The Way Back to You

by Michelle Andreani

  But another reason is because I’m hoping this stray animal somehow is Ashlyn.

  Which is why I still haven’t admitted to anyone that I did this. Not Matty. Not my dad. Not Cloudy—even after she flat-out asked why I was buying cat food twenty minutes ago.

  Cloudy Marlowe is the one person I could have shared my thoughts with that this kitten might be (but probably isn’t) Ashlyn. Because, of anyone, Cloudy would understand completely why I’d want it to be true. The fact that she went out of her way to talk to me the day after I brought this kitten home is a major coincidence.

  Almost a year ago, Cloudy broke up with my cousin. At the time, I thought it was my fault, but it turned out to be a huge misunderstanding all around. Unfortunately, I made the mistake of trying to talk to her about it afterward. She went off on me for butting in and said, basically, she’d tolerate my presence moving forward for Ashlyn’s sake, but that was it. Even after Ashlyn died, even after Cloudy and Matty temporarily got back together, Cloudy didn’t go out of her way to have any real conversations with me. Not until today.

  The kitten stretches herself to be as long as possible while I unfold the panda Pillow Pet. This was an idea I got from Matty. He has a puppy-shaped one for his cat to sleep on, which is his big statement about what a badass he thinks Hercules is. (“Dude, he sleeps on top of a dog!”)

  I pat the pillow a few times to entice her to sit. She isn’t interested, though. Instead, she tiptoes over to her food and water dishes (which happen to be as far from her litter box as possible), in the exact spot where my shoes were until I chucked them all under the bed last night.

  The always-embarrassing clip from the song Matty set on my phone as his personal ring and text tone starts playing (“I don’t want anybody else / When I think about you, I touch myself”), and I check his text: Everyone’s here but YOU. Am I going to have to drag you from that house? Haha!

  I send back: Haha

  Of course, it isn’t an answer to his question and it isn’t going to get me out of anything.

  Now that I’ve seen the cat is okay, I should take off. I was supposed to meet everyone fifteen minutes ago at the bowling alley for pizza, pool, and darts. (But no bowling. Go figure.) I still have my coat and shoes on. Keys and phone are in my pocket. I’m set. I just need to walk out of this room, drive back to town, and do the thing I said I’d do.

  I stand up, leaving the closet door open so the kitten can wander around my room if she wants to. “I’ll be back later.”

  But as I’m reaching for the doorknob, I imagine the conversations I’ll be forced to have with the guys about girls they’re hooking up with, midwinter break plans, the upcoming baseball season, and whatever else. Then I glance back at my bed and picture myself sprawling across it listening to music.

  Even though I should feel like a jerk for this, I breathe easier as I toss my coat on the chair, kick my shoes off, and get started on making my second vision a reality.

  HELPING ANIMALS WAS probably Ashlyn’s favorite thing. I’d known from the beginning, but it really hit home when she showed up at my door last January with a sewing machine and a bag of fabric.

  “What’s this for?” I asked as I helped her lug it inside.

  “Koala mittens,” she told me. “There’s an animal hospital in Australia taking care of koala bears that got severe burns on their paws in brush fires. They’re asking people to sew these little cotton coverings to slide over the wound dressings. You want to help?”

  “Okay.”

  We settled in next to each other at my kitchen table, and she handed me the pattern: basically a five-by-six-inch rectangle, but it was curved across the top like a cartoon gravestone. I traced and cut out red plaid while she threaded her machine.

  Being around Ashlyn at that time was exciting and weird. She’d invited me to Winter Formal, and we’d started holding hands at school and kissing good-bye, but she wasn’t officially my girlfriend. We still barely knew each other. (She and Matty had lived next door to each other for years, but my summer visits had somehow always matched up with the times she was away at camp or on family vacations.)

  “How’d your cat hunt go this morning?” I asked Ashlyn.

  Since she volunteered a few days a month for the Bend Spay and Neuter Project, it was a guaranteed icebreaker topic.

