The Art of Losing

by Lizzy Mason

  But Cassidy was already shaking her head, preempting my apologies. “Don’t worry about it. I got Ryan and those guys to take the keg with them and nothing was broken. As soon as word got out about what had happened, everyone quit drinking and cleared out fast.”

  Ryan was Mike’s best friend. He had more patience for Mike’s drunken antics than I did and covered for him as much as he could. I bet Mike called him as soon as he got to the hospital, before he even called his mom. Not because Ryan meant more to him, but because Ryan could start smoothing over any potential fallout right away.

  Mike would ask Ryan to find out who knew what and what people were saying, so he’d know what he could lie about and what he could cover up. I was surprised Ryan hadn’t called me to gauge my mood, but then I remembered I’d turned my phone off.

  “So everyone knows what happened?” I said.

  Cassidy nodded slowly, as if trying to ease me into it. “Yeah,” she said. “A few people texted when they saw the accident. The . . . aftermath. Mike’s car is so recognizable with that happy face sticker on it. As soon as someone snapped a picture, it just spread. You know how it is.”

  I did indeed know. Ryan’s job got a lot harder then.

  But I cared more about how many people knew about what had happened between Mike and Audrey. How many of them had seen me running down the stairs, out of the house? How many had seen me leave my sister and my boyfriend alone together in Cassidy’s room?

  “I shouldn’t have left Audrey there with Mike,” I choked out. The brick reappeared, the one that seemed to have taken up residence in my throat. “It should have been me in that car—”

  “Shut up,” Cassidy interrupted.

  I blinked at her. She kept her eyes on mine as she turned her chair, facing me, wrapping my hands up in hers. Her thin fingers were chilly from the hospital air-conditioning. Every part of her seemed to be trembling.

  “I know that you’re hurting right now. But if you say anything like that ever again, I will punch you. Hard.” A faint smile crossed her lips. “Harder than Batman would punch . . . um, the Joker?”

  I couldn’t help letting out a small laugh. Cassidy had always been confused by my love of comics. Real life was her escape, including our friendship. Cassidy preferred being a force in student government and debate and Model UN. Not physically, though. In our kickboxing segment in gym class, sophomore year, the heavy bag barely moved when she hit it.

  “Batman is probably one of the weakest superheroes, comparatively speaking,” I couldn’t help saying. “A better threat would be to punch me harder than the Hulk or Superman. Just scientifically, they both have super-strength. Batman just has gadgets and human muscles.”

  Cassidy rolled her eyes. “Fine. I’ll hit you harder than Superman would hit the Hulk or whatever you just said.”

  I snorted.

  “Okay?” she pressed.

  “Okay, okay, I won’t. I swear,” I said, pulling my hands from hers. “But I need you to do me a favor.”

  She narrowed her eyes. “What?”

  I held out my phone to her. “I need you to erase all of Mike’s messages. I don’t want to see or hear his apologies.”

  She took it. “I’m deleting his number, too.”

  I nodded. “Good idea.”

  “I do have good ideas occasionally,” she said, glancing up from my phone with a wry grin. “You should listen to me more often.”

  “You’re going to say you told me so, aren’t you? About dating Mike?”

  She shrugged. “Can you blame me?”

  “No.” I sighed. “But try not to blame yourself either, okay?”

  Cassidy handed me my phone and scrubbed her hands across her face. Her eyelids were heavy.

  “Go get some sleep before your parents get home,” I said. But I grabbed her hand as she stood. “It was a good party. Before the drama.”

  Cassidy leaned down and hugged me. “You’re sweet for lying to me. Thanks for coming even though you hated it.”

  “I only hated it a little . . . until I hated it a lot.”

  Cassidy paused at the door. “That’s how I know you love me. Because you stayed anyway. Until you couldn’t.”

  Audrey and I were finally alone. I felt awkward and uncomfortable in the silence. I kept waiting for her to open her eyes and yell at me for watching her sleep.

