Page 117 of Never Forget
"Were you planning to go to college with Amber?"
"No."
"Then where did the acceptance letter come from?"
He shook his head.
"Amber and her father filed the application. Without asking me. I'd already said no—more than once, over months. They did it anyway. That's one of the reasons I broke up with her. She doesn't hear the word no when it's inconvenient for her."
I nodded slowly.
"And the key?"
He scratched the back of his head. The gesture I'd seen a hundred times when he didn't know where to start.
"The key is where I really messed up."
He took a breath. He was already trying to hold himself together before the first sentence.
"I'd been trying to break up with her for months. She kept finding reasons for me to stay." He took a breath. "I'd said no to her functions before. Once I told her I couldn't come to one of her mother's things and she showed up at my apartment with a suit in her hand. That's how she was. That's how she is. You didn't tell Amber no. You just told her something she was going to work around."
I waited.
"Her mother's party. She'd been pushing me to come for weeks. I knew if I said no straight out, she'd just show up. So I asked Jack to cover for me. I went to the party because I was going to end it that night. I wanted it to be over."
His voice was getting thinner.
"I was there. I was about to pull her aside. And then the hospital called."
He stopped.
"Jack had gone back in for that little girl. He was already in intensive care by the time I left the party. I never told Amber anything that night. I went straight to the hospital."
His eyes closed.
"And then Jack was gone. I wasn't thinking about Amber. When I finally broke up with her, the key wasn't on my mind at all."
He opened his eyes. They were wet.
"I know how it looks, Jamie. I know. But that's what happened."
I couldn't move.
"So why didn't you tell me about Jack?"
He looked at me.
He opened his mouth. Closed it. I watched him try.
"I'm sorry, Jamie. I really am."
"Sam."
"I just couldn't live with myself. I knew I had to tell you. I just—I didn't know how. Because I still?—"
His voice broke mid-sentence, the way it did when it had been held together too long with nothing behind it.
"Because I still blame myself. For all of it."
