Away We Go by Emil Ostrovski

things would be worth the cancer even if I was outside the walls, if no one was going to come and take me away.
    She unbuttons her gown. Takes my shirt off. Next my pants. My underwear. She pushes me down, onto the bed, her palms cold against my skin. I feel her lips, her hot breath, on my stomach, my belly button, my groin. . .
    â€œClose your eyes,” she says.
    â€œYou’re sure? You don’t usually—”
    â€œPlease close your eyes.”
    I close my eyes and moan quietly. I don’t want her to stop, but I force myself to say, “Are you—” I leave the thought hanging. When she doesn’t answer, I don’t ask again.
    When she’s done, I do her. Then I roll out of the bed and say, “Don’t move a goddamn inch.”
    She moves her toe a goddamn inch, her eyes twinkling mischievously.
    Downstairs I make blueberry pancakes, because Alice and her grandma would eat them on summer evenings, out on the porch. Grandma would sprinkle sugar on top. It would go dark and her grandma would teach her the constellations, Big Dippers and Little Dippers. Her grandma writes sometimes, and Alice writes back, of course she does; they reminisce about celestial silverware.
    I kick open the door to Alice’s room, struggling with the tray of food. Pancakes, jam, scrambled eggs, two glasses of milk. Three steps into the room I catch my foot on a pair of Alice’sshoes and everything that comes up must go down. I want to jest, to make light of the situation.
    Instead, I begin to cry. She made these sucking noises, and I let her make them, the girl whose grandma taught her the constellations, the same constellations I told her I was uninterested in, and there is the lingering taste of her in my mouth. I tasted Alex, once. He tasted better—like salty-sweet potato chips. The truth is I didn’t like returning the favor for Alice; the truth is it made my neck hurt.
    She hugs me, I get a whiff of her strawberry shampoo, and I feel nauseous. She must’ve taken a shower while I was preparing this— mess.
    â€œWhy did you—” I hesitate, can’t get the words out. I look at Alice—Alice, who believes, who read an article on AwayWeGo about Coca Cola’s alleged anti-union activities in Latin America and now wants to kick it off campus, she wants to save Latin American union workers, and she wants to save me, too, to have me counseled into happiness. I taste vomit in the back of my throat as we clean up the floor together.
    â€œNoah?” she asks as I throw a wet paper towel in the trash and head for the door to grab another roll.
    â€œIf I’d known this would happen, I’d have made sandwiches,” I say, wiping at my eye with my arm.
    â€œYou still can,” she says, missing my joke. “When we do our picnic. If you can suspend your nothing-matters-everything-is-futile—”
    â€œA tall order,” I say, to humor her.
    â€œâ€”you might actually have fun! I promise you will.”
    I’m waiting for her to tell me that talking to someone about my feelings would help. To tell me that crying over a spilled breakfast is. Not. Normal.
    â€œLove you,” is what she says. Her eyes flick away from my face.
    â€œLove you, too,” I mumble back, and my heart cramps up. Good liars have stone hearts. I don’t have a stone heart, but that doesn’t make me a good person.
    It does, however, make me a bad liar.
    â€œNoah,” she says, her voice hesitant. “It’s coming up, isn’t it? It’s very soon now?”
    She means my birthday.
    â€œYes,” I admit. “Soon.”

    I can still drink Pepsi though right?
    In light of Coca Cola’s history of human rights violations, we, the undersigned, are resolved to demand an immediate end to Westing’s affiliation with Coca Cola. It is our duty, as citizens of a global community, to act in a manner that is commensurate with the