“Wait. What do you mean again?” He waits for me to explain, but I don’t, instead going up and hammering a nail that doesn’t necessarily need to be hammered. “Did you die at the scene of the accident?” he asks and I pound the hammer harder against the wood. “Quinton, talk to me.”

My heart misses a beat as I ram the hammer into the nail repeatedly. “Yeah, so what if I did?” I shrug, like it’s no big deal, even though the urge to go find a bump is hitting me harder than it ever has. “Shit happens sometimes.”

“Shit happens sometimes?” He’s astounded, standing there with the nail gun loosely in his hand, about ready to drop it. “Quinton, you’re a walking miracle.”

Miracle? Miracle? Is he f**king kidding me? One pound. Two pound. Three pound. The nail is so far in that the wood is starting to split around it. But I can’t stop until he stops talking. “Yeah, try telling that to Lexi’s parents,” I say, wiping the sweat from my brow with my arm, and then move to another nail. “Or Ryder’s. They’ll tell you how delusional you are.”

He shakes his head and then snags hold of my arm as I swing back to hit the nail again. “Quinton, you can’t expect them to think any differently,” he says, looking me directly in the eye. “They lost their children and are probably never going to forgive you.” His words are sharp and jagged like the shrapnel that cut open my chest and nearly killed me.

I jerk my arm away from him. I’m not really mad at him; it’s more that there’s so much panic and anguish in me that I can’t figure out any other outlet than to yell at him. “I need to tell them I’m sorry at least… I never did that.”

“I don’t think you should, at least until you can deal with what’s probably going to come after you say it,” he explains as I drop the hammer on the ground. “I think what you need to do is work on forgiving yourself, because it’s all you can do and life will get easier when you do. It might even end up being good.”

I cross my arms, wishing I could curl up in a ball and erase the last few minutes, go back home and put that picture up on the wall. “I’m not sure I can do that. Forgive myself when they haven’t yet.”

“Sure you can,” he assures me, picking up my hammer and extending it in my direction for me to take. “It’ll just take some time.”

I don’t take the hammer from him and instead storm away, the knife in my chest digging deeper as I think about how I wanted to say sorry to Lexi’s mom one day, hoping that something might come out of it, but now he’s saying I shouldn’t because what I want—need—to happen probably isn’t going to. Then I think about how I just took down her photo and put it away and I start to regret it.

“Quinton, come back,” he shouts out after me.

I shake my head as I keep walking. “I need to take a walk and think,” I say to him, trotting down the stairs of the house and onto the bottom floor. There are a few guys at the site, but I barely pay attention to them even when they wave.

When I get outside, I dash across the parking area and to the sidewalk. Then I start walking toward the corner. I don’t look back, looking straight ahead as I wander toward the unknown, one foot in front of the other, focusing on that instead of how I feel. I’m not even exactly sure what I’m upset about. I think it might be a combination of everything that’s happened today and the difficulty that just comes with living life.

Life.

It’s so f**king hard.

One minute things are fine. The next they change into something painful. Every day just moving. Changing. And I’m left coping. Is that what I want? To go through day after day like this? So up and down? I’m not sure I can do that.

Not sober, anyway.

The last thought guides my feet to a place where I can start making everything easier. I don’t stop walking, going for at least an hour, passing blocks and blocks, until I’m standing in front of Marcus’s house, staring at the door with a flowery wreath on it like a f**king psychopath. I can’t seem to bring myself to walk away, yet at the same time, I can’t get my hand to knock on the door. I’m getting so furious with myself for even coming here. Why did I do it? I don’t want to be here.

What do I want?

What do I need?

Why do I feel this way?

Why can’t I bring myself to walk away?

Questions are racing through my head so quickly I’m hardly aware of anything around me. It’s like I and what’s on the other side of that door are the only things that exist. That’s it. I need to walk away. I need to knock. Go. Stay. Go. Stay.

