Page 108 of 72 Hours of You

“I’m so glad I told you about the clocks,” I say. “It’s such a comfort having you know.”

Jules grins. “Totally, right? Now tell me if that hot Italian girl at the cheese place across the street is going to live. Or at least has more than two hours left.”

I roll my eyes. “She’s clear.”

“Perf. I’m going to go see if she wants to share a baguette. Unless …”—Jules pauses—“you changed your mind, and you want me to come with you?”

I shake my head. “I’m good.”

“You sure?”

“I’m sure.” It’s been pretty great having Jules around—well, when she’s not rage-baiting hundred-year-old grandmothers—but this is something I have to do by myself.

She nods and gives me a hug. “I’m proud of you,” she says into my ear, before heading across the cobblestone street.

I watch as she goes right up to the girl and starts tossing her hair and making some joke. The Italian girl is immediately delighted, laughing and leaning in, touching her arm. Jules will probably be obsessed with someone else by tomorrow—or hell, by this afternoon. But … these days, I think there’s something beautiful about the way she’s always unafraid to start something new. To leap, heart first. To think of every day, every person, as a potential beginning.

I mean, couldn’t be me. But good for her.

I pick up my backpack and walk for a little while, watching the people on the streets playing checkers and selling tomatoes. The giant red-brown walls of the city jut up into the sky, holding all these different people together in this one place. As I walk, I run my hands along a wall, dragging my fingers over the bumps.

There’s a man in a fedora eating an orange on a stoop. He leans back on the marble stairs and takes a swig of bottled water. I wonder how old those stairs are, who designed them, and how many other people have sat on them over the years, eating oranges under the sun.

In the days after the Plaza, everyone at school made cards and dropped flowers and casseroles at Peter’s parents’ house. Sometimes, I’d park my truck across the street and just stare at all the things people left. Teddy bears, candles, the usual shit. Shit Peter wouldn’t have cared about. Sometimes it’d make me so angry, seeing a new stuffed animal or bunch of fake daisies appear in the pile. But then I’d hear his voice in my head, telling me that this stuff wasn’t for him. It was for his mom, and his dad. It was for everyone who was left behind. A few weeks in, I bought a hardcover of a new Hank Green book and placed it carefully next to some perfume-sprayed letters from the cheer squad. My own offering on the altar for the boy who had too many books and not enough time.

It didn’t make me feel any better. But, I don’t know, maybe his mom saw it and smiled. Maybe.

There was a service, a big one, with everyone from town and a lot of people from his last school. I couldn’t bring myself to go in, but I sat on the steps outside, thinking about handrails and concrete versus marble. His mom found me, afterward. I steeled myself for her to scream at me, slap me, something. But she just showed me her phone.

“Do you know anything about this?” It was an email with the subject line: For when Dad’s gone too.

Peter had spent the rest of his money on a solo cruise to Antarctica. For her. At the hotel, when he found out his parents weren’t going to make it, I thought he’d been sending them a goodbye message, but he had been forwarding his mom the ticket confirmation.

“Why Antarctica?” she’d asked, her eyes full of tears. And I couldn’t say, Because Antarctica is for second chances, and because Gordon didn’t get to go. So I told her a different truth: “Because he wanted you to be happy.”

And who knows, maybe she will be. One day.

She must’ve found out the results of his Huntington’s test, but she didn’t offer to tell me (I mean, why would she?), and I didn’t ask. Knowing now wouldn’t change anything. Not for Peter, anyway. And if he didn’t get to know, then neither do I.

A few days after the funeral, Charles went to court. He pled guilty right away. Apparently, he was the one who’d called 911 right after it happened. He told them everything. The police found him at the Queensboro Bridge, his expensive shoes teetering on the edge, and they pulled him back. He’s in jail now, but honestly, I think the real punishment is that he has to keep living with all the pain he won’t let go of.

For a while, the grief group at Noah’s house met twice a week, and there were months when it seemed like Emma and Sophia would never stop wearing black. But one day, right before summer, Emma showed up in a purple crop top and turquoise leggings, and that was that.

It was awful, going to school. Sitting next to his empty desk. There were some days I couldn’t make myself get out of bed to go at all. And there were other days that were … dark. So dark I forgot light even existed. But then Jules would come home and put Kristen Stewart on my head, and tell me all about which seniors were asking her to the prom or whatever, and I would think about what Peter would say if he were there. How maybe (definitely) he and Jules would’ve become friends. How he would’ve teased her without really teasing her, and how she would’ve whispered too loudly to me, Okay, I can totally see why you’re so down bad for this nerd.

In those last hours, I thought I’d never hear his voice again, but that’s not actually true. I hear it all the time. Peter said we don’t get an epilogue in real life, but I think we do. The people who are left behind have to keep going—they have to keep turning the page. And if you’re really lucky, those people write you into everything they do. Or at least they try.

I try.

I hitch my backpack up a little higher and breathe in the warm, fresh air. A little girl with messy braids trips on her own shoelaces and the giant gelato she was holding falls, predictably, to the ground. She doesn’t cry, though. She just glares at the melting clump of cream and sugar like she’s pissed the fuck off. And I can’t help but smile.

While her parents scramble to wipe up the mess on her shirt, I slip inside the gelateria, a cold blast of AC blowing my hair back. I get a small scoop of stracciatella and bring it back outside.

“Here you go,” I say, as I hand it to her.

“For me?” she asks, her brown eyes lighting up.

“For you,” I say.