That Night

by Cecily Wolfe

  She smiled to herself as she tried not to spill sugar on a table as she refilled the jar. Kayla was the one who would have brought something like that up, a crack in the curriculum that needed fixed so no one would get hurt. Cass paused for a moment, because someone had been hurt. They all had.

  The bell over the door jingled and she called out, her back to the customer as she twisted the cap back on the jar and wiped the table with a wet rag.

  “I’ll be with you in a moment.”

  She turned around and found three girls, three of Kayla’s teammates, standing just inside the door as if they were afraid to come any closer. Cass thought it was a smart move on their part, after what she had done to Stephanie yesterday. She walked away from them and around the front counter to stand at the cash register, where she straightened her spine before speaking again.

  “How can I help you?”

  The girls weren’t wearing their green bows, nor were they in uniform. They must not have had practice today. It didn’t matter what the team did now, since her only connection to them was gone. They stumbled against each other like some sort of comedy act until one of them stepped up to the register. Cass watched her swallow before she spoke.

  “Hey, Cassidy. I know we’re not really friends,” she turned and looked at the other girls, who, as if on cue, moved to stand beside her. “But we don’t think what Stephanie did was right. We all know that Kayla didn’t use drugs, and we know she was having trouble with her knee, even after the surgery and therapy. We miss her too, and honestly, we’re so used to having her to go to, to advise us, to listen to us, and we’re kind of lost without her.”

  “We know it’s not the same as what you and Sarah are going through, but . . .”

  “We just wanted to say we’re sorry we let Stephanie do that fundraiser thing yesterday. I don’t think that anyone believes Kayla was an addict, not before yesterday or after, and it only made Stephanie, and all of us, look stupid. It’s hard, without Kayla. I don’t think we realized how much we counted on her.”

  “I did,” Cass said, her voice barely audible. “I always knew how much I counted on her.”

  The girls were quiet as they looked at each other, then down, and back to Cass. She shook her head as if dismissing them.

  “Thanks for this. Maybe in the future you shouldn’t follow someone like Stephanie. Or maybe you shouldn’t follow anyone.”

  She could tell that they were unsure how to respond to her statement, but before any of them could speak, the bell above the door rang again, and a group of little boys in soccer uniforms rushed in. The girls backed away as Cass turned her focus on the children, and after she took their order and looked up, noticed that they were gone.

  Day Twenty-Two

  Sunday

  “Going to Sarah’s isn’t a reward, Mom. We’re doing homework.”

  “By the pool, no doubt. No, you need to stay home. You’re being punished, and if you would think before you acted, you wouldn’t be suspended, and could spend most of your time over there, like you usually do.”

  Her parents were their usual understanding selves, and while Sarah could come to her house, Cass was sick of listening to her parents. She was tired of the sound of their voices, their reprimands, and their obvious disappointment in her. A suspension was a big deal, and while she had served a few detentions for minor infractions, a suspension might work against her when applying for the military or college, as her parents wanted her to do.

  College had never appealed to her; she wanted to jump in and start doing something as soon as she left the classroom, and while nursing would take more coursework, she would also be traveling, meeting people from all over the world, and doing meaningful work for people who needed her. She could never be who her parents wanted her to be, and she wasn’t even going to try.

  “I need to go see the recruiter while I’m off, so I’ll need the car sometime.”

  “While you’re off? Is that what you’re calling it, like you’re on vacation or something?”

  Cass was loading the dishwasher and a plate in her wet hand started to slip. When it dropped into the tray with a clatter, her mother huffed behind her.

  “Fine. You had better just be going to see him, and not any of your friends. This isn’t supposed to be fun.”

  When Cass stood up, she kept her back to her mother with great effort, and didn’t respond. She lifted the dishwasher door and closed it, turning the switch so the appliance came on. It was an older model and noisy, so it was difficult to hear over the racket.

  “I’m not trying to be insensitive, Cassidy.”

  Unfortunately, she could hear her mother’s words, and her answer tumbled out viciously as she rounded on the woman.

  “Then don’t.”

  She stomped out of the kitchen and for once, her mother didn’t follow her to have the last word.

  “Well, do you feel any different yet?”

  Oh my God, Paul thought as he closed his eyes against his mother’s voice. She had been asking him that question for two days, almost three now, since he started on the anti-depressant Thursday night. Friday morning, before he had done anything beyond using the toilet, she was at the bathroom door, asking if he felt better. What did she think he was on, anyway?