  “Really good! Except I found out one of the females from last weekend had already been spayed. They noticed the scars right before surgery. If she’d been ear tipped, we’d have known without having to bring her in. Oh, well.”

  I wasn’t sure what to say, so I simply nodded. Before I’d started hanging out with her, I had no clue there was a system in place for trapping (humanely, she always emphasized) feral cats, taking them in for spaying/neutering and vaccinations, and setting them loose again. I also had no clue that veterinarians cut the tip of one ear so people could spot these feral cats easily.

  I slid both pieces of one soon-to-be mitten to Ashlyn, which she lined up and pinned together. “I wanted to tell you,” she said, “the reason I’m late is because I picked up the sweetest little Pomeranian on my way. She was prancing down Greenwood, so I pulled over, coaxed her into my car with treats, and drove to the address on her tag. Her name was Charisma and she was out of her mind with joy when her owners opened the door.”

  Chuckling, I shook my head.

  “What’s funny? Her name? I think it’s perfect.”

  “Oh, no. I wasn’t making fun of it. I’m just comparing our days. You helped homeless cats, retrieved a lost Pomeranian, and now you’re sewing for injured koalas. Guess what I did? Went snowboarding and ate three quarters of a pizza. I mean, really. What could you possibly see in someone this lazy?”

  After the words were out, I wished Matty had been there to cut me off midsentence and drag me from the room. Sometimes, he was all I had to save me from my pathetic self. It had been on my mind a lot, though: Why does Ashlyn like me? We didn’t have much in common and there were cooler guys she could have picked. I couldn’t help wondering whether she somehow saw me as another stray who needed her help.

  She smiled. “There’s nothing wrong with snowboarding. And you’re not lazy. You’re constantly working out and training for baseball season. That takes up a lot of time.”

  “Me playing ball isn’t changing anyone’s world, though.”

  “Not true. It’s changing mine.”

  “In what way?”

  “In the way that”—she leaned over, almost whispering—“I can’t wait to see how good your butt looks in a uniform.”

  “What?”

  She burst out with that wild laugh of hers, and then clamped her hand over her mouth. “I didn’t mean to blurt that out. I’m allowed to be shallow, though, right?”

  “Sure.” Suddenly feeling so much better about us, I scooted my chair closer to hers. “So what are you saying exactly? I’m just a piece of meat to you?”

  “Kyle Ryan, I’m a vegetarian.” She leaned in and kissed my cheek. “You’re more like a seitan and pineapple shish kebab to me.”

  I’M ON MY back with my arm slung over my face as symbols of light migrate through grayness behind my eyelids. The overhead light is causing this distracting effect, but I haven’t turned it off because I’m not sure I want to commit to being in bed instead of just on it at six o’clock on a Friday night.

  Dad and I already got our conversation through my door over with before I cranked up the music. Matty stopped texting me probably an hour ago, so I’m not expecting it when my door bangs open and Matty calls out, “Time to join the living!”

  My heart leaps and I move my arm for a better view of the closet. The kitten isn’t visible at the moment. I remain silent while trying to recover my calm, hoping she won’t make an appearance before I can get rid of Matty.

  “All right. Tyrell’s waiting in the driveway.” He claps his hands together. “Let’s go, K.O.!”

  (K and O are my first and last initials. They’ve also been used as my baseball
nickname since I was a kid. It’s K.O. as in “Knock Out,” as in “Knock it Out of the park.”)

  I don’t move to get up. Even with Matty here to coerce me, I’m not feeling it. I breathe deeply and exhale slowly, trying to get lost in the music again.

  “St. Peter’s Cathedral” by Death Cab for Cutie has been on repeat the entire time I’ve been lying here, and Ben Gibbard is once again singing, “When our hearts stop ticking, this is the end. And there’s nothing past this.”

  “Hang on.” Matty leans his head close to the speaker on my nightstand. “What did you just say?”

  Ben responds in the song, like Matty had known he would. “There’s nothing past this.”

  “Can you repeat that?” Matty cups his hand around his ear.

  “There’s nothing past this.”

  “Still not getting it. One more time?”

