What You Left Me

by Bridget Morrissey

  Spencer takes it. No rebuttal. Not even a reaction.

  The edges of Martin’s envelope have started to fray from my iron grip. I can see loose-leaf paper inside. “We got this for you,” I say.

  It leaves my hands and goes into his, and he slips his fingers underneath the edge. He pulls out three sheets of paper and begins examining them. A question mark hangs in the air for so long it numbs the rest of us into placidity. Just six people staring at one person in silence for what seems like forever. Abruptly, Spencer drops the sheets and looks at the ceiling tiles.

  I gesture to the papers splayed out along his side. “May I?”

  “I don’t care,” he says.

  Novemember 12

  Dear Marty or Spitty,

  It is Marty and Spitty. We are 9 years old. This is what you do if one of us dies. We will haunt you if you do not do this! You have to do this to who is dead, Marty or Spitty!

  1. Make sure I am dead. Please look at my body and really make sure I’m not sleeping.

  2. You can have all my good stuff if I’m dead. Give away all my other stuff so my family isn’t sad.

  3. Tell my family to stop crying and be nice.

  4. Give them my note.

  REMBER! REMBEMBER! REMEMEBER! THE DEAD ONE WILL HAUNT YOU IF YOU DO NOT DO THIS.

  Sinserly,

  Martin Frederick McGee

  Spencer Alan Kuspits Junior

  • • •

  Everything happens for a reason. Brooke got that tattooed on her ankle the day after her eighteenth birthday. I sat with her in this divey parlor in the city, owned by her cousin’s friend’s uncle or something, and waited as she picked out the type of writing she wanted. It looked like it was going to be a bust. She blew through two books of fonts without any luck, and she didn’t want the tattoo guy making something up. She looked off into space, holding her head up so tears wouldn’t fall, and she saw this random picture fixed to the ceiling that said something like Persistence Overcomes Resistance in weird, scraggly cursive.

  “See? Everything happens for a reason!” she screamed as she pointed to the picture.

  The tattoo guy grabbed a ladder, took the picture down, stared at it for a while for reference, made a draft on paper, and then went to work outlining Everything Happens for a Reason on Brooke’s skin. All ten of his knuckles were inked with the words TRUTH and KARMA, which seemed to be pretty perfect for the occasion.

  “Are you sure you want to do this?” I asked.

  “Yes,” Brooke said. Her grip on my hand got so tight I thought she might actually break bone, and the guy hadn’t even started tattooing. My hand was numb by the time he did. I distracted myself from the possibility of permanently losing feeling in my fingers by staring at the needle making a million little pulses into Brooke’s ankle, the sentence she chose getting covered up in black smudge, then wiped clean, another word popping out to be read for all of eternity.

  We stopped at her favorite ice cream spot afterward. She was licking the edges of her Rainbow Cone to keep it from dripping onto her hands when I asked, “Why’d you get the tattoo?”

  She’d been so secretive about the whole thing earlier it felt like I’d set off a bomb if I asked then, but her mood had since taken a complete 180, so I figured it was safe.

  She told me that when she was twelve, her brother died not far from where we were parked. He was outside trying to fix a broken spoke on her bike when a car spun out and crushed him.

  She came to our school the next year, and all of her brother’s stuff got thrown away in the move, so she couldn’t find anything that he’d written on to use as a reference for her tattoo. She was ready to give up on the whole idea when she saw the handwriting in the picture on the ceiling. It was exactly like she remembered her brother’s.

  “I guess I don’t get it,” I said. “His death was an accident.”

  She put her ice cream cone in the drink holder and shook her head as she wiped multicolored drips off her shirt. “Yeah.”

  “But the tattoo,” I started. I didn’t know how to continue. None of it made sense to me. How is there a reason for a fluke like that?

  “Exactly,” she said. “He lived for a reason. A million of them, of course, but one was to always look out for me. He died for a reason. To teach me to never take a single second for granted. Now I have a permanent reminder of that.”

