What You Left Behind

by Jessica Verdi

  Alan introduced me to Aimee Nam as his girlfriend, and I was genuinely happy for him.

  Ms. Genovese pulled me aside after AP U.S. history to thank me for participating in class more this week and to tell me if I keep up the good work, she doesn’t see any reason why I wouldn’t get a five on the AP exam at the end of the year.

  My mom told me it’s great to see me smiling again. And she had the hugest smile on her face when she said it.

  I know it sounds crazy, but Hope hasn’t been crying as much. She finally has one full tooth, right in the front, so maybe it’s not hurting so much anymore? Whatever the reason, she’s let me hold her a couple of times without putting up a fuss. And her little chubby fingers have been reaching toward my face more than they used to, like she’s trying to tell me she wants me around.

  I’ve been feeling good. Sturdy. Which is saying a lot. So of course I let my guard down.

  Seriously, how is it that I’ve waded this far through waist-high shit and still haven’t learned there’s no such thing as a happy ending?

  Chapter 27

  Friday afternoon, I pick up Hope at day care and go straight home to rest before I have to be back on the field for the biggest game of my life. Coach confirmed the UCLA recruiter is in fact in town to watch me play, so all I have to do is put up a good showing—hopefully as good as last week’s—and I’ll be golden.

  I actually manage to get in a half-hour nap, thanks to Hope’s new cooperative attitude. I get up when my alarm goes off at five-fifteen, change Hope’s diaper, and head into the kitchen to make her a bottle. Mom’s there, stirring sauce into a pot of pasta.

  “What’s this?” I ask, swapping the baby for a bowl. She slides the baby harness over her chest and lowers Hope into it. “I thought you’d still be working.”

  “I cut out early today. Thought you might want to fuel up on carbs before the big game.” She starts mixing some baby formula, and I plop into a kitchen chair.

  I take a bite. God, I was really hungry. I take another. “Thanks, Mama,” I say through a mouthful of food. “But I thought you didn’t want me to go to UCLA anymore.”

  “It’s not a matter of whether I want you to go or not, bud.” She kisses Hope’s little baby nose, and Hope giggles and squeals and waves her arms and legs around. “It’s more complicated now. But that doesn’t mean I don’t want you to impress the pants off that recruiter.”

  “Mom. Gross.”

  She laughs. “You know what I mean.”

  “Yeah.” I finish off the contents of the bowl and chug a bottle of water. “I gotta go. Have to be at school by six.”

  Mom nods. “Hey, I wanted to ask you if it’s okay if I bring Declan tonight.”

  “Who the hell is Declan?”

  “My boyfriend.” She grabs Hope’s hand and waltzes around the tiny kitchen.

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa. First of all, since when is he your boyfriend?” Mom getting a boyfriend? Alan getting a girlfriend? The world is a strange and remarkable place. “Second of all, his name is Declan? What the hell kind of a name is that?”

  “It’s Irish, you doofus. What the hell kind of a name is Ryden?”

  Good point. “A weird-ass name my weird-ass mother made up.”

  She sticks her tongue out at me. “And he hasn’t been my boyfriend for very long, but I think he will be. And I want you to meet him.”

  I raise an eyebrow. “He knows about me?”

  Mom rolls her eyes. “Obviously he knows about you if he’s coming to your game tonight.”

  “And he knows about Hope?”

  “He knows about Hope.”

  “And he’s okay with it?”

  Mom looks me dead in the eye. “I wouldn’t be with someone who wasn’t.”

  “All right, then I guess it’s okay if he comes. Game starts at seven. You should get there early to get good seats.”

  “Thanks, bud. Is your, um, friend coming tonight too?”

  “My, um, friend?”

  Mom’s suddenly super occupied with smoothing Hope’s hair. Which is ridiculous, because her hair sticks up every which way no matter what. “The girl from work you’ve been spending time with.”

  I clear my throat. “Her name is Joni.”

