by Sarah Dessen
“Well,” I said, and he dropped my hand. “There’s my ride.”
“Right,” Matthew said. “See you later.”
We walked out the door together, and Rogerson leaned over to unlock my door, keeping his eyes on Matthew as I climbed inside.
“Who’s that?” he asked as I put my seat belt on.
“He teaches my class,” I said. “Where’ve you been?”
He just shook his head as he put the car in gear, gunning across the parking lot. “Dave said he could get us a good deal on this ounce, but the guy never showed. Waited for an hour.”
“Oh, man,” I said. “You must have been really mad.”
He didn’t say anything, instead looking past me out my window to the sidewalk beside us. When I turned my head, I saw Matthew walking, his backpack over both shoulders and hands in his pockets, head ducked against the falling sleet.
I was about to change the subject, but something felt strange to me, an unsteady feeling like before lightning strikes. Rogerson still had his eyes on Matthew, even as he disappeared around a corner, and I thought again of the picture I held in my lap, the irritation in his eyes, the stark trees, with barely a sun at all in the sky behind him.
He didn’t say a word the whole way home. But when we pulled up in front of my mailbox, he cut the engine and just sat there, looking straight ahead. I slid my fingers down to my door handle, telling myself he was just in a bad mood, not my fault. Dave had made him wait, and then he’d seen—or had he?—Matthew holding my hand. I could slip out, he’d go burn off steam, and then later everything would be okay. It would. If I could just—
“So,” he said suddenly, and I felt that crackling electricity again, a whooshing in my ears, “what’s going on with you and that guy, Caitlin?”
“Nothing,” I said, and my own voice sounded strange to me, like it was weightless, drifting up, up, and away.
“I saw you.” The words were clipped and low. “Don’t lie to me.”
“I’m not lying,” I said quickly, and I hated the way I sounded, so weak and pleading. “I just wished him a Merry Christmas and he shook my hand ...”
“Don’t lie to me!” he yelled, and in the small space of the car it was so loud, hurting my ears.
“I’m not,” I whispered. “Rogerson, please. It’s nothing.” And then I reached out and touched his arm.
He was coiled and taut, a mousetrap set to spring at the slightest touch. As soon as my fingers brushed his sleeve, his fist was in motion, springing out at me and catching my jaw, knocking me backward so hard the door handle dug into my right side, twisting the skin.
I felt like I couldn’t shut my mouth, but even so I was still trying to explain. “Rogerson,” I said. “I—”
“Shut up, Caitlin,” he said.
“But—”
He slapped me hard, across the other cheek, and it felt like part of my face was shattering into tiny pieces. I covered my face with my hands, stretching my fingers to cover the span from my forehead to my chin, as if without them I would fall apart altogether.
“This isn’t my fault,” he said in a low voice, as I tasted blood in my mouth. “It isn’t, Caitlin. You know what you did.”
I didn’t say anything. I didn’t think I could take another blow. Instead, I closed my eyes and thought of trivia, again: questions and answers, the solidness and safety of facts. When the biggest secret about Rogerson was the limitless stretch of what he knew.
What instrument do sailors use to measure time?
I told myself to breathe. A chronometer.
Where in Italy did pizza originate?
My cheek was still burning, all the way up to my temple. Naples.
I turned my head, resting my sore cheek against the cold glass of the window, and looked at my house. We had a fat plastic Santa standing by the front steps, white lights strung in the tree by the walk, and a row of tiny reindeer mounted on the roof of the garage. Upstairs, I could see my father sitting in his chair in the square of one window, reading the paper, just like he had in a million nights of my childhood.
I closed my eyes, willing him somehow to look through the dark car windows and rush out and save me from Rogerson, and from myself. But he didn’t. Instead, my father did what he always did: He folded the paper, picked up the remote, moving across channel after channel, waiting for me—and Cass—to come home.
When I came inside twenty minutes later my mother was taking a casserole out of the oven.
