THEY SAY THE COCAINE had lethal amounts of fentanyl in it. Three people died at the party, but in the waiting room of the hospital—as I teeter between crying, pacing, and pulling at my hair—I hear they're losing more.

Nobody will tell me who.

Not when I cry and beg. Not when I keep it together and calmly ask, "Is it him?"

"I'm sorry, but we can't release names until families are notified," a nurse tells me as she rushes down the hall.

Defeat cripples me. I shouldn't bug them while they're working, but this has been the worst night of my life, and there's no end in sight. Through the windows of the waiting room, the amber sunrise creeps through the blackness of the night. I fall into a chair. My gut alternates between clenching and squeezing, nausea and an achy emptiness.

I'm not alone here. Parents, siblings, other people from school—anyone who woke up from the calls from the hospital is here. I keep looking for Garnett and Lucas, maybe even Dorothy, but none of them show.

Grandma used to say it was a sin not to pray. With everything I went through as a kid, I'm not sure I ever had any faith—but please, God, anyone who will listen: don't let Carson die.

"Jill!"

I stand, just as Val hurries into the waiting room and slams into me with a hug. Sobbing uncontrollably, I hug her back.

"Jesus Christ, what happened?" She holds onto my arms as we break apart, dark eyes hardened and serious.

"I—I don't know," I stammer. "They did bad coke. They died, Val."

"Blue?"

"No, I don't know." I cover my eyes with the sleeve of my jacket and cry more. "Val, I don't know."

More people rush in, hugging each other and crying just like Val and I.

"Okay, come here," Val says. We sit down, and she holds both my wrists in her cold hands. "Just tell me what happened. Why were you even at the party?"

"I had to find Carson. There's so much more to him than I ever realized. I forgive him, Val. For everything."

"Please tell me he's okay."

"I wish I knew."

More than anything, I wish I knew.

When a doctor holding a clipboard emerges from the hall, the whole room stands. I hold my breath. The doctor's eyes lower as he reads off, "Guardians of Daniel Pope?"

A couple steps forward. Gary and Marie Pope, who own the florist downtown. They come into Dee's for Saturday morning breakfast sometimes with their daughter, Alise, and their son, Dan, who was in my English class this year. Gary holds up Marie as her knees buckle.

"Yes, that's us," Gary says. "Is our son okay?"

"May I talk to you in private for a moment?"

"Why? Where's Dan? Take us to him!"

"This way, please," the doctor says. The Popes hurry after him, but when they're partway down the hall, Marie lets out a sob I know I'll remember until the day I die.

The atmosphere after that is thick with grief, so many faces thinking the same thing as me, wondering if our worlds are about to change forever. I sit there, powerless, until Garnett and Lucas storm into the waiting room. They don't even see me as they attempt to shove past nurses down the hall, but they're blocked off.

"Let us through!" Garnett shouts.

"Please," a nurse says, "you have to let the doctors do their jobs!"

I hurry over and pull back on Carson's brothers, and as soon as they see me, their anger is redirected.

"What happened, Jill?" Lucas spits. "Where the hell is my brother? He OD'd on something?"

Even though I can barely breathe, I collect myself enough to sit them down and tell them everything from the party. Val's presence beside me makes it easier to stay calm. But when I bring up their mom, a confused rage takes over both Garnett and Lucas's faces.

"What about our mom?" Garnett asks. "Why was Carson upset about her?"

"She's at home fine," Lucas says.

A cold awareness hits me. "He didn't tell you, did he?"

"Tell us what?" Garnett asks.

Exchanging a look with Val, I hug myself and shrink in the chair. Images of Dorothy Blue chill me to the bone. Not even Carson's brothers know. I used to have it out for these guys, but I've learned to see pretty clearly that they care about Carson. I have to believe that if they knew, they would've helped him.

"I can't tell you," I say. "You have to talk to Carson yourself."

"Don't mess with us like that," Lucas says. "The hell are you talking about? What did my mom do?"

"I can't tell you!" I exclaim. It gains me a few looks, so once again, I crumple up and whisper, "It's not my place to tell, okay? You have to talk to Carson."

Honestly, I doubt they'd believe me even if I did tell them. I'm still stomaching it myself. As far as I'm concerned, if Carson is alive, only he can tell them.

Garnett runs his fingers through his dark brown hair. "Believe me, I'd love that."

Each minute that ticks by feels like an hour, but most of the waiting room is silent now. Mom hasn't woken up from any of the texts of calls I've sent, but I don't want Nolan to experience this anyway. If Carson isn't okay—we'll deal with that. But I wouldn't wish this state of purgatory on anyone. The not knowing is eating me alive from the inside out. My hands have gone purple from the cold, and I think about how I was sitting in his bedroom earlier tonight, submerged in his smell, and that thought I had; that he might never come back to it.

