 39C. And the whole time, I try to decide whether Jasper agreeing with me about Cassie being off the rails makes me more worried or less, while trying hard not to think about how long it will be before my emergency exception escape valve suddenly stops working and my anxiety floods back, waterlogging my lungs. Somewhere, a clock is ticking down. The only real question is what will happen when it reaches zero.
At its worst, there is no keeping my panic private. These days, the throwing up is mostly a bullet I’ve learned to dodge. But the passing out is still always a messed-up possibility.
The first time it happened was in a diner on a family road trip to the Four Corners the summer before eighth grade. That summer, restaurants were my panic button du jour. Stepping inside one was hard enough, forget about eating. The second we were in the breezy Gloria’s Café in Chinle, Arizona, I could feel something wasn’t right. But it wasn’t until I got up to go to the bathroom that I realized how bad off I was. I’d only gotten a few steps when the floor pitched hard to the left and the world went full-on black. I wasn’t out long. But passing out was freaky and embarrassing, and I’d worked hard to avoid a repeat performance. Still, there have been at least a half-dozen times in the years since that I’ve failed. I’m not looking for lucky number seven to be when I’m with Jasper.
The Exit 39C sign finally appears up ahead.
“Now what?” Jasper asks.
We’re at Exit 39C. Where now? I type.
Luckily, Cassie answers right away.
Get off onto Route 203 and wait. Trying to figure out address. More soon.
Cassie, you have to tell us something. What is going on? Who are you with?
I wait. But there is no other reply.
“What’s up?” Jasper asks.
“I told her she had to tell us something.”
“Good,” he says. “She does.”
Finally, another text. They don’t—got2g
“What did she say?”
“‘They don’t,’” I read. “And ‘got to go.’”
“What the hell does that mean?” Jasper looks over at me, his eyebrows bunched.
“Maybe she was kidnapped.” And I feel much worse once I’ve said it out loud. “I mean, she’s obviously with somebody, more than one person, it sounds like.”
I imagine some kind of roving band of hippies that Cassie joined up with. Maybe now that she’s with them at their commune, they have turned vaguely creepy. Cassie would want to keep things friendly. She’d be smart enough to seem game until she makes a run for it. I try to keep picturing this, instead of the many terrible alternatives, like a group of tattooed men with Cassie tied up somewhere.
“That does not sound good,” Jasper says as we pull to a stop at the bottom of the steep exit ramp. “‘They’ does not sound good. Not good at all.”
The only sign of life in the pitch-black distance is the glow from a gas station up the hill to the right: Clark’s Auto and Freshmart. At least it looks open. Good news at almost nine thirty in middle-of-nowhere New Hampshire. If we’re even still in New Hampshire anymore. I didn’t see any sign that we’d crossed into Maine or Vermont even, but it’s possible that I missed it.
“Let’s go wait there,” I say. “Cassie will have to give us an address eventually if she wants us to find her.”
“If she really wants us to find her,” Jasper says quietly. He glances in my direction as he turns right at the stop sign.