Page 94 of The Last Thing You Said

“Have you been drinking?” I ask, like that’s the reason I don’t want to get in the car with him. I bite my lip to keep from crying, trying to make it seem like I’m being practical, logical, like this has nothing to do with the last time—the only time—I sat in the front seat of the Firebird.

He shakes his head. “No,” he says, and now he sounds pissed. “No, I haven’t been drinking.”

I know he’s telling the truth. I can see it when I finally let myself look into his eyes, and they are clear, and flashing in the light from the streetlamp, and filled with pain.

He’s in your heart, Hannah said.

He is. I want to see if we can salvage what we might have had, but standing here, next to the open passenger door of the Firebird, I can’t. I remember every word that he said to me in that car. Every word.

I can’t. I can’t get into the Firebird. I can’t let Ben help me.

“I don’t need your help.” My voice cracks. “I’ll walk home.”

“Why don’t you ask your boyfriend for a ride, then?” The anger is still there, hovering beneath the surface of Ben’s words, and his expression changes. Tight, closed, pissed off. “Where is he, anyway?”

I pinch my lips together. It’s none of his business where Simon is, and my stomach twists when I think about the reason he’s not here. “He went back to St. Paul,” I snap. “His grandfather died. And thanks to you, I’m sure he looks like shit.”

“Not my problem,” he says.

“What is wrong with you? Why would you do that to him? To anyone? I don’t know you anymore, Ben.”

I stare at him, see an almost imperceptible shift of his jaw. He won’t say anything. I turn away from him and hurry down the driveway.

That wisp of a memory of Ben’s fingers in my hair at Hannah’s party must have been my imagination.

Nothing has changed.

49 · Ben

I slam the door of the Firebird, rev the engine, and back out. I drive in the opposite direction of downtown and Lucy, past Lions Park and the carnival. I drive until my eyes blur.

The peace, the resolve I felt this afternoon are gone.

Why can’t I get Lucy out of my head? I’ve been able to kill my emotions for months, and the minute I see her at the resort, I’m lost.

Guthrie thinks I’m on the right path. Isn’t that what he meant that night on the beach? Lucy’s the right path. She’s been the right path all along, and I’ve been too fucking stupid to see it.

And she’s right, I am an asshole.

I am a stupid, fucking asshole, and it seems like all I know how to do is hurt the person I love the most.

I’ve hurt her so much, so many times.

And, God, Trixie would be so pissed at me for this, for all of this. For pushing Lucy away when I should have held her close. For all those other girls I’ve hooked up with. Trixie would shake her head and smirk and whack me on the arm.

“Fix it, Ben,” she would say. “Don’t let her go.”

Life is short, so live it.

I pull off the road. I turn around in the weedy parking lot of the abandoned Bump ’n’ Putt on 371 and head for home.

For Lucy.

If I hurry, I can catch her.

And she’s still there, out on the county road past Sullivan Street Park, walking on the shoulder. It’s busy and dark and the cars fly past her. She’s going to get herself killed if she’s not careful.

I won’t let that happen.