Crash

by Lisa McMann

  It would have been better if I hadn’t done that.

  It’s Sawyer’s mother. She takes one alarmed look at me, then hits the gas and pulls up to the back door of the restaurant.

  I bite my lip, not sure what to do. In a panic, I make a run for it, down the sidewalk into the neighborhood. “Shit!” I say when I’m far enough away. I keep running, turning the corner, around the block to my meatball truck. “Shit, shit, shit.” And then I’m speeding home as fast as I can so I can get back upstairs, get into my pajamas, and establish my alibi.

  Thoughts fly through my head. Did I leave any fingerprints anywhere? No, I was wearing gloves the whole time. But the meatball truck’s engine will be warm. The restraining order police will check that when they come after me, and they’ll know I’m lying. Should I just tell the truth? What’s my dad going to do? I park the truck and throw snow on the hood to make it look like it’s been sitting there all day, which I know is stupid, but I’m not thinking straight, and then I fly up the stairs, hoping, pleading, that there’s no one up there waiting to catch me.

  The apartment is empty.

  Just as I left it.

  I breathe a sigh of relief and hang up my winter things.

  Five minutes later, the phone rings.

  Twenty-Four

  I stare at the phone, and then make a mad dash to check the caller ID. It’s a cell number, no name. The area code is local. And I don’t know what to do. If it’s Mr. Angotti, I’ll die. But it’s probably a telemarketer. But what if it’s not? If it’s Mr. Angotti, I don’t want him to leave a message . . . or worse, try the restaurant line and get my dad.

  That decides it. I lunge for the phone and pick it up, forcing myself to control my voice.

  “Hello?” I say, like my mother would say.

  There is a momentary silence on the other end, and I think it must be a telemarketer after all.

  And then, in a puzzled voice, “Jules?”

  I die inside. “Yes?” I say, my voice filled with air, not just because of the exertion of lunging halfway across a room.

  “It’s Sawyer. Look, what the heck are you doing?”

  Now I’m silent. And guilty. But I’m going to fake it. “What are you talking about?”

  “My mother saw you.”

  “Saw me where?”

  “In the parking lot. Tonight. Come on.”

  I hesitate. “Dude, I’ve been home sick for two days.”

  “I know that. Doesn’t mean you weren’t out in our parking lot twenty minutes ago.”

  He knows that, he said. He noticed I was sick. I feel a surge of confidence bordering on recklessness. “You’re sounding a little paranoid, Sawyer. Why, exactly, would I be in your parking lot in the freezing cold when I’m sick?”

  “You tell me.”

  “This is an extremely weird conversation.”

  He pauses, and I think I hear a soft laugh. “Yeah. Pretty weird.” His voice goes back to normal. “So you really weren’t there?”

  I sigh. “Oh, Sawyer,” I say, and my voice sounds all throaty—almost sexy, which is, um, new for me. I blink at my reflection in the computer screen.

  Now he laughs sheepishly. “Okay, so my mom’s the paranoid one. Sorry about that.”

  “Where are you?”

  “Ahh,” he says, and I wonder if he’s not sure, or if he’s afraid to tell me. “I’m . . . out. For the moment.”

  “Don’t worry, I’m not going to stalk you. Look, since I’ve got you on the phone,” I say carefully, “I wonder if you’ve given any more thought to the little thing I told you last Sunday. You know, the thing where there’s going to be a crash, and I’m kind of trying to save your life, and you think I’m insane. Because, to be honest, I could really use your help.”

  “Jules, no,” he says, and I can hear a hint of annoyance in his voice. “I mean, yes, I thought about it, and no, I’m no longer thinking about it, and it’s really weird and creepy, and I was hoping you’d have moved past it too. And maybe we could pretend it didn’t happen.”

  I nod, phone plastered to my ear. “Yeah, that’s what I figured. Okay. Well.” Suddenly I get all choked up, because it’s all so newly real to me, and it’s so weirdly fake to him, and I can’t stop the emotion, because I’m just . . . mired in this. This thing is running my entire life, but it’s just a tiny blip in his. Until one day, bam! And then it’s over for him. None of this is fair in any way.

