He sighs and takes my hand, weaving his cold fingers through mine. “I’m sorry too. Don’t leave. Please.”
There’s not enough light to see his face clearly, but I can hear the vulnerability in his voice, feel it in the way he squeezes my hand. Something inside me melts.
“Walk me home?” I ask softly.
He nods, his tensed shoulders sagging in relief. Still holding hands, we exit the park and start down the sidewalk to home. The colorfully lit houses seem almost garish on the walk back, like someone went and jacked the wattage up to maximum. Or maybe it’s because everything feels clearer and more intense after what happened in the park. Even the smallest things seem amplified now.
When we get close to my house, Ethan leads me behind the neighbor’s tree again. I tilt my head up, expecting a kiss good night, but he’s not even looking at me. He stares at the ground in front of him, lost in thought.
“Ethan?” I touch his arm and he looks up, blinking like I just woke him from a dream.
“Do you think this is a mistake?” he asks out of nowhere. “Us, I mean? Is it becoming too much?”
Too much. Does he mean our relationship? The conflicting mix of guilt and desire that rushes through me each time we kiss? The feeling that we’re betraying Aubrey’s memory in selfish, dishonorable ways? Everything about this is too much.
“I—I don’t know,” I tell him. It’s mostly the truth. I don’t know what the hell I’m doing anymore or what I want or how I feel. All I know is I’d be devastated if I lost him forever too.
“Okay,” he says, even though it’s clearly not the answer he wanted from me. I’ve never been too much for him. Not even now, when I would be for anyone else. “Can I ask you one more question?”
“Of course.”
The wind picks up, rustling what’s left of the leaves on the branches above us. Ethan glances up as if gathering courage from the sound and then returns his attention to me. He shifts his weight from one foot to the other, suddenly nervous.
“My parents are going out for New Year’s Eve,” he says. “They won’t be home until the next day sometime, so I’ll have the house to myself for about twenty-four hours. Do you want to come over and celebrate Aubrey’s birthday with me?”
I don’t know what I was expecting, but it’s not this. My first instinct is to decline. I haven’t been to the McCraes’ house since Aubrey died, and the thought of going there again makes me light-headed with dread. Aubrey’s school pictures are probably still on the walls, her room still exactly as she left it. Or maybe not. For all I know, her parents could have scrubbed the house clean of all traces of her. I’m not sure which would be harder, seeing things that remind me of her or not finding anything at all.
But Ethan’s waiting for an answer, so again, I give him a noncommittal one.
“I’ll think about it.”
It’s the most concrete promise he’s going to get from me right now and he knows it. Without saying anything else, he walks me up to my door and kisses me lightly on the lips before disappearing back into the dark.
twenty-four
Sophomore Year
AT LUNCHTIME ON TUESDAY, I BOLTED OUT OF class right at the bell and waited for Ethan near his locker. When I saw him approaching, I gave him an expectant look. In response, he frowned and shook his head.
“I don’t think she’s talked to him,” he said, stopping in front of me.
To my horror—and probably Ethan’s—my eyes filled with tears. I’d given Justin plenty of time to do the right thing and own up to his mistake. I realized now he’d probably never had any intention of telling her. He’d missed the deadline I’d given him on purpose, forcing me to do his dirty work for him so he wouldn’t have to. Coward. I couldn’t believe I’d ever liked him.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah, he’s just such a . . .” Frustrated, I squeezed my eyes shut, trapping the wetness inside. “Never mind. Do you know where Aubrey is?”
“No, but we have a lunch meeting for orchestra in a few minutes and she said she’d—”
“What’s going on?”
Adrenaline flared in my stomach and I turned in the direction of the voice. Aubrey stood about two feet away, watching us. Ethan and I stared back at her, mute.
“Dara, why are you crying?” she pressed when we failed to answer her question. “Are you—did something happen?”
These were the first words she’d spoken to me since Sunday. On a normal day, I would have felt relieved she still cared enough to ask. “Aubrey,” I said, and then immediately ran out of words.
“What is it?” Her hands rose to her hair, but it was already in a braid, so they just lingered there for a moment before dropping to her sides again.
I glanced at Ethan, who gave me a tiny nod of encouragement. “Can we go somewhere and talk?” I asked her, stalling again.
“No. I need to know now.”
“Aubrey . . .” I trailed off helplessly.
She crossed her arms. “Just tell me, Dara. Does it have anything to do with Justin? You seem to hate him all of a sudden. Obviously something happened and you’re both keeping it from me for some reason. Travis told me he heard you two fighting in the hallway yesterday, but I thought he was exaggerating or imagining things. Now I’m not so sure. Just tell me,” she repeated, her eyes boring into mine. “Are you and Justin . . . is something going on between you two?”
This was something I’d worried about for the past two nights as I lay in bed wondering what would happen when she found out—that she’d think Justin and I were fooling around behind her back. Still, hearing her actually voice the suspicion out loud sent a tremor down my spine.
“No, Aubrey,” I said, taking a step toward her. “Of course not.”
She continued to stare at me, waiting, silently begging me to explain. And I didn’t have any other choice, because no matter what repercussions might come from this, no matter how impossible it felt to say the words, I owed her the whole truth.
“The other night at Paige’s party,” I began, keeping my eyes on the scuffed floor, “Justin came up behind me in the garage and he pressed up against me and he . . . he put his hands on me. I stopped him, but he was so drunk it was like he didn’t even realize what was going on. That’s it, Aubrey. Nothing else happened. I didn’t tell you right away, because I wanted to give him a chance to come clean to you first. But he hasn’t, so . . . I’m sorry.”
I looked up in time to see her face go from expectant to shocked to bright red with anger. At first, I thought the anger was for Justin, since he’d crossed a line no boyfriend should ever cross, but then she opened her mouth.
“I can’t believe you,” she said, eyes blazing. “You’re just saying this because you’re jealous. You’ve been jealous this entire time and you’re doing whatever you can to sabotage this for me. What kind of friend does that?”