x x x
At four thirty, Harry texts that they’re wrapping up and should be there soon. I start to gather my stuff, and Ben and I go wait out front.
“Am I going to see you again?” he asks.
My breath catches. I’m not sure why.
“Because if I’m not,” he continues, “there’s something I need to tell you.”
“Oh, okay.” So this why he wanted me to come up. Not to see the kittens. But to take his confession. “Go ahead then.”
He takes a long drag on his cigarette and when he exhales, there’s not nearly enough smoke. It’s like all that toxic stuff stayed in him.
“She cried. After we slept together. She cried. She’d been okay, and then she was crying.”
“Was she drunk?” I ask. “Like, really drunk?”
“You mean did I fuck her when she was passed out? Jesus, Cody, I’m not that big of a shitbag.”
“You’d be surprised how many people are.”
And I tell him. About Meg’s other first time. That party, sophomore year. She’d done a bunch of Jägermeister shots and had been making out with Clint Randhurst. Things went too far too fast. And though she didn’t exactly say no, she definitely hadn’t said yes. To make matters even worse, Clint must’ve been the one to give her mono. Because after that was when she got sick.
After Clint, Meg swore that she was never going to do that again unless it was with someone she truly cared about. Which is how I know she cared about Ben, even if maybe she shouldn’t have.
“So it wasn’t you. You weren’t the reason she cried. Or if she did, it was happiness, or relief maybe. She clearly liked you. Maybe that’s why she cried.” I tell him this to unburden him—or maybe to unburden me; at Meg’s insistence I never told anyone about Clint. But if anything, Ben looks more cut up. He shakes his head, looks down, and doesn’t say anything.
When the Do-Gooder Van pulls up, Stoner Richard sees Ben’s downcast eyes and looks at me. “What’d he do now?” Richard asks.
“Nothing.” I climb in the van.
“If you find anything else on her computer, will you tell me?” Ben asks.
“Okay.”
He closes the door behind me and knocks on it two times. And then we drive away.
13
Harry works on the computer all night. And then the next morning. When I wake up, early, his light is on and I’m not entirely sure he’s been to sleep.
“I’ve almost got it,” he says, eyes gleaming with excitement. “This was such an unusual encoding. Did Meg do it herself?”
I shake my head, shrug.
“If she did, then I mourn her loss even more.” Now he shakes his head. “We could’ve had so much fun geeking out together.”
I smile politely.
“You never know people, do you?” he asks.
No. You don’t.
x x x
Alice wakes up a few hours later and tackles me in a hug like we are best friends.