My phone starts to vibrate in my pocket and the sound brings me out of my daze. I don’t want this—I remember that. I’ve been to this place and even though it’s easy, I chose to leave it for a reason—I chose life.

I turn to walk away even though my body’s so stiff it feels like it’s going to crack apart. But when I’m in mid-turn the front door of the house suddenly swings open. Marcus looks a little startled as he stumbles back in the doorway. He’s wearing a white T-shirt, jeans, and no shoes. His black hair is thinner than the last time I saw him. Not from old age—he’s only twenty-two. But because he’s gotten into harder stuff since then. The scabs on his face and arms and his major decrease in weight are evidence of that. And also evidence that he has what my mind is craving at the moment.

“Wow, where the f**k did you come from?” Marcus says, scratching his arm as he glances around at the front yard behind me, which is decorated with a giant inflatable Santa. “Quinton, my man, how the hell have you been?”

To him it’s probably such a casual question, but to me the answer is more complicated than living. “I’ve been good,” I lie, and then exchange a handshake with him. “How’s things going with you?”

He shrugs, glancing over his shoulder into the house. “Not too bad. Just been living life.”

I nod with uneasiness. “That’s good.” I’m about to say good-bye and walk away because things feel really awkward.

But then he looks back at me and says, “You want to come inside for a bit? Dan’s here chillin’.”

Fuck. Shit. Fuck. What am I doing? “Maybe… I mean, yeah. Sure.” Walk away.

Marcus steps back to let me in and I stare down at the threshold, watching in slow motion as I lift my foot over it and step inside. Just like that I enter the world that nearly killed me.

I’m trying to decide how I feel about that as I follow Marcus down the hallway and toward the basement where I used to spend a lot of time getting high. Marcus is chatting about something, but I barely hear him because I’m too distracted by the way my mind and body are reacting to the pungent scent flowing up the stairway. I’m sure a lot of people probably wouldn’t notice the increase in moisture in the air, but having craved the sensation before, my senses heighten.

I know what I’m walking into before I walk into it, which means I should turn away. But I don’t. I walk right into it. Part of me wanting it. Needing it. Seeking the quiet.

Dan’s sitting on the leather sofa when I enter the room at the bottom of the stairs. He looks about the same as the last time I saw him, maybe a little scragglier and his hair a little shorter. He has a light bulb up to his mouth and he’s heating the glass with a lighter. He glances up when I walk in and then lowers the light bulb.

“Quinton, what the fuck,” he says with a surprised laugh. Smoke leaves his lips and enters the air around me and I helplessly feel myself crave it. He gets to his feet and sets the light bulb and lighter down on the table. “Where the hell have you been for the last year or two?”

“Around,” I tell him, being purposely vague. That was always the thing with hanging out with people who were high. Nothing mattered. The future. The past. If you wanted to dodge questions, they’d let you, because they were too fixated on getting the next hit. So different from spending time with Nova. Or even Wilson.

He nods, like I’ve said something that actually means something. “Cool. Cool.”

“I heard you were in Vegas,” Marcus says as he winds around me and plops down into the sofa, reaching for the light bulb.

“Who’d you hear that from?”

He shrugs as he collects the lighter. “I heard my mom talking. I guess she heard it from your dad or something.”

My dad’s been talking to people about me? That pisses me off a little.

I go over and sit on the couch beside Dan, knowing I’m probably about to ruin the last few months of getting clean, and desperately searching for the will to get up and walk the hell out of here. “Yeah, I was there for a few months,” I say, blinking as Marcus blows some smoke out.

“I heard that city was pretty crazy.” Dan is fixed on tracing the cracks in the leather with his finger, spun out of his mind I’m sure.

“Yeah, it was pretty f**king crazy, I guess,” I tell him vaguely as I watch Marcus take another hit, my mouth starting to salivate for a taste myself. But there’s also conflict within me. I want it, but I don’t want it. Do. Don’t. What do I do? Why am I here?