  “Joni,” Mom repeats, nodding.

  “She has to work tonight, so no, she’s not coming.” That’s true, though Joni wanted to switch her schedule so she could make the game. I told her not to, that I’d be too nervous with her there, that I’d call her after to let her know how it went. Which was code for, “No, don’t come, ’cause if you do, you’ll talk to my friends and find out everything I’ve been hiding from you, and that would be very, very bad.”

  “Bummer,” Mom says.

  “Yeah.” It is a bummer. I would have liked Joni to be there. I always played better when I knew Meg was in the stands, watching. Oh well.

  “Has she met Hope yet?”

  “No.”

  “You going to bring her around here? She’s welcome anytime, you know.”

  “I know.” I nod. “Well, see you at the game. Love you.”

  “Love you too. Have fun.”

  • • •

  On the drive to school, my phone keeps ringing, but it’s in my gym bag in the backseat, so I ignore it. I pull into the parking lot and am getting my gear out of the car when I hear someone call my name. Alan sprints toward me from the school’s entrance, waving his arms.

  “Jesus, man. What’s wrong?” I ask as he reaches me. I sling my bag over my shoulder and start toward the locker room entrance on the side of the school.

  “Ryden,” he says, gasping a little but keeping stride with me. Poor guy needs to get more exercise. He sounds like my grandpa. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you. I called you, like, ten times.”

  “I was home, dude.”

  “I thought you had a game tonight.”

  “I do. Hence me being here now. What’s wrong with you?”

  “I found something,” he says.

  I stop. Only now do I notice the expression on his face—he looks kinda freaked out. “What? What did you find?”

  He reaches into his backpack and pulls out a notebook. Purple. Single subject. Pristine. There’s a folded piece of paper taped to the cover.

  Alan holds it out to me, but I can’t take it. I can’t seem to move at all. “What. Is. That.”

  “It’s exactly what you think it is. Well, not exactly. It’s different from the others. But it’s definitely Meg’s.”

  “But we looked everywhere!” I hate that my voice sounds frantic, but that’s pretty much how I’m feeling. I’ve barely thought about the journals this week. Why did it have to appear now, when life was finally starting to make sense? When I finally stopped looking back and started looking forward? “Where did you find it?”

  “It was in my old camping backpack, in the back of my closet. I was looking for a bag to bring to the game. Aimee’s into sports, so I was going to pack us some snacks and hot chocolate and stuff and come with her tonight—” He stops when he realizes I don’t give a shit about his romantic picnic with his girlfriend. “Anyway, this was in the bag.”

  “Did you read it?”

  A pause. “Yes. But if I had known what it said, I never would have—”

  “Does it have a checklist in the back?”

  Alan thrusts the book toward me again. “Just take it, Ryden.”

  I still can’t move my arm. I feel cold and hot and sick and sad and nervous and so, so mixed up. I don’t trust my own eyes. It’s easier to hear it from him. “Alan. Please. Does it have a checklist in the back?”

  He nods once. “Yes.”

  I suck in a breath. “What’s checked off?”

  “Mabel and Alan.”

  I fucking knew it. Those two were sooooo sure the other journals did
n’t exist. But I knew Meg. I know Meg.

  “Ryden…” Alan says, starting to look a little uncomfortable. “Please, take it. There are things in there…I’m sorry, man.”

  What? He’s sorry? What does that mean?

  I don’t move, and he drops the book. It lands with a soft thud at my feet. Then he walks away almost dejectedly, the opposite of the frenzy he was when he first arrived.

  When Alan’s gone, my body starts to work again. I crouch and pick up the book, opening the note stuck to the cover.

  Alan,

  If you find this before Ryden has read the first journal, please don’t give it to him. Only let him see this if he’s already looking for it. You’ll know what that means when the time comes.

  Love always,

  Meg

  What the hell?

