Page 44 of Not Made to Last

I’ve never understood a single statement more.

I motion to the ceiling. “Did you know that Earth has more trees compared to stars in the Milky Way?”

She laughs, a breathy little sound I want to bottle up and keep forever. “Did Max tell you that?”

“Maybe…” I freeze. “Didyoutell him that?”

“Maybe,” she repeats, rolling onto her back. “But three trillion trees on Earth is nothing compared to 7.5sextilliongrains of sand.”

“That’s not a real number.”

“It is so. It’s seventy-five, followed by seventeen zeros.”

“Why do you know this?”

She shrugs. “You’re not the only one who likes stats.”

“Fair,” I say, “but I don’t go to sleep with them every night.”

Her shoulders shake with her silent laugh, and she turns into me again, eyes focused on my single helix pendant she’s toying with.

She doesn’t ask about the necklace, just says, “I keep them there as a reminder that the world is vast, filled with so many singular objects,andwe, as individual humans, are just one of thosethings. We’re so small. All of us. So insignificant.”

Maybe so, but… “Why do youwantto be reminded of that?”

Her mouth snaps shut, and she looks away, eyebrows drawn as if thrown off by the question. “Can I ask for your truth now?”

“You can just ask me for the sake of asking, Cheeks.”

Forearm on my chest, she lifts herself half on top of me, all so she can look directly in my eyes when she asks, “How much do you know about what happened to my grandparents?”

Even though I was expecting this question at some point, I hadn’t decided exactly how to answer it. I hesitate, but keep my eyes on hers. She deserves that much. “I know there was a car accident that involved two cars—your grandparents’ and one with three teens inside. Both your grandparents died along with a passenger from the other car. The driver was a sixteen-year-old boy who had been drinking.”

The kid’s blood alcoholbarelyregistered during testing, so he was far from drunk. In fact, had he been over twenty-one, it would have been a non-issue. There were other factors involved, too. It was pouring rain, and the road they were on was winding,with no barriers on either side. Speed may have been a factor, too, but it was never proven. From what I could tell, it was the absolute definition of a literal accident.

I keep all these thoughts to myself, because the last thing I want is to come across as if I’m defending the boy, now man, who played a hand in her grandparents’ death.

Biting back a sigh, I say, “I know the driver is the son of a wealthy politician, and that politician paid a hell of a lot of money to make the whole thing disappear, at least from the courts and the media.” And this is where I struggle with the circumstances around her grandparents’ death. My dad would, and has, done the same for me (and himself, his family, and his empire). To be fair, though, I’ve never actually killed anyone.

The one time I wanted to, I failed.

Nodding slowly, she asks, “I assume you were around here when it happened… Is that how you know?”

I shake my head. “I wasn’t.” And I don’t know how to maneuver this part. Telling Olivia the truth wouldn’t make her the first person in my life to know about it, but it would make her the first person I’d have to explain myself to. And, honestly, I’m not ready to walk that path.

I could give her the same lie I give to everyone else, but that puts her in the same category as the rest of the word, and that doesn’t feel right either.

So, I say, hoping my deception doesn’t show, “It happened the beginning of my sophomore year, and I was abroad for the first semester, so…”

“Abroad…” she says, quirking an eyebrow. She can ask me to elaborate, and that’d be fine. By now, I’ve got the lie seared so deep in my memory that it rolls off my tongue without a second thought. But she doesn’t ask that of me. Instead, she says, “What else do you know?”

I inhale a sharp breath, let it out slowly. “I know that there was a payout for an undisclosed amount, and… I know they sentenced the driver to a year at a boarding school for troubled boys.” In other words, his dad’s power and money saved his ass.

I refused both when it came to my sentencing.

Liv’s eyes widen as she stares at me, as if surprised I held that knowledge. “So… you know a lot…”

“Maybe…” I answer, shrugging. “But that’s not all of it, is it?”

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