Page 63 of I Hope This Email Finds You in Hell

But his words shake loose the truth: I want the same. I gesture at the bumper-to-bumper traffic. “Looks like we’ve got plenty of time.”

Though his eyes are trained on the cars ahead, they seem anywhere but. “Growing up here, it was just my mother, brother, and me. My brother was the only friend I had and the only one I needed. We were two halves of the same whole.”

He says it simply, but the realness behind the words makes an ache throb within my rib cage. It’s the longing for a sibling, for someone to grow and laugh and deal with shit with. The loneliness of being an only child had never hit me as hard as it did once my parents died and I had no one to split the responsibilities of the aftermath with. It was all on me.

I couldn’t handle it. Avoided it so hard I ended up in hell.

“When did that change?” I gently prompt to avoid my own inner spiral.

Remorse reflects in his dark irises. “I didn’t lie to you about making a deal with the devil. I did. But it wasn’t to go to the overworld. It was to protect my family. I thought it was a good thing—the only thing—to change our situation, but…my brother was furious I did it without consulting him.” Tatianna’s words come back to me. Luke always has an ulterior motive. “That’s when the resentment started. After that, it only got worse.”

“It sounds like you were trying to do the right thing,” I offer.

A laugh chuffs out of him as the traffic finally lets up enough for us to crawl forward. “I was trying to survive.”

“I get it.” I swallow, thinking of my own unorthodox means of survival.

“Yeah?” It’s his turn to do the gentle prompting. “This is a two-way street. You can show your cards. That recurring nightmare you have…you said it’s from the night of the car accident, right?”

I nod, focusing on my hands and the ring on my finger. “The night I killed my parents.”

He frowns. “Emphasis on accident.”

“I guess. But I’ve gone over it a million times. I only had one glass of champagne, but maybe I was drunk and didn’t know it. My dad wanted to drive, but I convinced him to let me. I knew not to swerve for animals in the road, but the deer appeared and I freaked out and turned the wheel and the woods were there and—” I break off, sucking down a deep breath. “We hit the tree on my dad’s side. My mom went through the windshield. Dead on impact, both of them. Yet somehow all I got was a concussion and minor injuries. How is that fair?”

“It’s not,” he says softly. “Things rarely are. But it doesn’t mean you deserve to hate yourself forever for a split-second decision.”

I shake my head, my dirty little secret boiling up my throat like acid. “You don’t get it. It wasn’t just that. Sure, that night was the start of it. But then there was everything else. After my parents died, no one even blamed me. My friends were there, my fiancé and I made up and he helped plan the funeral, my supervisor encouraged me to take as much time off as I needed. Everyone was kind and nice and there. But I hated it. I didn’t deserve it.”

Tears burn the back of my throat. “So I lashed out. I broke things off with my fiancé because I couldn’t stand how disappointed he was in me when I quit school. I said really awful shit to make him leave me alone, and yet he’s still checking in on me. My friends tried to call and I convinced myself they hated me. I inherited my parents’ house but couldn’t stomach sleeping in it knowing they were never coming home. So I just—left.”

I laugh through the tears streaming down my face. “I left without saying goodbye, I blocked people, deleted my socials, and gave South Florida a big middle finger as I drove north. I was trying to get to New York City.”

“Because the city reminds you of your mom,” Luke remembers. Of course he does.

“Yeah. And it seems to be where lost souls go.” I pause, chuckling. “Damned souls, too, apparently. I thought it would fix me. But…I couldn’t do it. You saw last night how I get behind the wheel, especially when it’s dark. I can’t see straight, or breathe, or stop shaking. My car got messed up in Tarrentown because I panic-swerved into a curb, and the fix was expensive. By the time it was ready, I lost my nerve. So I never left.” Realizing how dismal that trauma dump was, I add with forced cheer, “The plus is that the whole dead-parents thing works like a hat trick—got me a mechanics discount, an apartment, and a job.”

Luke doesn’t find the humor in it. Or, maybe, he just doesn’t know what a hat trick is.

“You said you had to make up with your fiancé.” Of all things for him to hang on to, I don’t know why it’s that. “What happened there?”

I prepare myself, aware how ungrateful I’m about to sound. My ex’s word, not mine. “We got engaged right before Christmas. The ring was silver. I know it sounds crazy, but—”

“You only wear gold,” Luke finishes for me.

I stare at him.

“What?” He nods at the amethyst stone sitting on my finger. “That ring you wear all the time is gold. I’ve seen you nearly every day for the past month. Not once have you ever worn silver.”

Krystal loved to tease that she caught him looking at me. And sure, I caught him, too, sometimes, but I assumed it was just him needing my attention. He almost always followed up with a mundane office ask or, most recently, testing me to spill the beans about his exorcism-after-hours antics. I didn’t think he was really looking at me.

“Yeah,” I say softly. “That was it. I mean, not just that, but it made me realize if he didn’t know me after all our years together, he never would. I said yes anyway, but me being upset caused a huge fight between us. I moved back in with my parents and we agreed to do our own thing for New Year’s Eve. Then the crash happened and I could see things I didn’t before.”

I think back to the months following the accident, a cloud of grief and heartache and, weirdly, clarity. “Having grandkids was important to my parents, and that pressure fell on me since I was their only kid. They had me when they were older, so the clock was ticking. But being with someone romantically doesn’t come easy to me unless I really know them, so starting over seemed like a waste of time. Losing my ex meant losing the perfect future I’d built up in my head. But then I lost it all anyway and everything felt pointless.”

Resting my glasses in my lap, I use the sleeve of my crewneck to wipe my eyes as the truth wobbles past my lips. “I’m the bad guy. I ran from my old life because it hurt too much to stay, and I’ve been running ever since.”

My sniffles are the only sound punctuating the silence of the van. Even the honking outside has died down. But when a warm hand rests on my thigh, thumb tenderly rubbing over the thin fabric of my leggings, I’m not surprised. Just grateful.