Will’s cheeks turned pink, and he shook his head. “It’s not that she blames you. She just doesn’t know anything about what happened, except that you were the last one to see him. If it wasn’t for Jack’s note …”
Jack’s note. His mother found the note the day after Jack disappeared. In it, Jack had said that he was running away. He begged them not to look for him. I hadn’t known about the note until after he was gone.
“Do you … do you think he knew what he was going to do?” My voice cracked at the end, and I took a deep breath. “I mean, how could he have known? How could he …” But he did know. The note proved it.
Will put his arms around me and held me tight as I focused on not causing a scene.
“I was as surprised as you were. He never said a word about taking your place. If anything, I thought he was planning on going with you.”
“It’s my fault.”
“Don’t say that. Jack knew what he was doing. Besides, if he were still here and he had lost you again … there’d be no living with him.” Will’s lips pulled up in a sad smile. “Trust me, I’ve seen it. There’s a lot of moping, body piercing, bad poetry, tattoos. It’s not pretty.”
I smiled and thought about the tattoo on Jack’s arm. It said Ever Yours in ancient Sanskrit symbols. The same words he had written to me after our first dance. His last words to me before the Tunnels took him.
“Nothing could have changed Jack’s mind,” Will said.
I didn’t answer, but I knew Will was wrong. I was the reason Jack was getting the life sucked out of him. Some part of Will had to believe that too, even though he’d never say.
I shivered despite the warmth from the sun. He held me quietly for a few moments more until my regular breathing had resumed and his mom had made it a sufficient distance away.
We started walking again.
Will broke the silence first. “It’s been two months. Do you think he’s still alive?”
“I know he is.” That was the truth. I’d told Will about my dreams countless times, but I could understand how difficult it was to believe. Or maybe it was comforting to hear me say it again and again.
“Tell me how you know,” he said.
I smiled. “He’d told me that the symbols on his tattoo were ancient Sanskrit. I researched it, and it’s true. How could my subconscious have known to look in ancient Sanskrit?”
He nodded.
I grabbed his arm. “I’m going after him, Will. You know that, don’t you?”
Will shook his head and smiled faintly. “How, Becks?”
I hesitated to tell him about my map of the Dead Elvises sightings and my theory that they were getting closer to Park City. I didn’t want to get his hopes up, but then I thought about our history. For a few of us there was no such thing as getting our hopes up too high. It wasn’t possible.
“Cole’s band was in Austin last night,” I said. “He’s getting closer. I think he’s coming back.”
Will’s face changed so slightly, I almost didn’t catch it. But there it was. In the tiny lines around his eyes, in the microscopic twitch of his mouth. Hope.
Not the beach sands of hope of someone who hadn’t been through what we’d been through. Will’s hope was like mine. A tiny kernel. One grain of sand coursing through our bodies, leaving traces of it in ways only the other could see.
I grabbed his arm. “And if Cole comes back, all I need is one little part of him. One strand of hair. One … I don’t know … fingernail. Anything I can swallow in the Shop-n-Go.”
We were at the bleachers now, the graduates and their families filing past us, but Will stopped.
“If Cole comes back,” he said, “I’m gonna kill him.”
I snorted despite the seriousness of the situation. “You can’t kill him.”
“Why not? We know where his heart is now. I can break his pick.”
“But if you do, we lose our best chance to get back to the Everneath.” He was quiet for a moment as he considered this. “Besides,” I added. “We aren’t even sure what would happen if we broke his pick.”
It was true. We’d only been acting on a theory about breaking Cole’s heart. Another Forfeit, named Meredith, had given me an ancient bracelet with Egyptian symbols on it. She was convinced that it held the key to killing an Everliving, but the Tunnels captured her before she could find out. Jack and I showed a picture of the bracelet to a professor of anthropology named Dr. Spears; after he studied the symbols, he’d theorized that breaking the heart would destroy the Everliving.
Because Everlivings such as Cole didn’t have real hearts inside their chests. Their hearts had been transformed into objects they could carry around with them. It happened the instant they became immortals. The emptiness in their chests symbolized their unbreakable link to the Everneath, and also meant that they couldn’t survive on the Surface unless they stole emotions from humans. There was a point when I thought I’d figured out that Cole’s heart was in his guitar and that smashing it should’ve killed him. Or at least made him mortal. But Cole’s heart was actually in his guitar pick, and the Tunnels came for me anyway.
It was still hypothetical. We didn’t know what would really happen because we never got that far.
“A guy can’t live without his heart,” Will said, but I could tell he was reconsidering Cole’s immediate demise.
“C’mon.” I tugged on the sleeve of his shirt. “We can’t miss this.”
But he didn’t move. “Becks.”
“What?”
“I want you to know, here and now, that if we can’t get Jack back … you won’t be able to stop me from killing Cole. Whether I have to break his heart or tear him apart.”
I let out a breath. “If it gets to that point, it’s you who won’t be able to stop me.”
I didn’t know if I could physically kill Cole. Breaking a guitar pick was one thing, but doing something more violent? Such as … stabbing someone? Strangling someone? That was another thing entirely.
Then again, wasn’t it murder just the same? I didn’t know. But I had plenty of time to contemplate it because the graduation speakers were boring. Jennifer Carpenter talked about how the future was theirs for the taking, and Dione Warnick—yes, that was her real name—gave a resounding speech that had something to do with the size of the graduates’ shoes and their carbon footprint on the earth. She even had visual aids: a pair of her grandpa’s old hiking boots.
