Page 51 of Grief & Glitter

“Ten years, Noah.” He looked away. “Ten fucking years you’ve hated me.”

“I don’t hate you.”

I laughed, and it came out ugly. “You’ve got a strange way of showing it.”

“I never hated you.”

“You kept asking me why I couldn’t save him.” Nothing. “Every time I saw you. Like I hadn’t already asked myself that a thousand times.”

“Because I’m a fucking coward!” His eyes squeezed shut. “Because it was easier.”

I stopped breathing. Dad leaned forward. “Noah?”

Noah covered his face with one hand. “It was easier if it was Gideon.”

I couldn’t move. “What was?”

Noah began to cry, not quietly. His whole face folded, his shoulders shaking under the thin hospital gown. Dad started to stand, but Noah shoved his hand out. “No.” Dad froze. Noah looked at me. “I dared him.”

I stared at him. “What?”

“Ethan. That morning…” The room disappeared. There was only Noah. “I dared him in the kitchen while you were still asleep. He deleted my Call of Duty profile. I was so fucking angry. I called him chicken shit.”

I couldn’t breathe as Noah wiped his face with his hand. “I kept at him. Told him he was a scared baby for not wanting to skate that morning. He got pissed off.”

“Noah.”

“He wasn’t supposed to go that far. He was supposed to skate out a few feet, prove he wasn’t scared, and come straight back. That’s all I said.” Dad made a broken sound. Noah kept talking. “I never thought he’d actually try for the point. I never thought I wouldn’t even be there to stop him.”

He didn’t just go a few feet. I’d looked over. He was already past the drop-off, skating for the point like it was nothing, laughing too loud, too pleased with himself.

“I yelled at him to come back,” I said, broken. “The ice went before I even got close.”

“Gid—”

I stood so fast the chair went over. “I went after him as far as I could before it started cracking under me too. Tyler dragged me back before I went through. By the time anyone reached him⁠—”

I couldn’t finish it.

“I know,” Noah said, and it sounded like it cost him everything he had left.

“You weren’t there. You don’t get to say I know like you were there.”

“I know I wasn’t there.” His voice cracked. “That’s the whole point. I sent him out to prove something to me because I was pissed about a fucking game, and I wasn’t even there to stop it, and knowing the last thing he ever heard from me was chicken shit.”

“You kept asking me why I couldn’t save him.”

Noah sobbed. “I know.”

“You made me believe I killed him.”

“Because you were there and I wasn’t, and it was easier to let you carry it than to tell you what I’d done.”

Ten years. Ten fucking years. “I believed you.” That silenced him. I pressed both hands to my head like it might keep my skull from splitting open. “I believed you.”

“I’m sorry.”

“No.”