I avoided the mirror as I opened the cabinet and reached for the pill bottle on the ledge. Popping the lid off, I let one slide into my hand and rolled it between my fingers.
Forty-one. It had been forty-one days since I’d actually taken one of these. I’d thought the camp set up to handle meds withdrawal would make it easy-peasey. No such luck, but I was off them. For now.
I could take one at any time—go back on my dailies. It didn’t mean defeat. It meant I knew I’d reached a limit. At least, that’s what Dr. Meadows said.
But to me, it did. All I’d wanted for the last three-and-a-half years was to be boringly, averagely normal.
Not to question what people saw every time someone looked at me. Not to use every moment, every movement as a way to camouflage myself.
I dropped the pill back in the bottle and sealed it shut with a childproof thud. Not today my friend. I could fly solo one more day.
Closing my eyes, I pictured my morning. I’d put on safe clothes. Meet Chris. Hash out if he could get me back on the dean’s list or if I was dumping his plan. Go to Ben’s with a bathing suit tucked in the very bottom of my bag, which may conveniently have been “forgotten” at home. And generally have a good Saturday.
It would be a good Saturday, damn it.
Once I found my black skirt I’d feel better. It made me look more symmetrical. Less disproportionate. Avoiding the mirror, I brushed my teeth and pictured the perfect day. The perfect outfit. The perfect me.
Rule 18: Always, always, always have a safe outfit ready to go for any occasion.
I closed my eyes and pictured the pool party. Black wraparound skirt hanging loose off my hips for balance, fitted tank for slimming, flip-flops for kicking off. Bangs wispy but out of my face, check. Pedicure, check. Three favorite lip glosses, triple check. Now to find my clothes.
As I headed back to my room, the tattered edges of my robe’s sleeve caught on the door handle as I went by. I gave it a yank, a harsh rip overriding the music playing from my iPod speakers. That was not a bad sign. Only good things were going to happen today. Saturday had no options. I was in charge.
I turned to my room. It was a mess. Understatement.
Every night I cleaned it, carefully putting each piece of clothing where it belonged. Organized and ready to go.
Only last night I hadn’t put anything away. After the day from Chaos Grand Central, all I’d wanted to do was crash, so everything lay where it had fallen before school.
I waded through the pile, pulling anything out that was black, looking for my skirt. Nothing. Every time I found something, I tossed it behind me, sorting through things on the floor, draped over the chair, at the foot of my bed.
I got down on my hands and knees and looked under the bed.
Where the hell was it?
My hands shook already. I needed that skirt. It was the only thing I could leave the house in. I’d done all my special visualizing in the thing, now I needed it like air, water, and a satin pillowcase that wouldn’t snag my hair. It was like social armor. Never go out in public without the right armor or you’ll get—emotionally—skewered.
From downstairs the dim chime of the doorbell echoed up the hall. Oh, crap. I grabbed at the towel loosely twisted about my wet head. How did he get here so quickly? What was he, like, Superman now? Only without the Clark Kent part. Which would make him…what? Besides annoying that is?
I faced the pile of black clothes in the corner. Maybe I’d accidentally thrown the skirt in with everything else.
On my hands and knees, I rifled through the deluge of black, throwing things behind me again in such disarray that it made the earlier mess look show-room-perfect. No skirt. Seriously? No skirt? I couldn’t leave the house without that skirt. Damn it, I couldn’t leave my room without that skirt.
I sat back on my heels, tears streaming down my face, when a knock came at my door.
This is what I always feared. Things like this. I mean, even a three-year-old can dress herself. Before the meds, before the diagnosis—hell, before we’d known there was anything really wrong with me—it had started with little things. But, the more I tried to explain to people how I really looked—without them humoring me with “the truth”—or about my fears around people looking at me…well, that never went well. Most girls thought you were just trying to get attention.
So I stopped since that was the last thing I wanted anyway.
