I text them to say that I’m at work and am just now checking my phone. A chat bubble immediately pops up from Claire but goes away, then my phone is ringing again. I let it ring a few times while I look at her caller ID photo. It’s a candid picture of her mid-laugh, which I can hear in my head when I look at it. Her hazel eyes crinkle at the corners, where freckled cheeks form an innocent smile. We don’t look alike. We don’t act anything alike either, at least not anymore. Claire used to always copy everything I did. If my favorite color was purple, so was hers. If I declared that I hated broccoli, so did she. But then I was old enough to wear makeup and get highlights in my hair, and she wasn’t. Thus set the trajectory for the big personality divide. Golden-child Claire, and Sloane, the child sent from Satan himself to ruin my mother’s life.
I hit decline on the call and begin typing.
I said I’m at work and you can text me whatever it is.
I find that a little white lie here and there is better than having to tell my family that I’m severely hungover, especially after last year’s events. I consider myself lucky that Adrienne isn’t here yet to witness me in this state, since I’m sure my mom has her on Sloane patrol. That was one of her conditions for letting me finish out at Pembroke: moving in with my honors-college, fashion-major, has-her-life-together cousin. Adrienne spent all of last summer in New York City interning at Valentino, and I spent mine doing one hundred hours of community service. We are not the same.
Another text bubble from my sister. I watch the little dots that indicate she’s typing. But then they go away. My phone is ringing again, this time from my mom. I decline her call as well. Claire’s face pops up again, and instead of nostalgia, I’m just feeling annoyed. I answer the phone ready to bite her head off.
“Someone better be dead for you guys to be blowing me up like this,” I snap at her.
There’s a long pause on the other end of the line. “Um, well...” she says quietly.
I abruptly sit up in bed, which does nothing helpful for my head. “Wait,” I say, lowering my voice. “Is someone actually dead?”
Hearing Jonah’s name come from the other end of the phone makes my ears ring. A time-stopping, head-throbbing ringing that nearly drowns out the rest of what she says.
Claire fills in the blanks for me on how my high school ex-boyfriend died last night in a horrific car accident. My hand trembles as it hovers over my mouth and all I can say back isoh. The two of us sit in shared silence and I know if she were here right now she’d rest her head on my shoulder to comfort me; I’d then rest my head atop hers. The room tilts as I lean into the phone, wishing this were the case.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers when I don’t say anything more. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah. Just...” Shocked? Confused? I have more questions though I know she can’t answer them.
“Yeah,” she breathes. And I know she gets it without me having to say it.
When I hang up with Claire, I sit with my knees pulled into my chest, willing myself to cry, but no tears come. I start to thinkmaybe I should feel bad for not crying, but in a way, he was dead to me already. I wrote a eulogy for him and everything.
I get a text from my mom. She’s given up on trying to call me now that I got the news.
Are you ok?
Yeah I’m fine.
I get back up out of bed and dig through my backpack. Another text comes in from her.
Are you sure you’re at work? Claire said you sound like you just woke up. It’s almost 3 pm on a Saturday. Sloane, if I find out you’ve been out partying all weekend you will be coming back home.
I roll my eyes at that. A third message comes through.
You promised you wouldn’t get into trouble this year, don’t make me regret letting you go back.
I want to respond in all caps,I GET IT, but I don’t, it’s not worth the fight. I find my leather journal at the very bottom of my backpack. I bring it into bed with me and open it up to the first page, the first eulogy, Jonah’s.
For anyone who doesn’t know me, I am Jonah’s girlfriend of three years. Or was his girlfriend. Because our beloved Jonah was taken from us too soon, in a fiery plane crash over the Atlantic. It just blew up, no survivors, so tragic. Jonah had always wanted to see the world. So much so that one day he just got up and left for the other side of it with hardly a goodbye to spare. Literally, he texted his goodbye to me. Had he just stayed here with me like he promised, this wouldn’t have happened. Had he just followed through with our plans, he’d still be here. So, Jonah, now it is my turn to say goodbye, and I’ll do it in person and not through text because I’m not a coward. I wish you could’ve seen the world, but now all you are seeing is the bottom of the ocean. I hope it was worth it.
There it is, my first post-breakup eulogy. I was absolutely devastated when we broke up, because you always think your first love will last forever. And we had a plan. We would go to Pembroke together, where I would be an English major and he would study medicine. We’d make a bunch of new friends, but we’d never grow apart. We’d move into a one-bedroom apartment together in junior year and get a puppy named Rocky, after Jonah’s favorite movie. On graduation day we would toss our caps into the sky, all hopeful for the future, and as they tumbled back down, I would look over and see Jonah on one knee, with a ring in his hand.
Three days before freshman year started, I got a text from him saying that he was sorry but he wouldn’t be joining me at PC; he was taking a gap year to backpack through Europe. He said he’d always love me and cherish the time we had together. I swear I’ve never cried so hard in my life. I begged my mom not to make mego to Pembroke without him, but thankfully one of us had a brain and I ended up here anyway. I unfollowed him on all social media platforms—I couldn’t bear to see him living his life without me. I deleted every picture and video of him I ever took, and I did not keep in touch; in fact I’ve seen him only once since we ended things, at a bar back home over winter break two years ago. He gave me a nod and a smile, and I returned the gesture. A small agreement that we both ended up exactly where we needed to be. Jonah had stayed overseas after his gap year to attend a university in Scotland, and I stayed here in Massachusetts. It was like we never even happened.
The only proof of a relationship is right here in this fake eulogy.
Chapter 2
Four hours later I walk into Fresco, the Mexican restaurant off campus that’s best known for underage drinking and tabletop dancing, and slide into the booth with Annica and Danielle.
Annica greets me with an annoyed look; I’m late and they’ve been waiting. She flips her long auburn hair over a shoulder and slides a jumbo margarita my way from across the table. “Since I knew you’d be late.”
I take it, grimacing slightly as the glass slides over what looks like a footprint. “Oh, you just know me so well.”
