A guitar rhythm plays and the crowd jumps, and Elijah kisses me like we’re all alone in this packed room.
The lead singer, Andre, introduces the band, and I know we should stop. We should turn around and watch the show, but I’ve never wanted something so badly in my life. We don’t stop kissing until Andre says, “I dedicate the first song to this couple in the front. If that’s not love, I don’t know what is.”
I break away from Elijah and look back, my head spinning and my body reeling, and find Andre looking straight at me.
He winks.
Chapter Nineteen
Nothing can kill my high for the next week — not even the ever-pressing and gnawing fact that Elijah hasn’t contacted me since the concert. He’d promised that he would try and told me not to give up on him.
Something in his eyes made me believe in him. Sasha’s eyes wouldn’t betray me, not ever. Her brother’s won’t either.
I’m going on with my days, school and work and school and work, and I’m pretending like everything is peachy. Sasha has more adventures for us, and Elijah promised to be at every one, no matter how crazy his life at home became or how many extra shifts he picked up at the body shop. He finally admitted that he’s been working more to save up money for college tuition, or at least the computer he’ll no doubt need once classes start.
I swallow a lump in my throat and drag the broom across the floor at Izzy’s, sweeping up glitter, ribbon cuttings and little pieces of floral tape. After the concert, Elijah and I had a wonderful time together. We held hands and walked to a coffee shop that had a poetry reading on the balcony. We didn’t kiss any more after that earth-shattering embrace in front of the lead singer of Zombie Radio, but something in us changed. Now I know he wasn’t avoiding me.
Still, no matter how passionate he seemed when he promised that he was fine, that he’d be there for Sasha’s next adventure, I can’t shake the feeling that something is wrong. It’s hard knowing someone isn’t accessible every second of the day, thanks to cell phones and social media. This distance truly keeps us from getting to know each other.
The bells on the door jingle, so I abandon my broom in the back of the shop and head up front. Izzy is at a chiropractor’s appointment this afternoon, and she’s left me in charge for the first time ever.
I open my mouth to greet the customer. Then I see a sweep of white-blond hair and yet another velour tracksuit, so I rush up and hug her instead.
“Mrs. Cade!” The real flowers all around us are no match for her floral perfume. It has a nostalgic appeal that will always make me feel at home. “How are you?” I ask, instead of What are you doing here?, which is on the tip of my tongue. I know why she’s here: because the flowers on Sasha’s grave need to be updated. It just sucks to be reminded.
“Sweetheart, I’m doing just fine,” she says, releasing me with a good squeeze on my arms first. “How’s business?”
“Everyone wants black roses for Halloween,” I say, glancing toward the wall of the shop that we’ve decorated for the holiday. “It’s kind of morbid.”
“I’ll say!” Mrs. Cade looks over the Halloween display and purses her lips. “Do you think Sasha would like those?”
“We have black roses coated with glitter. I think she’d like those the best.” The stabbing pain in my chest from talking about Sasha is still there, but it’s getting more manageable every day. The only problem is that now there are so many other things I can’t talk about.
“I’ll take a dozen black glittery roses,” Mrs. Cade says, reaching into her purse for her wallet. “I agree that Sasha will totally get a kick out of them.”
“Are you taking them to her grave?” I ask as I pick out the prettiest roses we have and wrap them up with purple and orange ribbon.
She doesn’t say where she’s going, but she knows I know. “You could come with me, if you’d like …”
“I get off at six,” I say, glancing at the clock. Still twenty minutes to go.
“Perfect. I’ll just have a coffee across the street and then come back and get you, okay?”
“Sounds good.” I smile, but I am feeling some pain. I’m not only keeping this epic secret about Sasha’s life, I’m also lying to Mrs. Cade about my own life. Elijah is my friend now, maybe something more. But it won’t ever happen if he has to stay hidden in the dark.
***
Seven days. No emails, no carrier pigeons, no message written in the clouds. Nothing from Elijah. I sit cross-legged on my bed, my laptop in front of me, checking again. It blows my mind that he doesn’t have a phone. They sell cheap prepaid phones at gas stations. If I didn’t think he’d stubbornly refuse it, I’d buy him one myself.
