by Cecily Wolfe
Now Cass had to sit through a morning of unwelcome attention, as students gathered in the bleachers of the gym, most of them happy to get out of class. She couldn’t hold that against them, not when they didn’t know what it felt like to lose their best friend. She was too tired to be angry.
If she could just get some sleep . . . she thought of Sarah sleeping in the hammock, her breaths even and restful, and resolved to ask Sarah if she dreamt. If she dreamt about Kayla, about finding her sooner, like she had the past two nights. She hadn’t slept so much as dozed, and wondered that she was able to dream. Didn’t that only happen when you were deep in sleep, some kind of layer of consciousness where your mind was able to make dreams come?
“Hey.”
It was a voice and a face she didn’t recognize, but the tone and expression were non-threatening, so she responded with the same. The girl, who seemed younger than Cass and a little nervous, held her hands tightly clasped and her lips moving without sound after the initial word, as if she wasn’t sure what to say.
Cass waited for a few moments, then turned away to find a corner under the bleachers where she could hide. Maybe they would look for her, try to single her out. She was not going to let that happen.
“Wait, please.”
The girl made a feeble attempt to touch Cass’s arm, brushing it with fingertips so lightly Cass barely felt them. She looked back.
“My cousin,” the girl said, and swallowed as if there was something in her mouth she couldn’t get out, as if it hurt to speak.
“An overdose, too. She had only used a couple of times before, but there was something strong, something new, in the last one.”
What was she talking about?
“The cops said it’s everywhere, this stuff. She wasn’t even an addict, though, she didn’t have a problem.”
Cass didn’t say a word. She stared at the girl’s lips as she continued to talk, now that she had broken through some sort of initial fear.
“Your friend didn’t either, did she? It was her first time, right?”
Now that the girl had brought Kay into it, Cass became wary. Was she looking for details to gossip about? Or was there really a cousin, and what was this new stuff she was talking about? The girl shook her head and took a deep breath.
“It’s everywhere, like I said. They can’t stop it.”
That didn’t make sense. If they found the drug dealer who was behind the dose Kay had, he would be stopped. There were more out there, of course, but didn’t locking one of them up help? Cass wanted to walk away, but she couldn’t. What would Kay want her to do? Listen to this girl, who wasn’t saying anything that really helped, or hide somewhere and avoid this whole day of drama?
“What are you talking about?”
The girl smiled then, a sigh revealing her relief.
“I can show you, there’s a Facebook group and a website, and lots of people with family and friends who are gone because of it.”
“Uh, I don’t do that stuff, all that group stuff. Just tell me what you want, why you’re talking to me.”
The smile faded and the girl shrugged.
“I just wanted you to know. Your friend isn’t the only one, so if you need someone to talk to, or just, if you want to read some of the posts online, there’s a lot of us. Unfortunately.”
“Yeah, well, I don’t talk. Thanks, though, I think. I just need this bullshit here to stop.”
The girl, her dark honey-toned skin shining in the glare of the overhead fluorescent light, glanced around at the kids crowded together, talking and laughing as they continued to push their way up the steps on the bleachers, sitting in rows where flashes of color and waving hands looked like something out of a yearbook picture.
“No one did this for my cousin. Shit goes down at his school all the time, no one gets special treatment for dying, gang banging, getting pregnant. Same old, same old there.”
She didn’t look resentful as she said it, but Cass wondered how she couldn’t be. As much as she didn’t want to be a part of this, she knew that some of what was happening was about honoring Kayla, aside from opportunity for kids to ditch class for counseling when they didn’t need it.
Hell, she thought, maybe some of them did. Just about everybody knew Kay, so she and Sarah might not be the only ones missing her enough for it to disrupt their lives. How could any school not notice or care if their students were dying?
“I’m sorry,” she offered, and she meant it. The girl returned her focus to her and nodded.
“Me, too, Cassidy. Can I give you my number?”
Cass tugged her phone from her back pocket, her breath catching as she did so. Would she think of the time it took for her to get her phone in her hands and dial 9-1-1 that night every time she did this?
She gave the phone to the girl, who tapped in her number quickly and handed it back.
“Let me know if you want the sites, or just to talk. We don’t have to be friends or anything, just . . . it’s hard to be alone with this, so I wanted you to know that you don’t have to be.”
She walked away and out of the gym, just as a new group of kids showed their faces in the open doorway.
