Momentum

Epitaph.

The guest bedroom is a little cramped. Alex explains that it used to be Mr. O'Hara's at-home office, but it was converted into a guest bedroom after he retired last year. The queen size bed takes up about a quarter of the room, and right next to it, there's a small dresser with a lamp and picture of the O'Hara family on top of it. I take a closer look at the picture and smile at how cute Kelly and her siblings look. The family stands in front of the ocean, with Kelly, who looks no older than five, resting on her father's shoulders. Her older sister, Erin, is holding up their baby brother, Jerry, in a way that resembles Rafiki holding up Simba in the opening scene of The Lion King. Mrs. O'Hara stands behind them, her mouth open as she laughs at the childish behavior of her daughter.

"Kelly was pretty cute when she was little," says Alex, looking over my shoulder. "Wonder what happened."

I shake my head, smiling lightly. "No idea."

Once we're both in bed, Alex turns off the lamp on the desk beside the bed, and everything around me is reduced to obscure black masses. I turn on my side, and as my eyes adjust to the darkness, Alex's face staring back at me comes into focus. The corner of her mouth turns slightly upwards, and I feel my mouth do the same.

"Hey, Tobs."

"Hey, Lex," I exhale, the tension in my body dissipating. "I'm gonna miss this."

She adjusts herself under the covers, moving slightly closer to me. "What do you mean?"

"Having sleepovers like this," I clarify. "When we're all in college next year."

"We can still have sleepovers like this in the summer," she says. "Or when we're home for Christmas and spring break."

I shrug. "It'll be different. We'll be different."

"We'll still be us, Tobin. Yeah, we'll be a little older and a little smarter, but I'll still be me. You'll still be you. Christen will still be Christen, and Kelly will still be Kelly."

"What if we outgrow each other?" I say quietly, feeling just a little bit too vulnerable, even though Alex is the only person here to listen to me. "What if we change too much?"

She shakes her head. "I don't think we could change that much, Tobin. I can't see myself ever outgrowing you. You're like my third kidney, at this point."

"People have a kidney removed all the time." I point out, half-joking.

"Not willingly," she says. "Nobody ever wants to have one removed."

"But it still happens," I state. "They don't get a say in whether or not they get to keep it, not really. Because of course they want to keep it; it's been a part of them for so long. But as soon as it starts breaking down, as soon as keeping it starts hurting them more than helping them - getting rid of it becomes the only option. No matter what the person wants, there isn't a choice to be made anymore."

"There is," says Alex, the vitality slowly ebbing from her expression. "They could still choose to keep it. It definitely wouldn't be easy, and they would probably be in pain all the time, but they could still choose to, if it's what they really want."

"To self-destruct?" I ask, and Alex nods. "Not even a kidney is worth doing that much damage to yourself. You would hate it, eventually. Hate that you feel a need to keep it. Hate yourself. Hate everything."

She stares at me, a kind of sadness infiltrating her eyes. "I'm never going to hate you, Tobin."

"This past week scared me," I admit. "There was a point where I thought you did."

She shakes her head. "Not even for a second."

I smile lightly, closing my eyes. "Good."

"Tobin?"