I take a deep breath. It’s Saturday, and I have a lunch date at the Cades’ house in an hour. Mrs. Cade invited me over when we were at the cemetery yesterday. I don’t know how I’ll get through yet another meal with my best friend’s parents and pretend that nothing has changed. Still, I have to do it for Sasha.
Before I take a shower, I walk into my closet and stare at the bag on the floor. It’s hidden, a shoulder bag slumped next to a bunch of my other crap, and only I know what’s inside. Elijah’s work shirt.
Bending down, I reach inside and pull out the shirt, like I’ve done almost every day since the concert. It’s embarrassing, but this is my only link to the guy who disappears until Sasha calls us back together.
I run my fingers over the stitching of his name. It’s the only thing that confirms he’s a real person, not just some email address of ones and zeros online, pretending to be real. He is real, and I’ve seen him and touched him and talked to him. I just have to have faith that I’ll hear from him again. Then I get an idea.
Monterrey’s Auto Body Shop stares at me from the patch on Elijah’s shirt. I pull out my phone and search the business name, finding an address in just a few seconds. It’s a fifty-minute drive from my house. A surge of excitement rises in me as I stare at the shirt in my hand.
After lunch with the Cades, I’m going to give Elijah’s shirt back.
***
The smell of takeout Chinese food fills the air on the Cades’ patio. I fill my plate with some of everything. Mr. Cade is in a cheery mood today, and he’s even wearing cargo shorts and a polo shirt, which is about as casual as the man gets. Mrs. Cade wears a lavender pantsuit and a string of pearls around her neck. They’re a picture-perfect wealthy married couple, from the outside. Inside, they’re still broken with grief.
Sunny, who usually begs for food at any opportunity, lies on the patio with his head against the leg of Sasha’s chair. When I call his name, his eyes flit to me but he doesn’t move. I slide my chair back, take a piece of chicken off my plate and kneel down next to him.
“Sweet and sour chicken,” I say, holding it out to him. “Sasha’s favorite.”
He eats the chicken, then leans into my hand when I scratch behind his ears. He’s seventy in dog years, so in a way, he’s spent more time with Sasha than even I did. “I love you, doggie,” I whisper to him, repeating what Sasha always said. He just stares at me, his unmoving tail a sign that the happiness has been taken away from him.
I have an okay time at lunch. We talk about Mr. Cade’s job and how he’s had several successful wins for his clients lately. Mrs. Cade tells us about her new ladies’ group and how she’s made a few friends. She hasn’t told them about Sasha, and we agree that she shouldn’t feel pressured to talk about it if she doesn’t want to. For now, the Cades are just trying to find a new life, one that goes on day after day without a daughter.
They ask me about school and work, and if I’m still planning on becoming a veterinarian after I graduate. I have to stop myself several times from mentioning anything too … revealing. Basically, I spend an hour talking in circles around the safe topics of school and work.
I stay for a cup of coffee, not exactly becaus
e I want it but because Mr. Cade gets a work call and heads to his office, and Mrs. Cade acts like she doesn’t want me to leave just yet. I plan on heading straight to Austin when this is over, but I’m not going to rush this time with Sasha’s parents. They need me more than I need them.
Mrs. Cade messes with her coffee maker. There’s a weird vibe in the air, and I get the feeling she wants to tell me something but hasn’t quite worked up the guts to say it yet. A sliver of fear slips up my spine. Can she tell I’m hiding something from her?
But when she finally turns around, stirring her sugar cube into her coffee and taking a seat next to me at the kitchen island, I’m pretty sure it’s not that.
“Are you okay?” I ask just to break the silence.
“Oh sweetheart,” she says slowly, staring into her coffee. “I don’t think I’ll ever be okay again. But yes, I am fine right now.” She takes a sip and then cradles the coffee mug in her hands, her soft brown eyes searching mine. “There is something I wanted to talk to you about.”
The way she says it eases my nerves. I know it’s not about Elijah. “I’m here,” I say. “For anything you need.”
“Well,” she says, “I’ve been meaning to talk to you about Sasha’s room. You were her best friend, so if there’s anything of hers you’d like to keep, I want you to take it.”