  The psychiatrist herself had explained how the drug worked to both of them. Or at least, she explained how much was understood about how the drug worked. She went over all the side effects that were possible, which took several minutes and made his mother more than a little concerned. A lot of people must take it, though, he figured, so these problems couldn’t be happening to too many of them, or doctors wouldn’t continue to prescribe it.

  Besides, he had to go back to school soon, and a part of him wanted to play ball again, to lose himself in the physical exertion, the strategy, the effort; but if he thought too much about being with other kids all day, about the questions they would ask, he just wanted to go back to bed. If he had to go to school, maybe this drug would help him deal with it by then. He didn’t have to worry about it now.

  “No, Mom. I’ll let you know when I do, okay? I told you that before.”

  He was tired and wanted to go back to bed, but he knew that she would hound him if he did. Spending all day at the hospital wore him out, even though he just sat and listened to other people talk. The counselor who replaced the first woman who handled group therapy wasn’t as nice as the original counselor was, and they all knew that she hadn’t returned because while she hadn’t opened her purse while they were still there, she must have at some point that afternoon, and what she found probably made her reconsider her efforts with them.

  The girl who couldn’t eat had disappeared the next day as well, and while the new counselor wasn’t supposed to disclose personal information, she did let it slip that the girl’s parents had moved her to an inpatient eating disorder facility. Paul had almost laughed. That tiny sparrow of a kid had more balls than he did, and he found himself hoping she would get better. What would it take for someone like her to get better? How did anyone end up being unable to eat, anyway? It was a strange and sad problem and he had no idea how anyone could help her.

  If Kayla was still here, he would talk to her about what she was eating, or rather, what she wasn’t eating. The more he thought about her concerns about her weight, and how it would affect her soccer performance, the more he was convinced that there was more to it than that. The first counselor had hassled the girl about control issues, and pressed her to talk about why she felt the need to control through her food intake. Maybe there was something in the idea of control when it came to what Kayla had been doing with food.

  She was so worried about playing soccer, about grades, about pleasing her parents. He couldn’t believe that there wasn’t a doctor who was able to help her with her knee, if only her parents were willing to put in the time to take her to doctors until they found the right one. He had just wanted to help her and she kept pushing him away, then letting him back in, as
if she couldn’t decide, or maybe, he admitted to himself, leaning his forehead into the mirror above the sink, because he wouldn’t let her go.

  The surface was cool and he closed his eyes against his reflection, listening to his mother’s footsteps fade away as she went downstairs. He knew if he took too long, she would be back, but at least she wasn’t talking to him like he was in preschool anymore. Something had happened between his parents while his father was here, maybe because his father was doing what he did best.

  Nothing.

  He was useless, at least to them, so there had been no point to his visit, and he wasn’t sure what his mother had been expecting when she asked him to come. Did she think he had become a different person in the last few years? The man had sent child support checks that were court ordered, and that was the extent of his involvement with either of them. They were fine without him, probably better than if she had convinced him to stay with them when he clearly wanted to leave.

  Paul hadn’t understood it at the time. Maybe no one did. Looking back, he could see that missing his father, wondering why his father didn’t want him anymore, all of those questions, while the answers came later and when they did, hurt, weren’t anything he could have done anything about, and if he had tried, had somehow found a way to push his father into wanting him and his mother, it wouldn’t have been the same. But Kayla had wanted him, even if she had been trying to break up with him time and time again. That was different.

  She hadn’t been interested in anyone else, or fallen out of love with him. She had told him time and again how much she loved him, but that it wasn’t enough, not right now. They both had a lot to think about, to worry about and plan for, and continuing to be so serious about each other was beginning to feel like something else she had to juggle. It wasn’t like that for him, though, and he didn’t understand what she meant.

  If they loved each other, how could their relationship be a problem? Wouldn’t it be good for them to stay together, to help and support each other?

  How long would it take for these meds to work, anyway, he wondered, trying to redirect his thoughts like the counselor at the hospital had taught them during group. Shift into more positive thinking, about anything, it didn’t matter. Well, he was positive the meds wouldn’t work, because they weren’t going to change what had happened. Taking them wouldn’t hurt, though, in spite of the weird side effects that his mother worried about.

  She was waiting for him to morph into someone happy and cheerful, but that was never going to happen. He wouldn’t mind it if took the edge off, but he really didn’t deserve that. The counselor had explained the grief process, and how guilt worked into it, but Paul was certain that in this situation, his guilt was more definite. He was sure that in a lot of situations, people who were sad after a death weren’t guilty of anything, because there was nothing they could have done, but this was different. He had been focused on what he wanted, and hadn’t paid enough attention to what Kayla had been going through.