  But I’m determined not to let him die without me making a complete fool of myself in an effort to stop it. I close my eyes. “Well,” I say again, my voice quavering, “I just want you to know that whether you help me or not, that’s okay. I understand. And I’m still going to, ah”—my voice turns to gravel—“do whatever I can to . . .” I can’t say it.

  He’s silent, and I wonder if he hung up.

  I take a breath. “Are you still there?” I ask.

  “Yeah,” he says.

  “Oh.”

  There’s a pause.

  “Whatever you can to . . . what?” he says.

  “Um . . .” I close my eyes. And I figure he’s going to die, so why not? “Save you. Yeah.”

  “Jules,” he says again. “You’re nuts.”

  “Sawyer,” I reply, and now I’m pissed because he actually said it to my face, or to my ear or whatever. “I’m not nuts. I don’t know what I am, but I’m not nuts. I’m not normally weird, even though this particular episode in our lifelong soap opera seems that way. But I do—I—I do—I care about you. And I’m going to save your life, and you probably won’t even know it, or believe me afterward, either.” I take a breath. “But I can’t not do it. So I don’t care if your father puts out a restraining order on me, or your grandfather breaks my father’s heart after he already did my grandfather in, or whatever. You just do whatever you Angottis have to do to feel superior to the Demarcos until the end of time—that’s just, you know, fine with me, and that’s, like, capitalism and shit. But goddammit, Sawyer, despite all that, I’m going to save your fucking life anyway, because I love you, and one day you’d better fucking appreciate it.”

  I wait, shocked at myself.

  After a long pause, he says, “Wow.”

  “Yeah? So?”

  “So basically, what you’re saying is, my mother actually did see you in the parking lot tonight.”

  My eyes spring open, and before I can think, I yell, “Ugh! My God! You are such a jerk!” And I slam down the phone in disgust.

  Then I realize that slamming it didn’t actually hang it up, so I pick it up again and jab the off button really, really stinking hard, and bang the phone down into its cradle again.

  I stare at the desk, and all I can do is shake my head at myself. “You? Are bumblefucking nuts, Demarco.”

  • • •

  Five reasons why I, Jules Demarco, am nuts:

  1. I just screamed at the boy I love

  2. I just told the boy I love that I love him. Ugh.

  3. I pretty much admitted that I was lurking in his parking lot

  4. And tried to make his mother look paranoid

  5. Then there’s that vision thing

  You know, though, there’s something really energizing, or, no, that’s not even the right word—empowering, I suppose one of those Dr. Phil speaker types would say—about screaming at someone, and almost not caring what they think anymore. Because what’s happening here is so much bigger than all of that. After nine years of loving Sawyer Angotti, and worrying about everything I say and do in or near his presence or in the presence of anyone who knows him, and being mad and embarrassed at myself repeatedly for laughing too loud, or saying something that wasn’t good enough for his ears to hear, I feel pretty freaking awesome.

  Awesome enough to think about putting a big sign on my head that says, “Yeah, I love you. So the hell what?”

  Before I head to bed, I go back to the phone and grab Sawyer’s cell number from the caller ID, enter it into my cell phone contacts, and erase the
number from caller ID memory.

  Because I just might need it one day.

  Twenty-Five

  I catch the scenes on TV while waiting for Rowan to finish up in the bathroom. And they’re everywhere I go. I have to be careful driving now—all the road signs are stills of the explosion or of Sawyer’s face, so I either have to recognize the sign by shape or go by memory of where stop signs are, and remember what the speed limit is through residential areas. The trip from home to school is an easy one, but this could be a problem the next time I do deliveries.

  However, I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about road signs. I don’t even bother to look at Sawyer once I get to school, as much as it pains me. I don’t think all that much about what people might be saying about me behind my back, and to my own amazement, I care even less. All day at school my mind is occupied with details. What am I missing? How can I figure it out? Even brief thoughts of Rowan vid chatting with her boyfriend during second hour don’t sway my focus.

