I sat quietly, juddering slightly whenever we hit a bump.

‘Am I still going the right way?’ Heath asked, awkward. ‘June mentioned you lived on the way to hers. I’ve just been going that way.’

I swallowed twice before answering. Crossed my legs. Recrossed them the other way. ‘Yeah, no, you’re good. It’s the next left.’

‘Oh. Really?’

‘Yeah. Why?’

‘She’s the next right.’

A couple more minutes crept past. Eventually, he pulled on to the cul-de-sac and I pointed towards the house with the green shutters. I went to leave. ‘Hey,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry. That’s not what I meant. Truthfully. I’m still here if you ever need to talk.’ His eyes suggested he meant it. I was struck by a wave of acceptance, looking into this harmless-ass kid’s eyes, really, for the first time, with his dead mom and beautiful girlfriend and big house and I was so jealous of everything, everything. The emotions were so annoyingly conflicting; I wanted to hate him. But he gave me nothing to hate. Maybe he was purposely being careful around me. Who knew? But honestly, at least this boy was looking after her. If I couldn’t have her I was glad he could.

‘No worries,’ I said finally. ‘Thanks for the ride.’

‘Happy New Year,’ he said.

‘Thanks, man. You too.’

I slammed the door shut and the sound of it rang in my ears, muffling the beginning of Autumn’s first movement.

Olivia wouldn’t pick up the phone. I knocked on her door in a last-ditch effort to get some closure, at least, but Mrs Good answered. She said Olivia was asleep, despite her bedroom light being on.

I sat in bed, not feeling particularly awake but not particularly tired, either. In a weird liminal state, it occurred to me I was completely sober again now and my mind ticked along clearly, running through the events of the night in no linear fashion. Just snapshots.

I did feel bad about Olivia. But who the hell did she think she was, telling people about the texts? We used to spend every waking moment together, the dog days of the summer sprawled out on the asphalt. Everything that happened to me became Olivia’s concern. I told her everything. The thought of her exhausted me now, and I didn’t know why, or what had changed. Dad had something to do with it, sure, but even before then the niggling feeling had been crawling under the surface: the thought that we’d both been growing, but in two entirely different directions.