Where’s Maggie’s running stuff? I type, then stop myself. Because why should I get her stuff? Why do I deserve it, over Dylan? Over her family? Who the fuck am I to demand Maggie’s stuff the day after she died, from her brother who’s grieving, her brother I don’t even know that well—
I erase the message with shaking hands and just type I’m sorry to him, send it, though I know those two words can’t even begin to encompass who Dylan has lost.
Who I’ve lost.
Fuck.
I don’t know how I make it through school.
I keep expecting everyone to talk about it, talk about her, but she didn’t go to our high school, so why would it matter that she’s dead? Why would anyone care about the girl from our rival school who died?
I want them to care. I want them to care because I do, because this is shattering me slowly from the inside and if they cared maybe it wouldn’t be so goddamn lonely.
There are a few hushed whispers in the hallway, more in awe over the fact someone close to our age died than anything. We think we’re invincible until we’re not, and at the same time, there’s relief in the air, an awful kind of relief.
At least it wasn’t one of us.
I make it through Art and I make it through chemistry but by the time we get to English, reading passages from Jane Eyre out loud, I can barely hold it together. I sit next to Julia and mindlessly doodle in my notebook, anything to get my mind off Maggie. When class ends, I’m the first to bolt out of my seat, relieved that the day is over.
“Corinne, wait!” Julia says as I head into the hallway. I stop by my locker and turn to her.
“What?”
She stops. “I just . . . are you sure you’re okay?”
Her question almost makes me start crying.
Almost.
But I can’t lose it now, not in front of her, not after yesterday.
“I’m fine,” I say, and she narrows her eyes at me.
“Corinne.”
I swallow past the lump in my throat. “It—I don’t know, hearing about Ma . . . that girl, I just thought about Nana, and . . .”
Julia’s face instantly softens. “Oh, Corey,” she says, and pulls me into a hug.
Guilt gnaws at my insides because what the fuck, Corinne, using your dead grandmother to not tell Julia about Maggie? Who does that?
God, I don’t deserve to be grieving her. Not at all.
“I’m fine, I just . . . need some time,” I say. “And I might—I might miss practice for a day or two.”
Julia nods. “I’ll tell Coach. Call me if you need me, okay?” she says, and she hugs me again.
She is so genuine, so nice, and if I don’t deserve my grief, then I definitely don’t deserve Julia’s kindness. Or her friendship.
“I will,” I say, and she pulls back, my sadness mirrored in her own face, because we both know I probably won’t.
Five Months Before.
We’re in her basement. We were playing pool, but we aren’t anymore. Instead, we’re on her couch, kissing.
Kissing her is different from kissing any boy. Kissing her is soft hands and soft lips and curves that mirror my own, and hands sliding up shirts and—
“Maggie?”
We break apart, and at the top of the stairs is her brother. Dylan. I’ve only met him a few times, and he’s been nice enough, if a bit wary of me.
His face is as red as his hair.
“You didn’t answer when I came in, so I thought you might be down here . . .”
“Dylan,” Maggie says, and she’s blushing as much as he is. “This is Corinne. My . . . girlfriend, I guess,” she says, and it’s the girlfriend part that fills the room but the I guess part that fills me.
Dylan nods, then, turns and heads up the stairs. I tug the edge of my shirt down and don’t look at Maggie, because we’ve been so careful, we were always so careful—
“He’s going to tell.”
“He’s not.”
“He will—”
“No, he won’t.”
Her hand over mine, my head on her shoulder. I should get up and leave before her brother comes back, but I can’t make myself.
But she holds my hand, she keeps me tethered so I can’t run away.
One Day G O N E.
I text Julia when I get home, just to say something, to thank her for today. Dad’s already in the kitchen when I walk in, cooking. Ground beef is sizzling in a pan on the stove, and I smell the spice blend he uses for tacos. Bowls of toppings are set out on the counter.
Taco night. Like we used to do back when my parents were still together, Dad making tacos and drinks for him and Mom, some sort of fancy mocktail for me.
I pull my hair back from my face, secure it with a hairband around my wrist. Blond strands get caught in my fingers as I pull my hair through the elastic, lean in to sneak a taste of the salsa in the food processor on the counter. I am not much taller than my Dad. We even look alike—same blond hair, same straight noses, though my eyes are brown like Mom’s.
I wonder if he hates that—that I got her eyes.
I guess I’d hate it if I were him.
“I’ll make you a mocktail if you want,” Dad says as he turns off the burner. “Blender’s clean. Want a piña colada?”
I swallow.
The last Taco Tuesday night we ever did ended in Mom drinking three piña coladas by herself before we’d even eaten, Dad tight-lipped going to his office to ignore the problem after she passed out on the couch.
I’d brought the leftovers to school the next day and shared them with Chris and Trent and Julia, and when I got home and tried to talk to Dad about what had happened the night before, he just shook his head.
“Sure,” I say. “That sounds great.”
I shower before dinner, trying to scrub not telling Julia and Maggie’s death and my text to Dylan from my mind, as if a shower is going to make any of this go away.
Bysshe is desperately meowing at my bathroom door when I get out, so I give him a treat. When I head downstairs, Dad’s already eaten, so I make a taco and sit down at the kitchen table.
Dad’s left the newspaper carelessly flipped to the obituary section, and Maggie’s senior portrait looks up at me.
I flip it shut so fast I rip the paper and spill half my taco on the ground, plastic plate clattering on our tile floor.
“Everything okay, Corey?” Dad asks.
“Everything’s fine,” I call back, scooping up filling from the floor and dumping it in the trash.
My hands grab the newspaper before I can stop them, shoving the pieces in the pocket of my sweatpants. I wet a few paper towels and wipe the floor, throw my plate in the sink, and run upstairs.
On my bed I piece together the newspaper. I don’t know why I’m doing this to myself, don’t know why I’m going to torture myself reading Maggie’s obituary because it’ll just be dry facts about how great she was, all the people who have survived her when she should have lived a much longer life than she did—
And yet.
I flatten the scraps, wince when I see I’m getting sauce on top of my purple comforter. I scrape at it with a fingernail, steel myself to read the obituary.