The Secret of Ella and Micha

inside my head and what I’m hoping is that tonight’s will block out the sound of my dad’s voice.
    Ella bailed on me when we got back to our houses, muttering something about finding her father. I offered to go with her, but she declined and took Lila instead. I let her be because I sensed she needed space. I was fine with her taking some time as long as it wasn’t the space of five hundred miles.
    Ethan and I take a break from working on the car to plan the party. After a massive amount of text messages are sent out and a couple of keggers ordered by Ethan, we’re good to go.
    We’re hanging around in the kitchen, waiting for people to start showing up when clouds start rolling in and thunder rattles at the windows.
    “Can I ask you something?” Ethan asks abruptly.
    I take out a frozen burrito from the freezer and drop it on a plate. “Sure. What’s up?”
    “Don’t take this the wrong way.” He tips back in his chair. “But what is it with Ella? Why are you so fixated on her? You have like a ton of girls falling at your feet all the time and you used to totally be all into it. Then suddenly you weren’t and it was all about her.”
    “I wasn’t ever into the girls falling at my feet. I was just bored.” I pop the plate into the microwave and press start.
    He grabs a handful of chips from a bag on the table. “Okay, but that still doesn’t answer my question.”
    I cross my arms, uncomfortable with the awkward heart-to-heart moment. “I’m not sure, but why do you care?”
    “I’m just curious because you’ve never talked about it.”
    “Yeah, but we don’t talk about a lot of stuff.”
    He lets the chair legs reconnect to the floor. “Look, I’m not asking you to open up and spill your feelings out to me, so quit being weird. I just want to understand because I’ve known both of you practically forever.”
    The microwave beeps and I turn to it. “It was the night of the snowboarding incident. That’s when I realized things were different.”
    “When she broke her arm?” he asks. “And you had to take her to the hospital.”
    I nod. “You remember how she fell off the roof and then didn’t get up right away and certain people were yelling that she was dead.”
    “Hey, I was drunk,” Ethan gripes because he was the one yelling. “And she looked dead to me.”
    “Well, that’s when I knew.” I take the burrito out and set it on the counter. “Thinking she was dead was seriously the most terrifying thing that’s ever happened to me. More than the idea of my father never returning. More than my own death.”
    Ethan nods, trying to make sense of my babbling. “Okay…”
    I slam the microwave door shut and sit down at the table. “Hey, you asked.”
    He taps his phone on the table. “What do you think of Lila?”
    “She seems nice.” I get up and grab a soda from the fridge and then toss one to Ethan. “And she seems to be into you, I guess.”
    He taps the top of the can, and then flips the tab. “Yeah, but she barely knows me.”
    Sipping my soda, I sit back down. “Everyone barely knows you.”
    He shrugs, staring out the window. “I never really understood the point of that whole get-to-know-you thing.”
    The house phone rings and our conversation ends. I inhale the rest of the burrito as the answer machine beeps.
    “Um, hi... this message is for Micha.” It’s my father’s voice.
    I freeze, gripping the edge of the table.
    “Look, Terri, I understand that he’s pissed at me, but I need to talk to him. It’s important, okay? And he hung up on me yesterday morning… I thought maybe if you encouraged him to call me?” He sounds frazzled. “I don’t know… look, I’m sorry.” He hangs up.
    I release the table from my death grip, get up, and delete the message from the phone. When I turn around, Ethan is on his feet. The hole that I punched in the wall hasn’t been fixed and I think about hammering my fist through it again.
    “We should get our shit picked up before it rains,” Ethan says, staring at the sky through the window.
    I pop my knuckles and walk for the door. “Sounds like a plan.”

    Ella
    I find my dad at the bar. It’s the first place I look, but it’s disappointing that it was so easy. Lila waits for me in the car, because I ask her to. When I walk in, I spot him slumped over in a barstool with an empty cup in front of him. Denny, the bartender, is wiping down the counters with a rag. When he sees me in the entryway, he holds up