Accidentally on Purpose

Chapter Forty-Eight

The words weren't processed into my head. I heard it, but my brain refused to acknowledge the fact that I heard it, so I just stared at Jonah in confusion as his face twisted into a kind of expression I had never once witnessed on his face.

There were tears falling down his face, and I struggled to understand why—until he repeated what he had just said in a much, much weaker voice.

"I was in the other car," he said—or blubbering, more accurately. "I've been thinking—trying to remember. I was driving and I saw—I saw your car, I saw it, I know now that it was yours, the timeline matched up and I—" his voice caught and a strange sound came from the back of his throat. It was like he was trying to gasp for air and throw up at the same time. 

I felt like the world beneath me was crumbling. If I hadn't been sitting down on my bed, I would've fallen to the floor along with my heart. "What the fuck are you talking about?" I whispered in a scared, timid voice.

Jonah's hands were shaking as they tried to pull his hair out of his head. The sight pained me, but I was too busy trying to make sense of the words that came out of his mouth and I felt like pulling out my own hair.

He started to recite, the words coming out of him like they were being pulled by strings. Like he had no control of any of it. Like he was narrating a story that he'd memorized over and over again. He wouldn't meet my eye. "Twenty-fifth of November. We just moved here for less a month—I was mad like I had always been each time this had happened. My parents and my sister went out for Thanksgiving dinner because the house was still a mess and so many things were still packed in cardboard boxes. I skipped it, and they let me because there was nothing they could do to drag me out of my room.

"I stole my dad's car. My old neighbor used to give me lessons. Just driving up and down the street, never too far away, and he was always in the car with me. He knew it'd be a while before I could get my learner's permit but he said he wanted to prepare me for it. But that night I bailed family dinner and stole my dad's fucking car and I drove around like a mad man—I barely even know how to drive one without Mr. Denning guiding me and yet I sat on the driver's seat and had my hands on the wheels—"

"No." I covered my ears with the palms of my hands, trying to block out the words that just wouldn't stop coming out of his mouth as everything slowly registered in my brain. He was crying and I was crying and I didn't want to listen to any more of it. "No. No, stop it. Stop talking, Jonah, please—"

But he continued on as if he didn't hear me. As if he couldn't stop the words from coming out of his mouth. "I was out of my mind. I didn't know what I was doing. I was angry and I just wanted to make my parents mad. They never got mad at me, even though I kept acting up whenever my mom's job made us move places. I knew sneaking out would make them mad," he kept going and going as I rocked back and forth on the bed with my ears covered with my hands. But I still could hear his voice loud and clear. "I was so high on the thrill of being on the wheels without anybody else keeping their eyes on me. I kept driving, and it was so late at night. My parents were probably already looking for me, but I didn't care. I don't even remember what happened but I remember seeing the car—your car, I know now. I remember hearing a crash and I think you screamed and sometimes I still could hear it when I close my eyes trying to sleep at night, but I didn't remember anything else because I ran... I ran... I drove away and didn't look back..."

"Please, Jonah. Stop talking!" I cried. "Please shut up."

The sound of my own cries finally drowned out his voice. He was talking, he was sobbing, he was pulling his hair out, but all I could hear was the sound of the crash and all I could see was the blinding light before it all went into complete darkness.