  I wanted to understand, but I just didn’t. There was a reason for his life, but no reason for the way he died. He was a victim of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. I remember thinking if that happened to me, and my brother got killed while trying to fix a goddamn bike, the last thing I’d want on my body was something that said there was supposed to be a reason for that.

  If I accept the permanent ink on Brooke’s skin, this mantra so many people seem to chant whenever things go wrong—that everything happens for a reason, that I was meant to get into a car crash, to be here now—shouldn’t I be able to see what the reason is?

  When I was in Brooke’s dream, I tried speaking honestly. Owning the truth of what we were to each other. That wasn’t the trick, either.

  So what is?

  • • •

  I pass the first page around and read the second.

  Novemeber 12

  Mom and Dad and Katie,

  Go on a road trip to visit my aunts and uncles. I’m dead but I’ll come because it will still be a good time. I’ll win every game of I Spy, and nobody can get mad because you won’t even know I’m cheating. Sorry, Katie.

  Please don’t be sad. I hate when Katie cries. I don’t want my mom to cry. I love her very much. I’ve never seen my dad cry so he’ll probably be okay I guess. Katie told me Grandpops smiled when he died. You guys can smile now. I miss him very much, so I know you miss me too but Grandpops smiled because he was happy. You can be happy too. Give some of my stuff to Spitty. He can have my books. Let Turrey have my shoes. Chris can have my candy wrappers or something.

  I liked being your son and brother. Rembemeber that and do not be sad or mean! Tell the Cubs to win the World Series for me. That is my only request. Also, ask them to play “Jump” for me and my dad. Dad can sing it very loudly like when it comes on the radio in the car or when he cooks bacon on Sundays. He has a bad voice, but he likes to sing when he is happy. I like to sing that with him.

  Please be nice. You were a very good family.

  Love,

  Martin Frederick McGee

  Spencer comes around from his state to snatch the last paper from my hands. “You don’t need to read mine,” he says. Then he looks at me. Really looks. Hard. It’s a focus he hasn’t displayed since I met him.

  “I didn’t find out about these letters the way I told you,” I admit. I tell him about my dreams.

  As soon as I finish explaining, he scowls at me. He doesn’t believe. His heart wants to, I’m sure, but he’s too damaged to listen to it. Instead, he lets angry words flow out of him. It seems that he might be trying to scream at the world for being so senselessly cruel, but only random fragments are coming out, which just elevates his frustration. “He told me to stop thinking of it! Tell me how I’m supposed to do that!” he yells as he grabs at his hair.

  I look around for help. There isn’t a nurse in sight.

  “Hey!” Spencer yells at me. “Don’t look away.” Now his words make sense. “You think you can help? You don’t know the first thing about anything.”

  I try not to react, but it doesn’t matter, because he moves on to berating Cameron for “standing around and acting like she knows me too.”

  Brooke for “sleeping with Chris before prom and still going with Fly.”

  Aminah for “crossing her arms like that.”

  We all look at one another, puzzled, working hard to not feed into his frenzy.

  Spencer moves on to Turrey. “Wipe
that look off your face,” he says, smiling so big I can see most of his molars. “You think you’re so much better than me because you weren’t in the car. Guess what? I know the real reason you didn’t come with us after graduation.”

  Daniel and Turrey fidget at the exact same time.

  “Exactly,” Spencer says in response. “I saw you guys on your roof.” He points to Turrey. “You knew I was coming to egg your house on Thursday. It’s tradition. Did you think I skipped you on accident?”

  Cameron grabs my forearm. Her palm is slick with sweat.

  “I parked my car because I was trying to figure out what you were doing,” Spencer continues. “I thought maybe you were waiting up there with eggs you were gonna throw back at me, and I was actually pretty impressed. But nothing happened. You guys went in through the window. You didn’t close it after. I got out to throw my eggs inside your room, because how epic is that? Would’ve been my best work yet. And I heard you guys.” He pauses. “Yeah. Heard.”

  “So what?” Turrey responds. “I like guys. Big deal. I know you’re not about to try and make me feel bad about it.”

