Page 27 of The Road to Ruined

Hazels stands and walks toward us. "Come here, Teagan," she says.

I wrap my arms around her. Sniffling, I say, "Your hair looks pretty."

"I fucking hate it," she says. "It's not me—at all—but thanks. You should change yours, too, by the way."

"I'll consider it. Thanks for opening the door."

"He won't come back for you, Teagan," River says. "He's a liar. Promise me you won't just wait for him, and you'll try to live your life."

"I won't," I tell her. "I'm trying. I'm looking for a job, and I'm going to my sister's wedding in Mexico. I'm going to do normal things, go through the motions until it feels real again—until I'm better at telling the difference again."

"I hope it's soon," she says.

"Me, too."

She hugs me one last time, kissing me softly on the lips, and I try not to cry again when she leans her forehead against mine and, looking into my eyes, says, "I love you, Teagan. Take care of yourself. Think of yourself."

"I love you, too." I swallow the lump in my throat. "I'll think of you, too. Both of you."

"Bye, Teagan," Hazel says.

"Bye."

Holding my breath, I turn the knob and walk out the door, closing it softly behind me. The girl I hoped I could be again—the one who never cried—loses as I walk around the side of the house and retrieve my phone from the gravel under the window. She loses when I get into the car, leaving that bungalow and the people inside it behind me. She loses when I pull out onto the interstate and my chest cavity aches with the knowledge that I'll never see them again, either, but they'll be better off without someone like me.

Someone who's brought them nothing but grief.

And after stopping in Blythe to fill my tank, she loses again. My phone buzzes with a news notification as I pull back onto the highway, and I catch the headline, readingNew Song Allegedly from Infamous Rock Band, Gods of Tomorrow, Leaked from Russian VPN Today.

Tunnel vision sets in when I turn back to the road. I white-knuckle the steering wheel with sweaty palms for a minute, willing it to pass, before giving in and pulling onto the shoulder.

It's not them,I think, clicking the link.There's no way it's them.

I push play on the video.

"Is it a hoax?"the news anchor asks."The internet is divided over whether this single, leaked onto the internet from a secure Russian VPN earlier today, is really the work of infamous rockstar, Declan De Rossi, the front man for Gods of Tomorrow, who is wanted on several federal criminal charges in the US, including murder, or if it's nothing but a ruse."

"I'm going to go with ruse, Pete,"his co-anchor says.

"Really? Why are you so sure, Sasha?"

"Because we've had so many of these,"she says."Sightings all over the world, hundreds of false reports all for the samereason—to keep the absolute chaos going. I mean, we've never seen anything like this. And the song itself is so different from the rest of their work. Why this song? Why now? If De Rossi wanted to send a message to the fans, I don't think this would be it."

"I don't know,"Pete says."Let's take a listen. The track is titled 'Pretty Poisoned.' Let us know what you think in the comments—real or hoax?"

Bile rises in my throat as the screen goes dark, and Luca strums the intro to the song he wrote for me. The familiar lyrics in white letters scroll across the screen as Declan sings the first lines of the song.

And I can't breathe. All I can do is hurt. It hurts like a kick to the ribs from a steel-toed boot after the man who said he'd always take care of you tells you to close your eyes and leaves you alone, sobbing in the dirt on an abandoned airfield.

But one was an addict

The other black licorice-laced cocaine

I knew this batch was poison

but shot straight into the vein

I drop my head onto the steering wheel and sob through the entire song. Declan didn't even change it—Luca said he always changes his lyrics, but it's exactly the way I remember.

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