  “There’s nothing past this.”

  “So what you’re saying is”—Matty stands straight and belts out the next line—“there’s nothing paaaaaast thiiiiis.”

  The phrase keeps repeating through my speakers. It’s soothing, which is why I haven’t been able to stop listening to it. Some days (like every day this week), it’s the only thing that makes me feel (sort of) okay.

  “I know you’re all about the atheist anthems these days,” Matty says, “but this shit’s going to make you kill yourself. And if you kill yourself, I’m going to have to kill myself. Then your dad will. And my dad. My mom will be so pissed, she’ll kill herself so she can come kick all our asses in the afterlife.”

  “There is no afterlife,” I mumble.

  I’m pretty sure he doesn’t hear me, which is fine because I can’t change his mind. I don’t even want to. There have been so many times since losing Ashlyn when I’ve wished I could believe in something big the way Matty does. The way the vast majority of the population does. Having that certainty seems so much easier.

  Matty strides to my desk and turns the music off. At this moment, it’s the worst thing he could have done to me. In a cheerful tone, he says, “I’m telling you. You’ve got to stop with this music. Because only you can prevent the Ocie suicides.”

  Does he honestly think he’s being funny?

  “Fuck off, Matty.”

  “Hell, yeah.” He climbs on the bed and bounces by my feet. “That’s the spirit. Cussing is a good sign. A great sign. Give me some more. How about an ‘asshole’? Or a ‘cocksucker’? Let’s hear it! You do have something to live for.”

  Pushing myself up onto my elbows, I shout, “Enough with the suicide jokes, you fucking asshole cocksucker!”

  The movement at the end of my mattress halts. He asked for it, but by his wounded expression, it wasn’t what he’d expected. “You’re right. I shouldn’t have said that. I was just—”

  “Just get out already!”

  His mouth moves a few times, making no sound, until he’s finally able to burst out with, “I’ve been texting you for, like, an hour! You couldn’t be bothered to tell me you were bailing on me again?”

  “You couldn’t be bothered to take a hint?”

  He glares at me. “No! Not with how much you’ve been freaking me out lately. You keep disappearing. I’m always covering for you and I don’t know why. It clearly isn’t helping. The season hasn’t even started and you’re already stressing the coaches out.”

  “I don’t care,” I lie.

  “Well, you should.” Matty’s voice is getting fiercer by the second. “You’re the best player on our team. If your head isn’t in it right now, how do you expect—”

  “I don’t care about any of this crap.”

  Another lie. It isn’t as if I suddenly hate baseball. I just can’t handle the pressure of everyone counting on me when I can’t count on myself.

  Matty jumps to his feet. “Since when did it become ‘this crap’?”

  “Since . . . I don’t know! But I’ve decided not to play this year.” Matty is staring down at me with his mouth open wide, but it’s a relief, finally having said the words aloud. “I’m done,” I add.

  “Are you kidding me with this? I mean, what are you even saying? It’s like you’re speaking in tongues.”

  “Whatever that means.”

  Just then, my dad pokes his head in. “Hey, what’s going on?”

  I shoot Matty a warning look. Based on his reaction, I don’t want to have this discussion with both of them at the same time. “It’s nothing, Dad.”

  “Right.” Matty stares straight back at me. “Nothing other than the fact that Kyle is quitting baseball.”

  So much for him “always covering” for me.

  “What?” Dad’s expression matches Matty’s from a few seconds ago.

  I’ve put off making this decision forever. Still, I’m surprised they’re this surprised. Baseball is a spring sport, but training is a year-round expectation. During the past several months, I’ve skipped almost as many sessions as I’ve attended. The coach wasn’t getting on my case yesterday for being too committed.

  Dad makes his way into the room. He moves my jacket to sit on my chair, while Matty remains standing at the foot of my bed.

  “Kyle, what’s going on?” Dad asks.

  “I’m not quitting anything. I’m just not trying out for the team this year.”

  Matty says, “You started playing T-ball when you were, what? Four years old?”

  “So?”

