Make the Fireflies Dance, page 8
I climb into my car, buckling my seatbelt and starting the engine before Kenyon finally walks back to the Jeep and does the same. When we leave the parking lot, we head in opposite directions, and I watch in my rearview mirror until he turns down another street. As soon as the taillights are out of sight, I pull over and throw the car into park.
“Oh my gosh,” I say, my voice loud in the empty car. My fingers brush the place where his lips had been, and my head fills with memories of the night. My heart still dances an excited rhythm in my chest, and I can’t help but shimmy in my seat. I’m filled with intense energy, and I don’t know how else to disperse it.
Is this what dating’s always like? If so, maybe Operation Mystery Kisser isn’t such a bad idea. A girl could get used to this.
It’s not until I’m lying in bed, my face washed and teeth brushed, that I realize I never got what I was after tonight. I’m no closer to knowing if Kenyon was with me in the theater or not. But as the night replays in my mind for the hundredth time since I left Pier 23, warmth growing deep inside me at the fresh memories, I can’t bring myself to feel disappointed. I guess I’ll have to try again with Kenyon another night.
There are worse things.
chapter Thirteen
I WAKE UP THE NEXT MORNING TO A WHIRLWIND OF MESsages from Shyla in our group thread, my phone’s constant vibration pulling me from a fitful sleep. I squint at the screen, scanning the messages with still-bleary eyes. As I read, my stomach flits with memories of last night.
I scroll to the end of the thread and type a quick reply.
ME: Sorry y’all. No kiss last night.
Shyla’s name pops up immediately, the bubble telling me she’s typing. I wait until her words appear.
SHYLA: What?! That was the whole point!
I groan. Somehow, when they told me their plan for Operation Mystery Kisser, I didn’t realize how difficult it would be. The idea of so many blind dates was hard enough to stomach that I wasn’t even considering the actual kissing part. I guess I thought it would simply happen.
My chest flutters with the memory of Kenyon lowering his face to mine. I was so sure he was about to kiss me. My cheeks heat up, and it’s almost like I can still feel his lips on the soft skin next to my mouth. I pull the phone closer to my face.
ME: I think he wanted to.
SHYLA: So what happened?
If only I knew.
I send a series of rapid-fire texts, telling her all about my night with Kenyon. Before long, Hadley and Naoise jump into the thread, probably pulled from sleep the way I was minutes ago. My phone blows up again, another burst of messages lighting the screen.
I’m typing out my work schedule for the week—requested somewhat forcefully by Naoise so she could plan my next date—when the doorbell rings. Through my closed bedroom door, I can hear Dad answer, then his muffled words carry down the hallway. He’s talking with a woman whose voice I can’t quite place. I strain to hear what they’re saying but am unable to make out the words.
A few minutes later, there’s a soft knock on my bedroom door.
“John, you up?” Dad asks.
“Yeah. Come in.” He steps into the room holding a small box.
“What’s that?” I ask.
He looks at it with a quick shrug. “No idea. It’s for you. A woman from Pastor Starr’s church just dropped it off.”
I gasp, realization washing over me, and tears spring to my eyes. I reach for the box. “I can’t believe…” My words trail away, my brain unable to form a complete thought.
Dad rubs a hand over the back of his neck. “I, uh, was going to head out for a ride. You okay?” He hesitates, like he has something else to say. I can tell he wants to know what’s in the box, but he won’t press. He’ll give me my space so I can take my time before opening it. He’s always been able to tell exactly what I need.
I hide in my room and listen to Dad rustle around in the living room. It’s not until I hear the familiar snick of the front door shutting that I crawl out of bed and make my way into the kitchen. I set the box on the table, and it stays there, taunting me as I make breakfast.
It’s directly in front of me as I eat, delaying the inevitable. I push my plate away after I’ve eaten barely half of my eggs. It’s time.
The box is wrapped in plain brown paper with a neat twine bow tied around it. I reach to untie it but pull my hand back and grab my phone. My thumb slips across the smooth glass as I scroll for my brother’s name.