  And then, in the middle of fifth period, when I’m going over the details of last night’s visit to the parking lot, what I need to do hits me like a freight train.

  Between classes I text to Trey and Rowan: “Rowan, go home with Trey. Have to stop at library for stupid research paper.” I almost run over my former friend Roxie and her BFF Sarah, who are standing in the middle of the hallway as I type. My shoulder brushes Roxie’s armload of pink and red construction paper and sends it sliding across the floor in all directions.

  “Watch it, freak!” she says.

  I almost apologize. I almost help her pick it all up and let her call me a freak and just take it, take it, take it—that’s the Demarco way. But instead I look at her, and at Sarah, and back at Roxie again. “That’s insane freak,” I say. “Get it right.” And I keep walking.

  After school I high-five Trey and head out the door, right past Sawyer and his group of friends, including Roxie. He raises an eyebrow at me, and I shrug. Yeah, I love you. Yeah, I was in your stupid parking lot. So the hell what?

  That stomach flip is still there, big-time. But my sudden decision to be the insane freak at school makes me feel like a totally different person—like nobody can touch me, because I’m on my own.

  Oh yeah, baby. I’m on my own.

  • • •

  At the library I make a little wish as I head to the computers. I don’t know if this is going to work, but I’m going to try. I find a vacant station in the corner, away from others, and sit down. I pull up an entertainment website and click on the first TV video I see—some reality show called Skinny Wallets, Fat Love. It doesn’t matter what it is. The video loads a hundred times faster than it would at home, and I push play.

  “Nice,” I mutter as the all-too-familiar scenes play out. I maximize it and expertly hit pause at just the right place, the frame where we’re looking into Angotti’s dining room. I squint, trying to see past the snowflakes, past the people in the window, to the interior wall, where the giant antique clock hangs.

  I take a screenshot and zoom in, hoping I can still make out the whole pixilated mess.

  And there it is—the clue I’ve been searching for.

  It’s the giant clock on the wall, and its hands rest on four minutes past seven. And since Angotti’s isn’t open for breakfast, it’s definitely got to be in the evening.

  “7:04 p.m.,” I whisper. I stare harder, trying to make out the second hand, but it’s no use. The exact second won’t be known, but getting it down to the minute is pretty awesome.

  “Jules, you are a genius,” I whisper. “Now you just need to synchronize.”

  A voice startles me back to the present. “Yo, insane freak. Talking to yourself?” It’s BFF Sarah, trying to sound tough, sitting down at the computer two seats away. She takes out a notebook.

  I frown. “What do you want?”

  “You messed up our V-Day Dance decorations.”

  “Maybe you shouldn’t be standing in the middle of a crowded hallway with them, then.” Where I’d normally be scared, I am now bold. I look at her and wait for her response.

  She wavers just slightly. “You’re pissed because nobody ever invites you. That’s why you did it.”

  I glance back at my screen and minimize it, then look back to her. “Invites me to what?”

  “Anything. Homecoming. Winter Ball. Valentine’s Dance.”

  I sigh and wonder if she’s feeling empowered today too. If she is, it’s not working. I lean toward her. “Did you come here to harass me?”

  She doesn’t respond, probably because she’s so dumb she doesn’t have an answer. She pulls out some papers and ignores me.

  I go back to studying my screenshot.

  But she’s not done. A minute later, she says, “Is that what made you insane, freak? You’re in love with Sawyer Angotti, but he never asks you to anything, and now you’ve lost your marbles. It is, isn’t it.” It’s not a question.

  My neck grows warm. There’s only one way she could have found out I told Sawyer I love him. Unless she’s just digging at me. That’s probably more likely. I stare at my computer screen and say nothing, heeding the inner instinct to brace myself for more.

  “But you can’t help being insane, can you,” Sarah says in a pitying voice. “Your family and all.”

  I close my eyes and grip my chair arms. In my mind, I decimate her. I scream, I kick, I hurt her on the outside for what she just did to my insides. I take a measured breath, and then I open my eyes and turn slowly toward her, covering my teeth with my lips and imitating that scary, gummy man from the hospital when Dad was there. In a harsh voice, I whisper, “Do you want to find out how crazy I really am?”

