The Last Time We Say Goodbye Part 36

I understand now that n.o.body could have saved Ty but Ty. There's no one else to blame. Not you. Not me. Ty was holding all the cards.

I understand this now, with my head.

My heart still wishes for the time machine. I will have to make my heart forgive us for that night.

I can forgive you so much more easily than I can forgive myself.

And there's so much I would ask you to forgive me for: For shutting you out.

For the way I stopped talking to you.

For the absolutely stupid reason I gave as to why I wanted to break up.

I didn't break up with you because of your sperm. Or because it wasn't working between us, because it was working. It worked.

You deserve the truth.

Whether you choose to forgive me or not, you deserve to know that I meant it. What I said that night.

I love you.

I tried really hard not to. You have no idea how hard I tried.

Or maybe you do have some idea.

But I love you.

If you don't know what to do with this information, that's okay.

I just want to tell you everything, if you want to hear it. If you want to know.

I'll start with this.

WHEN I COME OUT OF DAMIAN'S HOUSE, Seth is sitting on the porch steps smoking a cigarette.

"Is everything all right with the kid?" he asks.

"Yeah. He's going to be okay."

"Good," he says with genuine relief. "I was about to come in and get you. I have to go. I'm late for work."

"You should go," I tell him.

"You going to need a ride anywhere?"

I clutch my backpack to my chest. "I can get a ride. Thank you, Seth. Really. Thank you."

"No sweat." He takes a long drag. "I'll call you if I ever need to pick a lock. d.a.m.n."

I laugh and take the cigarette out of his mouth and step on it.

"What the h.e.l.l?"

"I'm trying to keep everyone from killing themselves today," I explain.

He snorts and gives me a half-irritated smirk. Then he gets on the motorcycle, puts his helmet on, and starts up Georgia with a roar. I wave as he speeds away.

I can't believe I rode that thing.

I get out my cell. Mom won't be off work for another hour. I take a deep breath and dial another number.

"Hey, Dad," I say when he answers. "Can you come get me? Everything's okay-I'm fine, but I need a ride."

Dad pulls up to Steven's house and puts the car in park. We both peer out from the winds.h.i.+eld for a minute. The Blakes' house is a white two-story farmhouse with a big wraparound porch, like a well-maintained and well-loved version of Damian's house. All the lights are on. The windows are bright, and the house looks warm.

Steven is lucky to live in that house, with his mom and his dad and his sisters, all under that roof.

I try very hard not to resent him for that.

I ring the bell. Sarah answers. I can tell by the look on her face that she's not sure what she thinks of me being here right now.

"Is Steven home?" I ask.

She pushes the door open and steps aside to allow me to come in. "Steven!" she yells as she stalks off. "Someone to see you."

My heart starts going fast when he appears at the end of the hall. For roughly 2.5 seconds I almost chicken out.

"Hi," he says softly. "How's Damian? I've been so worried all day. But I figured you would have called if . . ."

"Damian's all right. False alarm."

Steven lets out a breath. "Good. Whew. Good." He tilts his head to one side, confused now as to why I'm here, and looks at me hard, before seeming to decide something. "Do you want to have dinner with us? We just sat down."

"Oh, thanks, but no. My dad's waiting for me in the car."

"Your dad?"

"I just stopped by to give you this."

I hand him the journal.

He looks at me blankly. "Should I know what-"

"No. It's an experiment, of sorts. It started out as an a.s.signment from my therapist." I find that I can't look directly at him when he's holding the journal. "I want you to read it. I mean, if you want to read it. You don't have to. Dave-my therapist-he said that I needed a recipient for my writing, like an audience. And tonight I figured out-I've concluded-that my recipient is you. If you want to read it. If you don't, I get that, and I can take it-"

"I'll read it," he says, taking a step back like I might make a grab for it.

I think, Oh dear G.o.d, what have I done?

"Good," I say, backing toward the door. "Have a nice night."

