Page 97 of So Thirsty

I kick her foot. “You okay?”

“Peachy,” she says.

“Is everyone ready to go?” Elisa asks. She doesn’t wait for a response. She starts the engine, which stammers before settling into a gruff hum. When we pull up to the fairgrounds gate, Ilie gets out to open and close it because Tatiana refuses. I peer out from behind the curtain, sad to be leaving the only place I’ve been in the last few days where anything remotely good has happened.

Might have happened.

I’m not sure how I feel about last night anymore. Naomi’s point stands. Henry’s the one who turned me into this. Why was I so quick to forgive him? To trust him. To fuck him. Am I that desperate? Am I that stupid?

I should be angry with myself, but I’m too fragile for it. So instead I’m angry at her. At Naomi. Why couldn’t she just leave it alone?

Elisa puts on the radio, flips through stations, finding mostly static. She gives up eventually, leaving us with only the grunts of the camper. Ilie puts his arm around Naomi. She lets him, but after a few minutes she unbuckles her seat belt and lies down, using his lap as a footrest. She closes her eyes.

“ ‘Every day, it’s a-gettin’ closer,’ ” she whisper-sings, “ ‘going faster than a roller coaster….’ ”

She opens her eyes and looks at me.

Whatever she’s trying to tell me, I don’t understand. Our silent vows, our ESP—none of it’s working. We’re out of sync. She’s right in front of me, but she’s further from me now than she was when she was on the other side of the world.

When we were seventeen and had just gotten our licenses, Naomi would drive us around in her Jeep and we would listen to curated playlists, writing our favorite lyrics on our arms in pen, contemplating future tattoos that we never ended up getting. Sometimes we’d go to a cemetery for a quiet place to smoke weed. Sometimes we’d go to Hot Dog Johnny’s, because it meant driving through Buttzville, which we always got a kick out of. We’d sit at the picnic tables outside and have hot dogs with sweet relish, split some crinkle-cut fries, and drink root beer out of frosty glasses. Once, on a rare Saturday when I didn’t have to work, we went down to Seaside Heights, where we wandered the boardwalk, ate giant slices of greasy pizza, and mint soft-serve ice cream in waffle cones. We played Skee-Ball at Lucky Leo’s until our arms were sore, until we ran out of money. We pointed out syringes on the beach.

She’s not just my best friend. She’s my youth. She knew me when I was young—the purest, truest version of myself, before life got in the way. Before I knew about things like property taxes and deductibles and inflation, about the slow drain of ordinary days and the quick disappearance of ordinary years, about how men I’d never meet, with beliefs I don’t share, could make decisions about what I can and can’t do with my body. Before I gave in to doing what I had to and never what I wanted. Before all the choices that got me so far from the path I’d dreamt of. Before dreams became impractical.

She holds the best of me, and I think I hold the best of her.

But maybe that doesn’t matter. Maybe it’s too late to be our best selves. Maybe we’ve changed too much.

Maybe. Not maybe. I know we have. We’re bloodthirsty creatures now. We’re killers. We’ve bitten into a pulse. We’ve had a taste of something.

Henry reaches for me. I let him take my hand, thread his fingers through mine. He doesn’t know who I was before two days ago. He knows me only as this.

I always thought mutual history was something precious, to be coveted. I never understood it could be an anchor. Our shared past won’t necessarily help us move forward. It won’t answer the question that needs to be answered, and fast.

How do we live now?

29

I t’s a long drive, which provides me with the unfortunate opportunity to think. There’s an awkward silence in the back of the camper that everyone else seems to think is a comfortable one. Nobody attempts to break it.

The van’s faint grumble grows increasingly loud, but no one comments. No one seems to notice except me.

“Is that normal?” I ask when the noise is accompanied by the reek of exhaust.

Ilie and Henry exchange a look.

“What is it?”

They don’t answer. More time passes. Henry turns around, pulls back the curtain an inch, and peeks out the window.

“Elisa,” he says, his tone startling. Urgent.

“I know,” she says, making a sudden, sharp turn.

Naomi almost rolls onto the floor. “The fuck!”

“Put your seat belt on,” I tell her.

“I thought we were invincible,” she says, sitting back and folding her arms over her chest, annoyed that I scolded her. “What’s happening?”