jules accepted the bottle, blocked the spout with her tongue, and faked a swig. “there are a few things i’d like to do tonight if it’s okay with you.”

gabe took the bottle and two more gulps. “sure.”

“emma and i had a plan before she took things into her own hands. we were gonna throw away anything sentimental. it was her idea, but i’d like to honor it.”

“let’s do it.” at the dune grass grill, gabe’s eyes were transparent with clarity and focus. now his forehead sagged like a bulldog and his eyes watched the floor as if he was counting dust mites.

jules knew the look well; reality was sinking in. “i’d also like to write a note,” she said.

gabe sucked the tip of the wine bottle and popped it from his lips. “yeah.”

“you okay?” she asked.

he nodded, then lifted the bottle again.

outside, trevor's trunk slammed.

*  *  *

no more parents. no more fuck-ups. no more funerals or dinners or cry-baby ramblings; tonight was the night and if jules couldn’t finish the job, trevor would.

he lumbered from the trunk to the hood, dragging the empty garbage bags across the pavement as if they contained severed limbs from a chainsaw massacre.

PATIENCE was a dismembered virtue; stripped of its relevance at the exact moment THE BOY called TREVOR'S GIRL ‘gorgeous.’ no more waiting in the car. no more music from a dead girl’s ipod. no more mr. nice guy.

he paced instead; through branches and weeds and thorns that lined the driveway’s edge and tugged his jeans. a sagging twig looped between his hair and the walkie-talkie headband and nearly pulled it off. trevor snapped off the stick and readjusted the device against his ear. 

his eyes never blinked; never left the window where flashing lights would signal the release of kinetic anger.

over the headset: “you know what, sarah? i’m glad you came.”

“shh. i’m glad i’m here.”

trevor balled his fist and punched the jagged trunk of a tree. flesh tore from his knuckles and stuck with blood to the bark. he hit it again.

and again.

and again.

*  *  *

six vintage coke bottles, one collection of rocks, one digital slr camera with six lenses, ten filters and a case, seven multifaceted die with numbers instead of dots, two mint-condition star trek action figures.

BAG NUMBER ONE was double-bagged. gabe yanked the built-in ribbon and tied a bow.

edgar sensed the evening’s dread. he hopped and fluttered from bar to perch to bar and cussed unintelligible phrases at jules.

one cd player/alarm clock, one wii video-game system with thirteen games and a controller, twenty-five dvds, eight bluray disks, and one bluray player. triple-bagged and tied.

gabe tore his drawings from the magnetic display board and jules nearly leapt from the couch. she held her composure and watched the boy crumple and discard his art into BAG NUMBER THREE.

ten sketchbooks, two journals, one iphone, one wallet. from the bathroom, jules heard the snapping magnets of a medicine cabinet and the nostalgic rattle of pills. after gabe released seven orange bottles into the shiny depths of the bag and went back to work, she fished them out and scanned the labels: adderall. prozac. ritalin. zoloft.

from his bedside table gabe removed a plastic food container with banded wads of cash. “engagement ring fund,” he said and emptied the rolled bills into the bag. “romantic, eh?” 

pulled. tied. dropped.

one case of pencils, twenty-four assorted tubes of oil paint, one satchel of brushes, one box of pastels, five national geographic magazines, ten graphic novels (”sandman,” he said. “good stuff”), three pads of watercolor paper, one memento box containing his grandfather’s cufflinks, one tie-tack in the shape of a cross, six boxes of flavored tobacco.

“that’s it,” he said. “what about you?”

jules saw the tip of the walkie-talkie microphone protruding from the buckled flap of her backpack. she nodded to gabe, then shoved her bag alongside his art supplies and tied off the final sack.

his hand quivered. she touched it, warmed it, and he settled down.

“what about your watch?” he asked.

jules looked at the heart-shaped face (ten-thirty), then unbuckled the white-gold band and squeezed it in the top of the bag.

“time to write the notes?” he asked.

she couldn’t speak. she nodded.

gabe gave her a college-ruled notebook and a pen, then sat on the opposite end of the couch with the final inch of wine.

