Page 120 of The Hitchhikers

“She’s passed out.” He gripped her ponytail, wrapping it in his fist. Her scalp prickled. There was no pretense of him being tortured or sad this time. He didn’t even care to pretend.

“I’ll tell her tomorrow,” she sobbed.

“She won’t believe you. She’ll throw you out.”

Jenny knew the rest. She didn’t have relatives. No friends. No teacher she could confide in. Everyone liked Robert. Still, she tried to scream, but his hand came over her mouth. His face above hers.

She turned her head and squeezed her eyes shut until it was over.

Jenny hadn’t looked at Alice the entire time she’d been talking. She didn’t want to see disbelief, or maybe even an accusation. But Alice rested her hand on Jenny’s knee.

“I’m so sorry. I hope you know it wasn’t your fault.”

Jenny met her eyes and saw the truth of her words. Alice meant it. Even after everything that Jenny had put her through.

“The last time was when I got pregnant,” Jenny said. “Simon found me alone on our dock a week later and we became friends. Only friends—for months. He didn’t know I was pregnant until my mom kicked me out. I thought he would freak, but he took me in.”

She would always remember how sweet he was that night. He’d insisted she take a shower, brought her towels and a pair of pajamas, and let her have his bedroom. She’d emerged the next morning, with her hair a snarled mess, eyes puffy from crying, and found him on the couch, where he’d slept. He’d smiled and gestured to a shoe box on the coffee table.

“Look.”

She opened it. Her stones and shells. Her green sea glass.

“I can’t believe you found them!”

His smile faded, his eyes turning serious. “I’d do anything for you.”

She’d wanted to kiss him for months, but she’d been so scared. Of her mom, Robert, even of herself. But later that day, when they were sitting on the couch, the heat of his leg against hers, the smooth skin of his arm, the desire to touch him took over. She kissed him, thrilled and shocked. Mad with a reckless feeling that she could do whatever she wanted now.

He trembled, holding her shoulder as though keeping her at a distance, and she pulled back, confused. “I’m nervous,” he whispered. “I’ve been in love with you for so long.”

She leaned forward again, bolstered by his confession. This was right and true. She was meant to be with him. It was the only thing that made sense.

They were together from then on.

She learned how things could be when you loved the person. Simon never hurt her. He listened to her and let her go at her own pace. They learned about each other.

She needed to be touching him all the time. To breathe inthe scent of his skin and his hair. She loved greeting him at the door when he got home from work. He’d pick her up, and she’d wrap her legs around his waist, burying her face in the curve of his neck.

She began to feel love for the life growing inside her too. She could think of the baby without remembering Robert. He didn’t matter. Simon’s name would be on the birth certificate.

They’d made so many promises to each other, but they’d fallen along with his body, and now they were broken too. She was alone. She rested her head on his chest again and sobbed.

CHAPTER 42ALICE

It took a long time for Jenny to stop crying. Too long for them to be sitting in the direct sun, with no water. Alice’s skin felt tight and burned. Her head was pounding.

“We have to go,” Alice said. “We’re going to get heatstroke.”

Jenny blinked at her. She looked spaced out, hollow. Alice held Jenny around her bicep and urged her to stand. Jenny carefully got to her feet.

“Where’s the knife?” Alice said.

“I put it in my pack. I didn’t like wearing it.”

“Okay. Come on.” Alice followed a faint path that traveled to the right, which she’d thought was the same as she’d taken down, but the ground was looser, and her legs wobbly. The flesh around her bullet wound burned. Her feet kept sliding out from underneath her. She hadn’t made it far before she fell forward, scraping her stomach as she slid down a few feet. Jenny had only been a step behind, so she was bumped off-balance and slid along with Alice. They clung to the hillside as rocks, pebbles, and sand shifted under their feet, rolling and bouncing below.

Jenny’s eyes were wide as she stared up at Alice, who was desperately trying to think of a plan to get them off the hillside that didn’t end with them rolling to the bottom. Far to their right, the gravel hill changed into patches of soil and was dotted with treesand shrubs that had managed to take root. If they could make their way across, they could then move upward.