  Twenty-Six

  It was pretty awesome seeing Sarah react to that, I have to admit. She pushed her chair back with a loud scrape and her eyes went wide, her mouth open, her wad of gum just sitting there, tempted to roll out. And then she pulled her stuff together, called me a lunatic, and took off. I wonder if she got her assignment done. Tsk.

  I spend an hour studying close-ups of each scene, landing again on the one quick shot of the dining room window. There’s still something odd, but I can’t figure it out. I spend a couple bucks to print out all the screenshots, but when I go to pick them up off the printer, they’re not there. There’s just a stack of color shots of Skinny Wallets, Fat Love. Now I really do look insane.

  “Big sigh, Demarco,” I mutter under my breath. “Maybe next time print just one and check it, hey?”

  • • •

  Once I get home, everybody’s down in the restaurant already. So I start digging for a disguise.

  I sort through the hoards and piles and boxes. Because I know that somewhere in here, there’s a whole crap ton of Halloween costumes. And I definitely can’t be recognized again—at least not right now.

  After an hour, and just when I’m about to give up and get my butt to work, I find the mother lode in the far corner of the dining room, under a musty box of canning jars, which we keep in case we ever decide to fix the seventeen broken pressure cookers in the living room, which we’ll do if we ever learn how to can things. It all makes sense, doesn’t it? Especially since we have all this spare time to take up hobbies.

  Anyway, right on top of the pile are some retro glasses and three wigs: Elvira, Marilyn Monroe, and a generic one with brown dreadlocks, or maybe it’s Bob Marley, I’m not sure. I shake them, and only dust falls out—a good sign that even the mice are repulsed. A careful sniff of each doesn’t kill me or even knock me flat, so I confiscate them, putting them into a plastic bag and shoving them under my bed.

  • • •

  Five useful things about living with a fairly clean hoarder:

  1. If you look around long enough, you’re bound to find something for a science project

  2. There are endless opportunities for organizing if you have OCD

  3. The potential for canning is good to great

  4. It’s easy to hide things in plain sight
, like gnomes and bird cages an’ shit

  5. Survival rate is over one full year when zombies attack

  When I walk downstairs and into the restaurant, Rowan and Trey are standing on chairs at the entryway to the dining room, both with rolls of masking tape on their wrists and strings of shiny heart cutouts around their necks.

  I tie my apron around my waist and squint up at them. “Seriously? Do we really have to encourage it?”

  “Sing it,” Trey mutters. He slaps a circle of tape on the back of a red heart and sticks it to the trim work.

  “Oh, come on,” Rowan says. “It’s a beautiful tradition. Mom found those heart-shaped pizza pans.”

  “Wasn’t too beautiful for the martyred dude,” Trey says.

  “Heart-shaped pans. Like we need more crap,” I mutter as the front door jingles and Dad walks in with two magazines and a newspaper. Trey snorts and Rowan’s eyes bug out.

  “Feeling better?” Dad asks me. He doesn’t look quite so freaked out as he did the other day. I glance at Trey, who has a ribbon in his mouth. He nods once from his perch.

  “Yeah, I guess it was just the flu or meningitis or black hairy tongue disease or something other than pregnancy.”

  Dad blushes and pretends he doesn’t get it. “Take it easy tonight. You need to be ready for Saturday.”

  “I know.” Mentally I calculate the date and day of the week—being sick always throws me off. I’ve been thinking it’s Monday all day, but it’s Thursday. No wonder everybody’s hanging pink and red stuff everywhere. When Valentine’s Day falls on the weekend, it’s always out of control.

  I get into the dining room to give Aunt Mary a hand as five o’clock rolls around and the early bird diners arrive, right on cue. The decorations are all up in here already. Trey and Rowan must have started right after school. They have them draped in a lovely, nontacky way across the picture windows. Both Rowan and Trey are pretty artistic, which is why they’re hanging decorations and I’m serving. I get the drink orders for the first two tables by the windows while regretting being unable to print the pictures I wanted at the library.