“let’s make these notes about ourselves,” jules said. “please don’t mention me, okay? also, make sure you explain that you’re getting rid of your worldly possessions. emma would like it.”

gabe wrote on his page with exaggerated letters, “to whom it may concern, my NEW GIRLFRIEND SARAH told me NOT to write—”

jules attacked him in the crook of the sofa, but he jerked away the notebook just in time. she wrestled his extended arm for the paper but gabe was too nimble. “give it,” she said with epic determination and scratched his forearm with her nails.

her nose touched his and flared at the smell of fermented grapes. 

he pursed his lips to span the inch between them and kissed her. “no.”

“give. it.”

gabe grinned, then handed over the book.

jules shoved herself back to the cushion, ripped the incriminating page from the notebook and pushed it through the taught asshole of BAG NUMBER FOUR. “i’m sorry. i just want everything to be perfect.”

“i’m a little teeter-tottered,” he said.

she tossed the journal back in his lap. “write the damn note.”

*  *  *

gabe finished his letter before sarah and left to take a whiz. 

when he zipped and walked back into the bedroom, she was crying. there weren't tears or sobs or eroded trenches in the foundation of her cheek; her mask was stone, damming the ducts and preventing accidental leakage of emotion. her eyes were wet and she blinked heavy lashes to dissolve the grief.

“are you okay?” he asked.

“mm.” she tore her letter from the notebook, creased it, and placed it on the sofa beside his. “i’m ready.”

he scratched the knob on the back of his head. “are you sure?”

“i’m sure.”

he nodded. “i have a surprise first.”

“i don’t want a surprise, gabe.”

he ignored the tangible defeat in her words, then plucked a pair of boxers from the floor and draped them over the suicide notes. he grabbed her hand before she could question him and yanked her toward the door. “grab two bags,” he said. “if we’re gonna die, we’re gonna die in style.”

*  *  *

“—the fuc— oing?”

“—old you— surprise! —nother— of wine?”

the plastic rustle suffocated most of the words. trevor pulled a glove over the grey ripples of dead skin and the imbedded flecks of bark in his right hand. he scanned the perimeter, then braved the naked stretch of gravel, dashing and dodging spheres of light from the patch of woods to the dark side of the home.

“—you’ve nev— oat before!”

the broken voices in the headset became real voices from the porch above his head. he crept alongside the cinderblock foundation and spied the midnight bayou from the cover of a vertical support-beam.

the boy had julesie by the hand with four bulging sacks and a bottle of wine, forcing her across the backyard and onto a floating dock.

jules turned her head and searched the shadows. she was searching for HIM.

they tossed the bags into the boat and hopped inside.

from the headset, trevor heard a single word between the commotion: lighthouse. he beat his foot into the cinderblock wall and bolted back to his car.

*  *  *

the propeller shredded the bayou into bits and pieces and flung them into light from the tangerine moon. jules leaned over the boat's edge, stretched out her arm, and dipped her fingers into the spattering beads.

the boat soared. she held her wig with one hand, braced herself on gabe’s shoulder with the other, and stood on tiptoes to better catch the rushing air.

the boy touched the small of her back and coaxed her to the controls. she shook her head and shied away, but found her hands on the wheel when gabe abandoned her for the passenger seat.

he worked a borrowed corkscrew into the neck of the stolen wine, took a swig, gulped hard, and closed his eyes.

jules watched him rest. she turned her gaze to the open lake and opened the throttle.

*  *  *

the chain of yellow catwalk bulbs linked both lighthouses to the shore. gabe aligned the boat with the edge of the pier’s tip, then cut the engine, docked, and threw the bags from the boat's belly to the cement.

“that was incredible,” sarah said. she removed a fleece blanket (royal blue and embellished with a university of michigan big gold M) from the boat’s compartment and tossed it beside the bags. “in case it gets cold,” she said.

the air remained a tepid sixty-eight degrees, but sarah unrolled the blanket anyway and built a nest at the base of the square lighthouse. the barn blocked their eye-line to the beach, parking lot and city lights, leaving the couple with a lonely view of the inky sea.

sarah assessed the contents of every bag by groping the black membranes. she selected number four, then worked her nails into the knot until gabe’s crap peeked out the top. she reached inside and removed a pad and a pencil.