ME: You up?
The message jumps into the sent thread, the newest in a long string of unanswered texts. Before he’s able to respond—not that I expect he will—I tap out another.
ME: I really need you today. Please.
I squeeze the phone until my fingers hurt, staring at the screen and willing Clark to reply. For the telltale dots to let me know he’s there. That we still have some kind of connection.
They don’t come.
With nothing else to delay me, I grab the twine and tug, releasing the knot in one swift movement. I slide my thumbnail under a strip of tape and pull away the paper. In the box, there’s a small figurine nestled on a bed of crinkle paper.
It’s a firefly, made from wire twisted around a chunk of raw peridot. When I found the stone in a booth at the Christmas Market in December, I knew immediately what it needed to be. It took a while to find someone to do it, but Hadley’s dad knows a woman in his congregation who does custom wire work, so I brought it to her.
She’s had it so long that I almost forgot about it. The fact that it showed up today, of all days, seems like a sign somehow. I pull the firefly from the box and give it a closer look. It’s gorgeous, a work of art like I’ve never seen before. It’s delicate but strong, exactly like she was. My heart twists, the familiar ache of missing her intensifying.
I call Clark, but his phone kicks to voicemail after only two rings. He knows how hard this day is. He was there to pick up the pieces for me the past three years. Where is he now? When I call again, it doesn’t ring at all.
Suddenly, I can’t stand being in this empty house anymore. I lace up my boots and head out to my car. I don’t know where I’m going; I only know I can’t be inside anymore.
I drive aimlessly, barely recognizing the scenery around me until it’s too late. The curve is up ahead, coming at me fast. Before I get there, I slam on my breaks, my car skipping across the gravel and skidding to a stop. Dust rises around me in a hazy cloud, so much like that night, it makes my breath freeze in my chest, paralyzed by the memory.
Grief crashes over me, and I scream into the emptiness of my car, again and again and again, hitting the steering wheel with each yell that tears free from my chest. I relish the pain as my screams rip across my throat—crave it, even, because physical pain is so much better than the emotional pain battering me. Tears flow freely, dripping off my face and leaving dark spots down the front of the chambray romper I’m wearing.
When a knock sounds on the passenger window, I shriek, my heart leaping into my throat. I turn toward the sound, but it takes a moment to make sense of what I’m seeing.
I push the button to roll down the window. “What are you doing here?” I try to discreetly wipe away the snot that’s dripping from my nose.
Ezra leans into the car a bit. “You okay?”
I stare ahead, unable to look at him.
“I was on my way home from a class, and I saw you driving out this way. You looked upset. It wasn’t hard to figure out where you were going.” He shrugs. “Can I hop in?”
I push the unlock button, and Ezra climbs into the passenger seat, pulling the door shut behind him.
“You all right?” he asks after a moment.
I shake my head.
“Wanna talk about it?”
Another shake.
“Okay,” he says. He leans back in his seat and stares out the windshield. I wonder if he’s imagining the same thing I am, seeing the truck come around that curve, the other car drifting across the center line.
“It’s been four years,” I say. My voice echoes in my head, the congestion my tears brought amplifying my own words.
Ezra nods and says nothing.
“How can it still hurt so much?” I cry. “When does this stop?” My heart is breaking all over again, and I struggle to gulp in air past my tightening throat.
Ezra reaches toward me, hesitating for a moment with his hand hovering over the center console before grabbing my hand and wrapping it tightly in his own. He squeezes. I squeeze back, hard, and use his hand as an anchor to help bring me back. He doesn’t ask questions or push me to talk. He sits there in the passenger seat, holding my hand while I cry.
“How did you know I was coming here?” I ask once my sobs have been reduced to a few hiccups.
“There’s not a lot out this way,” he says. “Where else would you be going? Especially today.”
“You know what today is?” I ask, surprised.
“Of course. Desiree was like a second mom to me, Quin. I’ll never forget that day.”
