Why didn’t I die too?
I rocked back, tears springing to my eyes as my phone sounded off again.
The big, triumphant moment that I’d always been waiting and wishing for—the day my mother apologizes and welcomes me back—would end with her throwing me right back onto the street.
Maybe she would let me hang on to her final gesture and not remove me from her will once again, but even if she didn’t, ten thousand dollars and old furniture weren’t enough to cover IVF, and it certainly wasn’t enough for what happens after IVF.
It wouldn’t cover getting me and my baby out of a drug-infested apartment building surrounded by cops. It wouldn’t pay for me to go back to school and get my degree. And it wouldn’t pay for me to give my baby the good parts of my childhood, like flying back to Korea for Chuseok with the whole family, or drama summer camp with her best friends.
I turned my head, gazing in the direction of the manor. “There’s nothing waiting for me there...” My eyes drifted back the way I came. “...and there was never any life worth living back there.”
Dan blew up my phone again, drowning out my whispery croak.
“I’m the one who should’ve died.”
Dropping my head in my hand, I answered the fucking phone.
“Hello.”
“Sar—! Wait, hello? Who is this?” His irritation filled my ear. “Who the fuck are you, man? Why are you answering my girl’s phone?”
My mouth wanted to snap that I wasn’t his girl...
...but nothing came out.
He doesn’t recognize the smoker’s hacking cough that’s become my voice.
“Hello?! I said who is this? Where’s Sarah?”
I dropped my hand, slowly lifting my head up, and up, and up—my gaze latching on eyes I couldn’t see.
“Hey! You better fucking answer me!” he roared. “I swear, if that bitch is fucking around on me, I’ll—!”
“She’s dead.”
“What?” His anger snapped like a cold front—all heat and fire doused under frigid shock. “Wait, what did you say?”
“I... I...” My mind raced a mile a minute, throwing words at me like a dealer tossing product out the window with the cops on his tail. “There was an accident,” I rasped. “I pulled over to see if everyone was okay, and if theyneeded help and... she’s dead, man. There’s nothing anyone could’ve done. I’m sorry.”
“No, no, no, stop,” he cried. “Just stop!”
I’d give the bastard something. He actually sounded stricken.
“I don’t understand what you’re saying. What accident? Where are you? Where is she!”
“I’m out on some road in the middle of nowhere,” I confessed. “I was driving cross-country when I saw a dead deer on the highway and skid marks. I had a bad feeling, so I stopped to look and...”
“Oh, God, no. Oh my God! No,” he barked. “No, that’s not possible. You’ve got it wrong. Why the fuck would Sarah be out on some highway in the middle of nowhere? You’ve got the wrong person.”
“This is literally her phone, guy.” I was almost impressed with myself for sticking to the ruse. Part of me believed what I was saying. “You called her yourself—”
“No! She’s not dead! Whoever the fuck’s in that car stole her phone.”
I tossed my head. “I don’t know anything about that. All I know is I need to call the police, and get out of here. I don’t want anything more to do with this. I’m not going to be in a police station all night, questioned about why I was found next to a dead woman.” The bullshit just kept falling and falling out of my mouth.
“No one’s going to care about why you stumbled on some junkie thief. That’s not Sarah, and—and— I’ll prove it!” he burst out. “Send me a pic. I’ll tell you it’s not my Sarah.”
I was still shaking my head even though he couldn’t see. “The phone’s locked. How am I supposed to—”