The restroom was an obvious place to hide, but she didn’t have a lot of time to think of anywhere else she could duck into before any teachers saw her. There was the old gym, where all the duct-taped wrestling mats stood stacked against the walls; it was the most popular place to hang out while ditching class.
So many places to hide that even the usual hall monitors might be tricked into thinking that there was no one in the room when there were couples making out or kids who were sleeping tucked in a corner. Unfortunately, it was on the other side of the school building, so not an option. Cass stepped into one of the empty stalls and leaned against the wall, her head resting on the cool tile.
She could hear the buzz of voices, the hum of the microphone as someone turned it on, and the slow decline in volume as the cacophony came to a halt. The principal was speaking but the words were unclear, and Cass didn’t want to hear them anyway. She pulled her iPod from her purse and began to unwind the earbud cord from the device.
“Cassidy? Are you in here?”
Damn.
“They’re looking for you. Just so you know.”
Whoever it was hadn’t come into the restroom but had called in the open doorway, but Cass wasn’t going to look or open the stall door anyway. The girl was gone now, and she could hear her footsteps echo and she continued down the hall, back towards the gym.
Who was looking for her? Probably the guidance counselor, or someone who wanted to put her in the spotlight for this little performance. As much as Kayla loved being a leader and competing, she would have hated this kind of attention. It was like getting an award for making a huge mistake and dying because of it. Cass sighed, but she felt herself almost laugh at that, which is exactly what Kay would have said.
Whatever was going on in there wasn’t about Kay, it was about everyone else, about the adults who worried about drug use, about the school’s, and the town’s, reputation, about the soccer team’s performance without Kay. Kayla hadn’t been able to play for months but everyone had been counting on her to return this year for her final season, to lead the team back to a state championship.
Months of physical therapy after surgery was supposed to bring her back up to speed, but Cass and Sarah knew that it wasn’t going to happen, and that Kay didn’t know how to handle it. Paul hadn’t been in school, and no one was talking about him.
Cass thought that maybe she and Sarah should stop by and see what was going on, but seeing Paul without Kay was like . . . there were no good analogies that didn’t sound stupid or overused. It just didn’t make sense to see him without her, although the reverse wasn’t true. He had some kind of a train wreck of a parental situation himself, so nothing good was going on with him, she was sure.
Kay would have wanted her to check on him, she knew, and she felt like she had let Kay down fo
r waiting so long.
“Sorry, just trying to keep my own shit together, you know?”
Talking to a dead friend and hiding in the restroom with an iPod full of Metallica. Cass supposed that this was how she was going to spend the rest of her senior year of high school.
Day Twelve
Thursday
“I hate all these letters from colleges. They just keep coming, like she was still here.”
Mia called Sarah just before Cass pulled into her driveway.
“That is lousy. Just to see them, with her name on the envelopes - that has to be hard. Hey, Cass is here, I’ll put you on speaker, okay?”
Mia agreed, and Sarah explained to Cass that it was Mia.
“Hey, kiddo. How’s school going?”
Mia didn’t respond right away, and Sarah and Cass looked at each other during her hesitation.
“Do I have to go back to that place and throw my weight around?”
Sarah’s lips twitched but she didn’t quite smile. So far, Sarah had been the one throwing her weight around this school year. Better late than never, she thought, and wondered where that had come from. Sure, she had been annoyed by others many times in the past but never imagined that she would want or need to actually hit any of them.
Name-calling, sure. But physical force? It just never seemed necessary. Did it feel necessary now? She supposed her three day suspension from school spoke to that.
“No, it’s just weird. Everyone is really careful around me, like they don’t want to upset me. They’re nice, but, it’s weird.”
Sarah and Cass looked at each other. Cass understood what she meant, because she was getting the same treatment, but more of avoidance. Sarah’s experience, of course, had been completely different. Cass thought about the girl who had approached her before the assembly.
She didn’t even know her name. Her phone number was listed in her contacts now, but Cass didn’t know what name was attached to it, and hadn’t looked. Obviously she would notice a different name when she did look, but she hadn’t really thought about it. Kay hadn’t been a user, which was different from the girl’s experience with her cousin.
What the girl had said, though, about the other school, and everything that went on that no one seemed to care about. How could people not care if kids were dying, and if they weren’t dying, getting into all kinds of trouble that wouldn’t lead to anything good?
“Cass?”
