He stretches out his hand, the wind making his hair tickle his forehead. I stick out my hand and let him pull me up from the swing.
Are you dead?I want to ask, but he can’t tell me that. I slip my fingers between his and he squeezes, his palm warm.
You can’t be dead.
We sit on a bench, damp with moisture, and I can’t stop looking at him. Zach. Memory Zach.
“What?” he asks, quiet in the dark.
“It drives me crazy the way you’re dressed,” I say, even though it’s the last thing on my mind. “I get that you’re not really cold, that you won’t die from hypothermia”—especially if you’re already dead—“but it’s still really bizarre that you’re wearing that shirt when it’s so cold out.”
I unzip my puffy coat and peel it off. Then I hold out the left side to him. “Here.”
One of his eyebrows skitters up, but he takes it, amused. Scoots closer. Closer.
The warmth of his body against mine makes me lightheaded.
I wrap the right side of the coat around me. He pulls his half of the jacket around his body the best he can, which is ridiculous because it is much too small for him, not to mention both of us. But we are sharing it just the same, our bodies pressed close to each other, our breaths loud and warm, indistinguishable.
“Better?” he asks, the hint of a laugh in his voice, but his face is weirdly serious. And his eyes seem glued to my lips.
It makes me self-conscious. It makes me think too much abouthislips.
“Better,” I whisper, and his face is suddenly even closer than before. He smells like a mix of mint and cigarettes.
“Zach?”
Zach. His name is Zach.In the car yesterday, Katy didn’t talk about him like he was dead. Neither did my parents. He can’t be dead.
“Hmm?” he says, still so, so close.
“I want to find you. The real you.”
BEFORE
Early October
Once school starts, it gets harder and harder for Zach and me to see each other. Especially since he’s just gotten another job, working at the Cineplex at the mall. When we’re not at school, he’s either working or doing something with Raj, and I’m at orchestra practice or viola lessons or doing something with Katy.
So when Zach tells me his parents are going out of town for the weekend, and Kevin is at work,andhe doesn’t have to be at the store, it feels like fate is screaming at us.
I make up something about going to study at Katy’s and then wait outside for Zach’s piece-of-shit car. I’ve grown to appreciate its tacky bright blue color, the way it whines every single time Zach hits the gas.
“Hey, you,” Zach says as I climb into the passenger’s seat.
I lean over and kiss him. “Hey, yourself.” A drop of water falls on my chin and I giggle, then brush Zach’s wildandwet hair up.
The car smells like cologne, and my ears warm as I realize he put some thought into what we’d be doing today. We hadn’tsaidit in so many words, but we had both clearly been thinking it. I’d brought a small bag with a toothbrush and hairbrush and makeup and other very important items.
“Where did your parents go again?” I ask Zach.
“To Caldwell. They can’t get enough of Russell.” The last time I was over, Zach’s mom had insisted Zach show me something of the hours of footage he’d taken of his nephew when they’d gone up to Caldwell the week before. Zach blushed and pulled out his phone, showing me a pink-skinned baby with brown hair.
“He’s adorable,” I whispered, staring at the video of a cooing, wriggling newborn. I felt a tug at my chest, an overwhelming desire to reach through the screen and grab hold of Russell’s tiny pinkie. I like babies, but the thought of babysitting has always terrified me.What if I do something wrong? What if something bad happens and there’s no one to help me?Maybe I inherited Mom’s slight aversion to little kids, or maybe it’s because, being the youngest, I haven’t had much experience with them.
Russellisadorable, though, if only because I know they have a bunch of good-looking men in their family and he’d have to go seriously wrong to not wind up at Adorable.
We drive the rest of the way to his house, talking about school and his dad’s store and the solo Mrs. Dubois gave me a week ago.
