“Why are you giving me this?” Mateo asks.
“So you don’t crack your head open if you fall off the bike.” I sit on the bike. “It would suck if your Last Friend killed you.”
“This isn’t a tandem bike,” he says.
“There are pegs,” I say. Tagoe would ride on the back pegs all the time, trusting me to not crash into any cars and send him flipping off.
“You want me to stand on the back of your bike while we ride in darkness?” Mateo asks.
“While wearing a helmet,” I say. Holy shit, I really thought he was ready to take chances.
“No. This bike is going to be the death of us.”
This day is really doing a number on him. “No it won’t. Trust me. I’ve ridden this bike every day for almost two years. Hop on, Mateo.”
He’s mad hesitant, that’s obvious, but he forces the helmet onto his head. There’s extra pressure to be cautious because I’d hate for an “I told you so!” in the afterlife. Mateo holds on to my shoulders, pressing down on them as he gets on the pegs. He’s stepping his game up, I’m proud of him. It’s like pushing a bird out of its nest—maybe even shoving because it should’ve flown out years ago.
A grocery store down the block is opening its roll-up doors for business as the moon hangs high above this bank up ahead. I press down on a pedal when Mateo hops off.
“Nope. I’m walking. And I think you should too.” He unbuckles the helmet, takes it off his head, and hands it to me. “Sorry. I just have a bad feeling and I have to trust my gut.”
I should throw on the helmet and ride away. Let Mateo go to Lidia, and I can do my thing, whatever that is. But instead of parting ways, I hang my helmet off the handlebars and swing my leg over the seat. “We should get walking then. I don’t know how much life we have left but I don’t want to miss it.”
MATEO
6:14 a.m.
I’m already the worst Last Friend ever. It’s time to be the worst best friend.
“This is going to suck,” I say.
“Because you’re not outing your death?”
“I’m not dead yet.” I turn the corner. Lidia’s apartment is a couple blocks away. “And no.” The sky is finally lightening up, the orange haze of my final sunrise ready to take over. “Lidia was destroyed when we found out her boyfriend-future-husband-person was dying. He never got to meet Penny.”
“I take it Penny is their daughter,” Rufus says.
“Yeah. She was born a week after Christian died.”
“How’d that go? The call?” Rufus asks. “If that’s too personal you don’t have to tell me. My family getting their call was a nightmare and I’m not a big fan of talking about that either.”
I’m about to trust him with this story as long as he promises not to tell anyone, especially not Lidia, when I realize Rufus will die with this story. Short of him gossiping in some afterlife, I’m safe to tell him anything and everything. “Christian was traveling to outer Pennsylvania to sell these weird daggers and swords he inherited from his grandfather to this collector.”
“Weird daggers and swords tend to sell for mad bank,” Rufus says.
“Lidia didn’t want him to go because she was having all these hysteria freak-outs, but Christian swore the money would be worth it in the long run. They could buy a better crib, diapers and formula for the next couple months, and clothes. He took off, stayed overnight in Pennsylvania, and woke up around one-something to the alert.” My chest tightens reliving this, all the tears and screams. I stop and rest against the wall. “Christian tried reaching Lidia, but she slept through everything. He texted her every minute he could. He’d hitchhiked there with a Decker truck driver, and they both died trying to get back to their families in the city.”
“Holy shit,” Rufus says.
There was no consoling Lidia. She obsessively read Christian’s final, frantic texts and hated herself for not waking up to any calls. There was a chance for her to see him one last time through The Veil—a video chat app that drains batteries quickly, but also creates a stronger personal hot spot for anyone who’s somewhere with weak service, like a Decker on a highway headed home—and she missed those invites, too.
I don’t know if it’s true, but the way Lidia spoke about Penny in the beginning sounded like she resented her for wearing her out so much toward the end of her pregnancy that she slept through her boyfriend’s final hours. But I know she was grieving and doesn’t feel that way now.