“Can you feel mine?” she’d asked him back. His laugh was no more than a murmur into her hair.
Can you feel my heart?
As close as she’d ever got to saying I love you.
Evie stood and took a journal from her desk drawer. Her mom had bought it for her as a place to keep all the things she’d stopped saying aloud, but she had never really used it.
At first she hadn’t lived through anything interesting enough to put down on paper. And then later, when she had, it was nothing that should sit between such pretty covers.
She wound Shaun’s hair into a small loop and tucked it inside the journal, replacing the book in the drawer. Nearly a year of her life in one tiny thread.
She went down to the kitchen, flicking lights on as she went. The ticking clock was joined by cricket song floating in through the open windows and, far off, the mournful call of the trains that passed by Nan’s.
Her stomach growled fiercely. She’d slept the entire afternoon away and now felt raw and empty. It must have been days since she’d last eaten properly, without everything making her want to barf.
She grabbed a can of soup from the cupboard and dumped it into a pot.
It was Saturday night. Saturday nights used to be for all of them, together. Drinking and laughing in Nan’s front room, Nan deaf and asleep upstairs. Or, when it was warmer, prowling along the train tracks, climbing fences. Racing cars at the edge of town.
Tonight, instead, they were scattered. Each one falling away from the next—all the ties that had once bound them growing thinner and thinner.
On the breakfast table was a note from her mom.
Hi, Ev—Car out front. Boy in the attic. Do we need to talk??
Evie folded the page in half and put it back on the table. A pointed thing turned in her gut. She still hadn’t really talked to her mom yet. Of course, her mother knew that Shaun was dead. The whole town knew. But even when he was alive, Evie had kept him to herself. She’d never had the right words to explain him to her mother. That was exactly why her mom had bought the journal—to keep her from bottling everything up.
Her mom was always going on about letting in the light, getting some fresh air, seeing the bright side. But what exactly was so bright and fresh about Evie’s life? Every chance it got, all it did was hurt—even with Shaun, who was supposedly perfect. And what was the point in talking about that? In writing it down so she’d never, ever forget how much it all sucked?
How could she talk to her mom about a thing like Shaun? Her mom hadn’t even known she had a boyfriend when he’d slept two nights out of three in that brass bed upstairs. And now he was dead. Writing it down was never going to change that, and there was no point in talking about it now.
Besides, her mom trusted her—she couldn’t work nights if she didn’t. And she worked nights ’cause they needed the money. They always needed the money. So the sneaking out, the drinking, hopping fences, Shaun…confessing it all now would only break that trust, and that was something Evie knew they couldn’t afford.
She slumped down at the table and put her hands over her face. They filled instantly with tears. But she didn’t know if it was really Shaun she was crying for.
10
R
Réal avoided the hill on Monday morning. He pulled into the parking lot late and ducked into the school by the side door, racing to class just under the bell. As he slid into his seat, a nagging feeling bit at his gut. He tried to lose himself in the algebra under his elbows, but his gaze kept sneaking out the window, almost like he knew that cop car was going to pull up when it did, right where his eyes had been waiting for it.
Seeing it, though, he swallowed. He inched toward the window, watching the officers stride across the lawn and disappear from view. And when the old black phone on the classroom wall rattled its bell, he just knew it was for him.
The teacher spoke into it briskly, then turned and pointed at him, like the Grim Reaper digging a bony finger through Ré’s chest. “Dufresne,” he said. “Downstairs. Pronto.”
And then everything just lifted right off his head.
He stood up like he was on strings, not saying a word, and marched out of the room.
His ears buzzed and his chest felt like water, like even his organs were abandoning him. But he felt weirdly okay about it all. The sleepless nights, the terrible dreams, the memory of blood and violence. It was all over now. He could breathe again. It was done.
As his feet numbly touched each step down to the main floor, his mind itched to rebel against the strange calm his body felt. He eyed the side door. He could still run. But no. If they were asking for him by name, they already knew everything. It was time, he thought, to face the fucking piper, or whatever it was they say.
His dirty Vans squeaked against the polished hall tiles, announcing him. They were still flecked with Shaun’s blood, with his own. Through each little classroom window, he saw faces turned toward blackboards, heads ducked to notes. Exams started next week. And then he would have graduated, been done with this place. If only.
He put his hand on the door to the main office, took a breath and pushed.
Inside was the usual Monday morning chaos. Three kids already lined up on death row—the hard wooden bench that faced the high counter where detentions and suspensions were doled out. He knew the bench well, but not the faces. Just puppies.
