Didi
Zac kisses my shoulder and climbs out of bed. I watch him stroll to the bathroom and immediately I think of Walker. I can’t stop myself from comparing the two of them. And the comparisons aren’t good. Zac turns on the shower and shuts the bathroom door.
I roll onto my back and stare at the ceiling, pulling the sheets tight around me. What am I doing here? It’s been five days since the funeral and instead of getting better, the wound’s starting to feel infected, suppurating. I keep seeing Walker with that girl. My face burns as I think of all the things he said to me, all the lines he fed me about seeing me. What bullshit. I’m such an idiot. He never told me that he loved me. That should have been a sign right there that he wasn’t serious, that he was just playing me.
I hate him. I still love him. I hate him. And I can’t stop thinking about him. Or Dodds. I still can’t believe he’s dead. It still doesn’t feel real. None of it does. It’s like a never-ending nightmare. At night I start awake, heart pounding, seeing Dodds’s face swollen purple. His tongue lolling out.
I reach over to the bedside table and slide my hand into my purse, pulling out the letter. It’s creased and stained I’ve read it so often—I have it almost memorized; but I can’t stop myself from scouring it again for clues. What could I have done differently?
Didi,
Thanks for being a friend. I know you’re the kind of person who’ll try to figure out what you could have done to stop me, but you couldn’t have done anything. No one could have.
Life’s not all rainbows and unicorns, but I hope it is for you. If anyone deserves it you do.
Become a doc. Marry Walker. Be happy.
Callum
My phone buzzes. I reach for it: it’s my mom. I switch it off. I don’t want to talk to her. I don’t want to talk to anyone, in fact. Being with Zac is easy because he doesn’t ask questions.
And how would I even be able to start telling him, or anyone? I’m still reeling from the shock and can barely admit it to myself. My own mother. And José. All Zac knows is that I’ve had a falling out with my mom and I don’t want to go home.
The image of them having sex is seared into my brain. After everything she’s always preached to me about honesty and trust being the bedrock of a relationship, after believing that her and my dad were the paragon of a happy marriage . . . I feel sick to my stomach.
After I walked in on them in Sanchez’s room, I ran to my car and just drove. I was planning on going to Jessa’s, but halfway to LA I remembered she was away filming, so instead I ended up driving to Zac’s. If I stop to examine it, probably the motivation was a giant screw you to Walker, for leaving with Miranda without saying a word to me, for lying to me all along, for not being there when I needed him.
But it hasn’t worked. Falling into bed with Zac hasn’t made me feel in any way better. It’s made me feel worse, because every time Zac touches me all I can do is think about Walker and how much better it was with him.
Zac comes out of the bathroom a few minutes later wearing a towel wrapped around his waist. “So,” he says, sitting down on the edge of the bed and resting his hand on my leg. “This is becoming a regular thing, you staying over.”
“Yeah,” I say, sitting up. “I’m sorry. I can—”
“No,” he says, interrupting me. “I like it. Stay as long as you need.”
“Oh,” I say. “Thanks. I mean, right now just having a place to crash is great.” My eyes start to fill with tears. I’m like a busted, leaking fire hydrant. “Until I figure out what to do with my life.”
I swallow the lump in my throat. I don’t know what’s happening with my internship or my PhD. I want to talk to my dad, but I can’t bring myself to call him. I don’t know what to do, whether to tell him about my mom or not, and I’m embarrassed to face him after what he walked in on.
So I’m doing the only thing I can do—avoiding him and everyone else into the bargain.