Page 120 of Don't Let Me Go
I don’t bother to answer.
“I was also thinking that maybe this weekend, we could drive over to Daytona and hit the beach. It’s been a while since I’ve dipped my toe in the ocean, and I’ve been meaning to try out my new two-piece. Although when I bought it, the fetus who rang me up at the register had the nerve to suggest I might be more ‘comfortable’ in a one-piece. Can you believe it?”
When I don’t respond, my aunt lowers her voice in what I can only assume is an attempt to mimic mine. “?‘Oh, but Aunt Rachel, you’re so young and beautiful. I’m sure you’d kill it in a two-piece.’?”
“Aww, thank you, Jackson,” she answers herself. “That is so sweetof you to say. You really are a kind and considerate young man. Whatever would I do without you?”
I don’t know if Aunt Rachel is trying to get a rise out of me or make me laugh. Either way it doesn’t work. I hear her sigh in defeat, and the next time she speaks, her forced breeziness is gone.
“Look, kiddo, I don’t know what happened between you and Riley. You don’t want to tell me, and I don’t want to pry, but please know that whenever you’re ready to talk, I’ll be here. Okay?”
When I don’t say anything, she pats my foot again, shuffles out of the room, and shuts the door behind her.
I know I’m gonna have to get out of this bed and face the world at some point. But the thought of living in that world without Riley feels like an impossible task.
Imagining the rest of my summer, the rest of my senior year, the rest of my life without the one person who’s finally made that life worth living is impossible. I feel hollowed out. Empty. Like a husk. Like a thing that used to be Jackson Haines but now is nothing.
That’s what I see when I close my eyes and try to picture a future without Riley.
Nothing.
Chapter 48
Riley
“I wish you’d tell me what happened,” Dad says as he studies me across the dinner table. It’s Friday night, and he’s made this complaint or some version of it at least fifty times over the past week.
This time, like every time before, I ignore him. Avoiding his reproachful gaze, I push the lukewarm chicken and potatoes around on my plate in an attempt to make it look like I’m eating. I haven’t had an appetite since Jackson and I ended things, and mealtime with the Food Police has become the bane of my already baneful existence.
“Riley?” Dad persists when I continue to stare at my plate in the silence that has become my default since last week.
“Nothing happened,” I grumble. “Jackson and I just decided we shouldn’t be together.”
Dad shakes his head and sets down his fork. “But something had to have happened to make you come to that conclusion.”
I shrug and continue to devote my full attention to pushing around my potatoes.
There have been a couple of times over the past week when I’ve almost broken down and told my dad everything. About Jocasta. About our past lives. About the death sentence hanging over our heads if Jackson and I stayed together. Thankfully, I had enough sense to realize that the quickest way to get myself institutionalized (or at the very least sent to a shrink again) would be to start ranting about witches and reincarnation.
So I kept my mouth shut. I forced myself to get out of bed and go to work every day even though Dad insisted I take some time off. I figured if I pretended everything was okay, he might get off my back and stop checking on me every five minutes. But I was wrong. If anything, he’s been keeping a closer eye on me than ever.
I know that his constant attempts to get me to open up about what happened are because he wants to help. But his questions and concern are suffocating. They’re too much to deal with.Everythingis too much. My friends, my job, my life.
All I want to do is lie in bed and disappear from the world until I stop missing Jackson. Until the pain in my heart stops reminding me every second of every day of what I’ve lost.
But that’s never going to happen. I’m never going to stop missing Jackson. That pain is never going to go away. It’s going to be a part of me. Forever.
“Son, I have to ask...” Dad says, his voice taking on a strange, strained inflection that I’ve rarely heard before, “Did Jackson?.?.?.?hurtyou?”
A burning furnace of rage erupts inside me and my hands begin to shake. “Jackson wouldneverhurt me.”
Dad blinks in surprise, visibly taken aback by the vehemence in my voice.
“How could you evenaskthat?”
“I’m asking because it’s clear something happened,” he pushes back. “A week ago, you were the happiest that I’ve seen you in months. You were walking around the office with a smile on your face and a bounce in your step. Then you came home Saturday night, and it was like someone had flipped a switch. Now you’re hiding in your room, avoiding your friends, and walking around like a robot.”
I shrug. “I’m a teenager.”
