Sara Shepard - Seven Minutes in Heaven

“More for us,” Madeline said brightly. “We’ll bring you back some rum.”

Emma laughed. Suddenly, the sun on her face and the December breeze playing against her bare legs felt almost heavenly.

I watched my friends comforting each other, their eyes shining with tears, their smiles tentative in the winter sun. I knew how much they’d miss me—that they’d all carry that sorrow for a long time, deep in their hearts. But they would be all right. They would live, and thrive, and remember me with love, and eventually, they would let go of me, the way the living always had to let go of the dead.

Then I saw something that wrenched my heart in my chest.

Thayer, hands in his pockets, lingered off to the side. Alone. And watching Emma.

Thayer stood slightly apart from the crowd, leaning against the low white wall that surrounded the church’s property. He’d come in a perfectly tailored Burberry sport coat and slacks, no tie. His dark hair fell down over one eye, and his hands were shoved deep in his pockets. When he saw Emma approach, he raised his hand a little.

“Hey,” he said.

“Hey,” she replied. Silence drifted down between them. She watched Garrett join Celeste and Louisa, wiping tears from his eyes. Grandma Mercer had stepped down from the church, Mr. Mercer at her arm. Laurel walked swiftly to her side and took her other arm, murmuring in her ear.

A few feet from Emma and Thayer, a pair of mourning doves perched together in a cactus. They cooed softly at each other, back and forth, like they were deep in conversation.

“How is it the thorns don’t hurt them?” Thayer asked abruptly.

Emma cocked her head questioningly. He nodded at the birds.

“I guess because they’re so light,” Emma said. She swallowed, trying to push down the lump in her throat. “Thayer, I am so, so sorry.”

Slowly he drew his gaze toward her. His hazel eyes were pained but clear. “I’m not mad at you, Emma.” He gazed down into her face for a long moment, then looked quickly away. “It’s just . . . You look just like her. Even knowing everything, there’s a part of me that wants to kiss you.”

“But it’d be all wrong,” Emma said. She smiled sadly. “I’m not Sutton. I wasn’t even a very good stand-in.”

He laughed softly, one cheek’s perfect dimple revealing itself. “Don’t sell yourself short. You’re not her. But you’re pretty amazing.”

He drew his wallet out of his back pocket and pulled out a folded piece of computer paper. As soon as I saw it, I knew what it was. A tendril of electricity connected me to that letter.

“The cops gave me this,” he said, staring down at the note. “They found it on her phone. I guess Ethan must have tried to delete it, but their forensics guy retrieved it from the SD card. She wrote it, that night in the canyon, and saved it as a draft in our secret e-mail account. I think—I think she wouldn’t mind if you read it.”

Emma’s throat felt constricted as she took the note in her hands. Carefully, she unfolded it.

Dear Thayer,

I am still processing everything that’s happened to me tonight. I feel like my entire world has been turned upside down. But all this uncertainty has made one thing clear: I love you. I love you so crazy much, Thayer, and I want to be with you.

I know I’ve done a lot to hurt you. I don’t want it to be that way anymore. Wherever you’ve been, I don’t care. I’m not mad. You can tell me when you’re ready to—but it won’t make any difference to me. You’re the only one for me. I know this kind of love comes along once in a lifetime. I’m not going to let it go.

Yours forever,

Sutton

Tears welled up in Emma’s eyes. She wiped one away quickly before it could fall and stain the note. She looked up to see Thayer, a haunted, aching look in his hazel eyes.

“All those weeks when she suddenly wasn’t e-mailing me anymore, I was so confused,” he said, his voice breaking. “I thought we were over. I thought that the things I said to her that night in the canyon had made her hate me. And all that time, she was . . . gone.”

“Not gone,” I murmured. “I’m still here. Still missing you so much.”

“You couldn’t have known,” Emma said. “Ethan covered his tracks too well.”

“Ethan.” Thayer’s face darkened. “I owe that guy a few times over.”

“Well, he’s getting what he deserves.” Emma’s voice was steady, but even as she spoke she felt the cold that crept up around her heart every time she thought of him. Thayer blinked away his scowl, looking at her with concern.

“Are you okay?” he asked, leaning slightly toward her. She suddenly remembered that night at Char’s party, when Thayer had asked her the same question.

Don’t I look okay? she had teased.

And Thayer had said, You look perfect, as always. I asked how you felt .

Thayer, always so perceptive. She sighed. He seemed to see right through her, just the way he’d always seen through Sutton.

“I keep telling everyone I’m okay. But the truth is, I’m not. I don’t know if I’ll ever be okay.” Her voice broke for a moment, and she paused. “I’m just glad it’s all over. Until now I was so scared I couldn’t really grieve for her.”

Thayer reached out and hugged her close.

“Thank you, for what you did for her,” he whispered.

“Thayer,” I whispered, close to his ear. For a moment I imagined I could feel the heat from his body, the softness of his skin. “I will always love you. But we both have to move on. I want you to be happy. I want you to live.”

Tears glistened in his eyes. He rested his head on Emma’s scalp. “Good-bye,” he whispered. Emma didn’t have to ask who he was talking to.

The next afternoon, Emma stood at the mirror of Sutton and Laurel’s shared bathroom with a tube of lip gloss in one hand, staring into her own marine-blue eyes. It was still surreal, to look in the mirror and see herself. She’d been someone else for so long. And after everything she’d been through, she wasn’t quite sure who her real self was anymore.

Earlier that morning they’d all gone to the farmers’ market to pick out a Christmas tree together. Now she could hear Mrs. Mercer and Grandma Mercer in the living room downstairs, rearranging the furniture to make room for the decorations. Overhead, Mr. Mercer and Laurel’s footsteps creaked in the attic as they retrieved boxes of ornaments. All day a gentle quiet had permeated the house—not an awkward silence but a peaceful one. It was the quiet of wounds starting to heal, of deep sadness that needed room to breathe.

Emma’s eyes darted to the picture postcard she’d slid into the corner of the mirror, alongside all the photos of Sutton’s friends and the concert tickets and the fashion magazine clippings her twin had hung there. The postcard had a photo of the Alamo at sunset, and said GREETINGS FROM SAN ANTONIO in a blocky font. On the back, a scratchy, untidy hand had scrawled only I’m doing okay. —B. It had arrived the day before, addressed to Mr. Mercer. He’d left it by Emma’s plate at the breakfast table.