The principal spoke last. He made a reference to “loved ones who are no longer with us.” All eyes shifted to the empty seat between Farah Cannon and Noni Chatworth, where Jack would’ve been sitting.
A few people glanced back toward me, which meant I hadn’t entered as stealthily as I’d thought. Looks that said, You were the last one with him. You should know where he is.
The commencement announcer got to the Cs and called Jack’s name; and despite the number of times I’d imagined this moment, and thought I’d prepared myself for it, hearing his name felt like a hammer on my heart, threatening the dam that I’d built up there.
In the silence that followed, a woman near the front stood and walked toward the podium. Jack’s mom. I sank a little lower in my chair, trying not to think of the times she had grilled me since his disappearance. My story never changed. I didn’t know where he’d gone or when he’d be back.
Mrs. Caputo climbed the stairs to the stage and took the diploma, shaking the principal’s hand. She turned away and wiped under her eyes, and the audience applauded. Scattered football players in the crowd jumped out of their seats, and soon it turned into a standing ovation. I was at once overcome by the outpouring of love for Jack and immobilized by the guilt in my chest. I stayed in my seat, my head lowered.
The rest of the ceremony was a blur, only partly because of the fresh moisture in my eyes.
A series of hugs. Hats thrown in the air. Yearbooks signed.
I saw it all from the shadows of the old sycamore trees at the end of the field. Will was off to the side, his arm around his crying mother. I watched them for a long time, until I caught something out of the corner of my eye. The sun glinting off long, blond hair and shining in my eyes.
Jules.
My best friend. Former best friend. Still best friend?
She was talking to Dan Gregson, the head of the yearbook committee. Like me, Jules wouldn’t graduate until next year, so I wondered why she was here today. Maybe it was for Jack. After all, she’d been friends with him too. When I left last year, she became his best friend. Maybe even more than friends.
I studied her face. Her cheeks were not as round as they had been just two months ago. She was smiling at Dan, but the smile didn’t reach any other part of her face.
I was so focused on Jules’s face that I didn’t see Jack’s mom coming. I heard her before I saw her.
“You have some nerve showing up here!”
I turned to find Mrs. Caputo marching toward me, flanked by Will, whose expression seemed to read I tried to stop her. Her hand trembled at her side, as if she wanted to slap me but didn’t dare.
“You avoid my phone calls, your father won’t let me on your property, and then you show up here?”
Avoided her phone calls? My dad wouldn’t let her on our property? I had no idea what she was talking about. All I knew was that she had backed off over the past couple of weeks. I thought she’d given up.
“What are you doing here?” she demanded.
She was right on top of me now, and I took a step back. “I … I just wanted to …”
“To what? Keep up this … charade you’ve been selling?”
“What charade?”
“The one where you act like you don’t have the first clue where my son is when you know damn well it’s a lie.”
Will put a hand on her shoulder. “Mom—”
She shook him away. “She pretends to be a friend, pretends to love Jack, and she won’t even answer one question about where he went.” She was talking to Will but glaring at me. Her voice grew softer but still resonated with anger. “You don’t know anything about love.”
Her words stung. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Caputo. I didn’t know you were trying to get hold of me—”
“Enough with the innocent act,” she said. “I can’t even stand to look at you anymore.”
She whipped around and stalked off. It wasn’t until that moment that I realized we had an audience. Several people had wandered over, obviously curious about all the shouting. Now that she and Will had left, I was alone, the center of a dozen accusatory stares.
I put on my sunglasses to hide my eyes and set off for the parking lot. It wasn’t an act. I really didn’t know she had been trying so hard to talk to me. Was my dad playing the buffer? If so, part of me wanted to thank him, but another part of me was angry that he didn’t tell me about it.
Mrs. Caputo’s car came around the corner, and I ducked behind a tree. Of course I could understand her anger. The only thing keeping her from killing me had to be Jack’s note. She could never know exactly how much I was to blame for Jack being gone, but I silently made her the same promise I made to Will.
I will find your son. As soon as I find Cole.
The moment I thought the words, a strange feeling came over me. It was unsettling, like a pull at my back. A warning, almost. I crept farther behind the tree as Mrs. Caputo’s car passed by and suddenly, from behind me, two hands grasped my shoulders.
I jumped. Whipped around. Found myself staring into two dark eyes. And then I tried to stifle a scream that was equal parts panic and excitement.
“Hi, Nik,” Cole said.
THREE
NOW
The Surface. Park City High.
Cole. Standing in front of me. No matter how many times I’d imagined this moment, it didn’t prepare me enough. I forgot what I was supposed to be feeling. It wasn’t relief that my best chance to get Jack back was here now, even though that’s what I should’ve been feeling.
Instead, my emotions were much more basic.
Hatred and anger. As long as Jack was dying, it was easy for me to hate.
A group of seniors in caps and gowns wandered by, loudly congratulating one another, so Cole pulled me farther behind a small grove of trees until we were safely separated from everyone else.
Cole took a step closer. His dark eyes searched my face. “You look good.”
I lowered my hands, which had been covering my mouth. “You disappeared.”
His lip twitched. “Yes, well, I thought it only appropriate considering that you tried to kill me. I knew it was only a matter of time before you’d get that urge again.”
We were quiet. He seemed just as oblivious to the graduation hoopla going on as I was. He hadn’t changed since the first time I had ever met him, at Harry O’s club during the Sundance Film Festival. I’d just lost my mother, and unlike everyone else, Cole hadn’t tried to make me forget my pain. Instead, he’d given me space to feel every last drop of it.