  He washed and dried his hands, then stepped into his room to pull on a pair of shorts that were on the floor. It was getting too cool out for shorts but it didn’t bother him. Normally his mother would hassle him about it, but he thought she might not today.

  She didn’t even turn to look at him when he walked into the kitchen, but stood at the Keurig making herself a cup of mint tea. Paul could smell it as he came into the room, and took a deep breath before he sat down at the table.

  “You know that your father and I met in high school, right? I’m sure I’ve tormented you with the story more than once, especially when we were going through the divorce.”

  She kept her eyes on her mug as she took it carefully from the machine, holding the handle so she wouldn’t burn her fingers. The tea always came out hotter than the coffee, Paul knew, for some inexplicable reason. He made her tea sometimes, but since he also made coffee for Kayla and himself, he knew the difference in temperature.

  He watched the steam rise from the mug, barely registering her voice in his head as she continued.

  “A song,” he heard her say, but when she looked at him expectantly, he wasn’t sure what she was talking about.

  “Sorry, I didn’t catch that.”

  She smiled, a little sadly.

  “We had a song, while we were dating. I’m sure this doesn’t interest you at all. But we did love each other once, and when we had you, we were happy. But things change, obviously. I just didn’t want to accept that he wasn’t coming back to us.”

  He didn’t know how to respond. She wasn’t crying, and she didn’t look like she was going to, so he was glad for that, at least.

  She stared into her tea and he watched her inhale slowly before she lifted her eyes to his.

  “Did you have a song?”

  He blinked and sat up straight. A song? She was asking him, if he and Kayla had a song?

  Oh, damn.

  “Uh, yeah. We did.”

  She didn’t speak, but continued to look at him, as if she wanted him to continue.

  “It was kind of a joke, but not really.”

  She remained silent.

  “No, not really.”

  He stood up, using his arms to push up from the table, and turned away as he left the room, his head suddenly full of Kayla’s voice as the two of them sang the new Justin Bieber song, both terrible and catchy, together, her laughter as real as his own investment in the words. Let me love you, let me love you.

  Day Twenty-Three

  Monday

  Cass woke early, even though she wasn’t going to school. She wondered if anyone would bother Sarah about her fight with Stephanie, which, as the vice principal noted, wasn’t really a fight at all. Still, Cass didn’t feel bad about it, not with Stephanie’s poor taste and endless need for attention. She missed texting with Sarah and Kayla about every little thing, even when they were in the same room together, just so they could look up and laugh together over whatever it was, just because they could.

  Now her phone, as well as Sarah’s, was like a time bomb, and neither knew when it would go off with more hateful or disturbing messages. Kayla’s parents had changed Mia’s phone number, and while Sarah didn’t want to inconvenience her father, he agreed that it was a good idea, for Cass, too. She thought about stopping at the wireless store to talk to someone about how to go about doing that while she was out today, but thought that it might be a good idea to stick to her mother’s instructions to visit the recruiter and come right home.

  As much as she wanted to drive around all day just because she knew it would upset her mother, it wouldn’t do her any good, and it wouldn’t change how her mother was acting. Insensitive? Was that all it was called?

  She wasn’t sure when the recruiter’s office opened, but she thought he should be there and answering his phone by nine, at least. Last spring she had called him after talking the guidance counselor, the same one who was trying to get her to talk about her feelings now, into giving her a brochure about the Air Force that the school office kept in a rack on the wall. For some reason, the counselor didn’t approve of her interest in the military, and Cass wasn’t sure if it was because she was a girl or because the counselor thought everyone should go to college. Probably both.

  She had left the office with the information she needed, and while the counselor had discouraged her, she had called the recruiter that same week and asked as many questions as she could manage in a twenty minute phone conversation. But now, she thought, it was time to walk the walk and set up the ASVAB, no matter what anyone thought, including her parents.

  Why did they care anyway, if it wasn’t going to cost them anything, and she wouldn’t do anything in the Air Force that would embarrass them? If she broke any rules, she’d get kicked out, and she sure as hell wasn’t working towards that.

  Her father’s car made some sort of whistling noise as he backed out of the driveway, and Cass didn’t have to look out of the window to know when he’d made it to the stop sig
n at the end of the street. The noise faded just as her mother’s voice started in on her, as if complaining was going to change the fact that she was suspended.