“Rachel?” my mom called from the hall knowing better than to open it in the morning before she’d seen me. “You have a friend downstairs.”
“I know, Mom.” I tried to keep the panic out of my voice. Oh, dear God. What was I going to do? I clutched the robe around me. Air made it down my throat, but my lungs must have had a giant balloon blocking them. Or maybe there was an invisible elephant on my chest.
“Do you need me to ask him to leave?”
This is what I hated. I hated knowing that people knew. That they could see everything wrong with me. That my mom knew I couldn’t talk to “my friend.” Probably couldn’t leave my room. I grabbed at that thought. At her embarrassment and worry. Another emotion. Harnessed. For my mom.
No matter what, she’d be cool. No matter what.
I stood, kicking myself free from the nest of clothes around me, and walked to my door. Resting my head against it, I watched my hand trace the stained knot of the wood.
I felt a light knock, as if she were on the other side leaning her head against the door too. I pulled myself together, focusing. Before I wouldn’t have been able to, but now…
Now I was someone who could—who would.
“Can you give me a minute, Mom?”
“Sure, Rach. I’ll feed him. He looks like he eats a lot.” After a moment, she said. “I’ll be back up in about five minutes. I love you.”
Those last words. Those last words were everything. I knew she meant them and that she honestly couldn’t see me the way I did—monstrously out of proportion—even if she could, I knew she’d still love me.
I whispered back through the door even though I knew she was gone, “I love you too, Mom.”
Wiping my cheeks dry, I closed my eyes and tried to focus. On the back of my door I’d tacked a big colored paper sign that read: In case of emergency. The list of safe clothes. And, the most important thing.
The outfit.
I always kept one safe outfit clean and hanging on the back of the door below the sign. Even Mom checked to make sure there was always one there. That was the end game. The brass ring. The pull in case of emergency. The center of the Tootsie-Pop. The every cliché ever made by man to signify the end of a long, hard road.
In a hopefully not-so-distant future, everything I wanted would be signified in that one thing: To never have to make sure there was a safe outfit hanging on the back of the door.
I ran a light gel through my hair before pulling it up in a ponytail. With an ounce of luck, there would be zero finger-fins, but with the morning I was having there was no way I was looking in a mirror to check.
Pulling on the emergency outfit, I took a couple deep breaths. Actually, I tried to take a couple deep breaths, but the elephant had been replaced by a walrus so breathing was easier, but still a struggle.
I placed my hand on the doorknob, and gave myself a moment. Focus. Panic was an emotion I was learning how to manage. It usually started with a trigger. Bam—like flipping a light switch on, but went out like a sunset. Slower, fading as I compartmentalized it back into its appropriate box.
Downstairs in my kitchen was the enemy—who just also happened to be one of the best looking guys I’d ever seen. Not one of the best looking guys I’d ever seen in real life. One of the best looking, period.
He hooked up with every hot, semi-hot, and almost-kind-of-hot girl in the school. Probably in the county. But he never even showed an interest in hooking up with me.
Not that I would have.
What if he saw what I saw when he looked at me? What if everyone knew
and they all saw that?
I yanked my hand from the knob and backed away from the doorway like it was on fire…with lava…and dinosaurs…that eat people.
I sat on the edge of my bed, surrounded by the wreckage of my closet and knew I wasn’t leaving my room. Sliding down the side of the mattress, I started folding clothes and placing them in piles to put away. As soon as this was done, I’d be safe.
Safe.
The soft knock came at my door again.
“Rachel?”
I closed my eyes and said a quick prayer I’d make it through this conversation.
“Come in.”
My mom pushed the door open and peeked around it, obviously afraid of what she was going to find.
After a moment she joined me on the floor, folding clothes and handing them to me so I could put them in my version of the right pile.
“You know there’s a boy downstairs waiting for you,” she said as we finished the shorts-that-made-my-legs-look-less-giantess pile.
