The Bride Test(83)

The wedding started in an hour.

He’d changed into his tux and was ready to go, but he couldn’t bring himself to get into his car. That old playground song kept looping in his head. Esme and Quan sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G …

He’d lose his fucking mind if he saw Esme and Quan kiss. She was his to kiss, his to have and to hold, his to—

His to what?

He couldn’t stand looking at the now-empty glass on his coffee table, so he fled. He didn’t have a destination in mind, but of course, he ended up there.

In the garage.

He pressed the garage button, and as light filled the dark space, he advanced toward the bike. Dust particles sparkled in the sunlight like fireflies, and he breathed the old mustiness and gasoline-on-concrete smell into his lungs. For a moment, he shut his eyes, letting the scent take him back to a different time.

He yanked the tarp off the motorcycle and ran his fingers over one of the black handles. Bumpy texture, the grooves fingers had worn into the rubber, cold, lifeless. It was always this way. Always disappointing. Just like when he’d walked it home after Esme took it to the store.

He ran his fingertips over the deep scratches on the side. He half expected to find blood in there, but his fingers met nothing but rough metal. Against the odds, this was all the motorcycle had to show for its collision with a four-ton semitruck. Andy hadn’t been so lucky.

He’d been that 0.07 out of 100 who ended up in a fatal motorcycle accident. Because of Khai.

Khai had asked him to come over. Maybe asked wasn’t the right word. He’d said something along the lines of, “Come over. Let’s do stuff.”

There’d been grumbling about summer school homework, and Khai had told him to bring it and they’d do it together. More like Khai would just do Andy’s homework for him, but Khai didn’t care as long as Andy was there.

“See you soon,” Andy had said.

The drive from Andy’s parents’ place in Santa Clara to Khai’s mom’s place in East Palo Alto was about twenty-five minutes if you took Central Expressway, and Andy always did. He said the trees made him feel like a badass.

But twenty-five minutes had passed. Thirty. Forty. An hour. And still no Andy. Khai had paced back and forth, aggravated and impatient, sick, and he’d flipped through the pages of every book he could find until the corners were permanently upturned like ski slopes. When the phone had rung hours later, an incomprehensible knowing had claimed him. He hadn’t picked it up. He’d stood still, rooted to the floor as his mom answered the phone. When she’d gone pale and sank against the counter, she’d confirmed his suspicion.

“Andy’s dead.”

Khai’s head had gone quiet and crystal calm. No feelings, no pain, no more sick worry, just pure logic. In that moment, a pattern had arisen. Two points made a line, and you could extrapolate the slope and direction from there. His dad had left their family for a new one. Andy had died.

Bad things happened when he cared about people. But did he really care about them? Not if you compared his apparent level of caring to other people’s.

He was pulling the motorcycle helmet over his head and straddling the bike before he realized what he was doing. A turn of the key in the ignition. The deafening roar of the engine.

He shot out of the garage and sped down the street.

He didn’t plan to, but his hands guided him to Central Expressway. To the soaring pines. Sunlight in a cloudless sky. The pressure of the wind on his body. How many times had Andy experienced this? Hundreds maybe. Before everything had changed, Khai had planned to get a bike so they could do this together. In a way, they were doing it together now. The engine drowned out the crashing of his heart, but he felt it inside. He felt everything. Exuberance, fear, excitement, sorrow. Most alive when you might die.

He reached the place where three lanes merged into two, and a choking heat swelled over him. His lungs hurt, his muscles ached, his eyes stung. He brought the motorcycle to a skidding halt on the left shoulder and stumbled away, kicking up rocks and debris until he could brace himself against a pine tree.

This was the place. Andy had died right here. But there was no more caution tape, no more deep gouges on the road, none of that stuff. Sun, rain, and ten years of time had eroded the site of the accident, so it looked like anyplace. Just like time had dulled his emotions to the point where his brain could process them. It wasn’t too much.

But it was a lot. It was the death anniversary all over again. But now there was no Esme, and he was alone with this sadness. It dragged and crushed, swallowing him. He tore his helmet off so he could breathe, but the hot air suffocated him instead. He raked at his hair and rubbed at his face.

And when he lowered his hand, his fingers came away wet. For a second, he thought it was blood, but the shiny fluid shone clear in the daylight.

Tears.

Not because of dust in his eyes or frustration or physical pain. These were sad tears for Andy. Ten years late.

He shook his head at himself. That took “delayed reaction” to an extreme. But he was an extreme kind of person.

His heart wasn’t made of stone, after all. It just wasn’t like everyone else’s. Even without the tears, he’d know. He recognized he’d been deluding himself for a while. Quan was right.

It was easier to keep people at arm’s length when it was for their own good instead of his. That way, he got to be a hero instead of a coward.