Whatever I’d been expecting, it wasn’t that. “That’s … really nice of you,” I say as I think it over. But I don’t have to think it over. I look over at the sweet furry Labrador cuddled at my feet. Sunny. I want Sasha’s dog. A little flutter starts in my stomach. Sunny is the only living part of Sasha that Mrs. Cade has left.
Mrs. Cade’s hand is extra warm when it covers mine and squeezes. “Anything you’d like, okay? Clothes, trinkets. You can take her TV if you want. I know she’d want you to have it all. It’d make her happy.”
“I don’t think her TV would fit in my room,” I say with a laugh. “But maybe I’ll just go and look around?”
“Of course. Take what you want. You can always come back for more.” The woman is selfless, healing in the only way she knows how. She would want to help Elijah. I just know she would.
In Sasha’s room, I struggle with the feeling that I might look over and find Sasha sitting at her vanity, doing her eye makeup. Or emerging from the closet in a dress entirely too short. I go to the closet first, opening the door and stepping inside, letting the scent of Sasha fill my lungs. I take two Zombie Radio shirts, then a PCHS shirt from last year when we drew all over it in permanent marker. Sasha used it as a sleep shirt, and it’ll be my sleep shirt now. Tucking the clothes under my arm, I venture back out into her room and sit at her vanity. Sunny sidles up next to me, resting his chin on my leg.
My eyes have dark circles that makeup can’t hide. My hair is a darker brown than it was this summer, and it’s almost long enough to make a tiny ponytail at the base of my neck. Not that I would do that, because it’d look hella tacky. Tacky enough to make Sasha roll over laughing.
Pictures of us are everywhere, ascending in age from eight to seventeen. I have copies of them all at home, so I leave them where they are.
On Sasha’s computer desk, I take a tiny glass elephant that we got at the county fair a few years ago. Mine is in my room, sitting on the windowsill. Sasha’s will go next to it.
I turn around, holding tightly to Sasha’s shirts as I survey the room. I don’t really want her things. I want her here. I walk to the door and then turn around, taking one last look at her room.
Then I rush back inside and take her pillow. It’s memory foam, encased in her favorite Egyptian cotton pillowcase, and it smells just like her strawberry shampoo. I grin as I clutch it to my chest. Mrs. Cade said anything I want, after all. I choose this.
A soft thump hits my foot as I step into the hallway. I look down and find a silver flash drive that has fallen out of the pillowcase. My blood runs cold as I bend to pick it up.
A hidden flash drive can only mean one thing. But how could she have known I’d find it here?
My heart thudding, I return to her room and turn on her laptop. It powers up quickly, showing Sasha’s wallpaper photo of a famous library with three floors of books connected by a tall, rolling ladder. Sunny is watching me curiously.
I try to swallow but my throat is too dry. The flash drive slips into the USB port and my hands shake as I wait for it to load. Only one file appears. A video named MAYBE_DELETE.
My pulse thunders in my ears. My finger hovers over the mouse pad. Should I click or not? My eyes blur and then I see the tiny little camera lens on the laptop. This is the same camera she used to record so many of the videos she’s sent us. She sat here, at this laptop, and planned her entire last wish without me even knowing.
Whatever this file is, she thought about deleting it.
But she didn’t.
I bite my lip and double-click.
Sasha’s face appears on her own computer. She looks more vibrant than in the last few videos. This one must have been recorded a long time ago. “Hey guys,” she says, a flirty grin on her face.
Chills prickle down my arms as I sit in the same spot she was when she recorded this. Sunny hops up next to me on the bed, ears perked at the sound of his human’s voice. He looks around the room and then flops down. “So … you’ve probably figured this out by now. I mean, right? Look at you two.” She leans forward and wiggles her eyebrows.
No, I haven’t figured it out, I think.
“Maybe I’ve read too many love stories and it’s turned me into a hopeless romantic, but I just have a feeling about you two. Rocki, you’re adorbs and loyal and a little bit stuck in your shell, but I think Elijah can break you out of it. Elijah — not to be gross because you’re my brother — but you are totally gorgeous, judging by the pictures I forced you to send me.”