without a word, (her intentions were implied by gleam in her eye and the seduction in her step) she placed the supplies before gabe. she stood, unzipped the dress, and released it to a cotton puddle on their make-shift bed. she sipped the bottle of wine and perched—legs crossed—on gabe’s usual ledge.

he stifled his momentary awe and began with the curves of her waist in slow, intentional strokes. he blinked hard at his charcoal lines as if blinking would summon enough sobriety to DO THIS RIGHT. he studied the formation of her arms; the left resting on lifted knee, the right bracing her pose from the concrete slab upon which she sat. he studied her shoulders too; the circle-shaped burn above her left breast and the taut caress of her extended neck.

he sketched her hair, then used the eraser to draw highlights cast from the overhead lamp. he sketched the bottle hanging like a loose tooth from her fingertips. he sketched the intricate pattern of her bra, then shaded the top of her stomach where the arch of her lowest rib created a shadow across her bellybutton.

nose, eyes, lips... all rendered in pristine detail; he drew these features as they might appear in the moments between morning showers and the next slather of concealer.

sarah was meticulous and beautiful in the first drawing and gabe flipped the pad to show her.

she shook her head and drank more wine. “another,” she said and unclasped her bra. she laid down; her elbow and hip pressed the pebbled surface of her lighthouse throne.

the second drawing developed faster than the first, though gabe spent additional time on her newly-exposed chest.

another drawing; another pose. he sketched furiously with every artistic sense focused on the expressions BEHIND the details. the piece became sarah’s breath; a conduit for buried essence that could only be excavated through details invisible to the untrained eye: the precise angle of her brow, the trepidation in her unsettled arm, and the distance in her pupils as she dreamed with open eyes.

the fourth and fifth became violent representations of a suicidal girl; his pencil replaced by a marker with lines so bold they seeped to the next page.

gabe smelled the perspiration emitting from the collar of his shirt. he bit his lower lip and scrawled his initials at the bottom of the sixth drawing, then threw the marker in the lake.

*  *  *

jules sat behind him, arms around his waist, chin on his shoulder, breasts against his back. he shuffled through the drawings and she admired his experimentation. his talent was inarguable even by the harshest critic, but if she praised him now, he might halt the evening’s plan. she restrained her compliments and muttered, “nice work.”

gabe turned his head into the sanctum of her hair and the outside world fell away. he closed his eyes, kissed her, and wrung her heart like a sponge. she opened his mouth, touched his chest, squeezed his shirt, then finagled it off to reveal skin like taut suede from too many afternoons in the summer sun.

she released the boy and draped herself across the blanket. the plastic bags created a barricade, but one of them (she wasn’t sure which) still held trevor’s microphone. she raised a finger to her lip. “shh...”

gabe—laying shirtless along her profile—obeyed with a series of silent kisses. starting at her lips he sucked softly, then covered her cheeks, forehead and nose. trailing his tongue’s tip over the sensitive patch of perfumed neck, every watering bud brushed and stiffened her follicles until an army of invisible hair stood erect on her arms. he kissed her cigarette burn but she suppressed the memories and fingered his hair. when the tip of his tongue brushed the tense nerve endings of her tit, she braced herself for pain. 

but he didn’t bite. he didn’t pinch. he only kissed. and her limbs relaxed.

stars crowned the boy’s face when his torso lifted and pressed against hers. he touched her cheek, thumbed her lower lip; his eyes were blue, present, and alive... but he offered no smile.

knees to her chest; gabe understood. he wrapped his fingers through the string around her waist and slid the thong to her ankles (sparing no thought for the odd box attached to her garter.)

he touched with softest fingers. one hand stayed at her nape (she expected a hair-tangled squeeze, but he was kind) while the other found a place he had never known. she parted her knees to encourage exploration. he caressed the inside of her thigh in return and traced meandering circles around her crease.

jules grabbed hold of his belt and pulled herself up. she tugged the buckle, loosened the leather strap... but gabe removed his hand from her crotch and stopped her inquisitive fingers with a tender touch. she pouted, leaned back on her elbows, and studied the honesty in his eyes.

gabe found the underwear at her ankles and drew it back up her thighs. jules lifted her pelvis so he could slide it into place.

with her eyes, she asked, “why?”

he answered with another kiss on the forehead.

bugs congregated in a swirling mass at the lighthouse bulb. jules watched them dance from the pillow of gabe’s angled arm. her bra was back on—his doing—and she crossed her leg over his. “we didn’t need to stop,” she whispered.

