“Out,” you said.
You stood up stiffly. I stood up too. “You want to come with me?” you said. “I don’t want to … just leave you here.”
“Um. Okay,” I said.
Come on, Earth! Swallow me right now.
But it never does.
You pointed to the far left corner of the warehouse. “Can you grab the Bugs Bunnies? There are three piles—small, medium, large. We need medium. I’ll get the rest. But I have to hurry.” Your voice was flatter than usual, like you were trying not to show your feelings, trying to pave over them with smooth hardness. Concrete.
“Can’t keep the kids waiting,” I said jokily.
“No,” you said. Still flatly.
I nodded, and started walking.
It was weird, that voice on your radio. I mean, for once a voice came from nowhere and actually helped—broke that terrible moment after you tried to kiss me and I moved away.
Has to be a first time for everything.
Here’s the thing though: I wish I had let you kiss me. Part of me wanted to, I promise. Even if we were disturbed right away by the radio, I wish I had let our lips touch, wish I had not pulled away. Wish I had not caused that hurt in your eyes.
But at the same time … I couldn’t. Not at that moment. And I was angry with the part of me that wanted me to, if I’m giving you the whole truth.
Even writing this down, I feel pretty sickened by myself.
I mean, Paris was gone, most probably dead, and I was even picturing the idea of kissing you.
Because I pictured it a lot.
Even then, just after Paris had gone missing.
Believe me, I hate myself quite a lot right now, but what can I do? I said I would tell the truth, and only the truth, so help me, God.
I offer two things in mitigation though:
1. We were only together in the first place because of her. Because I wanted to find her. I mean, that was the whole thing we were doing. The Twitter thing. Working stuff out. It was you who knew the shape of the street Julie had been on; you who worked out that the car could only have turned out of a drive. It was all you—the clues, they all came from you. So you and Paris, you were connected.
2. I was a teenager. Am a teenager. I figure if Paris were a couple years younger, and the situation were reversed, she would have wanted to be kissed too. If she never had been, I mean. Never kissed, I mean. She totally would. Yeah, you were the first person I kissed. Don’t get a big head about it.
3. I was grieving. I was. And people’s emotions do weird things when they’re grieving. They want to kiss boys and stuff, and scream and shout and laugh. Or they pull away from a boy who tries to kiss them, even though they want to, even though they really want to. It’s not just feeling sad. It’s more complicated than that. Even Agent Horowitz said it.
4. The voice punished me for it. I mean, not by making me hurt myself. I’d mostly stopped doing that, now that I knew the voice couldn’t kill my dad. Though sometimes I still cleaned my room and stuff when it told me to. Because the alternative was a lot of cursing and shouting from the voice, which was unpleasant. But … where was I? Oh yes. The voice did a lot of cursing and shouting after I got home that day. It was unpleasant.
5. I’ve gone over my two things. I KNOW.
You drove me to the pier. If it weren’t for Paris being gone, it would have been as good as the first time, cruising along the beach, the hard sand under the wheels, slaloming around the groups of people. You had turned the radio on—some MOR rock ballad was playing. The windows of the truck were open, and the wind whipped my hair.
It’s strange: A car on a road feels normal. A car on a beach always feels like flying. Like freedom. Even then I felt it, almost wanted to ask you if I could drive again.
You parked right by the pier and jumped down; threw the bags of toys up onto the side.
I looked at my watch. “You’d better drop me at home. Sometimes Dad comes back for lunch.”
“You grounded or something?”
“It’s complicated,” I said.
“Sure. Okay. I get that. I get complicated.”
“You do?”
“My mom died too. When I was fifteen. Me and my dad … Things are difficult between us.”
I was staring at you.
“Oh, ****,” you said. “Your mom’s not dead? I thought your dad said … I thought it was … I don’t know. Something else we—”
“No, she’s dead,” I said.
You were swallowing anxiously. “Sorry, sorry, I just …”
“It’s cool,” I said.
“I blurt stuff out,” you said. “It’s a curse. My voice is totally out of my control.”
Oh, I thought, you have no idea.
“Anyway,” you said. “I’ll drive you home.”
I walked into Dr. Rezwari’s office and stopped. She was sitting at her desk, which was usually bare, and there was work all over it—files, sheaths of paper held together with clips. Her makeup was not applied as adroitly as usual; her lipstick was smudged and there were tracks in her eyeliner.