beyond me. I can't even look cool in a parka in sub-zero weather.
Then again, I might be sweating because I'm nervous. I keep touching the memory card in my pocket to make sure it's still there.
Up ahead, Nick Lively—how can you miss him with that tan?—stands beside a black media van, fixing his hair in the driver-side mirror. His eyes stray up to mine, but he doesn't register I'm that girl until I've already ducked behind Maggie again.
"This was such a bad idea, bb," I hiss to her. "Can we leave?"
She loops her arm into mine and squeezes my hand tightly. "Fat chance. We're in this together. Balls to the wall, right, bb?"
"I hate that expression."
The crowd is thick with high schoolers. We elbow our way to the front where a line of Myrtle Beach's finest stand looking bored and tired. But two of them have Holly's trademark peacock feather clipped behind their ear.
"That's so sweet!" Maggie coos. "They're paying homage!"
This isn't exactly how I pictured the vigil. I expected more… I don't know, music? Noise? Girls crying in the streets while their fifteen-year-old boyfriends console them? But no one's crying. There's a solemn, heavy shroud hanging over the crowd, despite the colorful array of peacock feathers poking out of rampant ponytails and fishtail braids, no one can seem to shake. Like everyone is afraid of being too loud. It's silly—I mean they can't exactly wake the dead or anything. Somewhere in the sea of people, a lone radio fades into "My Heart War," and people flick out their phones and light their lighters in honor.
A slice of blue fin cuts through the crowd to my left. I tell Maggie I'll be right back and dive after Boaz. He stops at the outskirts of the crowd, taking a pack of cigarettes out from under his black kilt. It matches his black tuxedo t-shirt. "Boaz," I whisper, and he almost jumps out of his skin.
"Jeez Louise, bro-ho!" He slaps his heart. "You wanna give me a heart defunct? Ever heard of not sneakin' up on the man while he's at a fuckin' cemetery?"
"Sorry," I apologize earnestly. Making sure no one is close enough to hear, I add, "Where's Roman?"
He puts his lips to the tip of the pack and extracts a cigarette, putting the rest back into his kilt. "Readin' every fuckin' rag mag in the state, probs."
"I didn't rat."
He snorts, taking out a matchbox, and lights his cigarette. He inhales a lungful, savoring, and blows it out in a ring.
I purse my lips together. "You know I wouldn't."
"Do I?" He doesn't sound bitter, just amused. "My Heart War" crescendos, Roman and Holly's voices combining with the vigil's voices, roaring the lyrics like they're the last words on earth. It's chilling, as if she's here in the weirdest way. Sort of spooky and...and really tragic. "You know," he goes on, "no one even bothered about her side of this. Roman's always been either the martyr or the culprit. Who's Holly? The victim. No one cares if she isn't."
Maybe now's the time to tell him about the pictures on the memory card. It'll clear everything up. I begin to reach for the memory card in my pocket when I pause, my eyebrows furrowing. "What do you mean, if she isn't?"
"Bro-ho, she was in love. Serious love. For-shit love."
I retract my hand. "With Roman?" Was she who the song was meant for? Has he loved her all this time?
He doesn't say yes or no. He sucks another lungful of smoke and blows it out over his head. "A few months before she died she got this tat. Ya'aburnee. It means 'you bury me.'"
The smoke snakes like a gray river into the blue sky.
"Ya'aburnee?" I echo, remembering the article from The Juice. A cold shiver races down my arms, and I quickly cross them over my chest to rub them away. When Dad died, I was mopping the stage of sweat from the rock show the night before. We were thirty minutes to opening, and Dad had been counting the stocks, his pen making sharp checks down his list. I still hear the sound when I'm swabbing the floors, that echoing chhhick, chhhhhick!…
The next thing I knew, he put down his checklist and leaned against the counter. Geoff asked him, "Hey, boss, you okay?"
"Yeah, I'm just a little lightheaded is all. Can you check and see how many dark ales are in the fridge?"
Those were his last words.
He dropped like deadweight to the ground,