Page 18 of A Match Made in Hell
‘You can’t fix anything.’ Sasha’s voice might be soft, but her words are weapons, sharp and painful and full of things I don’t want to hear. ‘You already quit, Willow. It’s too late.’
It isnottoo late. It can’t be. Past Willow’s hands shake to the same rhythm mine do now. I hate Sasha’s words, but I hate what they’re going to make me do even more.
‘You’d love Thailand,’ Sasha says. ‘Beautiful beaches, boys,parties. The whole time I was there, I thought about how much you’d love it.’
Jealousy and longing twist into an angry knot in my chest. She’s been jetting around the world for as long as I’ve known her. Her parents pay. At first I’d soak up every story like they were my own personal souvenirs, like just being close to her would be the same as me getting on the plane myself. But then she handed in her dissertation early and flounced off to Thailand and I couldn’tstandit.
When she returned, it was to a Willow whose mother had just died, who couldn’t get out of bed. She and Noah would whisper behind my back, partly plotting how to fix me and partly so she could tellhimher stories. Terrified I was going to miss out again, I let her tug me into the shower and out of the house, and suddenly I wasn’t envious of Sasha’s life any more because I was living it, living it in a way I never could when Mum was alive.
The freedom was exhilarating at first. Forgetting was easier than remembering. But then it stopped being fun, because deep down I always knew it couldn’t last – I’d wake every morning with a pounding head and a nausea in my belly that wasn’t just down to the alcohol. I kept sayingthis is the last time, because I had a promise to keep.
Now it’s a promise I’m about to break.
‘You know I can’t drop everything and go on holiday,’ Past Willow says.
‘You can. All you have to do isgo.’ Sasha moves closer to the precipice and leans over. I wish I could run over there and pull her back, pull heraway, because it’s my last chance to stop all this, stop Past Willow from saying the words that’ll ruin everything. Waves slosh beneath us, crashing against the cliff face with a thunderous roar. ‘You know, there’s a bay where we went cliff-jumping, and the water’s gorgeous, so warm and clear –’
‘Let’s do it now,’ Past Willow interjects.
No.
No no no –
Sasha shakes her head. ‘It’s too far.’
‘It’s not.’ Past Willow gives the water an all-too-quick glance. ‘People do it all the time here too. Go on. You first.’ Her hand is on Sasha’s shoulders.
Tears trail down my face. Every move she makes peels back the veil I’ve been trying to hide behind, revealing the truth I’ve been avoiding since I woke up in that tunnel.
‘We shouldn’t.’ Sasha bites her lip.
‘You’ve done it before,’ Past Willow says, pulling her closer to the edge. ‘This’ll just be a little colder. And this is my only chance, before . . .’
Before she abandons nights like this for a grey city full of smoke and late nights in an office. The thought of it is a knife through the gut. But she can’t change her mind. She just has this one final night, and she needs to make the most of it. Wind howls, blowing her hair round her face. She looks wild, out of control. Dangerous. She advances on Sasha. I close my eyes.
‘Watch,’ Sathanas commands.
I hate him. I hate him more than I’ve hated anyone, because I can’t do this, I can’twatchthis.
There’s no mud for me to slip on or rock to give way beneath me. There’s just me, purposefully pushing us closer to the edge because I’m so sick of the way she gets to experience everything and I never do. Just once, I want to feel it too, to have that rush alongside her instead of hearing about it second-hand.
Someone screams. I open my eyes. It’s Sasha. Her heels dangle precariously over the drop.
I’m not giving her an inch.
‘Let’s do it,’ I’m saying, over and over, and Sasha is crying, and I’m crying, but Past Willow isn’t, because she’s –
She takes another step.
Sasha falls.
My knees give way. Sathanas stands behind me, hand on my shoulder, like he’s afraid if he moves away I’ll do something stupid. There’s no need. I’ll never do anything more stupid than this.
Because this night wasn’t an accident.
Being too mindless to realise what waited below doesn’t make this any less my fault. I chose this. Because for all mythis is the last times, there was always a next time, because I couldn’t get it together, couldn’t stop looking for an escape, didn’t want to lose the freedom I’d found since Mum’s death to face reality instead.
Sasha screams on the way down. Past Willow doesn’t care, or doesn’t notice, because she spreads her arms out wide, and although she’s got her back to me, I know she’s smiling, because with the wind ripping through her hair, her dress, she’s never felt freer, empty of all expectation to be anything but what she is.
