The-Lucky-List-Rachael-Lippincott

hers so and cool against my warm skin. She helps pull me up, and suddenly the entire world is far
below us.
I instantly feel like I’m going to vomit.
I know, instinctually, that it’s beautiful. e blue of the lake, the sun high in the sky, the trees going
for miles. Despite all of that, though, I feel super dizzy. I’m nowhere near the edge, but I feel like I’m
teetering on it. It has to be a good twenty feet to the water below.
“Oh my God,” I groan, clutching Blake’s arm to steady myself, any attempt at remaining cool and
collected in front of her suddenly being tossed out the window. “is was a terrible, terrible idea.
Like… so stupid.”
“It’ll be fine,” she assures me, her voice confident but not dismissive. “What’s the worst thing that
can happen?”
“Death,” I say without even a second thought. “Either from impact, or from some stick down there
we can’t see stabbing through my chest, or from having a heart attack before I even jump or, or…
whatever! Blake, my dad only knows how to cook pasta! And eggs! He’s done for without me!”
Blake grabs ahold of both my shoulders and leans forward, her face inches from mine. “Emily. You
can do this.” She looks deep into my eyes, and I’ve never been this close to her before. Close enough to
see the tiny freckle on her chin, the almost golden rays encircling her pupils, the cupid’s bow of her top
lip. For a moment the fear completely disappears, replaced with a heart-hammering feeling, and I have
to look away to escape from it. “You can’t obsess over the risks and the what-ifs, or else you won’t do
anything. You’ll spend your life five spaces short of a bingo.”
I freeze, frowning, my head swinging back around to look at her. “You had me until that last bit.
Five spaces short of a bingo? What does that even mean?”
“I don’t know,” Blake says. “I was going for something like ‘if you don’t even play the game, you can
never win.’ You know?”
I bite my lip, processing. I do know. A bit too well.
She nods toward the edge of the cliff. “Do you want me to go first? Double-check for stray sticks?”
I give her a weak smile, nodding, but then I instantly want to take it back. I don’t want to be alone
up here. “Well, that would be—”
But without even thinking twice or hearing the rest of my sentence, she lets go of my shoulders,
turns, and launches herself off the cliff at a full sprint like an actual maniac.
I take a step back, clinging to the rock behind me as I watch her soar through the air, her arms
pulling together in perfect dive form, her body falling for one, two, three—too many seconds. Until
finally, her whole body disappears into the water.
I watch, holding my breath, waiting for her to reappear, but every second feels like an eternity, my
worst fears swimming around my head.
No, no, no.
Did her neck break on impact? Did she crack her skull on something? How many bones did she
break?
… And then she surfaces, her head finally popping up in between the white foam that formed as she
made impact, the both of us taking a deep breath. “No sticks! I didn’t even touch the bottom.”
“Oh! Great!” I peer down at her, and the world tilts again. e distance seems even more enormous