Shit.
Yanking on a jacket, I grab my keys and leave the room.
Apparently, I’m going to meet Gavin.
Chapter 5
Gavin
THERE’S A CHILL IN the cemetery when I arrive in my beat-up Hyundai Accent. I should be driving a Porsche or, at the very least, an Audi, but thanks to Mr. Riley’s shitty decision making and lack of moral fiber, I’m driving this piece of crap.
Perfect.
I park far from where I’m actually going. Just in case someone I know happens to wander by, I need an easy excuse for why I’m here. I park in make-out central, which is a weird name for the cozy little corner at the back of the cemetery. Nobody except freshmen come here to make out.
Slipping quietly out of my car, I start trudging across the quiet cemetery to the place where I’m going. I shuffle through the fallen autumn leaves and pull my jacket a little tighter around me. Somehow, even after all of this time, I’m still wildly uncomfortable in this place.
Maybe that’s the real reason I want Emilia here.
It’s not enough to just know that she’s hurting as much as me. I want to see her hurting as much as me, and I want her to share in my pain a little bit, even if that pain is dealing with how absolutely boring visiting a graveyard is.
Even if that pain is knowing we’ve both lost our fathers.
I make my way past several mausoleums and some large, fancy headstones. I secretly think of that as the “rich” part of the cemetery, which is pretty messed up, really. Who does that? The dead are just dead. They aren’t rich or poor, but their families certainly are. That’s why some people have these large, intricate tombstones.
And then there’s my dad.
When I get to his grave marker, I kneel down in the leaves. Maybe I shouldn’t. Emilia isn’t here yet – if she’s even coming – and I don’t want her to view me as weak, but it’s always bothered me that my dad doesn’t have something better marking the place where he’s been put to rest.
His tombstone is flat and it’s hidden now under the leaves. It doesn’t matter because I know where it is. I’d be able to find my dad’s grave in his sleep, but I push the leaves away and look at the tombstone.
“He wouldn’t have liked it,” a feminine voice says from behind me.
>
Emilia Riley.
She actually fucking came.
I don’t turn around. I’m not sure if I’m feeling more relieved or anxious that she’s actually here.
“What do you mean?” I ask, but I know exactly what she means.
“He liked pomp and circumstance. He wouldn’t have wanted something so plain.”
“He didn’t want this,” I agree. “He would have gone all out.”
“You know,” she kneels beside me and looks over at me. “In another lifetime, I could see your dad having a mausoleum.”
“For the family?”
“Nope,” she shakes her head, and her blonde hair bounces. “Just for himself.”
I laugh, even though I don’t mean to, because she’s right.
“He was kind of a pretentious mother fucker, wasn’t he?”
“I wouldn’t go that far.”