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Junie’s little lips quivered. Pawing at tears, she spun around and ran back to Simone.

This wasn’t fair. None of this was fair.

No one else stood. No one else stepped up.

Everyone had tears in their eyes, but no one stepped closer. No one reached out to the flames.

Just like on her first day here, when Delilah had walked into the therapy room of the rec center, and everyone kept talking. A few glanced over, but I’d been the only one who waved. The only one who offered her a seat.

I grabbed my tumbler from the ground, stood, and I stepped forward. Each move I made was like treading through water. Every lift of my foot, a chore of its own.

But before I knew it, the flames burned only inches from my calves. That knot in the back of my throat grew so big, I could hardly pull a breath past it. The only sound came from snowflakes sizzling as they hit the fire.

“I keep thinking about the first time Delilah came to my cabin,” I said. Slurred, maybe. But that knot in my throat softened as I spoke. “After I gave her a tour of the ranch, I told her that she could come up to my house anytime. And she did. She showed up at my door, and she came in, and I started to offer her a drink, but then I realized I had never asked how old she was. She told me she was eighteen. So I gave her some regular hot chocolate and told her that I would make my spiked hot chocolate for her when she was old enough.

“But she’s never going to be old enough.” Hot, salty water stung violent paths down my cheeks. “I can’t believe that she’s never going to be old enough. We’re never gonna drink spiked hot chocolate together or raise our daughters together like we said we would. Like we wanted to. And I think that’s what’s so hard, because I’m not just mourning my friend. I’m mourning the friendship we didn’t get to have.

“We only knew each other a couple months, and I really grew to love her in that time. Rhiannon might say it’s because I saw myself in her. A version of me that I wished I’d been. I mean, she was barely more than a kid.”

The tears streamed out my nose, and no sniffling could keep them inside. Wiping them away, I shook my head in disbelief. “Who could I have been if, at eighteen, I made the choice she did? If I left? What would my life look like? What would all of our lives look like?”

I finally looked up from the flames, but at no one in particular. All the faces blurred as I scanned the crowd. Maybe that was the stress. Maybe it was the cocoa.

“What would her life look like if she got to keep living it?” My voice broke. It took a few hard swallows before I could continue. “And you know, I keep thinking about something else, too. Delilah in general, she made me think about the act of leaving. The pain of it, the embarrassment, the shame. That got me thinking about those early days, too. Even before I left, when I was scrolling one day, and I happened upon some random article. It was about domestic violence.

“At the time, I hadn’t even admitted that I’d experienced it. That I was experiencing it every day. For the same reasons. The pain, the embarrassment. The shame. The weakness.” Lips dry, I licked them. When that didn’t do enough, I rubbed a hand over them. “It looked clickbaity. That’s probably why I clicked it. It said, a woman is eight hundred times more likely to be killed by her partner if he has strangled her. Eight hundred times.” Mouth still dry, probably dehydrated from all the alcohol, I swallowed a few more times before I could keep going. “You know what else they said in that article?”

I scanned the crowd, but all I saw were a lot of teary eyes and tissue dabs beneath noses. No one said anything, but a girl in the back, Eve, if memory served, shook her head. Answering my question, maybe. I didn’t know, but it felt like permission to continue.

“It said that three women a day are murdered by their partners in America.” Bottom jaw trembling, the tears came down harder. Faster. “Midnight, eight A.M., four P.M. One, two, three. Pop, pop, pop. Every single god damn day, three of us are murdered by the person we love most. And I don’t know how to sit with that fact. I don’t know how I’m supposed to just accept it. I’m okay now, I’m happy now, but three women a day. Over a thousand a year. It could’ve been me, it could’ve been you.” I waved at Simone, teary-eyed as she held Junie in her arms. I wasn’t sure Junie understood, and I hoped she didn’t, but I couldn’t stop.

“It could’ve been you.” My voice shook as I looked at Rhiannon. There were tears in her eyes too. Tears, and that same look she had given me the morning after Delilah died. Just before we fell to the ground, sobbing in one another’s arms. “It could’ve been any of us. But it was her. It was Delilah. It was a sweet young girl, who never did anything to anyone.” Hands trembling at my sides, I clenched them into fists. “Not me. Not someone who’s lived a bit. Not someone who maybe deserved it. I mean, the things my ex did, the things I dealt with, the things I didn’t turn him in for, I have to live with that.

“I have to live knowing that another Delilah will walk in behind me. That somebody else is gonna hurt the way that I hurt, and maybe her story will end like Delilah’s did. Maybe it’ll end like mine. Maybe she’ll get out like I did. But maybe she won’t, and she’ll be one, two, or three. Today, or tomorrow. And it’s not our fault. It’s none of our faults that they were who they were, and we allowed what we allowed, because we didn’t make those choices, but, but⁠—”

A gasping sob cut me off. It came on so suddenly, so forcefully, and all I could do was let it flow. My head pounded with each weep that escaped, but I hadn’t finished. “I don’t know. I’m just—I don’t know how I’m supposed to accept this. My friend’s dead, and I kind of blame myself for it, because she was so sweet. And she was so kind. And she said to me that all she ever wanted was to be what her dad wanted. What society wanted. Just a good girl. Marry her high school sweetheart, have a couple of kids, settle down in the suburbs. Be a sweet, innocent little flower. And I told her not to be. I told her to be a storm. I told her to be angry, to fight back, and I think she did, and I think⁠—”

Another gasping sob. I doubted anyone could make out what I was saying, but I kept going. Even as my numb knees gave way, and I backpedaled. To get to my chair, to get to something that would hold me upright. I crashed into something, someone. Their arms came around my waist, steadying me before I fell.

“I think she fought, and I think she lost. I think she lost.”

Just as his quiet voice touched my ear, the musky, citrusy scent of his cologne hit my nose. Sebastian’s arms were like ropes hanging off the edge of a cliff, refusing to let me drop. He whispered, “I’ve got you.”

9

SEBASTIAN

Tear-streaked eyes filled the crowd a moment ago. Now, everyone breathed deep or muffled their cries into tissues or the sleeves of their shirts. Gwen muffled hers into my chest.

We stood in that spot for a while.

No one else stood to give a speech. Not even Simone.

She sat right across from me, just beyond the flames in the center of the circle. Junie sat in her lap, curled against her chest. Her tear-filled eyes stayed fixed on Gwen, but she didn’t move.

Which was fine. I didn’t mind standing in this spot, holding Gwen upright. I was happy to. Honored to.

But Simone and Gwen were always together. Today, they were on opposite sides of the fire.