Prologue
If today was your last day, and you didn’t have a chance at tomorrow, how would you spend your last moments? How would you speak your last words? I ask Sam this now as he sits next to me on my long-forgotten bed. Actually, it’s more like how he would change his last moments and his last words. But before I tell you the end, I have to start with the beginning.
We were pressed together outside the little Java Makers, kissing passionately. Still holding me close to him, he slowly broke away and rested his forehead against mine.
“Good show tonight, huh, Em?” he asked, smiling softly. It was the last night of our senior year in high school and our band, Midnight Delirium, had just played a show at the Java Makers in our little town of Tracy, California to celebrate. The entire graduating class, quite a few juniors, and some sophomore and freshmen, plus the supporters of our band just there for a good time were crowded into the café. Vince, our drummer, was inside, probably trying to pick up chicks.
I giggled, playing with the ends of his hair. “I love you, you know that?” I murmured. Sam and I had been together since the eighth grade; we said this all the time and always meant it.
“I know,” he said, before I gave him The Look. “I love you too, Em.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a shadow move behind the building. I lifted my forehead off of Sam’s, startled. Maybe I was just imagining things; Sam hadn’t seemed to notice anything.
Something hit me hard in the back of the head and I fell to the ground in a heap. I could hear Sam calling my name. In my subconscious blindness, I heard a loud bang. Something warm and heavy, like a living ragdoll, fell against me and a hot, sticky liquid soaked through my shirt.
The last thing I heard before I was hit again was Sam whisper weakly, “I love you, Emerson Scott.”
Then everything went black.
