You'll Miss Me When I'm Gone

“And you didn’t tell me?”

“I didn’t tell anyone.”

She runs one hand through her hair and pulls at some of the short strands. “I’ve never understood it. The attention has never been enough for you. Not when it comes to your music, or to guys. Is that why you sabotaged me, because you couldn’t stand to see me get any of the attention? You realize, don’t you, that that could be why I didn’t get into Johns Hopkins?”

“Maybe you didn’t get in because they didn’t fucking want you.”

One of the fire pit kids is filming a video of us. Cool. Glad to know we are entertaining someone.

Relishing the control I have over the conversation, I get louder. “You were ready to leave us behind, go off on some grand adventure. Hooray for you! You were the only person who could understand what I was going through, and you wanted to leave. I had to do what I did.”

“Why did you even need me when you and Ima are so close?” Envy drips from her voice. “You guys have your little club with your old movies and helping out in her classroom.”

“It’s not the same,” I say, though it has been a long time since Ima and I have watched a movie together, and she no longer has a classroom. “There’s always been someone better for you. Your friends and your homework and now Zack. You have so much that I’ve never had, and you don’t even realize it.”

“Is that really what you think?”

“It’s not what I think. It’s our history.”

Tovah clenches her jaw. Scrape, scrape, scrape is the sound her teeth make. I don’t care if she can’t help it. I fucking hate that sound.

“Here’s the deal with my supposedly amazing friends, because I really only have three of them,” she says. “There’s Lindsay, who’s been ignoring me most of the year. There’s her boyfriend, Troy, who really doesn’t care about me one way or the other. And then there’s Zack, and”—she gestures wildly at the empty space surrounding her—“do you see him here with me tonight?”

I tilt my cup to my lips, but Tovah snatches it away and turns it upside down over the lawn.

“What the hell?” This action of her pisses me off so much that I push a hand into her shoulder. Hard.

She stumbles back, shoe skidding on the icy deck, but she grips the railing before she falls. “Haven’t you had enough?”

I hate you, I think, though I’m not sure it’s true.

“Part of the reason I wanted to leave,” she starts back up when I don’t say anything, “is that I wanted to be on my own for once. I didn’t want to be half of the Siegel twins. I wanted to see who I could be without your shadow constantly threatening to overtake me.”

“So you were jealous.”

She grunts like she cannot actually admit it.

“You don’t have to act like you’re above it,” I continue. “I’m jealous too. Okay? I don’t have the perfect relationship like you and Zack.”

“My boyfriend doesn’t even want to have sex with me.” Tovah lifts her shoulders in a dramatic shrug. “So there you go, another thing you’re better at.”

“Getting guys to sleep with me?”

“Sure. If that’s what you want to call it.”

I shake my head. She doesn’t get it. “You think you’re so much better than me. You’re going to save the world. All I’m going to do is play silly music, right?”

“Maybe you don’t have friends because you only think about yourself and your music,” she says. “You think you’re so grown-up, but you’re immature. Reckless. You can’t keep acting this way forever.”

Inside the house, something shatters. Someone yells. But we remain near the fire, the flames casting shadows onto Tovah’s face.

This is me, Adina, a girl on her way to becoming a ghost.

I stare at her. It’s still the plan, still the only choice I can make for myself. “I won’t. I’m not planning to be here long enough to find out how Ima’s disease is going to destroy my life too.”

Thirty-two

Tovah