Page 50 of Emma on Fire

“Emma, this is Rachel Daley.”

Anger floods Emma’s body. “What could you possibly want from me? You’ve already got your story, even if it was bullshit—”

“Emma, I’m sorry,” the reporter interrupts. “What you read is not the story I turned in. It’s the story my editor wanted to tell.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“I’ll send you my original version.”

“Don’t bother. Good—”

“Emma, wait,” Rachel says. “Don’t hang up. Please.” Emma can hear her take a deep breath. “I know how alone you feel right now. The world is watching you, yes, but they don’t understand you.”

Emma scoffs. “And you do?”

“I feel your anger,” Rachel says urgently. “I know the world’s in trouble, and I’m not interested in pretending that it isn’t. That’s why I became a reporter! That’s why I wanted to cover your story. Have you read any of my pieces? Last week I wrote about how the ocean around Cape Cod is warming faster than nearly any in the world. The week before, I wrote about Massachusetts being one of nine states to sue the oil and gas companies for—”

“I get it,” Emma says.

“But that doesn’t mean that I don’t think you’re hurting,” Rachel says quietly. “You,Emma Blake. It doesn’t mean that I don’t think you’re in trouble, too, as much as the world is.”

Emma stiffens. “This isn’t about me.”

“But itis,” Rachel says. “Look, I don’t want you to do this. But I can’t stop you.”

Emma looks over at the gas can. In the pocket of her backpack the heirloom Zippo waits. “No one can,” she says.

“Do you know what they say is the difference between being a suicide and being a martyr?” Rachel asks.

“No.”

“Press coverage,” Rachel says flatly.

Emma stiffens. What a terrible thing to say. But it’s true, isn’t it?I’m not going to be the girl who burned and no one knew why.

“So if you’re set on doing it, let me be there,” Rachel says.

It takes Emma a moment to speak. “Are you saying that youwantto see me actually set myself on fire?”

“Emma,” Rachel says, “I’m saying—”

But Emma hangs up. She’s heard enough. Rachel Daley might talk the talk when it comes to caring for the planet, but the only walk she wants to walk is the one that gets her above the fold on the front page. If that means a great shot of Emma’s skin sliding off her bones, so be it.

“Can you believe this shit?” she asks the empty room, asks Claire.

But then she realizes that there is someone she needs to talk to, someone who needs to believe some other shit that is very, very real.

CHAPTER 40

“EMMA!” BYRON’S VOICE booms onto the line. “You caught me on my way to a meeting.”

He sounds happy to hear from her, which isn’t a given. He hates to be interrupted at work, even by his beloved and now only daughter.

“We have to talk,” Emma says.

“But we just did,” he says. “We had breakfast together this morning, remember?”

“You said some words, and then I said some words. Don’t pretend it was a meaningful conversation.”

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