“She’s eighteen. She’ll be going to college in the fall and will have to navigate things on her own sooner or later, Mark. She is a very capable young woman. She will be more than fine. We have to let her go.”

Trisha is giving him a look I don’t quite understand, but Mark must understand it, because he sighs through his nose like Jenna used to and turns to me.

“Well, you can’t drive that far alone. I won’t allow it. I’ll book you a flight. And for the love of God, Amelia, don’t forget to text us.”

My head is spinning, my half-formed revolt is turning into a full-fledged battle, and Jenna isn’t here to be the general.

“You really don’t have to,” I say. “I can rent a car.”

I don’t tell them it would take every last penny of my birthday and babysitting money to afford the car rental and gas.

“No.” Mark’s voice is the most forceful it has ever been with me. “No long-distance drives. No cars. Ever.”

“Mark,” Trisha whispers, a hand coming up to rub his arm. “It’s okay.”

We are all thinking about the photos of a smashed-up rental car. Jenna died instantly in the front passenger seat; the other three passengers were taken to the local hospital, where they made a full recovery.

I bet Mark is thinking the same will happen to me, that another freak episode will take me away and there will be nobody left for him to dote on or to call on long lunch breaks or to turn the seat warmer on for. I have no idea what Trisha is thinking.

“I’ll fly,” I say. “If that makes you feel better. I’ll have to rent a car to get around town, I think, but I’ll fly there if you want me to. I … I just have to see what’s there. I have to go.”

I have to go away.

Mark starts crying in earnest. “Jenna would want you to,” he says. “She would want you to enjoy your summer the best … the best that you can.”

Trisha rubs his back in soothing circles and says to me, “I see no problem with a trip, so long as you are back in time for the college prep course.”

I don’t tell her that I would rather have someone explain to me how I’m going to live the rest of my life without my best friend. That, I would take notes on.