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“I’m calling it. 9:03 p.m.”
A time.
A time of death.
The officer in front of me tries to ease my pain as I release a strangled cry, but all I can see are her purple earrings. It’s all I can focus on.
Purple.
The color of death.
I lurch forward onto my hands and vomit all over the cement.
A sob follows, pouring out of me, my body burrowing into the roadway, gravel biting into my skin.
The jaws of life work to remove Theo from the wreckage—Theo’s body—and that’s when I fall back on my heels, bile still stinging my throat, and I zone out. That’s when everything turns into a foggy, slow-motion cloud of numbness. I can’t watch this. I can’t watch the boy I grew up with, the man who called me a brother, peeled off of a smoking piece of metal, reduced to nothing more than a hollow shell, while a woman with purple earrings tries to soothe my broken heart.
This can’t be happening.
This.
Can’t.
Be.
Happening.
I’ve lost my best friend—the Mario to my Luigi.
I’ve lost one of the only people in my life who’s been by my side from the beginning, who accepted me, who offered me friendship in my loneliest hours and laughter in my saddest.
Who knew my deepest, darkest secrets and loved me anyway.
Who used his last moments on earth to forgive me for breaking a childhood promise.
Who told me it was okay.
But it’s not okay… He’s gone.
Theo is gone.
And now I have to go tell June that her brother is dead.
23
HEAD FIRST
JUNE, AGE 18
“Are you sure you’re okay?”
Ryker holds me close as we sway to the romantic song, his hand pressed into the arc of my back. His opposite hand holds mine in a loose grip, while his eyes search my face with a hint of worry.
The dance is almost over.
Prom night is dwindling to an end, and instead of feeling fantastic and free, I’m feeling like a horrible traitor.
A traitor for kissing a man I had no business kissing.
