In an acid voice I said, “Sometimes I wish you were.”

We stared at each other with naked resentment. Then she kissed me, meanly, gashing my lip, and slid a hand inside my jeans. A moment later mine was in hers. I’d never hatefucked someone before. I didn’t think I had it in me. But there was no other word for what happened. It was crude and unlovely. Unloving. I came first, white heat knifing savagely up my belly. Then I turned tender like I always did afterward and stroked her cheek, but she grimaced and said, “Harder,” and I tried to oblige. She didn’t come. She pushed me away, cupped cold water to her face. Fumbled her clothes straight and staggered out.

We each had a set of car keys. I caught her before she started the engine.

“Elle, are you crazy? You’re drunk.”

I wrestled her into the passenger seat. When I buckled her in I knelt on the curb, grasping her hands.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I don’t know how to handle this. I’ve never really been serious with anyone. Guy or girl. This is a first for me.”

Ellis stared through the windshield, mouth drawn. Tears or water or both ran down her face, silver threads glistening in the starlight.

I kissed her knuckles. “Okay. Let’s just go home.”

Somewhere northwest of us, a girl with hairline fractures in her sternum left another party and got behind the wheel of her Jeep. As I double-checked the seat belt, Skylar tipped her head back, a comet tail of cinnamon whiskey trickling behind the bruises on her throat.

Ellis was eerily quiet as I drove. I glanced at her, my anxiety winding tighter. Fuck, she was crying, and it made me tear up, too. I could never watch her cry.

“This doesn’t work,” she said. “We don’t work. We’re broken.”

“We’re having an off night.”

“Over and over and over.”

I gripped the wheel like a vise. These were the last few minutes my right hand would be strong and whole.

“Please don’t cry,” I said.

Ellis took her phone out. Skylar took another slug.

I pressed the gas, felt the tires spin loosely on ice. Careful. Calm down, Vada.

But the one person who always calmed me down was the one making me unravel.

“We’re not broken, Elle. We’re still figuring stuff out.”

“It’s been four years. How long does it take?”

I never had an answer for that except Not yet. Everything in my life was not yet.

“You’re wrong.” She spoke in a small voice, facing her phone. “I don’t know who I am, but I know what I want. And we don’t want the same thing.”

“What do you want?”

“You. For the rest of my life.”

My palms chafed on the cold leather wheel. I didn’t know how to respond.

I’m not ready, I thought. I love you but I’m not ready for something this intense, this epic. I’m not ready for my life to start. What if I choose wrong? What if I commit to something I’m not serious about? What if I grow restless and unhappy like my father? I’m only twenty-two. Still a kid, really.

Is this my fucking quarter-life crisis?

Ellis tapped her phone.

“What are you doing?” I said.

“Buying a plane ticket.”

“What? Where?”

“Chicago.”

Again I pumped the gas before I could stop myself. We slid over the center line, but the highway was deserted. Plenty of time to correct.

Skylar started the ignition.

“Elle, what the fuck?”

“You don’t want me in your life.”

“Are you nuts? You’re my fucking world.”

She slapped her armrest. “You moved all the way here to get rid of me. You could’ve gone to grad school in Chicago.”

“Stop with the paranoia. They rejected me.”

“Did they, or did you withdraw your app? I don’t believe you. You moved here on purpose. You were hoping I’d stay behind.”

My teeth ground so hard they felt like glass about to snap. No shit, I thought. Your mother promised to take care of you if I left. If I set you free. Let you find your own happiness, instead of always chasing me like a puppy. A puppy I keep kicking because I’m too scared to love it unashamedly.

I didn’t hope you’d stay behind. I just wanted you to be happy. You deserve someone who puts you first.

You deserve someone better than me.

“Coming here was a mistake. And I’m going to fix it.” She tapped her screen decisively. “There. Booked.”

I was doing fifty in a forty zone. The road began to curve. The slightest twitch would send us flying into the other lane.

“Cancel the booking.”

“No. I’m going home.”

“Home is a few miles away. We’ll be there soon. Then we can talk about this.”

“I’m done talking. I’m just done, Vada. With everything. With you.”

Her words slurred. I felt the razor edge of teeth slicing into my lip.

“You’re drunk and being dramatic.”

“So what if I’m drunk? Maybe I have to be drunk to stand up to you. Ever think about that?”

I winced. “What do you want, Elle? What will make you happy? Tell me, and I’ll do it.”

“Take me to the airport.”

“I’m not doing that.”

“Then you’ll just keep making me miserable.”

I could have screamed. “God, what do you want from me? I fucking love you. I’m sorry I don’t show it exactly the way you want, but I love you. What more is there?”

“You’re just using me so you don’t get lonely till you find the man of your dreams.”

“Give it a fucking rest. You’re the only one I want. The only one who’s made me feel this way.”

“Liar.”

“It’s the truth.”

“Know why it’s a lie? Because you’d never marry me. Ever. But I’d do it. In a heartbeat.”

Gut punch.

How can you look that far ahead? How can you imagine that, when I can barely see us getting home safe right now?

“This is so unfair, Elle. You can’t judge my love based on some faraway future.”

“You don’t love me the way I love you. And you never will.”

Fifty-five miles per hour.

“So you’re just leaving? Do you know how cruel this is? I’m losing my girlfriend and my best friend.”

“Now you call me that. Because you have nothing left to lose.”

“Fuck you, Ellis.”

“Fuck you, too. And slow down before you kill us. Or just kill us, actually. I don’t care anymore.”

A scream rose inside me. I pressed it back down.

And as I did I pressed the gas pedal, feeling the fuel burn brighter, hotter, tires devouring the road. I clung to the curve. Always in control, even when I was going too fast. Ahead of us the tree line broke and iron struts rose against the night. A bridge.

All this time, Elle had endured my misgivings in her patient, understanding way. The way that sometimes made me see her as a doormat. Not once had she pulled herself out from under my feet like this. And when Ellis Carraway had enough, that was it. She’d cut her parents off cold. She’d left her entire extended family in Chicago, for me.

Now she’d had enough of this. Enough of me controlling our relationship, framing it in my terms. Enough of it being about me and my needs and my hang-ups.

Enough of me, period.

I’d finally pushed too far. She was leaving me all alone in this cold, dark, empty place.

Who the hell was I without her?

No one. A ghost.

If I was already a ghost, then what did it matter if I sped up?

If I smashed this car into pieces.

If I broke us. Like she was breaking my heart right now.

Fifty-six miles per hour.

Fifty-seven. Fifty-eight. Fifty-nine.

The bridge came up faster than I expected. Night played tricks with distance. I braked. The car fishtailed.

Black ice.

Oh, fuck no.

Steer into a slide, I thought, steer into a slide, but it was too close and we were going too fast and we’d hit the bridge rail before I could straighten out. My first-ever accident. In this strange, lonely state where I lost everything that mattered to me. Where I lost her.

Only me, I prayed as the railing rushed up. Please, God. Let it hurt only me.