I nodded. Yeah. How could I miss that? It’s what had me sitting in my room. At least it wasn’t Jared. Chris I could ignore.
Mom handed me a dark blue cardigan with extra long sleeves that fell to my fingers. That was a miracle within itself.
“Are you thinking about letting him stay down there?”
She reached out to take my hand, but faltered. How many moms had to think about if touching their kid might make them have some type of breakdown? She must have feared that every movement was a mistake waiting to happen. A trigger she could set off that would send us back to the year before my diagnosis, before the introduction of meds into our world. When everything, every look, every thought, every person, every fear could lead to a meltdown so large it could leave me locked in the house for days. Not just the house, but my room.
Have you ever lived in a house with someone who won’t let you look at them? No? Well, my mom and sisters have.
I get their fear. I was their fear.
And now, Mr. Potential Trigger was sitting in our kitchen.
“I don’t know. Maybe you could ask him to leave?” I heard my voice go up at the end, turning it into a question.
“What would Dr. Meadows say?”
I hate when she did that. When she didn’t have the answer and was afraid of misdirecting me. She trusted me to tell her the truth. She’d gone through as much counseling that first year as I had. She’d gone from angry and frustrated to…really good at being patient.
Or at least appearing patient
“Dr. Meadows would tell me if there is any way humanly possible to get myself out of this room without destroying my calm, then that’s what I need to do.”
I flipped my hand over on my knee, letting it sit palm up, showing her she could take it if she wanted. She wrapped it in both of her own delicate ones, rubbing the top with her thumb.
“Can you?” Her voice dropped to almost a whisper.
Right then, with my mom who couldn’t possibly get it yet still tried to understand, I thought I could do anything. I knew that could change in a heartbeat, but every once in awhile I felt indestructible.
“I can go down there, but…” Should I tell my mom the situation I’d gotten myself into?
“But what, honey?”
“I’m not sure I should.”
She rubbed my hand again.
“Rachel, I know Dr. Meadows said all this dating wasn’t the best way to handle your fears—”
“I’m not dating him.” As if that would happen. So very many reasons why that wouldn’t happen. I looked at my mom and realized for the first time in a long time, I had a normal problem. She’d probably love to hear about it. She deserved to hear about it.
“He’s not a very nice guy.”
She leaned back against the bed, still holding my hand in one of hers.
“He seems nice.” I could hear the doubt in her voice. He was good looking and polite. Every mother’s dream.
“Mom, he’s the one who screwed over Amy this summer. He’s also got the reputation of a high-end call girl.”
Mom cocked her head to look down at me.
“Then why is he in our kitchen?” She seemed more curious than anxious. Wasn’t she supposed to be worried about my maidenly virtue or something?
“He wants me to tutor him.” Her brows came together and she gave me this weird look. “I’m smart enough to tutor someone.”
For the first time since opening the door, my mom smiled.
“I didn’t say you weren’t, honey. I’m just a little surprised that he’d ask you if he and Amy have such a bad history. And that you’d say yes.”
“That’s the problem.” I pushed off the floor and started pacing the edge of my patchwork rug. “He seems to think he can help me with math. And he seemed so—”
“So?” she asked, more curious than worried.
“So pathetic and desperate. He sounded like he was about to panic. And he’s run through just about every girl in the school so the only other person who might tutor him isn’t really an option.”
“You weren’t kidding about the call girl thing, were you?”
“Did you see him?”
For a second, my mom got this silly grin on her face. It would be sad if every teacher, counselor, principal, coach, bus driver, human of the female persuasion didn’t get the same one when in close proximity to Chris Kent.
“It’s a good thing your sisters don’t get up until lunch then.” She grinned, making the joke.
If only it were actually funny. The last thing I wanted was Chris Kent anywhere near my sisters. “Mom, I’m not kidding. He’s not Mr. Safe To Bring Home To The Young Ones.”
“That doesn’t mean he’s using his powers for evil.” Great. Now she was joking about it.