Dad drives me home. He doesn't ask questions, which I appreciate. When I get to the front door, Mom comes out to meet me. She looks a little bit freaked out. She watches Dad drive off without comment.

"Do I want to know?" she asks.

"No. Is there anything to eat? I'm starved."

She finds us a box of macaroni and cheese, which she makes on the stove and then cuts some hot dogs into. I feel about five years old when I'm eating it, but I wolf it down. Mom watches me until I finish.

"Are you all right, Lexie?" She reaches across the table and grabs my hand. "Do you want to talk about it? I'm here for you, sweetie. I know things have been hard, but I'm here for you. I will always be here for you."

I squeeze her hand. "I know. I know you are." I take a deep breath. "I was at Damian's house this afternoon. He was one of Ty's friends."

"Yes, I know Damian," she says. "Did you know, he put the most beautiful paper rose into your brother's coffin? I've never seen anything quite like it."

Wow, the things I did not know that would have been so helpful. "Anyway, I thought that Damian might be feeling like Ty and Patrick, and that he might need my help. But then it turned out that he helped me."

She nods. "Funny how that works."

"I'm sorry for how I've been."

She blinks at me, startled. "How you've been? There's nothing wrong with how you've been. You've been getting by the best you can."

"Well, I'm sorry for how I acted in the car on the way home from Graceland. That was not okay."

"You said what I needed to hear," she says. "I'm glad you did. It woke me up to what I was doing to you, while I was paying so much more attention to myself."

"Mom . . ."

"I kept feeling your brother near me," she says with a sigh, looking down into her lap. "Sometimes I would smell him, or I would hear his footsteps on the stairs, and I was trying to drink it away, Lex, and I'm sorry for that. I won't do it again."

"Okay."

"About a week ago, I was driving back from work," she says, "and I felt this presence with me, in the car."

Uh-oh. Ghost in the car. Never a good thing.

"I was crying, the way I . . . do sometimes, and then I just felt it so strongly, that someone was there with me."

She shakes her head like she still can't believe it.

"And then what?" I prompt.

"Then I heard the voice."

I stare at her. "And what did Ty say?"

She glances up at me, startled. "It wasn't Tyler, sweetie."

"It wasn't?" I'm confused now.

"It was another voice. And it said, 'Will you put your son in my hands?'"

I swallow, hard. "Mom . . ."

"And I said yes," she murmurs. She lowers her head again, but she's not crying. "I said yes." She takes a deep breath, the kind of breath you take when a weight has suddenly been lifted from your shoulders.

"I haven't felt Ty since then," she tells me.

I put my hand over hers.

It has been one crazy day.

The doorbell rings. Mom and I glance at each other.

"I'll get it," I say.

I go to the door and open it. On the other side is Steven, the journal in his hand. He looks thrashed, red-eyed and bleary, and his hair in the front is all poufed up like he's been tugging on it.

Steven's a fast reader. I'd forgotten that.

"Hi," I whisper.

He's crying. He lunges through the door and folds me into his arms, crying.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry," he says, and sobs into my hair.

Something inside me fractures. Breaks.

"I'm sorry, too," I say, and I'm crying then, finally, like the floodgates have opened, and we're clinging to each other, weeping, as the water pours down and down.

IN THE DREAM, THIS LAST DREAM, I'm playing solitaire in a dark room. It's like an interrogation scene from a movie, a small card table and two chairs, a dim overhanging light. I am comfortable here. I turn the cards over one by one, not making sense of them. Sometimes I see them as little yellow Post-its. I keep turning the cards over: a king of hearts, an ace of spades, and then the note to my mother. Sorry Mom but I was below empty.

I lay this card in the discard pile.

Then Ty is there, on the outside edge of the light.

"How did you get in here?" I ask.

"I don't know. It's your dream. You tell me."

He sits in the chair across from me. He doesn't look like a ghost. He seems real. He even looks taller to me, and older, like he's aged during the time he's been gone. He is not quite the Ty I knew.

"Do you remember how to play war?" he asks.

I give him a look like, Oh, please.

"You always cheated," he says.