  Brooke starts looking around the room, trying to find someone to share in this news with her, but we’re all too focused on what’s happening.

  “Daniel’s not the reason I didn’t want to leave graduation early, so you don’t know what you’re even talking about,” Turrey continues. “Maybe I wanted to give my mom and dad a hug for always being there for me. Maybe I wanted to celebrate the fact that I’m black and I made it out of high school alive. Maybe I knew your sad ass would do something you’d regret.” He nods. “Yep. It’s all three of those things.”

  Spencer looks down at his hands. It’s stone-cold silent. Like a get nervous to think anything because you’re afraid your thoughts can be heard kind of silent.

  “You can’t try to hurt us worse than you’re hurting,” Turrey tells him. “It doesn’t work like that.”

  Like the flick of a switch, Spencer starts sobbing. Almost convulsing he’s crying so hard. He can’t breathe out of his nose, but he keeps reaching for it to wipe snot away then remembering it’s too tender to touch, frustrating himself more. “I’m sorry,” he says through the constant stream of tears. “I don’t care that you’re gay.” His eyes scan over the rest of us. “What the hell is gonna happen to Marty? I can’t lose him. I can’t.” He hiccups over his tears. “I can’t. I can’t. I can’t. I can’t—”

  This continues for so long that two nurses come in. They give us looks that say, Please leave. As we walk out, the racket from Spencer’s room quiets, like he’s been put to sleep.

  Part Three

  21

  The parking lot is full. Spencer’s 2002 Dodge Caravan sits a little crooked from a hurried park job. White with black detailing, like a color-inverted orca, the White Whale calls him over, oval headlights keeping constant eye contact. Why aren’t the eyes of a killer whale where they look like they should be? Spencer wonders to himself. Then he laughs.

  It doesn’t matter. Everything is perfect. He is free.

  He climbs into the driver’s seat. Fly gets in on the passenger side. The two amigos are supposed to be on a joy ride inside the White Whale, just like they’ve been doing since the end of sophomore year when the driving gods finally let Spencer pass the driving test, and he talked his dad into letting him inherit this beautiful beast, which had been rusting in their driveway since his mother’s death.

  But Fly isn’t having it. “Spits, come on,” he says. “We don’t have to do this.”

  Spencer ignores him. He takes two travel-size bottles of whiskey out from his glove compartment. He bought them with his fake ID a few hours ago, making him late to his own graduation. The guy at the liquor store didn’t even pretend to care that he was supposed to be a twenty-nine-year-old Floridian named Josh. He passes one to Fly and takes the other for himself.

  Spencer chugs his back in less than four seconds: a new record. His tiny bottle clanks against the black tar of the parking lot as he tosses it out the window. He’s never done this before. Left evidence on school property.

  It doesn’t matter now. Everything is perfect. He is free.

  “Spitty, listen,” Fly says. His voice cracks under the pressure of his own intensity. “I’m trying to wake up. You can’t keep bringing me here. When that car hits me over and over, I feel it.” He throws his full whiskey bottle out the window. “This is all a dream, Spits. Think of something else. Think of us in Chris’s kitchen trying to teach his grandparents how to use Snapchat or something.”

  Spencer revs up his engine and throws the gear into drive.

  He’s got the windows down. No music. No need. The sound of high school ending is the best sound in the entire world. There are no other cars on the roads around the school, so Spencer presses down on the gas pedal. He looks over, disappointed to see that Fly doesn’t have his hand out the window. He’s not wiggling his fingers around to grab the niceness, as if it can be held. He’s not saying, “By the way, that girl’s coming tonight.” He’s not doing what he’s supposed to do.

  “You’re really missing the point,” Spencer tells him. “Don’t you know I was joking when I threw that paper airplane? You didn’t actually have to ask that girl to come. Will you ever learn to take a goddamn joke?” Spencer presses harder on the gas pedal. The adrenaline will wake Fly up. Make him remember that it doesn’t matter. Everything is perfect. They are free.

