Chapter 11: The Car

I sat up in bed and looked at the photo until the screen went dark.

Then I got up.

I put on my jeans and my sneakers and my gray cardigan.

I called Thatcher on the way down the stairs.

He picked up on the first ring, out of breath.

"Where are you?" I said.

"Benefit Street. Halfway home. What's wrong?"

"Dena's outside my building in your mother's car."

"Don't go out there."

"I'm already out here."

I hung up.

The street in front of my dorm was empty and wet and orange under the lamps.

Across it, parked against the far curb, sat Anne's white sedan.

The engine was running. I could see the exhaust curling in the cold.

The headlights were on, pointed at the doors I had just walked out of.

I couldn't see her face behind the glare.

I didn't need to.

In our first life, I'd been carrying a paper bag from the bakery.

Two almond croissants, one for me and one for my husband of three days, still asleep upstairs.

I'd stepped off the curb at seven in the morning without looking, because who looks on a Tuesday on a quiet street?

I'd heard the engine rev.

I'd turned and seen a white car and my sister's face behind the windshield, and then I hadn't seen anything.

Lying on the road, I'd heard some man above me say a few flat words.

Then nothing.

Now I stepped off the curb and walked out into the middle of the street.

I stopped in front of Anne's bumper with the headlights full in my face.

I could feel the heat off the grille against my knees.

I put my hands in my cardigan pockets.

"Go on," I said.

The engine idled.

"You've got a running start this time. Do it again."

Nothing.

"Do it, Dena. You came all the way across town in the middle of the night. Do it."

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