Chapter 31 Ellis
ELLIS
The morning air was cool and crisp as we gathered in front of the Mustang. It had been packed with our bags, now filled with clean clothes. The only usual piece of carry-on missing was Margaret’s ashes, and it suddenly felt strange to see the cream tote absent from its usual spot on the back seat.
Dove stood talking to Jedd with an ease about her, a smile on her face that let me know she was okay.
Her space buns were tucked up neatly—she had let me do her hair that morning—and she wore a pair of black shorts and her favorite purple tie-dyed T-shirt.
I smiled at her scuffed, beaten Converse before glancing at Liv as I shut the trunk.
She stood beside Jedd, watching him as he talked, nodding along as if he could see her.
My heart squeezed.
I approached as soft laughter washed over me. Dove was telling Jedd in detail about the ash heist from her uncle’s house, and he just looked at her with a slack expression.
For a moment, it felt normal—like this was just a group of friends swapping stories before we set off. Not two girls and their ghost, and the boy she once loved saying goodbye.
For the last time.
I sidled up beside Dove and slipped my hand into hers, giving it a squeeze before looking at Jedd. My eyes darted briefly to Liv, and I swallowed, my throat already burning.
Jedd’s eyes were clear as he cleared his throat and cracked his neck, looking between Dove and me, but his gaze did seem to search the space around us, as if looking for Liv.
“You know, I was happy to be part of this,” he said, his voice a little gruff. “I thought it was gonna be some crazy bullshit when you showed up on my doorstep. But… Jesus, it was also one of the most important things I’ll ever do in my life, and I think I’m only realizing that just now.”
I bit my lip as warmth spread through my chest.
“Thank you,” he murmured. “For bringing her here. For—for letting me be part of her last chapter. For giving her the chance to close things off the right way.”
Liv’s smile faltered, her whole body seeming to tremble as she twisted her hands in front of her and swallowed.
Jedd drew in a shaky breath and ran his hand through his hair. “Where is she?”
“Right beside you,” Dove said softly, her hold on my hand tightening slightly.
He closed his eyes for a moment, his chest rising and falling as if he were bracing himself for what came next. Then he turned to face her, palms lifting slightly, open and trembling.
“Liv,” I whispered, my throat thick.
Liv’s eyes were wide as she placed her palms over his, her lip trembling. “I’m here,” she whispered, even though he’d never hear her, eyes filled with tears that would never fall.
“She’s touching you,” Dove told Jedd gently. “Her palms are over yours.”
Jedd’s jaw tightened, his lips pressed thin as his shoulders quivered.
“My skin feels cool there,” he said shakily.
“The same way it’s felt a few times since you guys have been here.
” He sniffed and cleared his throat. “I’m sorry.
I’m so damn sorry.” His voice was hoarse as he spoke.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t there to protect you.
And I know you would say it’s macho bullshit—that you never needed protecting—but I’ll always wonder.
I’ll always wonder if maybe, just maybe, if I had been with you—”
He broke off, drawing in a shaky breath.
“It’s always going to be something I’ll live with.
No matter what anyone says, that’s just how the brain works.
But I need you to know—thank you. Thank you for the light you brought to my life.
For never making me feel like I had to be more than I was.
I love you, Liv. I always have, and I always will. ”
Liv’s hands shook as she gazed up at him, her pink hair glimmering in the morning sun.
“I never realized what I had with you,” she whispered.
“Not really, at the time. But I’ve had a lot of time to think this last year, and I know now, Jedd—you’re one in a million.
” She let out a heavy sigh. “Don’t close yourself off.
Don’t let this—don’t let me—make you stop loving.
Find it again. Hold on to it. The world is still waiting for you. ”
Dove’s voice caught as she relayed the words, and Jedd’s eyes grew glassy as she spoke, one lone tear sliding down his cheek. I watched as Liv reached up to brush it away, but it remained as her thumb pressed over it.
Jedd let out a choked sound as he touched his cheek, as if he had felt the coolness of her contact.
“God, I really hope that’s her talking,” he choked out. “Because it sounds exactly like her.”
Liv let out a shaky laugh.
“She’s laughing,” Dove said, her voice cracking, a watery smile on her face.
“Of course she is,” Jedd said, his laugh half a sob, half a breath of air.