Marcus must notice me staring, because he holds up the light bulb and says, “You want a hit?”

Four words. One question. But my answer is going to be huge. Life-changing. God dammit. Why did I come here? I don’t even want to be here at the moment. Yet now that I am, it feels nearly impossible to walk away.

What the hell is wrong with me?

I’m about to nod. I’m not even going to lie. I have every intention of taking that f**king light bulb out of his hand, putting it up to my mouth, and messing up everything for myself. But then the damn phone rings inside my pocket. Over and over again. I hit silence without checking who it is and then reach over to take the light bulb from Marcus. But then the stupid phone rings again.

“Dude, someone wants to get ahold of you bad,” Dan remarks as he starts drumming his fingers on his knee.

I take the light bulb from Marcus, set it on my lap, then reach for my phone. I’m pissed off and totally ready to give whoever it is a mouthful. But then a text message flashes across the screen.

Nova: I know I’m probably bugging the crap out of you right now, but I really, really need to talk, so if you can call me, please do. And sorry for bothering u.

“Jesus f**king Christ,” I mutter because the moment I see her name on the screen, I know I have to get up and walk out. I can’t be here. If not for myself or anyone else, for her. Nova. The girl who brought me back the first time, despite how hard it was on her own life. The girl I look forward to talking to every day. Jesus, she’s become more important to me than drugs. More important than maybe anything else.

Marcus looks confused as I get up, terrified by my thoughts. “I have to go,” I say, and then I hand him back the light bulb, despite how much I don’t want to.

Marcus’s brows furrow as he takes the light bulb from me. “You sure?”

I nod, putting my phone into my pocket. “Yeah, I have to call someone.”

He gives me a baffled look, which is completely understandable—walking away is hard. Everyone in this world knows that and yet here I am doing it, even though it’s almost physically painful to leave.

He gets to his feet, sticking his hand into his pocket as he walks around the coffee table. “I’ll walk you out.”

I can’t believe I’m doing this. I’m baffled. Stunned. Shocked beyond reason, as my feet guide me toward the door, away from the need, the craving, the want, all because Nova texted me and reminded me that unlike the first time I did drugs, I’d be messing something of a life up this time by making the choice.

When we get to the front door, Marcus finally takes his hand out of his pocket and I notice he’s got a plastic bag in it. “So here’s the down low. Since you were such a good friend of mine before you took off, I’m going to give you a freebie.” He sticks his hand toward me. “I don’t usually do that for clients, but I’m gonna for you because I know once you get a taste, you’re gonna be back.” He grins like he’s got everything all figured out.

I stare down at the bag filled with tiny white crystals. “I don’t…” Give it back to him.

“You don’t what?” His forehead creases. “Shit. Did I read you wrong?” His fingers close around the bag with panic in his eyes. “I heard you were into this shit, but I guess I heard wrong.”

I shake my head. “No, I was… am… it’s just…” I don’t even know what I’m saying, so instead I stick out my hand, my fingers trembling, and I wonder if he notices or if he’s too high.

He drops the bag into my hand. “It’s the best in town,” he says, like it matters. It doesn’t. Not to most crackheads, anyway. “And it can be an early Christmas present.” He says it like he’s doing me a favor giving it to me. But he’s not. I know it. He knows it. Because we both know that if I do the line, I’ll more than likely be back for more.

“Thanks,” I mumble, putting it into my pocket and then reaching for the doorknob, both relieved that I have it and at the same time angry with myself. “I’ll catch you later.”

“Definitely.” He backs away toward the hallway. “In fact, I’m betting you’re going to be back really soon for more.”

I force a smile and then open the door and step out of the house. The cold air hits my lungs like bricks and my legs feel like lead as I trudge down the stairs and head for my house a few blocks down. I feel like I’m dragging weights behind me and the bag of crystal in my pocket starts to take over my thoughts. Finally I take the phone out of my damn pocket and dial Nova’s phone number, just so I can stop thinking about what I almost did. What I still may do.