“Everyone else does,” I say. “They only remember the day she died. They don’t remember the accident. Not like I do.”
“I don’t think that’s—”
I cut a glare at him, and his mouth snaps shut. “It’s business as usual today for everyone else. Dad is on a bike ride like every other Saturday. Clark used to remember with me. Every year, he’d be by my side. But he won’t even answer the phone today.”
“Do you two come out here every year?” he asks.
I shake my head. “This is the first time I’ve been here since… since…” I can’t say it aloud, and I don’t need to. Ezra knows. He and his mom were there for the whole thing. When Mom’s headache turned into vomiting and dizziness, Dad had Lylah come stay with me while he took Mom to the ER. I hid in my room, too embarrassed to face Ezra after Hannah’s party, and I was lying on my bed when Dad called from the hospital. Lylah’s soft voice carried down our short hallway and into my bedroom, no trace of panic in her words.
A gentle knock sounded at my bedroom door after she hung up. “Quincy? Can I come in?”
“Yeah,” I said.
Lylah slipped into my room, and I caught a quick glimpse of Ezra standing at the end of the hall with a confused look on his face before she pulled the door shut with a soft click. “That was your dad,” she said as she crossed the room and lowered herself to sit on the edge of my bed.
“What’d he say? Is Mom okay?”
She nodded, slowly. “It sounds like it. They want to do some tests to see what’s going on, and she’ll stay overnight, but it sounds like everything will be okay.”
With her words, I could feel the invisible fist that had been tightening around my chest for the past two hours loosen enough for me to breathe again. Mom was going to be okay. This was just one awful night, and then things would go back to normal.
“Do you need anything?” Lylah laid her hand across my bare shin, squeezing it in that familiar way of hers. I was glad she was there, even if I couldn’t face her son. She was normalcy, nearly as close to me as my own mom, and her hand on my skin grounded me in that moment.
Now, Ezra’s hand in mine does the same thing. I grip him tighter, calming myself through our connection. It may have been stretched over the past four years, but it’s not broken.
“Wanna go somewhere?” he asks.
“Where?” I sniff and wipe the back of my hand across my nose. There’s no hiding how gross I’m being at this point, but I don’t mind Ezra seeing me like this. He’s seen worse.
“Just someplace I like to go when I need to think,” he says. “We don’t have to if you don’t want, but I thought maybe you wouldn’t want to be here anymore.”
“You’re right,” I say. “I don’t know why I came here in the first place. Should I follow you?”
“Why don’t we park your car, and I’ll give you a ride. I can bring you back after.” He nods across the street, where there’s a turnoff for a fishing access.
I pull the car into a spot and lock it up, then we walk together across the street to where his car is parked.
“You okay?” he asks as he pulls open the passenger door for me. “Or okay-ish, at least?”
“Okay-ish.”
chapter Fourteen
WE DRIVE IN SILENCE, AND IT STRIKES ME THAT THIS IS the second time I’ve been alone with Ezra in the past week. We used to see each other almost every day, but this is the most time I’ve spent with him in years. It’s nice, somehow, spending today with someone who also loved my mom.
As soon as we cross the bridge to Carolina Beach, I know where we’re going. Ezra and I used to beg our parents to take us to the Kure Beach Pier. We’d sit for hours watching the people lined up fishing, concocting backstories about their lives. Once, an old man let Ezra help him reel in a shark. It was a super small shark, but still, it was the highlight of our summer.
We sit midway down the pier on a bench facing the ocean. A pelican perches on the railing in front of us, immune to the presence of humans. The pier is busy, people around us casting their lines into the water and posing for pictures against the railing, the ocean wide open behind them. But even with all the noise and bustle, it’s peaceful.
“What class?” I ask.
“Huh?” Ezra doesn’t look at me. We both keep our eyes on the ocean.
“You said you were coming home from a class when you saw me. What kind of class were you taking on a Saturday morning?”
“EMT training,” he says. “It’s every Saturday and Sunday for a few weeks.”
