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mountains before I went home and everything changed. He would
whisper my name as he kissed my lips, my cheeks, my neck, my breasts, and tell
me that he was the luckiest person in the world. I’d say I was luckier, and it
was true. That was always true.
    Graham
lingered on the line, and I thought—hoped—that he’d say something else, but he
didn’t. I didn’t blame him. Not even goodbye. We just sat there, neither of us
speaking, breathing into the receiver, and listening, waiting.
    Behind me June
called my name, but I didn’t answer. Graham’s breathing disappeared. I kept the
phone pressed against my ear even though he’d hung up, and told myself it would
be okay. My head didn’t believe me. My heart didn’t either. They both knew.
They knew that this moment, this feeling, was what happened right before we
drowned—and that the only person who I wanted to save me could barely talk to
me.

6.
Cassie
    I’M LEAVING ON SATURDAY.
Just say it, Cassie.
     “Water?” Rohan
asked, handing me a bottle over my shoulder. I took the water from his hand, and
he leaned in to kiss me before he let go. This conversation wasn’t one I wanted
to have, but he had to know. I had to tell him. I couldn’t be in another
situation like I had with Graham, or carry the guilt from sending him away. I had
enough of that to carry me through forever.
    Rohan pressed
his lips against my neck—once, twice, three times. I could only think of
Graham. I hadn’t been able to get his voice out of my head since his phone
call, so I pulled away from Rohan and curled my legs into his couch. He slumped
down by me, hand resting on my knee.
    “Are you still
mad about the RV? That was days ago. I told you it’s fine now.”
    “I’m not mad,”
I said. I was never mad; I was uncomfortable. It was a big commitment and he
didn’t even know me. That’s all I could think: he didn’t know me.
    “The guys are
pitching in and we’re fixing it up for the band.”
    “For a tour?”
    Rohan smiled.
“Yeah, Stan set it up. We’re recording the demo in two days and Stan has a
meeting with The Pitheads manager next week.”
    He was
glowing, bouncing all over the couch. I had to smile at his smile. “You
remember them, right? That ‘Girl with a Tattoo’ song. We saw them with Levi?”
    “Right.” I
remembered an underground concert with sticky floors and drunk girls and
something considered music that was a blend of bad techno and screaming noise.
It was horrible.
    “If the
meeting goes well?” I asked.
    “Vinyl Drive
would open. Fifteen cities, three weeks. Stan thinks he can get the new stuff
in front of labels in a few weeks because of the online fan base. He already
has a meeting set up.” They’d had a buddy shoot a video for YouTube. It went
viral in less than twenty-four hours. That was how Stan found them two months ago,
and that was how all this was moving so quickly. A label was huge. “Then who
knows? Your boyfriend could make it.”
    In the six
months I’d known him, I’d never heard Rohan talk like this. He was usually
wrapped up in what was expected of him from his family, his professors, and
himself. He’d had a five-year plan, and then the band happened, and now he was
talking like this.
    “Does he want
to?” I asked.
    He ran his
fingers across the tips of my hair, and his knuckles grazed my neck. “He thinks
so.”
    “And his
parents?” I’d never met his parents, but he talked about them enough. He and
his brothers were second generations in this country from Bangladesh. His
grandparents started with nothing, and worked hard to build a life for their
families. Rohan and his siblings were expected to make it count, to do
something that mattered, and music would definitely not fit into that category.
Rohan had said that much to me enough times to commit it to memory.
    Rohan laughed
awkwardly. “They will probably disown him. But maybe not? I don’t really know
yet. One step at a time.”
    I smiled,
feeling a little