Page 10 of Even After Sunset

“So I can help you,”I want to say.“So I can try to help you put the pieces of your life back together. Because no one else seems to have even tried.”

But instead I just go with: “Well, I’dliketo get to know you again.”

He laughs, rolling his eyes. “Trust me: you don’t.”

“Yeah, actually, I do.” My voice this time carries conviction.

He keeps looking at me, like maybe he’s processing my words. I struggle to try and read whatever’s going on behind his icy stare and fail. Then he lets out a sigh and combs his hand roughly through his hair. Obviously a habit he’s picked up since the days when we were joined at the hip.

“Look, it’s just a bad idea, okay? Us being friends.”

“Um… Okay.” I try again. “I just thought—”

“Christ!” He rolls his eyes. “Can you take a hint? I don’t want this!” He motions back and forth between us with his finger. “This whole bonding crap. I don’t want to be friends, alright?”

He slides out of the seat and stands up, digging in his pocket for his wallet. He fishes out a five-dollar bill which he slaps on the table.

“I’m going for a smoke. We’ll drive to Provincetown so you can go to your festival or whatever it is, and then we’ll go our separate ways.”

“I’m only trying to—”

“I’ll be out front.”

And just like that, I’m dismissed. Our entirefriendshipis dismissed.

I eat my eggs and toast alone for the next ten minutes, willing myself not to let even one tear escape. Because he may have hurt me, but I amnotthe shy, frail girl I used to be. Or the clueless rich girl he probably thinks I am today. And Silas doesn’t get to call all the shots. He can’t make me stop caring, or be the only one to dictate how this sudden re-acquaintance is going to play out. I can choose to be the bigger person if I want—if that’s what it’s going to take for me to be there for him.

I’m not going to turn my back on him just because he doesn’t like me anymore.

Chapter Five

Silas

Ishove the door open with one hand, digging into my shirt pocket for my cigarettes with the other—even though I told myself I was going to cut back. But I need a distraction. I feel like I’m going to blow. Like I’m going to punch the next thing I see and once I start, I won’t be able to stop.

Outside, I lean against the diner’s peeling siding and light my smoke like it might evaporate into thin air if I don’t get it lit in the next two seconds. I’m that desperate. I can already feel the memories shoving their way back in.

I inhale a lungful of nicotine and imagine the smoke slowly filtering through my body, shrouding everything in a thick haze.

It helps. I breathe a little easier.

I’m hungry as hell, though. But there’s no way I was going to let Jackie buy me breakfast. Especially when she’s already paying for more than half my bus ticket back. Still, I’m glad I got out of there: it would have been torture sitting there surrounded by the smell of bacon and hash browns, just watching her eat.

It’s hard enough being around her as it is: all sweet and glass-half-full, and oblivious to the fact that we no longer have anything in common beyond that terrible afternoon seven years ago. And even more oblivious to the fact that she only knows half the truth about that day, and that she sure as hell wouldn’t be treating me so nicely and putting up with my shitty attitude if she did.

But also, maybe if she hated me then I wouldn’t feel so guilty for hatingherright now—for moving on like all that stuff from the past hasn’t affected her. And making me glaringly aware that I’m still so trapped by it.

The softshhhlack… shhhlack… shhhlackof flip-flops against warm pavement pulls me from my thoughts and I look toward the door, which isalready swinging closed behind Jackie. She walks slowly, her gaze scanning for me across the parking lot. Her eyes widen and her face breaks into a smile when she spots me leaning against the side of the building.

She’s still got one of those faces where every muscle gets in on her expressions. Like an anime character: if she’s scared, her mouth forms a perfect circle, or when she’s pissed, her cheeks hollow and her jaw juts out. And when she smiles, like right now, her eyes go big and her cheeks suddenly get rounder, too.

A breeze picks up as she walks toward me and a few strands of pale brown hair blow around her cheeks and across her eyes. She tucks a lock behind her ear as she stops beside me and I realize that she always had long hair when we were kids. Like, down to her ass kind of long. But now it’s short; just about chin length—and it suits her. It’s neat and put-together. Like her. This new version of Jackie is so damnwholesome. Light and breezy, with hardly any signs of the worry she used to wear on that crease above the bridge of her nose. She looks good. And I don’t know how to feel about the fact that she turned out to be so pretty.

The breeze dies down a little and her hair stops fluffing and floating around her face, and she stops beside me. I don’t miss the way her eyes stray to the cigarette perched between my lips and I wait for her to make some comment about it, but she doesn’t. I know she’s dying to, though.

Instead, she says, “We have time for you to take a shower before we hit the road, if you want.”

I take a final puff, then turn and blow the smoke away from her.

---