Everything's Fine

by Janci Patterson

  "You'll warm up in a second," he said.

  Did that mean he intended to let me go after that? No. It was a line. One he might have used on Fiona, or Haylee before me.

  The pounding in my head faded into a fuzz, and I couldn't think of anything except the way Bradley's arms snaked around my waist, toying with the back of the waistband on my jeans. I'd listened to a thousand of Haylee's fantasies about those arms. But never, never had I put myself inside them.

  I looked up at him to tell him to unzip the jacket, so I could get away from his warm body and think again, but when I did, Bradley's face moved closer and I realized that he was going to kiss me.

  Words finally came to me: I'm not Haylee. But his lips were on mine before I could say it.

  His mouth felt warm and uncomfortably wet, and his nose exhaled hot breath down my face and onto my neck. My goosebumps spread over my body, until every follicle stood erect.

  I wondered if I could reach around and unzip his jacket from the back. But then a voice hissed from deep in the back of my brain: Don't be stupid. A boy is kissing you. You. So I tried to match the movements of Bradley's lips, but our mouths tangled together, off balance.

  The flip-flopping of my stomach dropped several inches. He must know I had no idea what I was doing. Suddenly, the synchronized tonguings I'd seen him perform with Fiona seemed a lot more impressive—like an Olympic sport. As if on cue, Bradley shoved his tongue past my flailing lips and into my mouth. I could taste stale Doritos in his teeth.

  The jacket pinned my elbows to his sides, cutting off my circulation. I slid my hands up inside the jacket and rested them on his shoulders so they stuck out like a chicken. Bradley's slobbering encompassed my chin, and I leaned my head away instinctively, tightening the collar of the jacket around both of our necks.

  I squirmed. Bradley seemed to get the hint. He shifted toward the porch swing, pulling me with him. "Turn around," he said, sliding me around in the jacket and then sitting down on the swing, so I ended up sitting on his lap with his arms around me. The collar of the jacket was choking me a little, so I unzipped it a few inches. But I guess he didn't really get the hint, because he moved his face next to mine and kissed my cheek, migrating a little toward my ear. I felt his hands moving up inside the jacket toward my breasts, so I squeezed with my arms, trying to keep his hands down without him noticing I was doing it on purpose.

  And then he scooted me farther up his lap, and I finally unzipped the jacket, fumbling with the bottom of the clasp. When I stood up, Bradley stood with me. My hands were shaking. I hoped he couldn't see that in the dark.

  What was wrong with me? A boy finally kissed me, and now I was freaking out? But I thought kissing would be different—more romantic. I thought it would make me feel closer to him, not squirmy inside.

  Bradley opened his mouth to say something, but the front door opened. Catherine stepped out onto the porch and I edged further away from Bradley. Too quickly. Her eyes got all wide and I wondered if she knew we'd been kissing. Was the slobber visible? I forced myself not to wipe my face.

  "Hey," she said. "We're going to play some games if you guys want to come back inside."

  Games. Like spin the bottle? I had to get out of here.

  Bradley nodded at her. "We'll be right there." She looked at us for a second until she got the hint and went back in.

  "I guess you better go back," I said to Bradley, after she was gone.

  "You're not coming?"

  I edged so far from him that I had to step down off the side of the porch, smashing some groundcover as I went. "No," I said. "I just want to go home."

  "You sure?" Bradley asked.

  "Yeah. You stay, though," I said. "I'll see you later."

  "Sure," Bradley said, heading toward the door. "Later."

  Then he went inside, just like that.

  I stood in Catherine's foliage, alone in the dark. My hands were still trembling, so I shoved them deep into my pockets.

  That, I said to myself, was supremely uncool. What must Bradley think of me? He must think I was a total spaz, that's what. I mean, kissing was supposed to be fun, wasn't it? He certainly seemed to have fun doing it with Fiona, so if there was a problem between the two of us, there was a good bet it was me.

  Someone bumped into the door from the inside, and I heard laughter over the music. I backed onto Catherine's lawn, and turned and walked down to the sidewalk. I couldn't help thinking that Nick wouldn't have left me alone in the dark.

