Aftermath(58)

He can’t finish. I take his hand and squeeze it. He just stares out at the ball diamond.

“That’s why I was a jerk to you the first couple of days,” he says. “I didn’t want you to see —” He inhales. “I’m not the kid you knew, and I was ashamed of that.”

I open my mouth, but he’s still talking. “Everything you liked about me, everything we shared, it’s gone. The shows we used to watch, I haven’t seen in years. The music we listened to, I don’t even have on my phone.”

“That’s —”

“That’s little stuff. I know. Tastes change. But I didn’t replace the shows or the music. I just… I just did nothing. I’ll watch whatever’s on TV. Listen to whatever’s streaming. I cut class, and I’m not even skipping to do something fun. My grades have tanked, and it isn’t because I don’t have time to study. I just don’t do anything. Except run. I run, and I run, and I run and…”

His hand trembles in mine. “Jamil used to call me a loser, and as much as that hurt, I knew he was wrong. I was smart, and I had hobbies, and I had friends. But now? I’m exactly what he said…”

His voice cracks, and his eyes fill, and then they widen in horror as the first tear falls. He releases my hand to wipe it away quickly. “Damn it. Sorry. I —” More frantic wiping as he turns his head, mumbling apologies.

“Jamil was an asshole,” I say.

His shoulders tense.

“I know I shouldn’t speak ill of the dead,” I say. “And he was your brother, so if you want me to shut up, just say so.”

Silence.

“You were smart, and I think he knew, in the long run, that would count more than being good at football. Now he’s gone, and I’m pretty sure I’m the only person who knows how he treated you. You never told your parents, did you?”

“I can’t. Not now. It’s too late.”

“So you’re stuck with it. Stuck pretending you miss this guy that everyone thought was so great. Except he wasn’t great to you. He made your life hell, and you’re trapped with that secret. I can’t imagine how hard that was, and I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you.”

He smiles, a sad twist of a smile. “You haven’t changed at all, have you? No matter what’s happening to you, you’re thinking of others. You were a lot closer to Luka than I was to Jamil, and the circumstances…”

He inhales. “It was worse for you. Much worse. Your brother was dead, and I went to your house because I was hurting, and when you couldn’t be there for me, I turned my back on you. I felt rejected so I abandoned you when you really needed a friend. I was a selfish brat.”

“When did you go to my house?”

“I threw pebbles at your window, remember? You looked out, but… It was lousy timing. You weren’t ready to see me. And I never tried again. I told myself…” He throws up his hands. “I don’t even know what I told myself. I felt rejected. I sulked and waited for you to come to me, and the next thing I knew, you’d moved away.”

“I…” I stare at him. “I thought you were angry.”

“Angry?”

“That night. At my window. You looked angry. Really angry, and I didn’t blame you. My brother was part of the shooting that killed your brother.”

“But that had nothing to do with you.”

My mouth opens. I can’t find words. I think of all the time I’ve spent agonizing over that moment. All the pain it caused me. All the outrage that my best friend had let me down. Even if I told myself I understood, I didn’t really.

All it would have taken was a few words. A text. An email. A phone call.

Are you okay?

Three words would have solved everything.

Three words. Three years lost because we hadn’t said them. Now my eyes are filling, and Jesse’s look of confusion changes to horror, and he’s patting his pockets and pulling out a half-shredded paper napkin and shoving it at me.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m so, so sorry. I was upset, and when you didn’t come to the window, I did get mad, and if you saw that, of course you’d think I was angry. I should have —”

“I should have —” I say at the exact moment he does, and we sit there, unfinished regret hanging between us.

I should have…

Should have. Could have. Didn’t.

Finally, I break the silence with, “You say I haven’t changed. But I have. That’s why I brushed you off yesterday. I didn’t want you to be disappointed.”

“I could never be disappointed, Skye. Not with you.”

My cheeks heat, and he says, “You might think you’ve changed, but I don’t see it.”

“I have. My goals… What I wanted to do with my life… It’s all gone.”

“So you don’t want to be an astronaut anymore?” he says.

His lips curve in a gentle smile, but I burst into tears, which he scrambles to fix with the napkin while tripping over himself to apologize for making me cry. And I apologize for crying. And then he has to say no, it’s okay.

A vicious cycle of apologies and embarrassment, ending with me drying my tears and pulling back and saying, “See? Not the girl you remember.”