“Do you think it was my destiny to come here?” This is something I thought about last night. “I feel like I was meant to be right here, right now. But that would mean my parents were destined to die.”

Matt slides his hand down my arm and presses his palm to mine. He’s holding my hand the way a parent would hold a child’s as we cross the street. It looks innocent, but my heart is racing.

“Not destiny, it’s more like fate. Fate can go either way, good or bad.”

I see what he’s saying, but it doesn’t make me feel any better. “If I had a choice to go back to my old life with my parents or stay here, I don’t know what I would choose. Does that make me a bad person?”

Matt stops walking and turns me to face him. “Something horrible happened and you ended up here. You had no control over that. Your parents would want you to be happy. They would want you to feel the way you feel right now.” I doubt that. They wouldn’t want me to be high. Just happy. And I am happy right now, right here, with Matt.

I choke back tears and throw myself into Matt’s arms. “I’m so glad I met you.” My heart feels heavy in my chest. Like it’s weighted down with too much emotion. Emotions I can’t act on or even acknowledge. There are things I can never say to Matt, to anyone. What I want to say is a betrayal to Nick. So, I choose my words carefully. “You’re my best friend, Matt.” I kiss his cheek just a few millimeters away from his mouth. A kiss on the cheek is nothing. We’ve kissed for real, even if it was a game.

“You’re not mad about, you know, the lying?” He looks at his feet. “I never would have lied to you, but Nick said…”

“I know.” I squeeze his hand. He doesn’t have to apologize. I know it was Nick. Matt would never betray me. It’s the one thing I know I can count on. “I understand.”

When we get to Lucy’s, I have no problem asking Matt if he wants to come inside. It isn’t like I have anything to hide from him. He hesitates at the door as if he’s not allowed to be alone with me. “Are you sure?” He looks around to make sure nobody is lurking in the bushes, ready to jump out and catch him doing something he shouldn’t.

“Why not? We’re friends, Matt, we hang out all the time. What’s the difference if we do it at your house or mine?” Something that feels like guilt surfaces as I try to convince Matt to stay with me. Maybe being alone at my house is crossing a line. I don’t even let Nick come inside when he drops me off.

Matt reluctantly steps inside the foyer and asks to use the bathroom. I point him in the direction of the guest bathroom and go upstairs to change out of my coffee-stained shirt. I’m looking for something to wear when I hear Lucy’s car pull into the driveway. I don’t know if I’m happy she’s here or totally disappointed. I grab a white tank top and pull it on as I hurry back downstairs in time to see Lucy introduce herself to Matt.

“Are you Nick?” Lucy extends her free hand with a smile.

“No, I’m Matt, Nick’s friend—Dani’s friend.” Matt shakes Lucy’s hand.

“Do you want to stay for dinner? We have more than enough.” She sets a bag on the dining room table and removes several cartons of Chinese food.

“Thanks, but I can’t. I was just leaving.” Matt sees me standing on the step and waves. “I’ll see you later, Dani.”

“I’ll walk you out.” I take Matt by the forearm and walk him onto the porch. “Thanks for the walk and talk and everything.” I lift my arms to give him a hug, and I feel his hand slide into the back pocket of my jeans. I step back and put my hand on my right butt cheek.

“Anytime.” Matt smiles and walks down the stairs. “Have a nice night.” There is a bit of sarcasm in his voice.

“Very cute.” Lucy appears beside me. I don’t deny it or agree with her.

I slide my hand in my pocket and feel a tiny bag full of pills. I knew I could trust him.

After dinner I tell Lucy I’m tired and go to my room. I pull my memory box from its shelf and place it on the bed. The smell of cinnamon overcomes me as I pull the last three sticks from the pack. I empty the little packet of pills into the bottom of the package and replace the gum, leaving one pill on the bed. I put everything back in the box and place it on the nightstand. I swallow the pill then wait for the thizz to take over, but I can’t keep still. I dump the contents of my memory box on the bed. I eat another piece of gum even though I’ll regret it later, and I start to look through the pictures. When I come across the last one in the stack, I feel a knot in my throat. It was taken on my seventeenth birthday, the last birthday we celebrated together. I stare at the eyes of the girl in the picture. Her round, chubby face, her frumpy clothes—they belong to someone that doesn’t exist anymore. She died that night with them. That girl has never felt the rush of thizz. She never kissed a boy as perfect as Nick. She has never been in love. She’s also never felt the pain and loss of losing her parents. She never watched someone perform CPR on her mother or pull a sheet over her father’s lifeless body. The girl trapped in this photo, in this moment, I wish I was her.

The picture was taken at my favorite Italian restaurant in North Beach. I remember the waiter singing “Happy Birthday” as he carried out a tray of tiramisu with seventeen candles stuck in it. That’s when I noticed my father was missing. I looked at the strangers that gathered around our table, but his face wasn’t among the crowd. Then I saw him. He was on the sidewalk having an animated conversation with a man I’d never seen before. He wore baggy jeans and an oversized puffy jacket like the public school kids I used to see on the bus. Their heated exchange was evident by the way people watched them as they walked by. When he finally came back in, I asked him if everything was ok. He waved his hand in the air and shrugged it off like it was no big deal. He looked frazzled, and that wasn’t like my father. He was an expert at hiding his feelings. I asked him if the man was a client, and he told me he wanted him to take his case, but he couldn’t because his calendar was full. That would explain why the man was upset. Landing my father as your lawyer was like winning the lottery.

My mother called for us to smile and snapped the picture just as I blew out the candles. My mother’s picture caught the man’s reflection in one of the many mirrors that surrounded the restaurant. It’s funny that I remember the guy on the street, but I can’t recall what I wished for.

Tonight is Nick’s eighteenth birthday. We’re celebrating at one of his family’s beach houses. The house is decorated in typical beach cottage décor. Lots of large ships and big vases filled with sea glass. The walls are a soft blue that plays well off the dark hardwood floors. The wall facing the ocean is solid glass. It looks like one of those moving paintings they sell at the mall. I watch the silent waves roll in as the sun sets on the horizon. The house, the beach, it’s perfect for what I have planned. We head up the stairs to the second floor and Nick shows me two bedrooms.

“This one is bigger, but the one across the hall has a better bathroom.” He steps back into the hall. “Or we can check out the third floor…”

“This one.” I pull him back into the room and he closes the door.

Nick and I haven’t gone past second base. I think. I don’t really know the bases. Heather says we’ve only gone to second, and I trust her. It’s weird, trusting Heather. I wish she was going to be here tonight. Her parents still have her on lockdown. Thankfully, we’ve been communicating through Myspace. I typed her a five-thousand word message the other night when I was high. Her message back was just as long. While I was stuck in my room with a gum package full of pills, she was at home with her parents and their pastor praying for her soul. When she told me she was grounded for spring break, I assumed it would only be a week. I had no idea Eureka’s spring break was two weeks long.