I couldn’t swallow. God, I hadn’t thought it was going to be this bad. But I had to do it. Exposure therapy. I couldn’t just go my entire life without ever being in a car again. But when I looked out over the dashboard all I could think about was whether Dad had enough time to think about anything before the windshield carved up his torso, if unconscious really meant unconscious, how half a second of blinding, earth-shattering pain probably feels longer than a whole entire life …

‘We don’t have to do this,’ June said. I turned to her. She’d noticed my unease, evidently, and her eyes slanted in a sympathetic grimace. ‘Like, listen, I know it isn’t what this is about, but I’m a good driver, and I’ll – I can go slow, warn you at turns. Whatever helps.’

I studied her face, all big eyes and full cheeks and warm skin. She didn’t look tired. And if she was thinking about how pathetic I was, she certainly wasn’t showing it.

‘So, drive?’

I chewed my lip, which wasn’t enough of a response. Nodded. ‘Yeah. Thanks.’

We started down the street.

The silence was unbearable. Just tyres crushing thin snow and June’s nails clicking against the steering wheel. The world spun past with a strange sense of unreality; the light from the lamp posts was too bright but everything else seemed somehow too dark and even the way the falling snow trembled felt menacing. I got an overwhelming sense that I wasn’t really here, that we weren’t really here, like we were actually just sitting stationary on top of one of those rolling street screens they used in old movies. The experience should have been accompanied by a shrill violin crescendo.

But nothing leaped from the shadows. Nothing jolted to a stop.

Each passing headlight threatened to ram into us, my heart skipping beats in response to each imagined collision. But nothing hit. Nothing broke. Nothing died.

It was fine.

June kept looking at me; for any feedback, I assumed, which was kind but also made me very aware of my own face. ‘How can I help?’ she finally asked, maybe five minutes in, when I’d taken to jamming my middle fingers into my temples.

Say something. Anything. I tried to hide my embarrassment by speaking quickly. ‘Can you just talk?’ Any stimulus. Anything besides doom.

We pulled up to the intersection of Main and College – we’d be at school in five minutes. I looked to her; she smirked, the blaze of the stoplight casting a deep red glow on to her face. ‘Oh, man. Yeah, I can do that. About what? Anything?’

‘Yeah. Anything would be good.’ Green. Forward. I paid close attention to the glove compartment, tried to will the heat into me to keep my teeth from chattering.

‘Oof. OK. That’s a lot of responsibility, Whitaker.’

Whitaker. That was nice.