“yes we did.” gabe shifted his shoulders and jules repositioned to her side. “what would it take to turn this around?” he asked. “to go home and shred the notes?”

“that would be amazing.”

“i stopped because i want to take things slow.”

“that’s sweet.” jules closed her eyes and reveled in the sentiment and lingering blur of wine.

“i stopped because i love you.”

as gabe’s words pushed slowly through a layer of mental molasses, jules’ spine hardened and her brain scrambled to organize the implications and ramifications of I. LOVE. YOU.

she sat up. she hugged the dress around her semi-naked form. she leaned over and peered around the edge of the lighthouse.

waiting on the shore—piercing the night like god’s halogen eyes—were a pair of suv headlights.

she jerked her head back into the shadow and scrambled to pull on the dress.

“what’s wrong?” gabe asked.

“’i love you?’ what does that mean? what are you trying to say?”

“i don't know... i’m a little drunk.”

“no, you’re plastered.”

“i’ve been lonely. i had a hard month. i think about death constantly, but with you here, i don’t think i can go through with this.”

“gabe—”

“i don’t want you to hurt yourself. i don’t want us to die.”

“GABE—”

“i know i’m not in my right mind but hear me out! you could move to grand harbor. i could—”

“shit.” jules adjusted her wig and paced the slab between the blanket and the water’s edge. “SHIT.”

“it’s not too late to—”

“i need to think.”

“sarah—”

“shut up. stay here. don’t follow me. do you understand?”

he nodded.

jules marched with bare feet down the length of the pier leaving the boy alone at the tip. the headlights were unwavering in the distance and jules patted the wrinkles from her dress and pressed her lips together.

livid tire tracks careened from the edge of the parking lot to the suv’s resting place at the shore. a silhouette—menacing in its lumbering demeanor—crossed back and forth between the headlights making them blink out of turn.

she stepped from the pier to the sand. despite her walloping heartbeat, she breathed slowly, stepped casually, and mustered her grace as her boyfriend closed the gap between them with bastard strides.

“he won’t do it,” she said.

trevor landed a foot from jules, abs undulating in sync with his heaving chest. when he spoke, kernels of saliva landed on her face. “he WILL do it.”

“i tried—”

“he’ll do it because you’ll convince him to do it because THAT’S YOUR FUCKING JOB, JULES.” he ripped off his headset and threw it in the sand.

“trev. baby. i can’t.”

he didn’t hit her, but circled like a tiger around injured prey. he paced his breath by inhaling through his nostrils, but nothing would contain the rage. “you think he’s special?”

“no.”

“you think he’ll be good to you? better than i am?”

she didn’t respond.

“you’re wrong. you know why you’re wrong? because you’re trash, julesie. you told him about daddy leaving, right? about the drugs? did you tell him that’s ONE-TENTH as fucked up as you are? do you really think a spoiled rich boy can love the real you? he can’t. he won’t. but he’s going to kill himself tonight and you’re going to help him and when he’s dead, we’ll steal his money, pull off the perfect, VICTIMLESS crime, and build a fucking life together. do you understand that julesie?”

she closed her eyes and balled her fists.

trevor walked to the car, removed something from the glovebox, and took ten heavy strides with shotgun-doug's revolver cradled in the palm of his hand. “i asked you a question, julesie.”

“i’m sorry.” her tongue was numb. “yes.”

“yes what?”

“i understand.”

trevor crossed his arms over her shoulders. the butt of the gun rested against her back. “if he doesn’t do it now, i’ll kill him. and if i kill him, then we get in that car and we run away and we do it all over again; new car, new screen names, new chat rooms; over and over until we make up for this mess. got it?”

“got it.”

“we have the note. i heard you write it. now we need that boy to kill himself and it’s all ours. do that for me, baby?”

he released her neck from that morbid hug and she turned and walked—

“hey,” he called. 

she stopped.

“i love you BECAUSE you’re trash, julesie. he won’t.”

she nodded.

“now GO!”

trevor’s final word shook jules like a gunshot. she planted her heels in the sand and dashed to the pier.

