Title: The Last Three Words
Genre: Young Adult
Release date: November 15th 2013
Publisher: Evernight Teen
Blurb:
Seventeen-year-old Christian Marx never belonged anywhere
but with his best friend Maye. Life with her beats the hell out of the dingy
apartment he shares with his neglectful mother. Mom may be blood, but Maye and
her little sister Rowe are family. Life would be perfect if only Maye loved him
the way he loved her.
Last night, she did. Today, she's dead—a tragic accident no
one could have predicted.
With Maye gone, it's up to those she left behind to figure
out how to move on. Only one person can drag Christian away from the ledge.
Only one person can save Maye's little sister from making a huge mistake.
Sometimes the only way to un-break yourself is to fix
someone else.
Ashley is a thirty-something perpetual teenager. She
(slowly) writes young adult fiction that pulls no punches and rarely conforms
to the unspoken rules. Home is upstate South Carolina, where Ashley lives with
her daughter, working for a living and striving to better herself and her
craft.
Author Links:
http://www.ashleyheckman.com
Goodreads link: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18718865-the-last-three-words?from_search=true
“Yeah, 387 Greer Highway,” my voice was flat over the sound
of sobbing, begging, in the background. “Overdose…barely…bourbon and something
prescription, I’m not sure.”
The dispatcher pledged to stay on the line until the
ambulance arrived, but I abandoned her first, setting the receiver on the
kitchen counter and grabbing the car keys before walking out the front door,
unnoticed. What was one more unforgivable act? Besides, I'd done my part. The
rest would have to be on the two of them. I stood in the driveway looking back
at for a few moments at this place that used to feel like home, and continued
on my way to anywhere but here.
I don’t remember the three point turn, or creeping under the
canopy of trees that shaded the long gravel drive from the house to the road.
Time was lost and instinct took over steering, the gas pedal, and the brake,
though I had no need for it. There was no traffic this time of night, when
morning hung only a couple of hours over the horizon. I just drove, the lazy
speed of the car moving through the dark echoing the numbness I’d succumbed to
after struggling against it for so long. It felt almost nice.
I watched, lost in thought, as the darkened houses and
pastures passed. I'd considered the existence of fate many times in my life,
but only for the past few weeks with any real seriousness. The mistakes made
tonight were no accident, no coincidence. Had any of it ever been?
Without realizing, I pulled the car off to the shoulder and
into the grass, at that place on Greer Highway that had haunted me for what
seemed like a lifetime. It felt like another life, when we’d been happy. I
stared out the windshield, willing myself to see something real, something to
anchor me in reality, but there was nothing.
I needed to feel it, this road I'd been avoiding in the
weeks since. To touch it, know if there was anything left there. It felt like
the natural place to make peace with all that had happened, apologize. There
had been a purpose to all of it. Maybe she could forgive me. But would I ever
forgive myself?
Thank you for having me :)
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