Before You Break

Regrets. So that’s what this was about. He felt remorse over something he’d said to him before he died. Maybe they had a fight. Or maybe he lamented not saying something to him.

“How . . . how did he die?”

And now his face contorted into something grief-stricken. It made my heart slam into my throat. “In a car accident.”

“Oh,” I said, and suddenly things began rearranging themselves in my head. Bells and whistles were going off. But still I didn’t know what it was that I was supposed to be remembering.

“Was he . . . was he alone?”

He shook his head violently and his eyes looked red and tortured. “We, um . . . we were at a party together. I was the designated driver.”

My stomach seized up as I tried to recall where I might have heard this story before.

The next part flew out of his mouth in a jumble of words and breaths and unease. “I drove Sebastian and his girlfriend, Amber, home. She was in the front seat and he was in the back, passed out. We sideswiped a truck, and Sebastian . . . He died instantly.”

And all of a sudden the sound whooshed out of the room. I couldn’t hear or see anything, only the memory washing through me like a déjà vu—this same conversation played out a couple weeks back on a hotline call. The exact story that haunted me, the identical voice that left me unsettled—and it all fell into place in my mind.

That poignant, agonizing, emotional voice was now here in the same room. I sprang up and backed away, unsure if my brain was messing with me.

My lips were immobile and I wasn’t sure how my features had arranged themselves. All I could notice was Qui

He bounded off the couch and then backed away from me.

“Just forget it . . .” He sounded like he was talking through a tin can. Like his brain couldn’t get his lips to form the right words. “Fucking forget everything.”

And then he was out the door and gone. Just gone.

And still I stood there and stared at the wall, at the ceiling, out the window, and only one thought was ticking through my brain. Qui

Suddenly the sound rumbled back into the room—along with my breath—and I gasped and sputtered and almost puked right there on my floor.

“DANIEL IS QUINN!” I rushed for the door.

“Qui

I needed to find him. I needed to explain. He thought I was disgusted by him—just like he’d always feared. Fuck.

I ran back inside to slip on my shoes and grab my phone and purse. I had an hour before I needed to be at the hotline. I’d find him before then, apologize, and explain that I was in shock.

Maybe I could explain without having to disclose the confidentiality of the mental health facility I volunteered for. I might be in a world of trouble for nearly having sex with one of my hotline callers.

Wasn’t there some kind of client-patient rule against cavorting with each other? How in the hell was I supposed to know that he was Daniel? This was totally coincidental. Did something like this even happen in a million years?

The first place I ended up was the frat house. I hadn’t been there in weeks. I didn’t see Qui

Joel’s eyes practically bugged out of his head upon seeing me. “Ella, what are you doing here?” I must have looked like a wreck, a tangle, a maze of emotions. Because that’s how it felt in my head and in my chest. And most of all, in my heart.

“Is . . . has . . . has Qui

“Qui

I ignored Joel and looked at Brian instead. “Has he?”

“I asked you a question, Ella,” Joel said, pushing the blond out of his lap.

“No, I asked you first,” I practically snarled. “So answer my fucking question.”

He stood up. “Are you screwing Qui

“Fuck you, Joel,” I said, and some of the guys whistled. Exasperated, I turned to dash out the door, figuring I wouldn’t get anywhere, anyway. But then I swung back around and faced Joel again.

“No, you know what?” I said, finally able to fit my jumbled thoughts together. “I wish I had been screwing Qui

He barked out a laugh. “You want to screw Qui

“See, that’s where you’re wrong,” I said, gripping my fingers into a fist. “He’s more man than you’ll ever be, Joel.”

I angled back my arm, wanting to take my anguish out on someone. Joel would have been the perfect candidate. I wanted to punch the astonished look off his face.

Jimmy came bounding around his seat to hold me back. “I should probably grab him and let you take a good shot, but you’d do more damage to your hand than his face.”

“He hasn’t been here, Ella,” Brian said now, in a soothing voice. “We haven’t seen him since he went home for a couple of days.”

“Thanks,” I sagged against Jimmy’s arms. “If you do, please tell him I’m looking for him and . . . and I’m sorry.”

I jumped back in my car and drove past Zach’s Bar, the pizza place Qui

I pulled into the parking lot of a drugstore and tried one last time.

Me: Please let me explain.

And then the only thing left to do was to head to work. I wasn’t sure how I’d make it through the next three hours, but I didn’t know what else to do. I sat at my desk wondering how in the hell I had even driven here—my mind was a patchwork of conversations between Daniel and me.

How he’d sounded when he’d cried—like an injured animal. How the last time we’d spoken he seemed hopeful.

Had that optimism come from meeting me or was I being too presumptuous? To think my very presence would do the trick when his problems were so ingrained. I had known better than that. Psychology 101.

I’d told Qui

My mind drifted to the pictures in Qui

And Amber. She’d been the girl in the parking lot at Zach’s. And he wanted her, felt something for her. No wonder they’d seemed to have such a bond as they held each other. They’d experienced something so tragic, so life-altering, together.

Now my brain was reeling. Spi

When my supervisor checked in tonight, I needed to tell him that I’d inadvertently befriended one of my callers. More than befriended. I had fallen for Daniel. For Qui

Was Daniel his first name? Daniel Qui