  “So, not trying out after thirteen years—after making fricken MVP as a fricken sophomore last year? That’s exactly what I call quitting. Don’t you want to play in college?”

  I shrug. “Maybe not.”

  “What are you going to do, then? Stare at your ceiling and listen to this god-awful music? Because that’s a useful way to spend your life.”

  “Matt,” Dad cuts in, “you should let Kyle and me talk, okay?”

  “Good luck with that,” Matty says, scowling.

  In a flash, he’s out of the room, his shoes pounding down the stairs.

  Ten seconds later, the front door slams and Dad lets out a loud breath. “That was a first.”

  He’s right. It isn’t like Matty to get pissed off and aggressive toward me (or anyone). Of course, I don’t blow up at him, either. We’re both off right now—all because I’m not Back to Normal Kyle.

  “I don’t know where this not-playing-baseball thing is coming from,” Dad says, “but Matt did make a good point. You need something to focus on. Something other than . . . what happened. We’ve all been waiting it out, thinking baseball season would be the thing to get you on track. You used to be busy all the time. You always had somewhere to go, something to do, people to spend time with.”

  I hate Back to Normal Kyle for being so out of reach.

  It’s true; I was never alone last school year. I hung out with Matty, along with different combinations of his friends. Being his cousin meant I was instantly more popular after I moved to Bend two summers ago than I was for the entire fifteen years that I lived in Arizona. Then Ashlyn and I got together and, aside from her out-of-town cheer camps in July and August, being with her was a huge part of my daily routine, too. When she died a few days after school started, I stayed home for the next two weeks. I full-on sobbed at least once a day for three months. I didn’t want to be around people who didn’t get it, people who were telling me they’d “see” her again someday when I was sure I wouldn’t. And that meant I didn’t want to be around anyone.

  Everyone thinks I changed because I can’t get over Ashlyn. But I know that even if she were to come back somehow, I’ll never be who I was before. I can’t unexperience the shock of having her ripped from my life.

  Dad goes on. “If you don’t want to play anymore, I won’t force you. This is a big deal and it deserves serious consideration, though. It can’t be a hasty decision you made because you’re pissed at Matt.”

  “It isn’t about him. It isn’t about anyone.”

  But really, it is about him. It’s about everyon
e.

  “All right. If it turns out this is what you really want, you need a plan for what you’re going to do instead.”

  Dad’s a dentist (he shares a practice with Matty’s dad, his fraternal twin brother), and he’s very big on plans. Pretty much the only unplanned things he ever did in his life were getting my mother pregnant and, later, divorcing her.

  “Staring at the ceiling can’t be my plan?” I ask.

  “Probably not,” he says with a small smile. “I’ve been thinking. How do you feel about talking to a counselor now?”

  I sit up taller against my pillow. “Dad, not this again. No matter what Matty says, I’m not suicidal. Okay? I’m not.”

  “I didn’t say you were. But I know you’ve been having a hard time, which is understandable. Now you’re saying you don’t want to be involved in the thing you’ve always loved most. And since you haven’t been talking to anyone about it—”

  “We’re talking now, aren’t we?”

  “—maybe a professional can help you in ways I can’t.” He stares at the floor. “Sometimes it’s good to sit down with someone who doesn’t know you, who can give an outside perspective.”

  Since Ashlyn’s death, I’ve been thinking a lot more about my mother (who for sure is in the category of Someone Who Doesn’t Know Me), and wondering if she’d be better than Dad at helping me get through this. During conversations like this one, it’s hard to imagine she’d be worse.

  “Your aunt Robin recommended a therapist,” Dad says. “We can try to get you in while you’re off from school. I think it will be good for you.”

  “No. Look, I’ll leave the house, okay? I’m going snowboarding tomorrow. I’ll find something to do every single day of the week, if that’s what it’s going to take to make you happy.”

  “This isn’t about making me happy. You know that, right?” I don’t answer, so Dad speaks in a rush. “I’ll call on Monday for an appointment. And I’ll even go with you if you want. Unless it will be easier if I don’t go?”