“Oh, my goodness!” she said, her eyes widening. She plunked it down on the counter and started across the kitchen, wiping her hands on a towel decorated with tiny Christmas trees. “What happened to you, Caitlin?”
“I fell,” I said quickly, even as she leaned in close, brushing my hair off my forehead. In Rogerson’s rearview mirror, after we’d smoked a bowl, it hadn’t looked that bad: just a bit red, puffy in places.
“Fell?” she said. “Jack, come in here!”
“Mom, I’m fine.” My father appeared in the kitchen doorway, the line in his forehead already creased and deep. “There was just some ice by the mailbox and I slipped.”
“Oh, I just knew it!” she said, pushing me down into a chair: The sore spot on my side hit against the armrest and I cringed, sucking in a breath. She didn’t notice. “Jack, didn’t I tell you walking back from Boo’s I slipped there? Didn’t I? Caitlin, was Rogerson with you?”
“No,” I said, shaking my head. “He dropped me off and then when I started up the walk my feet just flew out from under me.”
“Well,” my father said, his gaze steady on my face, “it looks like you hit right there on your jaw. Get that ice pack out of the freezer, Margaret, before the swelling gets any worse.”
“I’m fine,” I said again. “It doesn’t even hurt anymore.”
It was strange that I didn’t even consider telling the truth. I was just stoned and bleary, so cried out that all I could think of was curling up on my bed and going to sleep. Rogerson had lit the bowl without even a word, even as I sat there beside him, my ears ringing, and after a few hits everything just seemed to fade out. Increasingly, that was the way the pot worked with me lately. After a couple of hits, whatever had been bothering me drifted to arm’s length, like the end of a song on the radio you can just barely hear, just fading away.
And then he pulled me close to him, told me he loved me and kissed me hard and urgently, his hand curling around the back of my neck, the way he knew I liked it. As if somehow, that way, he could give back what he’d taken from me. And I let him.
Now, I closed my eyes as my father pressed the ice pack against my face, making it sting as the coolness seeped in slowly. I told myself I had too many secrets already: the drugs, cigarettes, my downward cheerleading spiral. If I let one out, the rest would tumble behind it, out of my control, like wild horses let loose to stampede.
It was funny. What I’d loved most about Rogerson was that he took me to a place so far from anywhere Cass had been. And now, him hitting me was the same thing. Cass wouldn’t have taken up with Rogerson, just like she never would have stayed with anyone who hurt her. But I wasn’t Cass, not even close. I was weaker. And I’d keep this secret before I’d prove that again.
“You need to keep this there until the swelling goes down,” my father said now, taking my hand and pressing it against the ice pack. “Okay?”
“It’s just so red,” my mother said in a worried voice. “You must have hit so hard.”
“Yeah,” I told her, averting my eyes. “I did.”
My father was putting on his jacket. “I’m going to go put some salt on the walk,” he said to my mother. “I think we’ve got some left over from last year out in the shed.”
“Yes, yes, it’s behind the potting soil,” she said, following him down the stairs. “And Jack, make sure you check the whole spot, won’t you? I’d hate to see anyone else get hurt.”
I moved the ice pack to my cheek. I could still taste blood in my mouth.
“Now, Caitlin,” my mother said as she came back up the stairs, the door clicking shut behind my father. “I’m going to run a hot bath for you. Won’t that be nice? And when you’re done, I’ll bring dinner to your room so you can eat in bed, and rest. Okay?”
“Mom, you don’t have to—”
“Hush. Go get undressed and I’ll let you know when it’s ready.” She started out of the kitchen, then stopped and put her hand on my shoulder, bending down to kiss me gently on the forehead. She smelled like vanilla and Joy perfume, and suddenly I felt like I might start crying again. “You really scared me, Caitlin,” she said, smiling as she brushed her fingers through my hair. “I don’t know what I would do if something happened to you.”
I could tell her, I told myself. I could tell her right now and fix this. I could say that he hits me and I hate cheerleading and I miss Cass but I know why she left and I wish I could make everything better but I can‘t, I can’t, I can’t even tell you where it hurts, not now.