To me, death was never simple. The one time Dad OD'd when I was a kid, Mom and I rushed him to this exact same hospital, and we waited in this exact same waiting room. With the mural painted on the wall, bug-eyed goldfish that look just the same as they did back then, it's like I've gone back in time. The two timelines intersect in my mind and become one.

I had a similar thought back then too. That when a person dies, they lose everything; every thought, memory, and dream, whisked away to only God knows where. Probably nowhere. Probably blackness. It's hard to picture what continues after the end of anything.

But for some reason, now I can't stop thinking about that toy fire truck Carson had on his floor the first time I went in his room. What kind of eighteen-year-old guy still has something like that kicking around? Probably for the same reason I still have my teddies; because it's the physical embodiment of your childhood, a time when you were pure. It's comforting for me to know that part of me existed. For Carson, I imagine that truck still held memories of the childish dreams he someday had of being a fireman. He grew up so different, but the fact that he kept the toy proves to me something inside of him still dreamt of places bigger than Hull, even when he told me, over and over, that he could never leave.

I'd do anything to get him away from this town now. Alive, not in a body bag.

Bringing my knees to my chest, I quietly sob, feeling like a scared little girl again with no answers.

That little girl will always live in me.

***

I jolt awake to sunlight through the windows.

Disoriented, it takes me a moment to absorb my surroundings. Most of the waiting room is empty. Only one nurse is behind the reception desk. Beside me, Val softly breathes as she sleeps, her black hair in a loose bun on her head and her sweatpants on.

Garnett and Lucas are gone.

"Val. Hey, Val, wake up."

She sucks in a breath and sits upright. "Shit, Jill, what happened?"

"Carson," I breathe out, before I dash toward the hallway.

"Whoa, hold on!" The nurse slips in front of me, but I'm looking over the top of her head. "I'm sorry, but if you want to visit someone I need to sign you in."

My chest rises and falls and rises and falls. Val comes up behind me and says, "It's okay, Jill. Just talk to her."

But I'm sweating so much I could combust. I shake out my palms, feeling constricted and constrained; the logical part of me knows the nurse is just doing her job, but I want to shove her away so I can get to Carson.

"Jill," someone says, and we turn to see Garnett Blue holding a can of soda and a bag of vending machine chips.

"Garnett!" I rush over to him, but stop myself. "Where is he? Is Carson alive?"

I can't read him. The five o'clock shadow on his face ages him ten years.

"Barely," is all he says.

The hope that leaps inside me is debilitating, but still, I cry. Because I know from experience the defeat you can feel after choosing to believe. The thought of seeing him again feels like a dream I'll never attain. It won't feel real until he's in front of me, breathing.

"She's with us," Garnett tells the nurse, and we continue down the hallway.

The hospital is nothing like it was before I passed out; the chaos has settled, and some of the people in the rooms are kids I recognize from the parties with their families.

They're alive.

Not everyone who did the coke died.

I follow close behind Garnett as we stop at a door. Garnett turns the handle. The light from inside pours into the hallway. It's so bright in there, like a glass box.

With bated breath, I peek inside.

Carson lies on white bed with Lucas at his side.

The world slows.

Brown eyes land on me and widen. For a moment, I wonder if I'm hallucinating all of this, until I hear his voice.

"Jill..."

He's alive.

Even as I stumble into the room, it's like my mind is working against me, and I can't believe what I'm seeing. He's paler than ever with deep bags surrounding his eyes, but he's alive. Without a second thought, I dive at him and hug him tight. I press my ear to his chest and listen to his slow pulse, just to make sure he's really here.

"I thought you were dead." I fist the sheets covering him and bawl into them, and Carson's hand rests limply on my back. But he doesn't speak. I wait for him to say something—anything—but it never comes.

When I stand upright, I realize Carson has tubes hooked up to him. I glance at Garnett and Lucas, who turn away with guilt. Carson must've told them what happened with their mom, and my heart hurts for them too.

"Should give them a minute," Garnett says, hand on Lucas's shoulder. They leave the room. I lock eyes with Val, who nods at me once before she leaves too.

Once the door shuts, the silence in the room suffocates me. I pull up a chair and sit next to him.

I'd like to think that someone who brushed hands with death would look happy to be alive. But on Carson's face lives nothing but pain; a ghostly expression devoid of all life—no, all hope. He won't look at me. My euphoria begins to fade, eclipsed by the thought that maybe, even with this second chance, he still wants to give up.

Smacking my lips, I tuck my hair behind my ear, then rub my thumb along my necklace. I don't know what to say.

"Sorry no one got you sooner," he mutters.

"It's okay... I thought I was never going to see you again. I was scared."