Sasha rolls her eyes and looks directly at me. “Can you believe his Instagram account isn’t filled with selfies? He’s hella retro, but I like it. I think there’s nothing more worthy of a fairy-tale ending than the dying girl’s brother and best friend falling for each other.”
I can’t believe what I’m hearing. I guess I should have known she’d be onto us. The girl picks up on everything, even in the afterlife. Why didn’t she send us this video, then?
Sasha tilts her head. “So if you’re hearing this and you’re like, ew, gross, then okay.” She holds up her hands. “Maybe I’m wrong. Totally NBD. But I just have a feeling, and I wanted to let you know it’s okay. Don’t feel bad for finding happiness outside of my death, okay?”
She waits a beat. “As for my parents … don’t tell them. Not yet, okay? They’ll be upset that I planned this huge adventure for you and left them out of it, and I still feel a little bad about that, but they never wanted me to find my brother in the first place. They need to be eased into this.”
A shadow moves into the room and I nearly launch out of my seat. My hand slaps the space bar on Sasha’s laptop and her video pauses. Sunny saunters by, not realizing he nearly caused me to jump out of my own skin. What if he had been Mrs. Cade? “Shit.” I breathe, willing my heart to slow down. I need to pay better attention.
I play the rest of the video. Sasha gnaws on her bottom lip. “I just — I don’t know. I’ve been thinking about this video for a few days. I think you two will make a great couple, and I just have this gut feeling that maybe it’ll work out for you. I’m still working out how you should tell my parents. I feel like asking you to lie to them about who Elijah is forever is kind of epically wrong, but” — she shrugs — “I’ll make a new video as soon as I figure out what you should do. That is, you know, if you two start liking each other. Totally not a big deal if you don’t.”
She winks and the video ends.
I rip out the flash drive, shove it in my pocket and close Sasha’s laptop. My thoughts are everywhere at once. It’s not like the heaven
s part and white doves fly out of the sky to the chorus of a thousand angels singing hallelujah, but it’s close.
Sasha just gave me permission to have this huge crush on her brother. I never realized how heavy the guilt of liking Elijah was weighing on me until it finally lifts away …
… and I am free.
Chapter Twenty
My parents are planning a date night tonight. It’s an event that was nearly nonexistent when I was a kid, but now it happens maybe once every other month when Dad’s schedule aligns with having a day off on a weekend. The glorious news is that I can practically run off and join a cult and tell them about it, and they won’t care because it’s date night. The bad part is that now I’m more than a little nervous to show up at Elijah’s work.
With the next few hours free and Elijah’s shirt in my passenger seat, I begin the drive while replaying Sasha’s secret video in my mind. The landscape grows hilly as I near Austin. Interstate 10 is pretty barren until I’m on the outskirts of the city, which is exactly where my GPS is leading me. I turn onto a side road and meander through an older neighborhood, passing a couple of gas stations and laundromats. This is unquestionably the bad part of town. I try not to imagine a world where one sibling is adopted into a life of luxury and wealth, while the other sibling ages out of the system and ends up here.
My chest constricts as I near Monterrey’s Auto Body Shop. It’s a long metal building with a faded plastic sign near the road. The driveway is gravel and full of potholes, broken-down cars and a black motorcycle. I park in the very first spot, on the other side of a tow truck and out of sight from the small window near the only door. A neon Open sign lights up the narrow window.
I hold Elijah’s work shirt in my hands, my shoes crunching over the white rocky driveway.
I can’t wait to tell him about the video. Maybe he’ll be so thrilled he’ll ask me on a date, and I’ll get to feel the wind in my hair on the back of his motorcycle. I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from grinning as I walk up to the weathered door and pull it open. A rush of cold air hits me as I enter into a small tiled room that looks like something straight out of the early nineties. Dark wood-paneled walls are covered with posters and brand names of car parts, plus some old award plaques from the Chamber of Commerce. Two ratty chairs are against the wall to my left, and an old desk is in front of me, the ripped leather chair empty. It smells a little like old coffee and a little like mildew in here, and the place is eerily quiet. I’d expected to hear machines rumbling, cars idling or, I don’t know — the hiss of spray paint or something.
The Last Wish of Sasha Cade Page 14