“Oh, trust me. He’s evil.”
“Just say no, dear.”
Just Say No To Evil. I needed that on a T-shirt.
“I’m not sure, but I may have actually promised. And he claims he’s great at Calculus and can help me get my grade up.” My mom knew I was struggling and hated that grade even more than L’Oreal discontinuing my favorite comfort-color lip gloss.
Before she could respond, a knock echoed through the house.
“Hello?” Chris’s voice came muffled through the door from a distance.
My mom looked at me. I could tell the decision was totally mine to make, but I couldn’t stand the guilt of telling her I broke a promise. The least I could do is talk to him and try to straighten things out.
Plus, I had to get to Ben’s house. Curiosity was one thing I always had in abundance. About everything. So, I needed to figure out who the mystery girl he was in love with, who wasn’t Luke, was. That was the closest thing to normal I was going to get.
I set aside the folded sweater on my lap and gave her a nod. My mom, always the thinking one, squeezed my hand. “Rachel, are you sure about this?”
I knew what she meant. She didn’t mean, are you sure you want to go downstairs to that pretty boy who can’t keep his pants on.
“Yup. This is going to work.” It had to work.
“Were things really that bad on the medication?”
I thought about it. No, things weren’t horrible. It just wasn’t the life I’d envisioned for myself. The sometimes slower emotions, dulled responses. The point that I knew the only thing allowing me to get through looking like everyone else was a little pill. It made me feel…fake.
But, I also knew that for them—my family—things were better after I got on the meds. There were no sudden, unforeseeable breaks in personality. I was even. No surprises. No crying jags.
“Not horrible, just…” We’d discussed this before I’d gone. There was nothing new to say.
My mom nodded and stood before offering me a hand. Pulling me up and straight into a hug, she whispered in my ear, “You can stay in here all you need, but I’d rather you be out there. Even with Mr. Unsafe.” She let go and started toward the door, finishing over her sh
oulder, “Especially since you’ll just be in the kitchen.”
Chapter 6
“Your mom makes great French toast.”
So not the opener I thought he’d go for.
“Um, thanks.”
Chris stood and walked his dish to the sink, turning his back on me while he rinsed it. I have to admit, that was a surprise too. I’d assumed he’d expect to be waited on hand and foot.
“Rachel,” he started as he towel-dried the plate. “I know you think I’m using you to get to Amy. Yeah, I’d like another shot with her, but I know that’s not going to happen—at least for a while. The last thing I want from you is help on that front. I just want to get my grades up. I wasn’t kidding about her not knowing about this tutor thing.”
I placed my hands on the top of the kitchen island, afraid a confrontation so soon after the little kick-the-day-off-meltdown would have them shaking. The cool tiles with their mortar ridges felt solid beneath my hands. Real. Centering.
“I’m still not—”
“Okay, how about this?” He leaned against the counter and crossed his arms over his chest. “You agree to meet me a couple times this week and we’ll see how it goes. Check me out. And I can see if you’re even worth arguing about this with.”
Leave it to Chris to turn asking for a favor into a test drive. And an insult.
It seemed fair—an easy way out. I could just say I wasn’t comfortable…which I wasn’t. It sounded like he’d be more willing to hear that after this whole test-week thing blew up. Which, I mean, only a cocky jock would need to see evidence of how bad an idea this was. And maybe that would be just enough time for me to get a better math foundation.
“Fine. But not this morning. I have somewhere I need to be.”
He pushed off the counter and moved toward me so just the island separated us.
“Are you going to Ben’s?”
How does he know this stuff?
“Why?”
He shot that grin at me, the one I was pretty sure typically got him whatever he wanted.
“Because he called me this morning and I could use a ride.”
I closed my eyes for a second. I’m not sure I could do a drive with just us in the car. My fingers crept down at my side, measuring my skirt, judging where it fell and where it would when I sat down. When I had to shift gears.
Secret Life (RVHS Secrets) Page 5