“Okay, Ultra, almost home,” says Josh. He, the slowest driver in the universe, actually accelerates.

Warp speed, please. I just want to be home.

The blanket mummifies my body, yet I continue frying from the outside in. Every year at the Washington State Fair, I have always wondered about the appeal of deep-fried Twinkies. There is none.

Josh swerves into my driveway like a stunt driver. Before he can dash around the truck, I’ve shoved the blanket off and pushed the passenger door open. That alone winds me. The walk to the front door might as well be an ultramarathon in the desert. Dad rushes out of the house to me. I can tell he wants to shove Josh away, all hands off my girl.

I tell him, “Dad, I’m not that sick.”

Even I hear the betraying “that”—the caveat, the concession, the conclusion.

It takes every bit of my focus to walk up the stairs to the threshold, shaking my head for all offers of help. Even with the UV filters shading the windows, I can feel the sun scraping along my skin.

“Bedroom,” I gasp, and that startles an “oh, honey” out of Dad.

Not soon enough, I’m in the dark, blissful dark. My eyelids shutter the moment I lie on my bed, body aching as if I’ve swum the entire stretch of the galaxy to reach this safe cave. The door closes gently, and I am glad to be left in the dark, even when the cross-examination begins in the hall: “Where did you take her? What do you know about the video?” And then the death knell for any possible future relationship: “Don’t you know that she’s sick?”