Hurt: A Novel (Solitary Tales Series) by Travis Thrasher

say.
    “You were in summer school, right? The session with the hottie?”
    “I think her name was Lily, not hottie.”
    He already looks bored and ready to go back to doing the nothing he was doing when I came in.
    “Look, Buck ley —you better get on this college thing.”
    “I always figured I’d go somewhere in Illinois.”
    “You gotta apply to those too.”
    “Yeah, okay.”
    “What’s your grand plan for life?”
    I want to live past graduation day and Memorial Day and then get far away from here.
    “I don’t know. Maybe be in a band.”
    “Play any instruments? Sing?”
    I shake my head.
    “Maybe you want to start there,” he tells me in a deadpan way.
    I kinda got other things going on.
    “Get on one of those tests, and pick out some schools. Hey—junior colleges aren’t bad. I went to one.”
    I feign a smile and nod.
    I leave his office feeling inspired to take on the world.

16. Friday Night
    My date with Kelsey is going to have to wait until tomorrow since she’s doing something with her parents at their church. I’m not sure what kind of thing people do at church on a Friday night, but I didn’t ask. Asking might mean she’d invite me, and I just—I’m not ready for that.
    Not just yet.
    I feel tired and restless and bored and anxious in this empty cabin.
    For some reason, I’m thinking about my age.
    Seventeen is not thirteen, but it sure isn’t twenty-seven. It is almost. It is not quite there. It is about time and anxious to move on and does anyone care?
    It’s big and tall but not enough to be legal or official.
    Seventeen is so close but not just yet.
    Not just yet.
    I listen to music on my headphones and scan the Internet, trying not to think of my age. Trying not to think of my fate. Trying not to think, but letting others think for me. To talk for me. To show for me. To act out for me.
    I’ve got a million choices at my fingertips, and it feels good.
    My room feels cold, but I turn up the volume on my headset, and the cold seems to stay away.
    My room feels lonely, but I scan YouTube and find something to make me feel surrounded and funny.
    Maybe others watch, but I don’t care. I don’t feel special, and I don’t feel like trying. Not tonight.
    The empty downstairs doesn’t echo when I’m listening to stuff I’ve downloaded for free. I’m watching strangers doing strange things. The world is strange, and I’m only seventeen, wondering if it’s going to get stranger. How could it? How could it ever?
    The beats bounce, and I try to keep up because if I do I won’t think of everything else.
    They’ll be distant memories if the volume gets turned up loud enough.
    They’ll be forgotten until tomorrow morning when the cold rips the blanket off of me and laughs.
    I can’t see God being happy with all of us. Not just me and not just this town, but everything and everyone. Doing their own thing in their own way.
    The news talks about all the messes in our country and everywhere else, and it makes me think that God finally said, “Do it your own way.”
    I tried and I failed. Miserably.
    But I don’t feel like reading the Bible. I feel like listening to music.
    I don’t feel like praying. I feel like posting something online.
    Could it really be that strong, the wind blowing against this cabin, rattling the walls and the floor?
    Is it trying to tell me something?
    I look at the sleeping figure of my dog and wish I could trade places. Sometimes.
    The peaceful sleep she seems to have.
    I’d love a little of that.
    I’d love a little peace.
    But the beats go on, and I close my eyes and I see Jocelyn avoiding me and Lily teasing me and Poe angry at me and Kelsey blushing around me.
    Will the songs always remind me, and if so, will I ever be able to change the tracks?
    Maybe I need a new genre, a new playlist.
    I don’t need the synths anymore. I need an … an accordion. Yes, an accordion. An accordion won’t remind me.
    But I listen to the drum machines and the