This time he pauses, tilts his head like he doesn’t understand what I’m saying.

“What was you?”

Your garage. Your lawn. All those times. You forced to clean up the mess.

My voice doesn’t sound like my voice.

I gulp air into my throat.

It was all me.

This time I know he hears me, because his face folds in on itself and he steps back, away from me. Looks down at the floor. The guard still holds my arms, waiting for Rose-Brady’s instructions, and his grip is the only thing keeping me upright.

When Zach looks up, the light in his eyes has gone out.

It hits me in the stomach, deep—the disgust, the revulsion, everything I deserve and everything I’ve always feared I am, reflected back at me.

And then he turns and walks off the stage.

He’s gone.

I drop my head down on my chest, sobbing, legs trembling under me, threatening to fold.

Someone touches my arm, soft, gentle, and I think maybe it’s Zach, maybe he came back, but when I look up it’s Lucy, always Lucy, and then the world pitches into black.

—

The next thing I know, I’m in Rose-Brady’s office, fluorescent lights flickering above my head, and she’s sitting at her desk, frowning at me. Lucy sits next to me, holding my hand.

I can barely concentrate as Rose-Brady talks. She says that the rest of the assembly has been canceled. That I took away all those people’s opportunity to remember what we’ve lost. That she understands that I’m still grieving, but so are other people. That she wishes I had come to her in private instead of doing what I did.

All I keep thinking about is when Jordan and I were younger, around six or seven, and I was scared of the dark. Jordan never was. He was always so much braver than me. Never afraid of silly things. Every night, I would lie in my bed, too scared to move, until I couldn’t take it anymore and I would bolt out of my room and into his. He would be sleeping, but he’d wake up and see me, and without a word he would scoot his body over toward the wall as best he could and make space for me in the bed. I would climb in, and we would cuddle together for the rest of the night.

As we got older, he tried to make our dad pay attention to me, encouraged me to try out for the band, took care of me, night after drunk night, and all he ever wanted in return was to be my friend, my brother, my twin. I ruined that. I ruined everything.

Lucy squeezes my hand tighter and I realize I’m whimpering, tears streaming down my face, soaking the front of my shirt.