  Mom had turned into a semi-hysterical fountain of tidbits and facts, poring over articles about head trauma and car accidents, until Tilly finally convinced her to join her outside for a very long smoke. Meanwhile, Dad fidgeted, paced around, left the room, and returned so often that I had turned it into a game in my head. Every time he left, I would get the chance to win money (from myself) to spend at the vending machine. How many minutes it took him to come back equaled how many cents I got. I’d earned more than two dollars already, so I had big plans involving a Snickers bar and a bag of chips.

  Party animal = me.

  I leaned forward and smoothed Audrey’s bangs flat on her forehead.

  Two weeks after I cut my hair, she’d gone to the mall with her friends and had come back with a hairstyle that matched mine. I was so angry I wanted to cut her ponytail off in her sleep.

  We’d always been the Langston Girls, a duo in everyone’s minds and nearly interchangeable. Aside from the two additional inches and fifty extra pounds on my frame, we looked so much alike that I would answer to “Audrey,” just in case they really meant “Harley.” Sometimes I’d even pretend to be her when it was less awkward than correcting the mistake of our neighbors and family friends. I knew enough about her life to answer their generally surface-level questions. Or at least I thought I did.

  I realized suddenly that I was staring at a bruise on her neck, a small reddish mark. It looked more like a hickey.

  Mike was a fan of giving hickeys. I’d always pushed him away when he tried, but maybe Audrey hadn’t known what he was doing. Or maybe she’d liked it.

  I sat down next to her and took her small hand in mine.

  “Hey, Audy,” I said quietly. “I don’t know if you can hear me, but I hope you can.”

  Only the rhythmic whoosh-thump of her ventilator answered. “So, listen, about this thing with you and Mike . . . I think we should just try to forget about it. For now. Don’t you?”

  She didn’t respond, of course, but her familiar voice in my head said, Yeah, sure, Harley. That seems likely.

  “I’m super pissed, and I want to scream and yell and beat the crap out of both of you. But, I mean, you’re here and I don’t plan to ever see him again . . . I think maybe we can deal with it when you wake up, okay?”

  The Audrey in my mind turned skeptical. Cool, she said. I’m definitely going to enjoy that conversation.

  “Don’t let that be a reason not to wake up,” I said, backpedaling. “You are going to wake up, right?”

  Behind her eyelids, I saw her eyes move. Or maybe I imagined it. Maybe the stress and sleeplessness had finally caught up to me. But for the briefest instant, my heart lifted . . . and then just as quickly, the elation vanished. The doctors had warned us that we could see involuntary twitches.

  “Just get better,” I whispered as I put her hand back down on the bed and tucked the blankets up around her chest. “When you wake up, I swear I won’t be mad. Just wake up.”

  She didn’t respond, not even in my imagination. Maybe she thought I was lying. I couldn’t really be sure myself.

  Later that morning, I awoke from a restless nap to the sound of a hushed conversation in the hallway.

  Mom had gone home to shower and change; Aunt Tilly had gone to pick up Spencer; and Dad was in the cafeteria, getting lunch and making phone calls to his side of the family. Mom and Aunt Tilly were pretty much the only two left on their side.

  I cracked an eyelid. The door was open a couple of inches, and a pa
ir of dark brown eyes widened and disappeared behind the cover of straight black hair. Neema, I realized. Audrey’s best friend. I shuffled on numb legs to the door and pulled it open, but Neema wasn’t alone. Her dad lurked behind her in the hallway, his face grim.

  “Hi,” she said, her eyes not meeting mine.

  Neema had been at the party, but I couldn’t tell if the awkwardness was due to Audrey’s hookup with Mike or because her best friend was lying comatose a few feet away. Maybe both.

  “Do you want to come in?” I asked.

  Neema nodded, so I stepped backward into the room and held the door open as she entered. She had spent plenty of time at our house, sleeping over and hanging out after school, but we weren’t friends. I didn’t like the way she bossed Audrey around, and I felt like Audrey gave in to her too much. But I knew that was probably just big-sister protectiveness.

