Loving Emily Read Online Free PDF Page A

she says, with his dad beside him. Yancy had been in San Francisco, but flew back and only got to the hospital a few hours ago.
    Each word from Yancy’s mouth is like a drop of water on my forehead, a kind of Chinese water torture. The words are dripping, dripping out the rhythm of
Michael is dead, Michael is dead
.
    But wait a minute. Yancy doesn’t know what she’s talking about. “I
drove down
PCH all the way and even went to your house, looking for him. There was no accident!”
    “Ryan, Michael went
north
on PCH.” There are tears in Yancy’s voice.
    Michael had driven in the wrong direction. He was too wasted to even find his way home. And I deserted him.
    “You saw him last night, Ryan?” Coming at this moment, Yancy’s question feels like an accusation.
    “Yeah, I saw that he wasn’t … in the best shape, so I told him I’d take him home. But then I had to leave for a few minutes. And he didn’t wait for me. And the Breakers Club valets let him go.”
    I left Michael alone when he needed me. All I could think of was myself and chasing this pretty girl around, and now, because of me, Michael is dead. I feel sick as I think back over our last conversation. He asked me to stay with him. And I blew him off.
    I killed Michael.
    With the hand that isn’t holding the phone, I’ve twisted one of my fingers painfully in the rope of the hammock. I twist it even more, until it hurts like hell, then loosen it as I talk. I do it over and over. Twist it, loosen it. Twist it, loosen it.
    “Did you say you offered him a ride?” Yancy asks me.
    “Yeah. But I had to leave. I was only gone a few minutes. I told him to wait, but he left on his own.” I should be saying, “I made him drive there in his car, then left him alone for half an hour when he asked me to stay. This is all my fault.”
    Her voice gets hard. “Nat’s calling the Breakers Club about this. We’re furious. They should
never
have given him his car!”
    I am still twisting the rope around my finger. I notice that, the longer and harder I do it, the more purple the tip of my finger becomes. I wonder if I can make gangrene set in. Maybe if I hurt my finger badly enough, I’ll stop feeling the intense, burning pain that’s in my throat and chest.
    Yancy says she’ll call us about the funeral, and we hang up. I suddenly think of the expression
My heart is heavy
.
My
heart feels heavy. My chest feels so full of pain that I think it will explode, and my heart will roll out onto the ground and lie there, beating by itself.
    I tell myself that I did my best. Anger hits me hard and unexpectedly. This isn’t all my fault. My mind reaches out for anyone I can blame.
    First of all, Chase, who poured drugs and liquor into Michael, when he was already drunk. And the Club. That valet handed Michael a death sentence when he gave him his car.
    And then there’s Yancy. She was a crappy mother, clueless, always gone. No wonder he ended up the way he did.
    My cell phone rings, and it’s Jonathan. “Ryan, man, forty foot waves at Surfrider today. You up for it?”
    Pacing back and forth on Rosario’s little patio, I dodge a long string of wind chimes and stare out across a lawn that slopes down toward our swimming pools.
    Michael is dead, I tell Jonathan. “He had an accident last night after the party.”
    There’s a long silence.
    “Michael
died?”
Jonathan’s voice trembles.
    “Yeah. His mom just told me.”
    Jonathan does a giant exhale on his side of the phone. “No way, man.”
    I feel like a hand is gripping my chest, making it hard to breathe. “I gotta go,” I say. “Will you tell people? I don’t think I can do it.”
    “Sure.”
    “Thanks,” I say.
    •   •   •
    I lie in the hammock, waiting for Ro. Sunday’s her day off, but Mom must have asked for a trade, to have Ro during the party. I fight off a wave of panic and focus on trying to breathe. Finally, I hear her footsteps.
    “There you are,” Ro says.
    I stand up.