“She didn’t make it,” she said. “Kristen didn’t make it.”
My heart dropped like an ice fisher plunging through a frozen lake, down into the inescapable cold, and I slumped against the wardrobe. I flashed back to that morning in Chile, the morning after, when Kristen and I stopped at a cliff on the drive out of town and screamed into the canyon below. I felt the same strange sensation now, something huge and sweeping, erupting out of me and up into the atmosphere. A mushroom cloud of power and sorrow. Something you could see from space.
“I’m sorry.” Jenny touched my arm and I jumped.
“I’m sorry too,” I said, and meant it. I hesitated. “What do we do now?”
“We should head back there. Tom said there are cops waiting to talk to you.”
Cold adrenaline careened through me. My hand shook as I grabbed my now fully charged phone on the way out. I unlocked it while the elevator made its slow descent: texts and voicemails from Kristen, “You ok?” and “Stay strong my friend” and “I’m on my way,” each one a stab to my gut. Kristen. As late as this morning I’d still been waffling, trying to decide if she was being inappropriate or if I was being too sensitive, too suspicious.
But that was before she shoved me in front of an oncoming car.
Well, in response to me pushing her off a cliff. Because she’d convinced me, erroneously, that I had it in me. That I was like her. That I could solve my problems by taking someone else’s life.
Oh God. My stomach gurgled; my vision swam. The silver doors split apart and I took off through the lobby, sprinting past the automatic doors in time to vomit. I spat and spotted Jenny in the doorway, but she whirled around and dashed back inside. A moment later she reappeared with a cup of water, and she rubbed my back as I brought it to my lips.
“Little sips, not big gulps,” she said.
“Thanks.” I swallowed. “You’re being so nice to me.”
“Like I said.” Her chin trembled and she looked away. “You remind me of my daughter.”
I finished my water and followed her to the car, acid still burning my windpipe and tongue.
* * *
—
Aaron wasn’t Aaron. He was battered and bruised, his face bulging and purple like an overripe plum. The face of a fighter, a boxer. A Spanish-American man beaten to death by a beautiful American visitor.
My heart had pounded as I’d entered the hospital, but I hadn’t seen cops anywhere. So I’d chanced it—sprinting to the surgery wing, asking a nurse there for directions to his recovery room. This felt like borrowed time, sand draining through an hourglass before everything blew up in our faces.
Again.
Gauze covered one eye, a watercolor wash of blue peeking out from the bandage, but Aaron opened the other and cracked a wide smile.
“Emily! How ya doing, babe?”
“I’m so glad you’re okay!” I touched his hand. “How are you feeling?”
“They gave me painkillers, so…awesome.” He swung his hand into a thumbs-up. “I feel as good as you look. Which is…” Now his fingers shifted again, forming the okay sign.
“A charmer, even on codeine!” I ruffled his hair. “The nurse said your folks are getting in this evening.” I was praying they’d arrive before Bill and Nana, or that we’d be kept separate, the Czarneckis heading straight to the morgue—I couldn’t face Bill and Nana today. Would they be sobbing and disheveled? Stoic and composed? Or, God…unflinching and, apparent only in the tiniest expressions, relieved that she was gone?
No. Kristen was their flesh and blood. They weren’t monsters…they weren’t like me.
“You’re gonna meet my paaaa-rents,” Aaron sang.
I smiled. “Exactly how I pictured it.”
“You still haven’t given me a kiss.” He pouted, then pursed his lips.
I leaned down and gave him a gentle smooch. He sighed happily.
A nurse had informed me Aaron had no memory of the accident, no memory beyond grabbing his keys and pulling out of the hotel parking lot, and it seemed unfair to demand answers when he was drugged-up and loopy. Still, the questions burned my throat like bile.
“Can I ask you something?” I said.
“Sure!”
“Why did you leave the hotel and come after Kristen and me?”
He twisted his mouth, thinking hard. At least I’d know if he wasn’t telling the truth—he didn’t seem capable of lying right now.
“So, I knew you didn’t want Kristen here,” he said, “since we came to Phoenix to get away from her. But then, when you sent me upstairs, I checked my phone and saw an article that they’d released an image of a suspect in the dead-backpacker story. It was aaaaall over the news.” His fingers winged out.
Shock foamed up through me, nearing my jaw, my face, my scalp. There was a Wanted poster out there with my face on it? What, a police sketch? Surveillance footage?
“And I went, Whoa, that girl looks like Kristen. And then I remembered it was in Chile! And that you said that she’s been acting cuckoo-banana-crackers!” He tapped his temple. “So I thought you might be in trouble. And I tried to call you, but your phone was in the room. So I was like, crap.” He looked thoughtful for a moment. “Can I have some water?”
I poured him a cup from the bedside jug and helped him with the straw. He finished glugging with a satisfied “Ahhh.”
“So you noticed I’d left my phone,” I prompted.
“Right. And I ran back down and realized you were gone. I asked if anyone had seen you and this woman said she thought you’d gone outside. I ran out and couldn’t see you but I still had the car keys in my pocket. Figured you couldn’t have gotten far. I thought I saw your red backpack disappearing around the corner, so I hit the gas. And that’s…that’s all I remember.”
“Wow. Thanks for coming for me.”
He knit his brow. “Did I save you?”
“You did, Aaron! I’m so grateful.”
“Good. ’Cause you’re awesome. You’re way out of my league.” He laughed, a slow, Mitch Hedberg–like guffaw. He pursed his lips again, lifting his chin for another kiss, and I leaned over and stamped his forehead with a peck, aiming for a clean spot among the tapestry of bruises.
“Hey, speaking of Kristen.” He squinted. “What happened to her? Is she okay?”
A nurse appeared in the doorway and Aaron greeted him, his question forgotten. No one seemed to notice my hand shaking as I waved goodbye.
* * *
—
His parents looked so much like him: Aaron had his father’s lush hair and angular jaw, and his mother’s sharp nose and pretty eyes. Their faces were contorted with fear, but Aaron seemed delighted to introduce us, quick to joke about his injuries. I wanted to spend the night at Aaron’s side, but they were politely firm in that parenty way, so they dropped me off at the hotel and promised to pick me up at eleven a.m. sharp, in time for visiting hours.
But around ten a.m., I got a call from the police station. A bored-sounding woman asked me to come in again—voluntarily, she added, if I wanted to help. They’d pick me up in fifteen minutes. I hung up, my head swimming, already racked with what felt like a full-body hangover.