  I’m about to tear open the book, but the parking lot is filling up, and there are more and more people walking past as it gets closer to game time. “Hey, Number One! Kick some ass tonight!” one guy says as he passes. I nod numbly and go inside. The halls are quiet and dark; it’s a nice night out, so no one’s taking the shortcut through school on their way to the field. I turn a few corners until I’m deep in the middle of the school, away from the people and the locker room, and I sit on the floor next to a water fountain.

  I take a deep breath and flip quickly through the book. Sure enough,

  Mabel

  Alan

  Ryden

  is written on the inside back cover. What catches me off guard is that most of the book is blank. There are only a few pages with writing on them, right at the beginning. Maybe Meg really did run out of time before she could finish it.

  February 5.

  Ten days before she died.

  I’ve been thinking about calendars a lot lately. I used to fill them with school assignments and plans and college visits and application deadlines. Doctor appointments too. But now planning, dates, schedules mean nothing to me anymore. I only have two things left to do: give birth to my baby and die. And I think I can remember that easily enough. No need to write it down.

  Now that I don’t have many calendar boxes left to check off, I’m left wondering if the boxes I had were full enough. And every time, I come up with the same answer: yes.

  I haven’t written about this yet, maybe because I had to get to this point in order to look back clearly. Or maybe I didn’t want to risk anyone—Ryden especially—finding out while I was still healthy enough to get mad at. We’ve finally gotten back to us these last few months—no more fighting. It’s been really nice. But I’m out of time. I have to write it down, otherwise no one will ever know, and it will be like it never happened. And it did happen. And I don’t regret it one bit.

  So here goes:

  I got pregnant on purpose.

  I’m sorry, what? WHAT?!?

  There, I said it. Or wrote it. Whatever. Whoever’s reading this, please don’t hate me. Just listen. Or read, I guess.

  I didn’t even know if it would work, to be honest. I’d already done one round of chemo, and Dr. Maldonado said chemo can mess with your reproductive system. I wanted to try anyway. Because I knew when I got my diagnosis that I was going to die. Dr. Maldonado doesn’t sugarcoat this stuff. The cancer was advanced. It had spread. The odds were not good. Yes, there was a small amount of shrinkage after the first round of chemo, but not enough to matter. It’s my body, and I know it well. I’ve known from the beginning I was going to end up here, staring at an empty calendar. It sucks, but it’s the truth.

  I wanted to take the time I had and really do something with it. I wanted to make my life matter, to leave behind a legacy. And after Alan said I should “live my life” that day in his room, it all clicked. I’m not an artist or a filmmaker or even a very good writer, but there was something I could create that would be important and make a difference in the world. A baby. I could use what was left of my life to give life to someone else. Like magic. And I actually had a boyfriend for the first time in my life. An amazing boyfriend who I wanted to be with on every possible level. It couldn’t have been more perfect.

  So we did it. We had sex. And then we did it a few more times. We never used a condom, because as far as Ryden knew, I was on the pill, though I’ve never taken the pill in my life.

  Ryden would never talk to me again if he knew I got pregnant on purpose. He didn’t want to keep the baby. I hate that I’ve been lying to him, but I can’t lose him. I need him. I love him so much. And I love our baby so much, even though I haven’t met her yet.

  There are only three truly important things left in my life: My baby. Ryden. And the cancer. We’re all so intertwined that I can’t imagine any of them without the others.

  Because even before the pregnancy, even before Ryden and I were together, he was part of it.

  I liked him so much freshman and sophomore years that I couldn’t concentrate. I could barely sleep. I didn’t have an appetite. All I ever thought about was Ryden and how utterly convinced I was that we were meant to be together. Even when I started feeling really terrible midway through sophomore year with the fatigue, the unexplained bruising, the constant feeling that I couldn’t get enough air, Ryden was still the primary occupant of my thoughts.

