But something in you bubbles up. And before you can clamp your mouth shut, before you can stop yourself, before you can call the words back, you tell her.
23DAYTON
You’re nervous Monday morning, dread pooling in your stomach as you try to count up all the hours, minutes, seconds before you’ll have to see Farshid again in history.
Is he still mad? Will he even talk to you? How are you supposed to do a project together after what happened?
Did he even make it home safely? You don’t know how far away he lives from you. What if he tripped and fell and has been in a ditch since Saturday? What if you were the last one to see him alive? Would that make you a suspect? Is it even a crime? What do all the different degrees of murder mean anyway?
“You okay?” Marshall asks as he pulls into his spot.
“I’m fine.”
“You’ve been weird all weekend.”
“Have not.”
You haven’t been weird. You’ve just been thinking.
Wondering if Farshid was right and you haven’t done nearly as much as you should have done to make up forthe incident. Wondering if you’ve been the bad guy all along.
Wondering if it’s too late to change things now.
“You ever think you’re right about something and then realize you’re wrong?” you blurt out.
“I’m your older brother. I’m never wrong.”
You snort and shove him toward his door as you open your own. He gets out, too, grabs his backpack from the back seat, and looks at you over his car’s trunk.
“For real, though?” he asks. “Yeah.”
“What did you do?”
He shrugs. “Tried to do better. What else can you do?”
You don’t know.
You thought you were doing better.
Now nothing makes sense.
You shrug. “Thanks, I guess.”
You can’t decide if you’re relieved or not when you get to Ms. Suchecki’s class and Farshid’s already at his desk. His shoulders take up too much room, but he’s hunched over, his head bowed over his notebook so his hair hides his face.
Still, when you take your seat, he straightens and looks right at you.
Not dead in a ditch, at least, but what now? Is he going to punch you right in the middle of class? There’s something different about him, though. Something in his face, but you can’t read it.
You swallow and wait, but he doesn’t speak, so you have to. “You good?”
He blinks at you. Looks away, and then back again. “I wanted to apologize.”
That’s the last thing you expected, so you just blurt out, “Huh?”
You don’t even correct yourself.
“I’m sorry,” he clarifies. “For my behavior Saturday.”
