Dancing with Molly - Lena Horowitz Page 0,75

could talk, I just kept saying I’m sorry over and over again. I wanted to say something encouraging. Tell him he was going to get better and that I’d be here when he did, but looking at him made it all seem impossible.

I don’t think he’s going to get better. But he has to. He has to. He’s Carson. He’s healthy and athletic and sweet and fun and kind and loving. He’s going to college in the fall. His life is going to be perfect.

It has to be. It has to.

Friday, August 1

Jess came by today. I didn’t want to talk to her. I don’t want to talk to anyone. I was staring at the TV when she came in. She told me she wished she’d been there so she could have helped, but I didn’t say anything. I’m glad she wasn’t there. If she was, maybe she’d be in a coma too. Or dead.

I love Carson so much it hurts. I miss him so much, and I’m so, so scared. I can’t think about anything else. I can’t talk to anyone because I’ll just start crying. He’s the only person I want to talk to, and I won’t talk again until I can talk to him.

Eventually, Jess gave up trying to talk to me and just sat there and watched TV in silence. I kept wishing she’d go away. When she finally did, I felt relieved.

Saturday, August 2

Carson is brain dead. My dad just told me. His parents are deciding whether or not to keep him on the machines. If they take him off, he’ll die. He’ll die. He’s going to die.

Monday, August 4

It’s my fault. It’s my fault. It’s all my fault. I’m never going to hear him laugh again. I’m never going to hear him say my name, see him smile, touch his face. He’s never going to go to college or play soccer or get married or have kids. And it’s all my fault. Mine. You’re the one who wanted to come here, he said. And he was right. I made him go to the party. I made him leave the restaurant. All he wanted to do was sit with me and eat dinner and talk. That was what he wanted. And I killed him.

Friday, August 8

Carson is gone. His funeral is tomorrow. I can’t go. I can’t face all those people. They know what I did. They know it was me. I wish they’d put me in the ground with him.

Monday, August 11

My mother took me to see Tim today. I cried the entire time. Just sat on his couch and cried. He gave me a box of tissues, and I used the whole thing. Everything hurts. Every last inch of me. He kept saying, Tell me what you’re feeling. What are you feeling right now?

I told him I want to die.

Wednesday, August 13

Someone has been sitting by my bed at all times for the past two days. My mom, my dad, Ashley, Jess, Tim, even my grandmother is here. I haven’t spoken to any of them. I don’t know what they’re doing. I don’t know why they’re here. I wish they would go away.

My mom keeps trying to make me eat, but I can’t. I won’t. Carson will never eat anything ever again. I wonder if he knew what was happening right before he passed out. I wonder if he was scared. I wonder if he hated me, in that moment. If that was why he looked at me so clearly right before he went down. Because he knew. He knew that his life was over and it was my fault.

Friday, August 15

Apparently I slept for two days and while I was sleeping, my mom read this journal. I woke up and she was sitting in front of me, crying, with the journal open in her lap. I sat up to shout at her, and my brain went fuzzy so fast I had to lay right down again. The room was spinning. I closed my eyes and brought my hands to my head, but it didn’t help. I could feel the bed underneath me turning, my organs fighting to keep up with the constant motion.

Mommy, make it stop, I heard myself say.

She gently moved my hands and kissed my forehead. I’d never felt anything so good.

That’s all I want to do, she said.

I can’t believe she read the whole thing. I can’t believe she knows everything. All the sex and the drugs and the