  She and Neema had fun together, and even though Neema wasn’t as full of energy as Audrey was, she seemed to be the only one Audrey would sit still with. To watch movies or paint their nails or play video games or do homework. Neema and Audrey just kept up a steady stream of conversation even when they watched TV. I envied their easy comfort with each other.

  So I tried to be friendly. I drove the two of them to the mall and let them hang out with me and Cassidy sometimes. I invited them to parties, including the one at Cassidy’s house.

  Neema approached Audrey’s bed and picked up her limp hand. She had to curl Audrey’s fingers around her own to hold it in place, otherwise it would drop back to the bed.

  “Why did this happen?” she whispered. I didn’t think she was looking for an answer, but then she spun around to look at me. “What was she doing in the car with your boyfriend? Why didn’t you drive her home?”

  My chest felt tight as I clutched at my necklace. “She didn’t tell you?” I said.

  Neema shook her head. “No, I left early. Before you did.”

  I felt her judgment like a slap. Audrey couldn’t have gotten a ride home from Neema. When I left after walking in on her and Mike, he was her only option.

  “I wanted to go home; she wanted to stay,” I lied. It was sort of true. “So she found another ride.” I pushed away the anger at Mike. I was used to doing that. But the anger at myself was too powerful to ignore.

  Neema turned, staring down at her friend. “She can’t die,” she whispered. A tear slipped down her cheek and she swiped at it angrily. “We left her there alone.” She leaned down and kissed my sister lightly on the forehead. “I’m sorry,” Neema whispered.

  A tear slid down my cheek. But I wasn’t so much devastated as I was angry. At too many people to even keep track. Including myself. And now, Neema was apologizing for me, and in doing so, she was also blaming me.

  I could feel my guilt beginning to simmer. I was a geyser and it was only a matter of time before I exploded.

  “Don’t apologize,” I said.

  Neema flinched slightly. My voice was louder than I’d intended.

  “It’s my fault that she’s here,” I added.

  Neema’s watery eyes were wide. Her lips quivered as she brushed past me toward the door.

  “That doesn’t make you feel better?” I snapped at her back. “That it’s my fault? That I’ve thought that every second since it happened?” I was almost shouting now. “Did you think I hadn’t apologized?”

  Neema’s father pushed the door open, his face a mask of disapproval.

  “I think we should go,” he said to Neema while glaring at me. “Clearly, this is a very stressful time.”

  He closed the door behind Neema before I could say another word. Not that it would have mattered. She was already halfway down the hall.

  I sighed, flopping down in the chair next to Audrey’s bed.

  He was right. It was a “stressful time.” My sister might die.

  And yet Audrey’s betrayal poisoned every second, no matter how hard I tried to forget. It reinforced every miserable, niggling suspicion I had always tried to push out of my thoughts: that Audrey was the more desirable Langston sister.

  This was my proof.

  I was sneaking out of the hospital to smoke one of Aunt Tilly’s cigarettes when I heard his voice.

  “Harley?”

  I froze. I should have known I’d bump into him.

  Mike sat on the little brick wall outside the Emergency Room, hunched over in the bright mid-morning sun. The glare was too bright, but it highlighted how terrible he looked. His wavy blond hair was tousled on one side and matted with blood on the other. He had a bandage above one eyebrow and a burn like Audrey’s on his cheek. He was wearing the same T-shirt I had last seen crumpled on the floor of my best friend’s bedroom.

  “What do you want?” I said through clenched teeth.

  He stood and put out an arm to steady himself on the wall. He was wobbly, disoriented. Good, I thought.

  “Can we talk?” he asked. His voice was hoarse.

  I squinted at him. “No,” I said. I turned to walk away, but he hustled up behind me, clearly in pain. I could see the strain on his face.

  “Please, Harley?” he said. He reached out for me, but I yanked my arm away violently.

  “Don’t touch me,” I spat. “The fact that you’re walking out of here right now, and she’s . . . she’s . . .” The words got stuck in my throat.

  He didn’t move to follow me when I stepped out of his reach. I headed toward the shady side of the parking lot, catching a glimpse of his mom’s car as she pulled under the awning that covered the ER entrance.

