The only two people in the world who loved me unconditionally, who would do anything for me, are gone.

I am no one’s.

So even though I know I shouldn’t, I ask the question anyway.

“Would you do it if I were Sara?”

Glenn straightens up, meeting my eyes.

“We’d do it if we had the money. That’s all it is. There’s just not enough.”

“You mean I’m not enough,” I say.

“No, that’s not what—” Cora begins.

“It’s fine,” I say.

But it’s not. Nothing’s fine. I want to tell them I’m sorry I’m asking for this. I’m sorry she died and I lived. I’m sorry they got stuck with me.

But guess what. I got stuck with me, too.

Instead, I tell them I want to go to bed.

Glenn opens my window before hauling his ladder out of the half-pink room. Alone, I put my lotion on haphazardly. A petite pair of slippered feet blocks the light under my door for a second, but no knock ever comes.

I shouldn’t have asked. I should just be grateful. They took me in. They sat by my hospital bed all those months, ever-positive Cora trying to distract me from the fact that I was lying there like a charred Tater Tot.

They’ve done enough.

On Sara’s bed, I open my laptop and stare at the profile pic I’ve avoided so long. I force myself to click on Ava Before the Fire, filling the screen with square, digital time capsules of who I used to be.

Me standing with my drama girls, arms around each other, leaning against our lockers.

#dramagang

Dad handing me flowers after the spring play.

#mybiggestfan

Josh with his arm hugging me around the waist almost as tightly as the green satin dress I’m wearing.

#lookingspiffy

In the final post, Sara’s frozen in midlaugh. I’m making a wannabe-sexy face next to her, showing off the smoky eye makeup we were trying to master.

#bestcousinsforlife

Smooth skin. Wide smile. Absolutely no idea that by morning, both of us would be gone.

As I stare at the old me, my reflection comes into shape on the screen. My face pulled in all the wrong directions. The scars are all I see.

I slam the laptop shut.

A familiar darkness creeps into my chest. The same insidious ache as when I learned my parents were dead. The same tempting nothingness from when I lay on the grass, clinging to the stars.

The blackness never actually left; I just keep it at bay.

So it won’t drag me under.

The darkness is easy.

Quiet.

Numb.

If I stay too long, I’ll never leave.

But as the dream of a better face, a stage, maybe even a boy slips away, the darkness tiptoes in.