After Forever by Jasinda Wilder Page A

in physical therapy several times a week, which Eden drove me to as well. She encouraged me when I wanted to quit, which was all the time. Never complained at my snappy attitude and ingratitude.  
    She’d infiltrated every aspect of my life, and I was confused by it, scared of it. I took to silence as a coping mechanism, responding only when spoken to, keeping my distance and my own counsel.  
    At the moment, I was sitting in her car, a two-year-old VW Passat. I was sweaty, stinking, hungry, and irritated. My thoughts were raging out of control, haywire. I thought of Ever, missing her, hating missing her, hating feeling like she was slipping away from me. I hated being so dependent on Eden, hated that I had to see her every day and fight how much she reminded me of Ever and yet how clearly she was her own person, so distinct and so unique that I couldn’t deny having noticed it, having seen it every day for so many weeks.
    Finally, as she parked the car in the guest spot of my condo complex, she sighed deeply and shut off the music, turned to face me. “You’re not doing well,” she said. “Emotionally, I mean.” I shrugged, kept my gaze directed out the window. She grabbed my arm and turned me. “Damn it, Cade, talk to me.”
    “Why?” I snarled. “Say what? How am I supposed to be doing?”
    “Well, tell me what’s—god, I mean, I know what’s wrong.” She rubbed at her face. “I can’t help you if you won’t talk to me.”
    “Maybe there is no way to help me. I miss her, Eden. I—she’s slipping away from me. I don’t remember the sound of her voice. I don’t—I don’t remember anything. I can’t—I can’t feel her anymore.”
    Eden was silent. There wasn’t anything to say.  
    “She’ll come back.” It wasn’t even a whisper from Eden. “She has to.”
    “What if—what if she doesn’t?”
    “Don’t say that!” Eden yelled, her voice an angry shriek. “She will ! You have to believe. You have to try , Cade! You have to talk to her. You have to—to remind her what’s here.”
    I heard those last words for hours after she left. Remind her what’s here.  
    The next day, when Eden picked me up, I had a shoebox under my arm. Blue, with a red and white Union Jack. A Reeboks box. It was heavy, stuffed full. Eden glanced at it but didn’t ask what was in it. Maybe she knew. She took it from me so I could crutch my way to the car. My right arm was healing enough to let me use crutches, but that was about it. My fine motor skills were basically nil, enough to let me open and close my hand, but not enough to hold a pencil yet.
    At the hospital, Eden sat in the corner, and I didn’t ask her to leave when I opened the top of the shoebox, revealing dozens and dozens of letters, sheaves of them bound together by rubber bands, a month’s worth of envelopes together in each rubber band. I pulled out the bundle at the back of the box, set the box down, and unwound the rubber band. I found the first letter Ever had sent me. Her handwriting…god, it was so huge and loopy and girly.  
    I pulled the letter out, cleared my throat. “‘Dear Caden,’” I read. “‘How are you? I’m excited to be your pen pal. I’ve never had a pen pal before. I don’t think I’ve written a letter to anyone before, actually. Not unless you count letters to Santa when I was in kindergarten. What should we write to each other about? Would you be interested if I told you about the painting I’m doing?’” I stopped, blinked hard. I could hear her voice. I heard a sniffle and knew Eden did, too.  
    I read the whole letter. The next one. And then I came to the letter in which she first referenced Eden. I stopped, lowered the letter, and made myself look at Eden. “I, um—she talks about you. In a lot of these letters. It might be—I don’t know. It might be weird. It’s—”
    “Is she, like, making fun of me?” Eden asked.
    I shrugged. “No. Not making fun of you, but it’s