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Kayla glares.
"Softly. Sock him in the mouth softly," I correct. "With my pinky."
Our food arrives and we eat like starved hyenas, which is an improvement, because on the ladder of voracious eaters teenage girls are just below great white sharks and above starved hyenas, which means we are actually behaving ourselves. The waitress doesn't seem to think so, and wrinkles her nose when she takes away our dishes, the rings of food left behind like halos of glory. And indigestion. I duck into the bathroom for a second to wash my face free of peanut sauce. And it's then the memories come flooding back with a particularly heinous venegeance. Jack leaned against that counter. Jack touched that sink. Jack touched my face for the first time while he stood where the counter and the wall met. Jack's in every tile of this bathroom, and I can't escape it.
And I don't want to.
He might be missing, gone from my life like a ghost, but here? He's still here. I can envision his tall frame here. I can close my eyes and be in the past again.
It's just a dumb bathroom in a try-hard Thai restaurant. But to me, it's so much more.
I wash my face and stare in the mirror.
This is the last dinner Kayla and I will have for a long time. Four months, at least. I leave tomorrow. She leaves a week after. This is where it all stops, and begins again. Nobody knows what will happen, but I'm determined to keep her in my life. I won't lose her.
Not like I lost Jack.
"Everything okay?" Kayla asks when I come back to the table. "Diarhhea?"
"Oh, constantly. It's my superpower. Semi-automatic shitting."
Kayla's quiet, which either meant she didn't get my joke, or she wasn't listening.
"You miss him, huh?" She asks quietly.
I know who she's talking about. It's hard not to when he's a giant pink elephant all but sitting on our faces. Spiritually. Spiritually sitting on our faces. But I play dumb because that's easier.
"Wren? Hell yeah, I miss him. I messaged that nerd on facebook last night and he never -"
"I meant Jack, dummy."
I'm quiet. Kayla sighs and crosses her arms over her chest as she waits for the check.
"It's not fair. He just took off and left you."
I laugh, the sound bitter. "It's fine. There was nothing between us, anyway."
Kayla gives me another, sharper death-stare. She'd learned from Avery well. "Don't bullshit me, okay? There's an entire school that can attest to your mutual attraction. And I'm your best friend. And I dated him for a while. I know exactly how much you meant to each other."
"Obviously not a lot," I laugh again. "Since he left so quick. Without saying goodbye."
Kayla's silent, waiting for more. I smile.
"Living is really weird. You never get used to it. But it happens anyway. And sometimes you find things that make it a little more comfortable, and you try to hold on to those things, and the tighter you hold, the faster they slip away."
I look out the window to the dusk-painted main street, gold streetlamps just starting to bloom. I'll miss this small town. It won't miss me.
"I think Sophia knew that the best out of all of us. Maybe she was the only one in the world who knew that. Maybe that's why she just...let go. Because the things she loved were leaving faster the tighter she held on."
"Isis -"
I turn back to Kayla. "I'm okay, I promise. I've just been thinking about her a lot. About what I could've done. Gran told me I couldn't have done anything. But I could've. I could've just let go. I could have let Jack go, and maybe Sophia would still be here."
"That's not true!" Kayla protests.
"Maybe it is. Maybe it isn't. But the only thing I really know is in that alternate world where I let Jack go, Sophia is more likely to still be alive."
Kayla flinches. The waitress leaves the bill, but she doesn't even notice. I motion at it.
"You gonna get that? Or should I?"
Kayla reluctantly fishes out two twenties, and I give a five for tip. On the drive home, with the sky dark and starless as cold ocean water, Kayla finally speaks.
"You didn't do anything wrong, Isis."
"No," I agree. "You're right. I didn't do anything wrong. But I didn't do anything, period."
Kayla tries to break the dark ice that's layered over our conversation, and I try too. This is the last time we'll see each other in a while, and even with that knowledge, the shadow of Sophia's death haunts us. Me. It haunts me, and it's ruining this goodbye, and I can't even stop it.
"Look, Kayla, I'm sorry. I'm just...just really sorry. I don't know when I got like this, and I promised myself I wouldn't be like this -"
"But it's easier said than done," She interrupts. "I know. Wren's been like this too. Don't worry. It's okay. I've had practice handling mopey."
Her smile is a little drained.
When we pull into my driveway, we sit in the dark car, watching the moths attack the porchlight. They throw themselves at it, over and over again, like they want to catch fire and burn.
"I'm lucky I met you," I smile at Kayla. "And I'm triple lucky you have a thing for insane weirdoes. Pretty much won the friend-lottery."
"So did I," Kayla pouts. "Without you, I never would've realized Avery was using me."
"Jack helped."
She nods, grinning wryly. "I guess. A little."
"Do you remember the first time we met at Avery's party? And he made you cry?"
"Oh god, I was such a crybaby. I can't even believe how dumb I was. And that was just, like, ten months ago. I could've had a baby in that time."
"A crybaby," I insert.
"All babies are crybabies," She counters. I take on a wise old man squint and voice as I postulate.
"But are all crybabies...babies?"
Kayla courteously punches me, then sighs and leans back in her seat.
"Jack was the first one to bring it up. He made me start questioning everything - why I was hanging with Avery, did I really enjoy her company, how much of my feelings were hidden behind the shopping and the gossip. Without him, it would've taken me a lot longer."
"Wouldn't have killed him to put some damn sugar on it," I grunt. "Willy Wonka does it all the time, and he's fine! Crazy and possibly homicidal, but fine."
Kayla laughs and shakes her head. "You know Jack. He doesn't work like that."
I smile, the thing a little twisted but still whole. Kayla puts her hand on my shoulder.
"You two are...the same. I didn't notice it before, but Wren pointed it out to me. He's right. You two really are the same. So I think...I think even if he's gone now, he'll be back. People like you - you don't find very often. He'll be back."
"And when he comes back, I will behead him." I announce.
"You'll greet him," Kayla says sternly. "With a hug."
"I will greet him with a hug. To his torso. Which will be missing a head."
Kayla slaps her palm to her face, and I hug her, laughing. Laughing warm. Laughing true. Laughing for the first time in what feels like forever.