  “You don’t mean that,” Fly says.

  “Oh really?” Spencer answers. “And how do you know?”

  There’s a small black blur behind Fly. Spencer thinks it’s a bug. Maybe it’s a bird. It could be a car.

  A car.

  It’s a car.

  Spencer can’t get his mouth to catch up to his mind. The words, “Fly! Look out! Look out!” come out eventually, but it’s far too little and way too late. His foot jumps over to the brakes on instinct, every ounce of energy inside his wormy body channeled into his right foot.

  The car smashes into the passenger side. Into Fly. Forward and sideways forces combine to slam Spencer into his airbag and door. His head collides with the heavy pillow of the bag and the glass of the window, breaking his nose and jumbling his brain. He can find only one thought. I killed my best friend.

  Crash. Smack. I killed my best friend.

  Crash. Smack. I killed my best friend.

  Spencer’s head hits the airbag over and over, the point of impact replaying on a constant loop.

  22

  Again and again and again and again, the other car devours my arm and my leg. Smushes my guts. Pulverizes my lungs. Shatters my body and rearranges the pieces into something unrecognizable. Every time my bones get crushed, the shock of the pain doesn’t shut me down. Wanting to stop Spitty’s dream becomes the only thing strong enough—real enough—to keep me from surrendering to the hurt.

  Still, crash after crash, I can’t change a thing. It’s like his dream and his memory are welded together into something more powerful than I know how to handle.

  • • •

  The lights in the hospital cafeteria are so unforgiving that every dark circle and blemish seems to be not only obvious, but accentuated. It doesn’t help that everyone’s already wearing sour looks. Spencer’s breakdown cast a fog over us, made worse by lack of good sleep.

  We carry our trays of food and find a table. It isn’t difficult—the hospital’s not very busy and the cafeteria has just opened for the day—but still we choose a corner, as if the lights will be kinder to us there.

  “I’m absolutely starving,” Brooke announces, trying to kick-start a conversation.

  “Me too,” I say, both because its true and I don’t want to leave her hanging.

  The others give halfhearted nods and start scraping at their plates.

  We sit awhile in this lull. I devour my food wi
thout looking up. The others are probably doing the same, but I don’t give myself the chance to find out. It’s nice to wrap myself up in the monotony of something as simple as eating, especially when the rest of life seems to be a full-time tornado.

  Out of nowhere, Brooke blurts out, “By the way, I think it’s great that you’re gay.” She looks back and forth between Daniel and Turrey as if they’re one singular unit. Her expression is so earnest that it makes the whole thing funnier than it has any right to be.

  The darkness loosens its grip on us, just enough to let the barest hint of smiles creep onto our sallow faces.

  “Thanks, Brooke,” Daniel answers. He pauses to arch his eyebrow. “I’m also a Sagittarius. And genetically predisposed to hating cilantro. Let me know if you have any feedback on this.”

  It can be hard to withstand a Daniel Stetson jab. To her credit, Brooke doesn’t break. She cocks her head and raises her eyebrows. “Your loss. My abuela is an amazing cook. I’d hate for you to miss out on anything she makes with cilantro.”

  My phone buzzes in my purse. It’s become such a constant sound that I’ve learned to tune it out completely. I only hear it now because Aminah is rummaging through my purse in search of it. “This is like the sixth time in a row. At least put the thing on airplane mode if you’re going to ignore it this much,” she says. She pulls it out and declines the call, then pulls up the menu. “Here, I’ll just put it on Do Not Disturb. That way it’ll still ring, we won’t have to hear it, but they won’t think you’re dead or something.”

  Her slip stills the table.

  “Has anyone heard anything else?” Cameron asks, even though we all know the answer. Her attempt to help Aminah out of the awkwardness is valiant but unsuccessful.

  We go back to picking at our empty plates.

  Spencer’s dad rushes into the cafeteria. He has his hand on his forehead and his eyes squinted in concentration.

  “Mr. Kuspits,” Turrey calls out. It’s a relief to have another human to distract us.