  Nick wouldn't have kissed me, either.

  I should have gone home, but instead I walked by Haylee's. I knew I couldn't go in, so I just stood on the sidewalk, looking up at Haylee's tree—a massive, gangly thing that shadowed the house from the street. Her mother hated it, but Haylee and Aaron both forbade her to call a tree-remover. It was the only thing they agreed on, and I was pretty sure that's why she let them have their way.

  I stood on the sidewalk, holding my breath, looking for Haylee's ghost. I waited for the hairs to rise on the back of my neck, for the goosebumps I'd felt with Bradley to return. But if Haylee was there, she didn't make her presence known. I couldn't feel her watching me.

  Maybe she'd given up on me. After what I'd done tonight, maybe she ought to.

  As I looked up at Haylee's dark window, I wished I could take this memory of kissing Bradley and hand it over to her. I'd only called Bradley for her sake, after all. I never would have gone after him on my own. I wondered if she'd had a kiss just like that with him, if it had been painful and awkward, and made her want to die, because being with him wasn't what she'd thought it would be.

  As I turned to walk home, I wanted to take one more detour, to walk by Nick's house, but I didn't. Haylee couldn't look out and see me, couldn't wonder why I was there. Nick could. And seeing him tonight would be too much. What if, in some bizarre moment of insanity, he decided to kiss me, too? Would he be able to taste Bradley on my lips, like a stale Dorito?

  If kissing Nick was going to be as awkward as kissing Bradley, I'd pass.

  Sometimes reality couldn't measure up to the dream.

  Two Years Before

  Our last New Year's in middle school, Haylee and I holed up in her room with her dad's little TV from the garage and a mountain of junk food.

  After the ball dropped, we were sitting on her bed in our pajamas, splitting a tray of mozzarella sticks.

  Haylee leaned back on her bed and propped her foot up on her knee. "So it's official," she said. "I'm a crazy person."

  "Is this supposed to be news?" I asked.

  She threw a pillow at my head. Then she hopped up and went into the bathroom across the hall, and came back with a yellow prescription bottle.

  "Happy pills," she said. Then she mimicked a stiff, official voice. "For depression and anxiety."

  "Your therapist gave you those?"

  "No," Haylee said. "An official doctor. Shrink. Person."

  I didn't know she'd been seeing more doctors. "Have you started them?"

  "Two weeks ago," Haylee said, shaking the bottle so the pills rattled inside.

  "And you're just telling me this now?"

  "Yeah." She cringed. "Don't say anything in front of my mother. She said if I told people, they'd think I was nuts."

  "I'm already aware," I said.

  Haylee smiled. "I know, right? But she told Aunt Julie about it and Aunt Julie thinks the drugs will wipe out my emotions and turn me into a zombie." She rolled her eyes back into her head and ambled back to the bed, moaning.

  I laughed. "So do they?"

  "No," Haylee said. "I don't think they do anything, actually. I'm as crazy as ever."

  "So they're not-quite-happy pills."

  "Oh, no," Haylee said. "They're happy pills all right. They make my mother happy."

  Chapter Eight

  On Sunday, Nick and I had the cemetery to ourselves— unless you counted Haylee and her new roommates.

  I'd hated being here during Haylee's burial. Today felt
different—peaceful. I sat cross-legged on the grass, looking at Haylee's grave. I'd expected it to be covered in bare dirt, since it was new, but the cemetery people had laid a grid of sod squares over the top. Haylee's headstone hadn't been put in yet, so the plot wasn't marked. A concrete pad sat where the stone would go when it was finished. She was buried next to her grandmother and grandfather, Leonard and Helen Ricks.

  They'd both died old.

  Nick leaned over the grave, careful not to touch the new grass, and pulled wilted daffodils out of the jar on the concrete marker, replacing them with the fresh ones he'd brought. Then he sat down next to me, leaning back on his palms. Today his shirt featured famous members of the Communist party, only they were throwing a literal party, with balloons and confetti.

