I edged into his room, which was, as usual, improbably neat for a teenage boy. “In the basement. Justin’s here so I thought I’d . . . you know . . . give them some privacy?”
He grimaced and mumbled something, but all I could make out were the words barf and phony. I snorted. Ethan’s contempt for Justin hadn’t waned. In fact, it became more transparent by the day. Aubrey was still in the my-new-boyfriend-is-flawless phase and couldn’t fathom the idea of her own brother not sharing the same opinion. But I understood where Ethan was coming from. After all, Justin was friends with the guy who’d slammed him into a locker a few weeks ago.
“Is it okay that I’m in here?” I asked, placing the bowl on the desk and knocking over a speaker. I righted it, then grabbed a handful of popcorn.
“Sure.” He swiveled in his chair, his gaze following my movements as I crossed the room and sat on his bed. He seemed vaguely surprised, like he couldn’t quite believe I was in his room. We’d hung out together before, just the two of us, but never on a weekend night and never in his bedroom. Usually, the only time we were alone without Aubrey was when we were both waiting for her.
I nibbled my popcorn, taking care not to drop any on the clean floor. Ethan’s room was so impersonal. Aubrey’s was the same. My room at home was a clutter of posters and pictures and nail polish and school work, but Aubrey and Ethan weren’t allowed to put posters or pictures up on their walls. Each item they owned had its rightful place.
“Aren’t you supposed to be practicing something?” I asked, nodding toward his violin and acoustic guitar cases, resting side by side against the wall by the window.
“I am, but Mom and Dad aren’t home, so . . .” He shrugged and spun back around to face the laptop screen.
I tossed a piece of popcorn up in the air and caught it in my mouth. “Slacking off, are you? Do you even like playing the violin?”
He twisted halfway around and looked at me. “Do you like cleaning your room? Going to school? Getting your teeth cleaned at the dentist?”
“Of course not. My parents make me do those things.”
“Exactly,” he said, and faced the computer again.
I stared at the back of his head for a moment. I knew their parents were rigid in their expectations, but the idea of them forcing Ethan to do something he had no interest in was excessively overbearing, even for them.
“Aubrey loves violin,” I said, like that was somehow relevant to his situation.
“Lucky her,” he mumbled, tapping on the keyboard.
An awkward silence hung between us, and suddenly I was desperate to lighten the mood.
My right hand was still half full of warm, buttery popcorn. I transferred it to my left hand, then chose the biggest kernel and lobbed it at Ethan’s head. It bounced off his ear and landed on the keyboard in front of him.
“Hey,” he said, wiping a splotch of fake butter off his ear as he turned to glare at me. “What the hell?”
I grinned and threw another piece at him, then another, until finally he grabbed his own handful from the bowl on the desk and started flinging them back at me. A few minutes later, the bowl was empty and his room looked like a popcorn machine had exploded.
But Ethan’s mood had improved, as had mine, so it was definitely worth it.
“You’re cleaning this up,” he said.
“No. I’m a guest in this house and guests shouldn’t have to clean.”
“Let’s go get Aubrey and make her do it, then.”
“Make me do what?” Aubrey appeared in the doorway, alone, her hair tousled from I didn’t want to know what. “Dara, what happened to you? You went to make popcorn and then—” The lovesick fog lifted from her face and she noticed the mess on the floor. “What on earth happened in here?”
Ethan coughed. “Um, just a little accident.”
“Well, make sure you clean it up before Mom and Dad get home.” She sighed and looked at me. “Dara, do you want to make more popcorn? I want some that hasn’t been on Ethan’s floor.”
“Sure,” I said, hoping she and Justin had gotten their fill of each other while I was gone.
The second Aubrey turned to leave, Ethan picked up a piece of popcorn and flung it at me. I caught it and popped it in my mouth as I followed his sister out the door.
seven
Senior Year
I’M GLAD YOU’RE BACK.
I’ve spent the last five days turning those four words over and over in my head and I still don’t understand. If I was sure of one thing during the past fifteen months, it was that Ethan hated me. He didn’t look at me at the funeral. Didn’t answer the letter I’d sent him the day after, describing how infinitely sorry I was. Didn’t contact me at all in the month between Aubrey’s death and the day I left for my aunt and uncle’s house. Not that I ever blamed him for any of it. I robbed him of his sister. His rock. I didn’t deserve his mercy.
The fact that he gave it to me anyway doesn’t make me as happy as it probably should. How is it possible that he doesn’t hate me? What’s his secret? How can he even stand to look at me after what I did?
“Dara! Dinner.”
I continue scrolling through the webpage I’ve been reading for the past two hours—the “RIP Aubrey McCrae” Facebook group, which for some reason still exists even though there haven’t been any new posts since the one-year anniversary of her death last June. I don’t know why I’m torturing myself with it. Actually, yes, I do. I think I owe it to Aubrey to witness the pain I caused, even when I’d rather turn away. So I read every one of those sad, melodramatic messages, even the ones written by people I’ve never even met before—who Aubrey never met. Dying young is a tragedy that belongs to everyone.
And then there are the posts about me.
They started appearing the September after Aubrey died, around the time school opened up again. Most of the comments are written by people I know, at least by name or sight. They’re vague, but it doesn’t take a genius to figure out who they’re referring to.
I guess she’s afraid to show her face.
Maybe she ran off to Mexico.
Or off a cliff.
Only the guilty run away and hide.
Apparently, the rumors have been circulating for a while. It’s a little scary knowing there are people out there who believe I’m capable of something so evil. I never expected to be welcomed back with open arms, but I didn’t expect to be labeled a murderer either.
I click X on the page and lie back on my bed, wondering if I can somehow get out of dinner tonight. I’m not hungry, and I’m definitely not in the mood for family time around the dinner table. But Mom insists on it. She won’t let me hole up in my room anymore, because the last time she let me do it, in the weeks after the accident, I’d told her I wanted to die too.
I get up and go downstairs. My father and brother are already sitting at the dining room table, loaded bowls in front of them. My mom comes in with two more bowls and sets them down at our respective spots. Beef stew. Yum.