  As this is the time for the truth, there’s something else I want to get out there, something else I’ve never told anyone: while I sat there in that oversized chair during my first chemotherapy treatment, shivering and sick, I wondered if maybe I would have picked up on the warning signs earlier if I hadn’t been so infatuated with Ryden. Turns out the symptoms of an unchecked melanoma that has metastasized to your liver, gallbladder, and kidneys are remarkably similar to those of lovelornness.

  Would things have been different if I hadn’t had a crush on him? Would I have noticed that the mole on my leg, the one that had been there as long as I could remember, had changed? Would I have gone to the doctor sooner? Would I be less sick now?

  I don’t have answers to these questions, and I never will.

  But I don’t care.

  I got to be with the guy I love, against all the odds. And he loves me too. And I get to take all that love and energy and joy and pass it on to my daughter. My legacy.

  Though I may not have many boxes left, the ones I have are pretty damn perfect.

  Chapter 28

  “Pretty damn perfect?!” I slam the book against the face of the locker across from me. The sound of my voice reverberates down the empty hallway. I thrust my hands through my hair, pulling hard, feeling the skin of my scalp tugging away from my skull, and let out the longest, loudest scream I can.

  Full sentences are beyond me right now. All I’ve got are words. Tiny phrases. Like my head is one giant keyword infographic.

  On purpose.

  Legacy.

  Love.

  Lying to him.

  Need.

  Perfect.

  Symptoms.

  Lovelornness.

  Blame.

  My fault.

  Her fault.

  On. Fucking. Purpose.

  Oh God oh God oh God. I pace the dark hall like a crazy person, raking my hands down my face over and over again, trying to make sense of all this.

  The funny thing is it makes sense. It makes perfect sense, actually. I can think clearly enough to know that if I weren’t me, if I were some random person watching the movie of my life, I would get it. The picture is clear now. But it’s not making the right kind of sense, the sense that’s been in my head for the past year.

  Here’s what I knew for certain: this whole mess was my fault.

  Here’s what I know now: Meg believed that too, but not in the way I thought. And not in a way that makes me feel any better at all. She was so obsessed with me sophomore year that she didn’t go to the doctor when she started getting sick? Her cancer got bad
just because I fucking existed? Are you fucking kidding me? Why would she ever write that? Why would she leave it in a journal for Alan to find? How cruel could she possibly be?

  I can’t believe I used to like knowing that Meg had a crush on me before we got together. That was the first secret I learned from her journal, the green one before the checklists. Now I wish I didn’t know any of it. I wish I’d never laid eyes on her notebooks.

  And the pregnancy, the one thing I knew I was to blame for—turns out it wasn’t my fault at all. Meg lied to me from day one. Used me, manipulated me, made me love her, let me fight for the abortion when she knew her decision all along, destroyed me just so she could leave something meaningful behind. Seriously, are you fucking kidding me?

  Well, guess what you left behind, Meg? Nothing but misery and pain and regret.

  I will hate you forever.

  Chapter 29

  My phone’s been going crazy. I sort of hear it ringing and beeping, but it’s far away, like I’ve got on noise-canceling headphones.

  It’s not until someone slams their hand on the driver’s side window of my car, right in my face, that the noise rushes in.

  I blink at Dave through the glass. Wait, how did I end up in my car? How much time has passed? It’s almost dark out now.

  He tries the door handle. It’s locked. “What are you doing? The game is about to start. You missed warm-up.”

  Oh shit. The game. The recruiter.

  I should fling open the car door, change into my uniform, and book it to the field with Dave. Maybe that’s what alternate-universe Ryden Brooks is doing right now. Or maybe he’s already there, warming up, because he never met Meg Reynolds in the first place. But all I do is slowly rest my head on the steering wheel.

  Why did I think the journals would actually contain good news? A cheat sheet of parenting tips? Really, Ryden? What the hell is wrong with you? You should have left well enough alone.

  Dave pounds on the window again. “Ryden! What the f!”

  Ha. Dave doesn’t curse. Forgot about that. It’s annoying. Sometimes a situation really calls for a shit goddamn fuck motherfucker, you know? Like right now, for example.