*  *  *

life preservers garnished every tenth arch like neon wreaths. the catwalk lights created ominous shadows like the bars of a black ferris wheel.

devastation, humiliation, terror; her mind raced to separate the deadly emotions from plans to FIX THIS. if she stopped to think—if she ducked behind the first lighthouse to pull herself together—trevor would see.

one-hundred strides to gabe. 

she waited until the suv headlights lost their sting, then slipped a hand under her dress, unpinned the pill case from her garter-strap pocket, removed two silver capsules—the deadly capsules—and flung them at the lake. she counted the remaining yellows, then in one swift motion snapped them away, pocketed the container and removed her phone.

fifty strides left. she dialed 9-1-1.

one ring.

two. 

at her feet, her own shadow grew and shrunk in rhythm with the passing overhead lamps.

three rings. come on! she thought and the operator answered.

“nine-one-one. what’s your emergency?”

jules deepened her voice; “i was alerted that a boy fainted on the grand harbor pier. please send someone to check on him right away.”

ten paces left. the operator asked another question, but jules collapsed her phone, shoved it in her dress pocket, and rounded the lighthouse corner.

gabe’s eyes were pink and puffed. when he saw her, he looked away.

she sat down and crossed her legs on the blanket. she faced the boy. she held his hand. “you need to listen to me, baby,” she said. “i can’t take this life anymore.” she spoke slowly. “i’m going to do this with or without you, but i’m begging you to do it with me.” she removed the tiny case and showed the boy the yellow pills.

his eyes welled. he shook his head. “tell me.”

“tell you what, baby?”

“tell me WHY.”

“it doesn’t matter. this is the only way we can be together—”

“bullshit. tell me the truth. WHY?”

she grabbed the bottle—two gulps left—and shoved it into gabe's bare chest. “this is the only way to end the madness.”

“answer. my fucking. question.” depths of frustration boiled in the corner of his lips. his mouth was closed, but the jagged formation of his jaw suggested his teeth were grinding.

jules set the bottle between them. “you want darkness?” she asked. “you want to hear stories about PAIN so you can draw pretty pictures? you want to know why i can’t live with myself? i don’t beat around the bush so do not ask for answers you can’t handle.”

“tell me,” he demanded.

jules hesitated and searched the boy's eyes for any glint of hope... then she pressed her nails into the brunt of her palm and spoke quickly. “i had sex for drugs when i was fourteen. over. and over. and over. pain killers are like heroin where i come from, and oxy can be expensive for trailer-trash families. my mom used. i used. jesse...”

“jesse?”

“it makes you numb. it makes you happy. once you start on the higher doses, you don’t stop. i had a neighbor named jason; he started selling when we turned fourteen. but with jason... i didn’t have to pay.”

“...so you ran away?”

“i was never comfortable. i didn’t look like them. i didn’t act like them. i liked to read and i liked to learn. girls hated me and boys weren’t friends; they were sticky gropings beneath the bleachers or ‘just once, i promise, i can make you feel good.’”

“but why did you leave?”

“shit happened and i ran.”

“what shit?”

“doesn’t matter, i—”

“sarah—”

“i joined AA. i saved myself and i abandoned my brother. i left him... i left MY BROTHER in the care of a FIEND.”

“you’re crying,” he said.

jules wiped away a salty streak of makeup and continued. “i met my boyfriend in the program. got clean after four meetings and never turned back.”

“i thought your boyfriend was a dick. or was that—”

“a lie.”

“you’re still dating?”

“it’s complicated.”

“does he know about our pact? does he know what you’re doing?”

“are you listening to me? it. doesn’t. matter. i can’t go back.”

“then stay! we don’t have to do this!”

“i don’t love you.”

“you do! i can see it in your eyes!”

“you want the truth?”

“yes!”

“you want the TRUTH, gabe?”

“yes!”

“the truth is you ARE faggy. you’re all knees and elbows and greasy hair. you whine about girls and beg for sympathy. you smell like BO, and when i tried to have sex with you, you pussied out like a frickin’ eunuch. do you ever wonder why you read so many fantasy books? it’s a lame-ass attempt at finding new experiences. the stories take you to extraordinary places and introduce you to fantastic new friends. but when you put the book down, all you have in life are some crappy drawings and your parents’ money.”

