For Every Missing Shade

Entry 28

"Okay, for this last one there is no funny business. Only sheer speed," she said.

"I am going to be so happy when I get to sit on the couch as you make me some lunch."

"I believe I speak for all women since the beginning of time when I say that I will never let that happen."

"Alright, well put your money where your mouth is and let's do this thing."

"Okay, you get to count it down," she said.

"Alright. Five, four, three-"

"I have lingerie to show you if you let me win," she whispered into my ear.

My jaw dropped. "Wait what?"

"Your choice! Go!"

The race was neck and neck as we furthered down the slope. I yelled over to her, "Were you being serious?"

"I guess you'll have to lose and see!" she yelled back.

"How do I know whether or not to believe you?"

She turned to me and smiled. It was the same smile she gave me countless times before we did something we shouldn't. I pulled out my feet from under me and stopped my sled in the snow.

Emma 4, Israel 3.

I smiled at the thought of losing. It felt like I was the real winner.

I walked back up to the cabin with her trailing behind me. She caught up and practically jumped on my back.

"You know, if you lied about this I will actually just sleep in the car," I said.

"I've said it before and I'll say it again: I'm not telling you shit about what's going on during this trip."

We got into the cabin and I started making paninis with some lunch meat and cheese I found in the cooler. She left to go into the room to change out of her now-drenched clothes. I played music on my phone on low while I cooked, humming the lyrics and synchronizing my movements with the beat.

I set the sandwiches in the panini press and leaned against the counter to check social media. I lazily scrolled through pictures of people I didn't care about until I opened up Twitter. I never checked it, but I saw that over the past few months it had accrued some notifications.

I scrolled for only a couple of seconds before Emma's name started coming up. Turns out her retirement from school didn't go unnoticed. There were more than a couple of people wishing her good health and asking about what happened. They mentioned a username in all of their posts that, when clicked on, brought up a picture of Emma in middle school.

Her mouth was clad with enormous braces and her bright pink polo clashed with her lime green khakis. She had only two posts, one accusing a foster care sibling of stealing her brush, and another making an aptly timed post about our troops in Iraq.

I scrolled through her mentions and it was flooded with well-wishes from people she doesn't even know. Jessie Schulte from my fifth period pre-calculus class says her thoughts and prayers are with her, along with a dozen replies and a little over a hundred likes. A couple of people on the swim team remembered family members getting diagnosed in their post, followed by a pledge to stand with her and help with anything she needs. My personal favorite was an empathetic Dillon Reynolds, who recounted the death of his gerbil that was, judging by the length of his paragraph, still a very sore topic for him to discuss.

Those same people who were saying they'd do anything for her now didn't even care to know she existed before. They were completely estranged from her life until it happened to get them a like on Twitter or a new retweet record.