His lips twitch downward, and somehow, he gets paler.

"What is it?" I ask, my voice cracking. "Why aren't you happy?"

"I know I should be, but I'm not, Jill." His eyes are devastated. "'Cause I'm still waking up in the same hell as before. I still have to live with what my mom did to me. My brothers didn't believe it at first, but they do now. Said I don't have to see her again if I don't want to, but it's not that easy."

"I know it isn't easy," I blurt, trying to take something from my own playbook—something about how much it hurts when your parent mistreats you, but things will always get better... but it all seems shallow and cliché now. I can't even imagine what he's feeling.

He sniffles, and I look at him, only to see his bottom lip in tremors, tears falling down his cheeks. "God, just let me die. I wish they'd just let me die."

"You can't mean that," I choke out. Carefully, I reach out and touch his hands. "We can get you help," I insist. "The treatment center Colleen went to is really good, and affordable too. They don't just cover addiction. They cover trauma too. You can talk to someone there, someone who knows what they're doing."

"Doctors tried to say that to me too, and I get it, it sounds nice. But I just can't see it. Everything's so dark, it's like I look in the future and I can only see it getting worse. I'll have to live without my mom. I've never done that, Jill."

"You can do it. And you don't have to do it alone. You have me. I'll always be a call away."

Something sparks in his eyes, desperate to ignite. But the flames won't light. I still see his hopelessness and feel his despair.

"Please, Carson," I say. "You deserve another chance at life."

"Why do you still believe in me? My mom didn't force me to do coke. I did all that myself."

"I know that, but you were also trying to cover the pain. It wasn't so black and white, and I get that now. I believe in you because I think you have a good heart, and you can be so much more than what you give yourself credit for."

"But I don't see how I can cope, especially without drugs. Even after I found out about my mom, getting stoned was my crutch. It's all I know."

"I wish I had the answers... but that's what treatment is for, right? To help you learn how to cope without that stuff."

A long pause. "Guess it would be my first time trying on my own, without my mom giving me whatever she was giving me."

More tears. I grab his hand and kiss his cold knuckles. "I'm just glad you're okay. You're going to get through this."

Carson's fingers reluctantly brush my hair, before he reaches down and hugs me, pulling me to his chest. We stay like that for what I wish would last a lifetime.

***

Two days later, the aftermath of the party has settled like a layer of volcanic ash over the town. For a while there, we were all frozen, but now we've gathered by the lake to hold a memorial for everyone who died that night.

Carson's still in the hospital, so he isn't here with me, but Val, Matias, Mom, and Nolan at my side. Down the beach, dozens of Hull citizens. Even the families who weren't affected join, because no matter what caused their deaths, losing so many young people at once has brought this entire town together in the worst way possible.

Pink and orange hues encase the stones on the beach, and the sound of the waves lapping against the shore syncs with my breathing. We set paper boats into the water and watch them float into the sunset.

Ethan. Comic Sans Font Resume Ethan died that night. Clarissa is here somewhere, crying, because they'd just started officially dating, and now he's gone forever. I hugged her earlier. She told me she was happy Carson is okay. I told her I wished I could say the same thing about Ethan.

A boy from another town, who was only visiting for the summer. His name was Theo. I never even met him, and his family isn't here, but his friends talk about him. Apparently he was the class clown type.

At the party, a guy named Greg lost his life too. I didn't know him well but I do remember him from the hallways at school. He was quiet.

Dan Pope. His parents didn't make it to the beach tonight.

One girl, Melanie, who was a year younger than me at Hull District. I heard it was her first time trying coke.

Now she's gone. They all are.

A total of five people died that night. Even though I'm glad Carson wasn't one of them, none of this is easy. There are people who loved the ones who died as much as I love him, but they don't get to share the good news, and that breaks my heart.

No one talks as we set more paper boats to sail. Down the beach, Shae stands away from the group and stares out at the horizon. Hazy lilac clouds with vibrant bursts of apricot paint the sky behind him, a sight far too beautiful for today.

The coke was his. Some people are blaming him for it, but I think he's as much of a victim as everyone else. I saw with my own eyes the way he was hauled into that ambulance. His kiss with death was as close as Carson's. But unlike Carson, Shae isn't trying to get better, at least not right now. I think he's punishing himself, even though he did the right thing by telling the cops who the dealer was. Apparently he's been arrested and they're investigating his supplier too, to try to get the laced coke off the streets the best they can.

Even though sadness burns in the air, the view still takes my breath away. Inhaling in the earthy scent of the lake, I focus on the water in front of me. Against the pastel sky, the swollen sun sinks into the lake, the brightest thing I've ever seen.

I wish Carson could watch this sunset with me, but there will be so many more for him. Because of that, I smile.