“please don’t...” his marshmallow eyes became gasping breaths and keeling sobs. “please don’t,” he said again.

(the desire to slit her own wrists wormed its way through jules’ veins and, for an instant, she wished she kept the silver pills.)

“you can’t talk me out of this. if you don’t help me, i’ll die alone. is that what you want?” she snatched the bottle again and forced it against his trembling hands. “TAKE IT.”

he shoved it away.

“you think you can take me out to dinner, buy me a dress, ask me some stupid questions, and expect me to be fixed? you’ve only scratched the surface of my pain. i’m sick to my core, gabe, and i want to die. i need you to swallow these pills. with me. right now.”

“i—”

“you couldn’t save john. you can’t save me.”

the boy was a shifting smudge of color through her watered eyes. he was standing now—she blinked to clear the blur—and he shoved their drawings in a fat garbage bag. he walked to the edge of the pier, spun two full circles with the orbiting sack, and relinquished his crap to the sea. SPLASH.

son of a bitch! she screamed in her head. don’t do that! she bit her bottom lip and kept cool. “gabe, you don’t need to do this.”

he didn’t respond, but grabbed a second bag, stumbled, dropped it, then kicked it to the ledge and into the water. 

SPLASH.

there was nothing jules could do but watch. the third bag was the lightest and it soared. it splashed. it disappeared into the murk, then bobbed back to the moonlight.

she dropped her head and closed her eyes. she heard the rustle of the fourth bag, gabe’s panting breath, a grunt, a heave, and—

*  *  *

SPLASH!

static exploded over trevor’s sandy headset. he tore the device off his head, pushed the revolver’s barrel into the waist of his jeans, and bolted to the pier.

julesie had her chance.

*  *  *

six yellow pills.

“you don’t believe in heaven,” he said.

“i do,” she replied and offered up her palm.

he stared at the pills, then pinched three between his fingers.

“it’s the only way,” she said.

his body slouched as if his soul escaped his flesh prematurely, leaving a boy's skeletal remains to finish the dirty work.

he placed the yellow capsules on his tongue.

jules did the same (but slid them behind her gums) and gulped hard.

gabe held the bottle.

swallow the fucking pills, baby, she thought.

he put it to his lips.

you need to swallow them NOW.

he tilted his head... and swallowed them.

from the corner of her eye, jules saw trevor’s demonic form dashing; flickering beneath the distant catwalk lights. she watched him approach but didn’t break contact with gabe.

his lashes fluttered. he tipped. jules caught his shoulders and softened his fall. he landed on his side. (she made sure of it.)

she touched his hair and leaned into him. her lips brushed the lobe of his ear and she whispered, “sometimes life isn’t worth the pain. i’m going for a swim. goodbye, my love.”

jules stood and swaggered to the pier’s edge. her toes curled around the concrete. she spread her arms and turned to face gabe. he needed to see this.

*  *  *

o true apothecary... thy drugs are quick.

sarah’s arms lifted like the wings of a black swan. in tedious slow-motion, her eyelids closed, knees stiffened, and her body drifted back-first into the abyss.

in gabe’s mind he screamed so loud that a vocal chord snapped and his arm shot out to grab her wrist—

in reality, he was numb.

in reality, she was dead in the sea.

it took but a moment to accept sarah’s fate; a moment longer to accept his own.

his terminal musings drifted somewhere between dream and memory; of EDGAR; of missing feathers; of blood like chocolate syrup and the previous night’s thunder. just a baby then, blown from a nest, toyed by the neighbor’s dog, broken and shivering in the hands of GABE who would build a home and forever ensure his care. 

darker than feathers it came, covered the boy at the tip of the pier, and rocked him to foreboding sleep.

*  *  *

jules spit out the pills and dove beneath the surface for the sinking treasure. massive boulders lined the submerged wall of the pier; slippery and fuzzy with weeds... but they weren’t bags so jules resurfaced. she dove again, deeper, and discovered with probing fingers a sack between the rocks. she emerged from the water, tossed it on the concrete, and accepted trevor’s outstretched hand.