  "Where'd you get daffodils in December?" I asked.

  "The flower shop," he said.

  They must have been planted under grow-lights somewhere, tricked into blooming in the wrong season.

  On top of the concrete pad someone had left a card with that lame footprints poem on the front of it. The one that ends:

  And the Lord replied

  My child, I would never leave you.

  When you saw only one set of footprints

  It was then that I carried you.

  I didn't see Jesus showing up to carry me today. I picked the poem up. "I'm throwing this away," I said.

  "Nah," Nick said, reaching over and taking it out of my hands. He pulled a pen from his pocket and crossed out the last line of the poem, scrawling something underneath.

  When he handed it back to me it read:

  It was then that I carried you

  It was then that we walked single file to hide our numbers.

  I smiled, and nestled the card back on the grave. A cold breeze blew through, and I shivered, running my hands up my sleeves.

  Nick looked at me. "You want my jacket?"

  I thought of pressing against Bradley, zipped inside his windbreaker. I could feel myself blush.

  "No, I'm okay." It felt right to be cold in a graveyard. Everybody else was.

  Nick stretched his legs out. "Thanks for coming with me."

  I still wasn't sure why he'd asked me to come. Was he just being friendly?

  I could still feel Bradley's mouth on mine. Just thinking about it made me want to wipe my face with the back of my hand. Nick didn't seem to notice. And why would he? I was just his cousin's little friend.

  Nick smiled at me, and my heart missed a beat.

  Ugh. I might not know why Bradley wanted to kiss me, but at least I could tell what he wanted.

  "You know what I miss about Haylee?" Nick asked.

  "What?"

  "The way she always stole my food," he said. "Anytime I had a candy bar or a bag of chips, she'd take half of it, without even asking. Isn't that a stupid thing to miss?"

  "Nah," I said.

  "It drove me crazy when she did that. But now every time I eat something, I want to leave half of it behind."

  "She knew it drove you nuts," I said. "That's why she did it."

  He laughed. "What do you miss?"

  A million things. "I miss having someone to talk to," I said.

  Nick was quiet. "I know it's not the same," he said. "But you can talk to me."

  Maybe about some things, but not about Bradley. "Have you come here a lot?" I asked.

  "This is the third time. I didn't see her as much as you did. So it wouldn't have been that strange for me not to see her for this long, you know? That's why I come here. To remind myself that it's real."

  "I thought I was the only one who didn't want to forget." Sitting here, remembering, felt right. It should matter enough to feel real.

  It should matter enough to cry about, too.

  Nick shook his head. "If I forget, then it sneaks up on me all at once. Remembering after forgetting is worse than remembering all the time."

  "Like spreading the pain out is better than dealing with it all in one dose."

  Nick looked down at his hands. "When you say it that way, it sounds crazy."

  I smiled. "It's not crazy," I said. "Not any crazier than feeling guilty for forgetting."

  Nick looked at me. "You feel guilty?"

  "Yeah," I said. "My best friend just died. I should be sad all the time."

  He tore up a piece of grass and twiddled it between his fingers. "Don't cause yourself more pain intentionally. There's too much of that going around."

  I picked at the grass in front of me. "I still don't get why she did it."

  Nick shook his head. "She was going through one of her low times, I guess."

  "She'd done that before. A lot."

  Nick shrugged. "It's a medical problem. Sometimes those get worse."

  "So something goes wrong in your brain and kills you?" I asked. "How can that happen?" Sure, she got depressed. She hid in her room; she cried on the phone. But those times never lasted for long. And then Haylee would be back. "Do you know how she did it?"

  He drew a deep breath. "Yeah, pills. Her dad's pain meds and her anti-depressants, plus whatever else she could find."

  In my mind, I saw Haylee lying back and falling asleep, her spirit floating out of her body, no longer weighed down by the endless highs and lows.

  "I read online that pills don't work all the time," Nick said. "Most of the time the person will throw up, maybe ruin their stomach lining for life, but they'll survive."

  "But not Haylee," I said.

  He shook his head. "No. Not Haylee."