  “I’m sorry,” he shouted after me, his voice breaking.

  I willed myself not to turn around. Instead, I ran, just like Neema had run from me. I shouted silently: That’s not enough.

  One Year Ago

  Walking down the hallway at my school isn’t like the scenes you see in movies. There are no girls tossing their hair while guys check them out. No one is slapping high fives about last night’s big game. No nerds are being tripped or bullied. The social torture is much more subtle.

  Audrey’s English class was held next door to the AP English class during the same period. Her class was full of athletes and slackers, the kids who struggled, and the ones who had learning disabilities. And while no one would make fun of her publicly, everything felt deliberate to Audrey—her friends discussing the books they were reading in class that would take her months to get through, talking about the colleges they were planning to apply to that they knew she couldn’t get into—and she ended up in tears a lot.

  I was headed to lunch with a few of my friends one day when we passed by the freshman lockers. Audrey sat on the floor with her back against her locker, her head in her hands. A few papers lay shredded on the linoleum floor next to her.

  “Go ahead, you guys,” I told my friends and diverted my path toward Audrey.

  I was still fifty feet away when I saw Mike walk out of the bathroom across from her. He did a double take and said, “Audrey? What’s wrong?”

  He eased down next to her and sat, quietly, waiting for her to talk. I stopped before they saw me and hid behind an open door. Audrey used to come to me with all her problems, but since starting high school, she was less interested in my opinion. But she liked Mike. She sought him out when he was over at our house, showing up wherever we were and putting a major crimp in our plans.

  “You won’t tell Harley?” I heard her say.

  Mike drew an X over his heart. “I won’t.”

  “I’m failing algebra,” she said quietly. “I’m going to have to go to summer school.”

  “That’s not such a big deal,” Mike said. “Algebra is tough.”

  Audrey took her head out of her hands long enough to look at him skeptically. “You and Harley both got A’s.”

  He shrugged. “We had each other’s help,” he said. “Maybe t
hat’s what you need, too.”

  “What, like a tutor?” she said with disdain. “Believe me, my parents have tried that.”

  “You haven’t studied with me, though,” he said. “Or Harley. Maybe we can help.”

  “There’s no way Harley would do that. She hates me.”

  The words were a punch to the gut, but she was partly right. I didn’t hate her, but I would have scoffed at the idea of helping her if she had asked.

  “If you pass your final, will you pass the class?” Mike asked.

  She nodded. “Barely.”

  “Then we’ll do it. Leave Harley to me. She loves you. And she loves me. So I think we can win her over, don’t you?” When he flashed his straight-toothed smile at her, I knew she would agree. It was impossible to say no to that smile.

  Audrey smiled back. “Do we have to?”

  Mike laughed and nudged her with his elbow. “She’s better at algebra than I am. Trust me, we need her.”

  Damn it, I thought. Mike was right. I’d rather watch Plan 9 from Outer Space—arguably one of the worst movies in history—than help my sister with algebra, but she needed me.

  I ducked out from behind the door. “Hey, you two,” I said, trying to act casual. “What’s going on?” I dropped to the floor between Mike’s legs. He slipped his arms around my waist.

  “We have a job, or better yet, a duty,” Mike said, “to get Audrey through her algebra final.”

  I patted her on the knee. “Don’t worry, kid,” I said. She wrinkled her nose at the moniker, but her tears had dried. “We got this.”

  Audrey heaved a relieved sigh while I fought back a wave of guilt that I hadn’t helped her before now. I hugged Mike’s knees and leaned against his chest, grateful that he was kinder to my sister than I was.

  It never occurred to me to be suspicious of it.

  Chapter Three

  The night air was humid and stale, like a wool blanket still damp from the dryer. I was almost done with the cigarette I’d bummed from Aunt Tilly, relishing the idea of getting back in the air-conditioning, when I heard the whisper of footsteps on grass. A telltale glowing ember—the orange tip of a cigarette—floated around the corner of the house next door. I considered putting mine out, but I figured if the person was also smoking, they couldn’t give me too much grief.