Sarah had been watching her, and she must have said something that needed a response, but Cass wasn’t paying attention.
“Sorry, just thinking of something someone said yesterday.”
Mia started talking, her voice high and reedy as if she was afraid.
“One of my teachers asked if there was going to be a service for her, but there already was one, right? I mean, the funeral.”
She waited only a few seconds before continuing.
“Stephanie was over and told Mom and Dad that the team wanted to let balloons go or something like that. What is she talking about? Wouldn’t that be bad, like if balloons got into the ocean and animals ate them?”
Oh my God, Cass caught her breath as she watched Sarah’s similar reaction. Mia sounded just like Kay, who had been livid over a video they all had watched in science class during middle school about pollution and the environment.
They all thought it was sad, the sick and dead animals on beaches or floating in the water, plastic bags and other items clearly visible as the cause of their demise, but Kay had gone on a tirade and insisted that everyone be careful to dispose of their trash properly so no animals would die.
“You’re right, and if those girls knew your sister at all, they wouldn’t even suggest that. I guess they just want to do something in memory of her.”
They were all quiet for a few moments, then Mia continued.
“Mom is calling for me. I guess I better go.”
“Okay, we’ll talk again soon.”
“Hey,” Mia’s voice became small, almost pleading. “Can you guys come over sometime, or can we do something?”
Sarah nodded as Cass answered for both of them.
“Sure, of course.”
They were quiet again before Mia sniffled, a small sound that sounded loud through the phone, like a cry in the dark.
“I miss her.”
Cass and Sarah had agreed to check on Paul that afternoon, but after talking to Mia, they both needed a break. A break from what, exactly, Cass wondered, as she watched Sarah stare out of her bedroom window.
Was there going to be a break from missing Kay, ever? What did it mean for her to wish for one?
“I called him but of course he didn’t answer, and his voice mail was full. It’s not that I don’t care about him, but . . .”
Sarah knew what Cass meant. They both knew that Kay loved Paul, and there were a lot of good things about him. He adored her, but he was too serious. There was a part of Kay, they knew, that loved the attention, along with the boy they had all known since they were in elementary school, but his intensity was a little scary, and Kay’s efforts to get him to relax and leave the future to its own devices hadn’t been very successful.
“He’s just too much sometimes.”
“Or all the time,” Cass raised her eyebrows and shook her head.
“Still, she’d want us to see what’s going on with him, and since his parents showed up at my house asking my dad for advice, well . . .”
They both assumed that Paul was in counseling, and that was why he hadn’t been to school. Of course he would take Kay’s death hard, but didn’t it hurt them, too?
If Sarah hadn’t been suspended, she would be in school with Cass, so why couldn’t he be there, Cass wondered, and considered that maybe she was being mean.
“I know everyone deals with grief in different ways, and maybe if they hadn’t been so close . . .”
Of course Sarah knew much more about it than Cass did, and Cass didn’t want her to think that she resented Paul’s selfishness (was that what it was?) when she and Sarah hadn’t just hidden away like she knew they both wanted to most of the time.
Hadn’t Sarah’s father done the same thing when her mother died, and if Cass said anything against Paul’s behavior, would Sarah take it as an insult to him?
“It’s different, Cass. My parents knew each other for so long, and were married and had me, and Paul and Kayla . . . I’m not saying he doesn’t have the right to be sad, just like we do, but I think his sadness is different. Does that make sense?”
Sarah had nearly read her mind, but Cass could honestly say that yes, what she said made sense, while she was a little freaked out that Sarah had known where her thoughts were wandering.
“Let’s just go, and get it over with. I’ve been thinking about the pool all day, and it was so hot, it looked like the plants in the biology lab were wilting.”
The weather was at the turning point in the season where it was cool and damp in the morning, and grew humid throughout the day, but chilled enough in the evening for Sarah’s father to turn on their gas fireplace.
They could swim after visiting Paul, then huddle in front of the flames, and neither would have to say a word, especially about the missing figure that would have made the two of them a trio, as she had nearly all their lives.
When Danny pulled into his driveway after football practice, two police cars were already there. He didn’t know if his father was home, but his mother probably was, and he hoped she wasn’t talking to anyone if his dad wasn’t there. His dad had told them all to lawyer up since they hadn’t done anything wrong, at least according to Danny’s father. The way Danny’s brother had been acting, he wasn’t so sure.