I blinked fast, trying to keep my own emotions in check, but everything inside me ached and swelled all at once—the rawness of his words and the tenderness of hers, the impossibility of such a strange and sacred goodbye.
Silence fell between us all, but it wasn’t empty. It was filled with everything unsaid yet spoken all at once, like we were all too afraid to take that final step.
Jedd suddenly stepped back, running both his hands over his face. “You guys should go,” he said levelly. “You have a lot more ahead of you today.”
Dove and I both nodded, not trusting our voices, and Liv looked down at her now-lonely palms, bringing them back to her sides before looking at Jedd, and then at us.
“Thanks for your help with the fireworks,” Dove murmured as she began to walk toward the driver’s seat, her hand slipping from mine.
“Anytime,” Jedd said with a grin.
I slid into the passenger seat as Dove slipped into the driver’s, turning the key until the engine roared to life.
I watched as Liv nodded once, bringing her hands together, clutching them under her chin as she rocked on her heels, before she turned and walked to us, sliding through the backseat door and into the seat.
She turned, facing him as she gazed through the rear window, watching him as we began to drive down the long, manicured driveway.
I glanced in the rearview mirror and saw Jedd standing in the driveway, one hand raised, his shoulders shaking.
Liv raised hers too, pressing her palm flat against the glass, and for one sharp, unbearable heartbeat, it felt as if the world were split between leaving and staying, between holding on and letting go.
Then the turn into the road took him from view, and the Mustang carried us forward.
Dove drove aimlessly for a time, allowing the Mustang to crawl through sun-washed streets and palms that swayed in the breeze.
Nobody was talking. Jedd’s street now far off somewhere behind us, but that last glimpse of him would forever be burned into the back of my mind.
Him standing there with shaking shoulders, waving to someone he couldn’t even see.
I sighed softly and picked at a loose thread on my shorts. I felt Dove glance over at me, and when my eyes lifted to meet hers, she gave me a small, knowing smile before turning back to the road. She adjusted the side mirror with two fingers, angling it so she could catch Liv in the backseat.
“Hey,” she called back. “You okay?”
Liv let out a soft snort. “No. Saying goodbye is the worst thing in the world.” She paused, tipping her head back to stare at the closed roof of the car. “It’s not easy. Facing the inevitable. Yet it happens anyway, whether we want it to or not.”
Dove made a small sound in her throat. “Yeah,” she murmured. “I get what you mean now.”
I cleared my throat. “Are you ready for your mom?”
“No,” Liv said, her voice both sharp and gentle at the same time. “No, I don’t think I’m ever going to be ready. Not really. It’s just part of the inevitable that I have no choice but to face.”
“Okay,” I murmured. “What’s the address?”
Liv told me, and my thumbs felt too big as I typed it into Maps.
The blue route snapped into place instantly, and I set the phone down in the cradle, my throat thick as I avoided Dove’s gaze.
The voice directed, Turn left in 0.3 miles, as if where we were going and what we were doing meant very little.
We moved with the flow of traffic, the roads swallowing us as we became just another brightly colored speck in a sea of colorful specks. As we approached the freeway, Dove’s hand came to rest on my leg, and some of the tightness in my chest loosened, just slightly.
“Man,” Liv murmured from the backseat. “God, I just got, like, really, really scared. I have no idea what’s going to happen. Am I going to see a light? Is there a doorman or, like, a person with a list? What the fuck is going to happen once I do this?”
The fear in her voice reached for me, gripping my heart in a vise as I remembered what it felt like to think like that—when I thought the end was truly coming for me and there was no way out.
The terror of the unknown, of what came after.
It had been one of the most horrific feelings I had ever endured, because it hadn’t been mindless pondering but a very real experience I was about to face.
And now Liv was in that experience, and I wanted nothing more than to take it from her.
“Hey,” Dove said gently, her eyes fixed firmly on the road. “No one knows what happens when we die. Not me. Not Margaret. Not even the monks meditating on a mountain somewhere. We all have ideas and hopes and stories, but we don’t have certainty.”
I glanced at Liv’s face in the rearview mirror. She was frowning at Dove.
We pulled onto the off-ramp as Dove followed the softly spoken instructions.
“Was that a pep talk?” Liv asked. “’Cause it was horrible and not at all comforting.”