“what the fuck happened?” he screamed.

her wig lopped sideways so she pulled it off and held it with the pit of her arm. she tore a hole in the plastic bag... and found her backpack. lucky first try.

trevor walked circles around the perimeter, squeezed his cheeks with his nails and furiously itched the back of his neck. “why the HELL did he throw them away?”

“forget it, trev. gotta go.”

“damnit!” trevor punched the air with both fists, “SON OF A BITCH,” and stomped over to the sleeping boy.

“he’s dead!” jules yelled. “we need to go!”

trevor stooped and studied gabe. “woulda killed you myself if i could...”

“trev, LET’S GO.”

approaching sirens blistered the sky with twisting patches of red.

trevor’s head perked like a dog sniffing the air. “yeah,” he said. “let’s go.”

*  *  *

trev kept the car under surprising control as he beat his fists into the wheel. “we're doing this. right now or it’s too late.”

“it’s already too late.” jules wrung water from her wig to the floor.

“you can wait in the car.”

“you wanna get caught after all that work? really trev?”

“that boy's got more shit. his parents are loaded. i’m going in.”

“what about your rules? what about putting your girlfriend’s safety first? turn the car around and get out of this town!”

“you messed up, jules. i need to fix it.”

“baby, please.”

“baby? BABY? you called HIM ‘baby’.”

“leave with me,” she begged. “please.”

trevor thumbed his forehead. “we can’t.”

“why not?”

“the note, jules.” he paused and let the notion sink in. “we’re going back for your note. we don’t have a choice.”

she rested her feet on the dash and pressed her forehead to her knees. “the note...”

“when his parents or the police search his room, they’ll find two notes. TWO. and what do you think they’ll assume when there’s a dead boy, a missing bag, and a second suicide note signed by some random girl?”

“i didn’t sign it...”

“it doesn’t matter.”

“i know.”

*  *  *

the car eased to a cautious stop on the street beside gabe’s home.

a car was in the driveway. lights were alive on the bottom floor. his parents were home.

trevor spoke first. “tell me the note was gibberish...”

“he was right beside me. i had to make it look real.”

“give me some good news, julesie. did you pocket some cash? anything?”

“no...”

he nodded. “okay.” he nodded again. “okay.”

the car lurched forward. jules wrapped her arms around her cotton dress and laid her head against the window.

*  *  *

a pencil case sat atop a sopping stack of national geographics on a dingy motel nightstand. the room smelled of rotten potpourri thanks to the sticky wet flecks of flavored tobacco.

trevor sat on the edge of the bed where he had spent the last three nights. his girlfriend laid behind him now, facing away and ignoring his inquisition.

he fished out a box of pastels; the slimy bright colors dripped down his hand and he smeared a rainbow of oily chalk on the back of the desk chair.

he scavenged the bottom of the bag and felt a piece of jewelry amongst the tubes of paint. it was the watch. he held it to the light, closed one eye, and saw beads of moisture trapped inside.

“i joined AA,” jules told gabe less than an hour ago while trevor listened. “i saved myself and abandoned my brother.”

trevor cringed as he recalled the conversation.

in the golden age of trevor and jules, they would stay up talking ’til eight in the morning; a pit-stop in the arizona desert, naked, alone, TOGETHER; gazing at stars from a sleeping bag on the roof of his car. it was colder than they expected, but tangled limbs kept them warm. that excellent night, jules divulged the saddest of her childhood stories until the sun rose over the mountains. trevor listened with an open mind. he held her when she cried.

but now, that boy knew too. even in death, gabriel jones shared their secrets.

trevor placed the watch on the nightstand, hit the lights and crawled beneath the covers. “you told him the truth,” he said.

jules didn’t move, but responded quietly, “he needed to believe me or he wouldn't have done it.”

trevor touched her shoulder. “i understand.”

she pulled away and his hand fell to the bed.

he didn’t yell, but spoke as tenderly as possible. “hey julesie, do you remember driving through arizona last year? we pulled off the road and slept on—”

“please don’t.”

trevor sighed, turned away, and pulled the sheet over his nose to block the potpourri of stinking tobacco. “i know you don’t want to talk, julesie,” he said. “but i have one more question.”

“what.”

trevor stared at the shadow of the heart-shaped watch. “who’s jesse?”