“Oh, is that why you were on campus last Sunday?”
“Yep. I was finishing up and heading home when Shyla snagged me.”
“Well, I’m glad she did.” I lean and bump him with my shoulder. “You’re going to make a great Sebastian. Ready to start shooting?”
“No,” he says and laughs. “I have no idea what I’m doing. I’ve never acted before.”
“First of all, that’s not true. We made so many movies together, and don’t even try to say those don’t count.”
He holds up his hands in front of him. “I would never. Night of the Killer Cat was a masterpiece.”
“And you were marvelous in it,” I add. It was our first movie together, and it’s comically bad. Dad has a copy of it saved somewhere, I’m sure. “Besides, if you do all your scenes the way you did at auditions, you’ll be just fine.”
The pelican stretches up, beak high in the air and wings spread to its sides, then plummets toward the ocean. We watch as it glides over the gentle waves and dips its beak into the water, snatching a fish for lunch.
“Can I ask you something?” Ezra says.
“Yeah.” I’m suddenly nervous. People only ask if they can ask a question if it’s going to be a difficult one.
Ezra rotates in his seat, angling his body toward me. “Why did we stop being friends?”
“I dunno. I guess we grew apart when we hit high school. That happens sometimes.”
“Except that’s not what happened,” he says. “We didn’t drift apart. Middle school ended, and it’s like you wanted nothing to do with me. I called you all the time that summer. And any time Mom and I came over, you’d shut yourself in your room. Then when high school started, you acted like you didn’t even know me. Why?”
“I don’t know, Ezra. My mom had just died. Did you seriously expect me to go back to normal? Pretend like nothing ever happened? Sorry, but no. I couldn’t do it. I can’t do it.”
He suddenly takes my hand in his again, squeezing it gently. I refuse to look at him. I’m afraid that if I do, I’ll break down, and I’m tired of crying. His thumb runs across the side of my hand, rubbing the scar I got on the Fourth of July when we were ten. It was the first year we had more freedom with fireworks, and we went way overboard. About halfway through the night, we found the bigger ones my dad had stashed away for the grand finale and decided to try some of those out. We were lighting a particularly stubborn fountain when a piece of the burning fuse broke off and fell onto my hand, burning me. Ezra and I snuck into the house to bandage it, and we never told our parents what happened.
“I don’t want you to pretend like nothing happened. I was hurting too, Quin.”
I glare at him. “You have no idea—”
“I’m not saying it was the same as what you were feeling. But I loved Desiree too, and then you shut me out and I lost my best friend in the world. I want to know why.”
“Right. I lost my mom, and I was supposed to worry about how you were feeling?” I snap.
He lets go of my hand. “This isn’t coming out right.” Ezra takes a deep breath. “I’m not blaming you for how you handled things, Quin. I can’t even imagine how you felt. But now that we’re going to be seeing each other more, I thought maybe we could… I was just wondering what happened to us?”
“It was my fault,” I say. My voice is carried away on the breeze, and I’m not sure he even hears me.
“What was?”
I turn to face him, our knees nearly touching on the bench between us. I’ve never told anyone this before, and I need to see his face when I say the words.
“Her accident,” I say. “It was my fault.”
Confusion morphs his features. “That doesn’t make sense,” he says. “I thought she slipped and fell?”
The scene unfolds in my memory as I tell him about that day. I remember it vividly: Mom and I were driving back from watching the fireflies, singing at the top of our lungs to compensate for the nonworking radio in her truck. As we came around the curve, a dark blue car drifted into our lane. My eyes connected with the driver’s face, and I saw his own eyes staring at the glowing screen of his phone. I screamed.
Mom’s arm shot out, slamming into my chest and pushing me back against the seat. The truck fishtailed with the pressure of the brakes, and she jerked the wheel to the side. When we hit the gravel shoulder, we skidded and bounced until the back end of the Ford smashed the guard rail with an ear-splitting screech. Finally, we stopped, a cloud of dust around us.
