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My chest tightened. This would be Andy’s forever.
“I hate to be a party pooper, but I need a nap. Can’t get drunk if I can’t stay awake, right?”
“Drunk?” I repeated, nearly choking on the word.
Andy nodded, a grin spreading across his lips. “What’s a beach party without alcohol? You just wait, Seth. You think this is going to be about me lying in bed wishing my life were different? Fuck that, man. You know me better than that.”
He was right: I did know him better than that, which was what worried me. He acted so strong, like he was ready for what was coming, but I wondered how much of that was an act. Death scared the hell out of me. Apart from my grandparents, who’d died before I was born, I hadn’t had anyone close to me die. Andy dying terrified me. How could he not be scared?
“This is about me forgetting I’m dying. Right now I’m alive, so I’m going to live. Or at least, going to live vicariously though you guys,” he added cryptically, his eyes narrowing as he chuckled.
“Oh God. What are you planning?” I groaned, growing more and more nervous by the minute.
“You’ll see.” He grinned. “But trust me. You guys are never going to forget me. I’m going to make sure of it.”
I snorted, my eyes meeting Em’s. She smiled back.
As if we could ever forget him.
***
Sitting at the kitchen table, I glanced up at Em as she walked into the room. She looked tired, her eyelids heavy with dark circles around them. Her long, dark hair hung over her shoulders, reaching halfway down her back. I inhaled sharply, her beauty breathtaking. I could’ve stared at her all day. Every time I saw her it was like I was seeing her for the first time. I forced myself to look away, back down to the newspaper I was reading.
“How is he?” I asked, reading the same line over and over.
She shrugged, grabbing a soda from the fridge. “You know Andy. Even if he wasn’t fine, he’d say he was.” It was true: anything, if it meant not worrying Em or I.
“How are you?” I asked, the words tumbling from my mouth in a rush. Sometimes it felt like I couldn’t even get my words straight around her. One look from her, one smile, and everything in my head felt jumbled. You’d think I’d be used to that feeling by now. I wasn’t. I didn’t think I’d ever get used to it. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to.
“I’m okay,” she said, shrugging. She walked around the table, pulling out the chair next to me, and sat down. Her perfume drifted past my senses: soft and delicate, just like her.
I stared down at the newspaper again, only now taking in the line I’d been reading for the last five minutes. The Twilight Carnival comes to town.
“Anything interesting?” Emily asked, her lips forming a perfect circle around the opening of the soda bottle.
Oh, God. I shifted in my seat, arousal building inside of me as I imagined those lips . . . elsewhere.
“Nope,” I said, the tone of my voice about three levels too high. I sounded like a te
enager going through puberty. “There’s a carnival one town over we can check out if you want.”
He face lit up. “I’ve never been to a carnival,” she said, her lips spreading into a grin. She fingered the rim of her bottle of soda, a wistful look in her eyes.
“How is that even possible?” I smirked. “Everyone’s been to the carnival at least once. It’s un-American to not have.”
“Excuse me,” she replied, sitting straighter in her seat. “You’re calling me un-American, Mr. I-Spent-Every-Friday-Night-in-College-Studying-Rather-Than-Going-to-the-Football-Game?”
“Hey, I had exams,” I protested, laughing. I was probably the only college student who took college seriously—partly because I didn’t trust myself to drink around Em. College had been a weird time for me. Em studying elsewhere had made me realize how much I hated being around her, yet I couldn’t imagine not being around her. Love was a fucked-up thing when it was one-sided.
“Every week?” she asked, rolling her eyes. Okay, she had me there. So I didn’t see the point in watching men jumping all over one another when I needed a near-perfect score to get into law school. So what?
Andy, on the other hand, had been all about the partying. He missed more classes than he attended, usually because he was too hung-over to find his way out of bed.
He and Emily had begun dating just before college. We went to Northwestern University, while she had studied literacy at Chicago University. Em would spend nearly every weekend in our apartment.
“What have you told work?” she asked suddenly.
“Nothing yet. I’ll call in sick on Monday and take it from there. I have some leave saved up, so I might try and wrangle that. You?”