  "Do you know who found her?"

  Nick lay back into the grass, and folded his arms behind his head, squinting up at the sky. "It was Uncle Aaron. He found her in the morning. He called 911, but she'd already been dead for hours."

  I closed my eyes, feeling myself in Haylee's bedroom. I could see Aaron opening the door to wake Haylee up for school, and then there she was, lying on the bed, all still and cold. I'd been looking to Bradley for answers, when Nick knew more than either of us.

  "I should have called her that day," Nick said. "I keep thinking, if she'd known how much we loved her, if she'd known she wasn't alone . . . Why didn't I call?"

  "You didn't know," I said. It felt strange, me trying to comfort Nick when I felt exactly the same way. I should have—

  "I should have known," he said. His voice lowered. "She told me she wanted to die."

  I sat perfectly still. The wind blew a leaf across the grave in front of us.

  He knew? "What?" I asked. "When?"

  Nick shook his head, realizing my meaning. "No! I mean, not that day. Like a month before. She said she didn't mean it, but I shouldn't have believed her."

  I ripped on a patch of grass so hard the roots came up. The tip of an earthworm sucked deeper into the sod, away from the light. "She used those words?" I asked. "She wanted to die?"

  "Yeah," Nick said. "I should have told someone. But you know how Haylee exaggerated things."

  A part of me thought, why didn't you tell? If he had, she might still be alive.

  I let go of my handful of grass. That wasn't fair. Haylee had said similar things to me, if not in those words. "She was always talking about how I'd miss her when she made her exit. I thought she was just being dramatic, but I should have known what she meant."

  Nick pulled a hand from behind his head and reached it toward me, like he was going to take my hand, but instead he just let it lie in the grass. He looked down at it, like it had betrayed him.

  I took the opportunity to watch him while he wasn't watching me back. His eyes were dark, not like Bradley's clear blue. But a ray of light passed over his face, revealing different colored spots of brown and blue.

  I wondered what would happen if I reached out and brushed his fingers. Would he grab on? Would he pull me into him?

  Would holding on to each other keep us both sane?

  The tips of my fingers twitched. But I couldn't be sure what he wanted. He was a boy; he was older than me. If he wanted to ma
ke a move, he could.

  I stayed still; he stayed still. Whatever crackled between us soaked away into the silence of the graveyard.

  "Don't blame yourself," he said finally.

  "How can you say that right after you got done telling me how it's all your fault?"

  Nick smiled. "Shut up. Just let me feel bad, okay?"

  "You couldn't have known."

  "But who else do I blame?"

  I lay back, resting my head on the grass. "If you figure it out, let me know."

  Nick rolled over onto his stomach, kicking his long legs out so his toes dug into the new sod. He propped himself up on his elbows, picking his wilted blade of grass apart with his nails, a millimeter at a time.

  He was so close, now. Only a few inches away. I rested my arm in the grass between us, a hair's width away from his sleeve. It would be so easy for him to shift in my direction, and then we'd touch. We'd be connected—the only two living souls in the cemetery.

  Nick got to the end of his blade of grass, and he blew the last piece in my direction. "I don't really know what to do now," he said.

  And I nodded. "That makes two of us."

  Eight Months Before

  On a Wednesday in April, Mom was waiting for me in the living room when I got home, a magazine spread across her knees.

  "Hey," she said. "Practice went late today."

  "It got out early, actually," I said. "So I went over to Haylee's."

  Mom paused for a moment. "Haylee can come over here, you know. You don't always have to hang out at her house."

  I dropped my backpack on the floor next to the couch. "I know," I said. "It's just easier to walk over there after practice."

  Mom raised an eyebrow. "And on weekends. And over breaks. And during the summer."

  "You're mad that I went to Haylee's too much last summer?"

  "No," Mom said. "I'm not mad. I just want to make sure you know she's welcome over here. I think I've only seen her once in the last month."

  "And that was last weekend," I said. "Not that long ago." Haylee had walked over to give me a math assignment after I'd stayed home from school to ice my pitching arm.