Chapter Twenty-Five

"You think I don't know about family, El?"

My question sits between us, filling the space more than our bodies on the tiny stoop outside Max's house. Anger swells within me, white-hot, with spiky edges. How dare El ask such a question? How many times has she been around my family? How many times have I told her about my family? Wasn't family one of the things that brought us together in the first place?

El swipes at her eyes clumsily because of the stupid can of beer still clutched between her hands. "That's not what I meant!" She puts the can down and then picks it up again. "I just mean it's not the same thing. I know your mom is—" El stumbles over her words, the way everyone does when they don't want to say the hard, true thing. "I know she's gone—"

"But she's never coming back so it doesn't count?" I interrupt, unable to keep the bitterness out of my voice.

El blows out a breath, putting down the beer can again. "It's just not the same," she repeats. "You don't know, because you don't know Max and me."

I sputter at that for a minute, unsure of what to say. Because it sounds a lot like El's saying I can't speak on family or grief, which is bullshit. And of course I didn't know her and Max, but I felt like I knew El. Hadn't I? We'd spent so much time together this summer. And she had called me her girlfriend when I met Max. And I'd snuck off with her on the back of a stolen motorcycle, all the way to Richmond, shitting, Virginia. And when I hugged her, it felt like home, and I've been looking for something that felt like home for months now. And maybe Eliana Blum was that for me in Dell's Hollow, when nothing was familiar.

I let out a long breath, trying to release my anger. Trying to pull upon all my years of training to grant me the ability to keep emotion at a distance.

I fail miserably and my next words come out through my teeth, snarling like a dog's been let off its leash. "You're right. I don't know Max, and I'm not even sure I know you. I mean, we just met a few weeks ago. It's not like I'm looking to marry a girl I just met. What I wanted to be was your friend. Or maybe your girlfriend. Or at least that's what I thought we were doing. You know, on this trip. Or this morning. Or even like fifteen minutes ago, before your precious sister rejected you and you decided to take it all out on me!"

God, this morning in the motel feels like ten years ago. El's crying now and I just want to reach out and hug her, but when my arm brushes hers, she shoves it off and stands up.

"Just don't," El snaps. "I shouldn't have dragged you here to see my ‘precious sister.' I should've come alone. Maybe it would've worked if …" She chokes back a sob, and the noise quells my anger. I wrap my arms around my knees, pulling them close.

"It was good to try and find Max at least. Maybe you can have some closure now?" I offer, feeling bad about my ferocious words and somehow wanting to salvage all this in some way.

"Closure," El spits out viciously. "Sure, great. That's fucking fantastic. Having closure is so much better than having a sister."

"I—"

As much as I want to fix this, I bite off what I was going to say. Part of me knows it's too late. El and I are now like two race cars locked together around a tight turn, careening toward a wall that we can both see, utterly unable to stop moving forward.

El pops the top of the beer can and dumps the frothy amber liquid on a patch of parched grass. "What do you even care? You're leaving anyway."

I stand quickly, as some of the beer El's pouring out splashes on my shoes. "That's not fair at all."

El flings the now empty can toward the door of Max's apartment building, where it clatters and smashes against the wall. "It's true. You're just like Max."

"What are you talking about?" I pick up the discarded can, because El Blum, good girl and cofounder of the Dell's Hollow Volunteer Club, is littering. Picking up the can feels like the least I can do to restore the balance of the universe. "I'm nothing like her!"

Confusion flits across El's face for a moment at my words and then she scowls. "You're gonna leave like her. Like Letty." She gestures wildly.

I drop the smashed empty beer can in a trash bin next to the front door. My mind and my heart are racing, but even still it takes me a minute to place who El's talking about and what she means. In the reflection from the front door glass, I catch sight of the Fast Furious T-shirt I'm wearing and something in my brain clicks. "Letty? Ortiz? As in Fast Furious Letty? What does she have to do with any of this?"

El makes a frustrated noise. "She's the template, Jo! For you, for my sister, for any girl who's going too fast and who doesn't give a shit about who she hurts along the way."

I draw in a ragged breath, brushing drops of spilled beer off my fingers and onto the side of the apartment building. I turn around. "Firstly, that's blaspheming Letty. And—most important—I'm not a fucking fictional character or your sister! You can't compare me to them!"

My words might as well be flung into the trash because El's still stuck on Letty Ortiz. She stands up, turns around, and crosses her arms. "Remember the movies when Letty was hunting Dom?"

"She had amnesia! She wasn't herself! Why are we still arguing about Letty Ortiz?"

"Because it's important!"

We're yelling at each other now, and this is so clearly not really about me and El but rather about her and Max, but fuck it. If El doesn't want me in her life or if she somehow thinks I'm like Max because we both race, and because we have better places to be than with her, that's fine. I don't need her, either.

I swipe at my own face—when had I started crying?—and say, "We have to go. We can't just hang around here, hoping Max is going to change her mind. That's pathetic even for you."

Ouch. Those words were not what I'd meant to say at all, and they hit El like a blow. She rocks back on her feet for a minute.

Then, she steps closer to me, her eyes dangerous. "If you think I'm so pathetic, then why did you come here with me?"

I step backward, and now my back's against the door of the apartment building. "Because I thought you were different from this irrational person who's yelling at me outside her sister's shitty apartment! I thought you were fun and kind and that you liked me. I see now that you've just been using me to find your sister, and that you were completely delusional about that, too. She doesn't want you here, clearly, so let it the fuck go already."

El steps away from me. "Fine." She pulls out her phone. "You're right. Thanks so much for all your help." She starts stabbing at her phone angrily.

"What are you doing?" I ask.

"Calling my parents back. I gave Max the key, remember? I don't have a way home. And it turns out there's not an Amtrak or bus back to Dell's Hollow; I checked while I was sitting in the diner. The one time I don't do my research …"

Even as she dials, I know I could still fix this. I could apologize for the cruel words I've said or try to bridge the space between us, but this isn't my fault. I shouldn't have to apologize when El's the one being an asshole.

"What does that mean for me if you call your parents? How am I supposed to get home?"

El shrugs and starts to walk away. "I guess we're stuck together for a couple more hours."

Well, fuck. What else am I supposed to do? Call my dad, who's barely capable of driving around Dell's Hollow, much less all the way to Richmond? I'm too young to rent a car, and I have money in my checking account, yes, but I can't take an Uber all the way back to Dell's Hollow. That would be a fortune.

Fuck's sake.

Hating myself just a little bit, I run after El.

El's parents arrive a few hours later. It turns out that Zaynah texted them after the fight she had with El and they were already on the road to Richmond by the time El called them. El and I spent the entire three hours we were waiting for them to arrive not saying anything to each other. We don't talk on the way home, either, during what has to be the world's most awkward drive. And El's parents don't talk to her because I'm in the car, which leaves us all drowning in silence. Which is fine. It's all fine. I don't need El. Maybe I don't even really like her—I'm not sure. All I know is that we're broken and I have no idea how to fix us and it's time to focus on myself, my goals, and get away from everything to do with El Blum as fast as possible.