“Don’t worry,” I said instead, as she ruffled my hair and walked away, my mother, to do what she did best, to take care of me. “I’m fine.”
When I went to my room to change into my bathrobe, my father was still outside, scattering salt by hand down the length of our walk. When he reached the front steps he went back, across the grass, to the spot by the mailbox where I’d told him I’d fallen, and scattered another handful there. Then, as I watched, he spent a good five minutes scraping his foot back and forth across the pavement, searching for slick spots, as if that was all it would take to keep us safe.
When my mother tucked me in that night, I was half asleep, my face sore, my belly full of chicken-broccoli casserole. She kissed my cheek carefully, not wanting to hurt me, then walked to my doorway and stood there in silhouette, her hand curled over the doorknob.
“Good night, honey,” she said. “I’ll see you in dreamland.”
I was too tired to answer her.
That night, I didn’t find my mother in my dreams. But for the first time since she’d left, I saw Cass.
The dream itself was long and complicated. Eliza Drake was there, and Corinna, and Mrs. Garver, my fourth grade teacher. We were in the Lakeview Mall, searching for something having to do with aluminum, running to the far end, near the Sears store. I was passing an empty storefront, just glass and empty inside, when I saw Cass. She was standing a few feet away, on the other side, but when I stopped she came closer.
“Cass?” I said, and Mrs. Garver was yelling at me to come on, hurry up, now, now.
She smiled at me, cocking her head to the side. She was wearing this bright red sweater and I remember wondering if she was stuck in there, trapped somehow. “Good luck,” she said to me, raising one hand and pressing her palm against the glass separating us. As if she could see the future, hers and mine, everything.
“Wait,” I said, “Cass—”
“Go,” she said, as Mrs. Garver grabbed my arm, yanking me away. “Go ahead, Caitlin. Go.”
“Cass—” I said again, but I was already running, looking back to find her, but now all the storefronts were empty glass, and I knew I could never find her, even if I tried.
When I woke up I was sweating and my jaw ached, a throbbing pain that seemed to match my heartbeat. I sat up in bed and turned on the light: It was only 10:30. I could hear the TV on in the living room as my father watched the early news, and next door Boo’s kitchen light was on and she was sitting at the table, reading a book.
I lay back against my pillows, still seeing Cass in that red sweater, her hand pressed against the glass. It was just a dream, I told myself. That’s all.
When I pulled my dream journal from under the bed and flipped to a blank page, I didn’t know yet what I would write. I put a hand on my aching cheek and just began:Dec. 20
Dear Cass,
I don’t know if you’ll ever read this. Maybe I won’t want you to. But something’s happening to me and you’re the only one I can tell. I had this dream about you tonight and it scared me into doing this: In the dream, I lost you for good. Lately I’ve been feeling like I’m losing myself, too. This is why.
My boyfriend, Rogerson, hit me tonight. It wasn’t the first time. I know you can’t believe I’d let this happen: I can’t either. But it’s more confusing than you’d think. I love him. That sounds so weak and pitiful, but lately, it’s been enough for me to forgive anything. But after tonight, I’m not so sure. He really hurt me, Cass. It still hurts now....
CHAPTER TEN
“Caitlin?”
I blinked, opening my eyes. My English lit teacher, Mr. Lensing, was standing over me, a well-worn copy of T. S. Eliot’s collected poems in his hand. All around us the room was quiet and I could feel everyone watching me.
“Yes?”
“Did you hear the question?” He shifted the book to his other hand, then lifted his glasses off his head and put them on while flipping a few pages with his fingers. “I asked you about the symbolism of the mermaids in Eliot’s ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.’”
“Oh,” I said, looking down at my own book, which was closed, and frantically flipping through the pages, the words blurring. “I, um, think—”
“Page one-eighty-four,” Richard Spellman, class president, whispered from behind me. “Bottom of the page.”
“Right,” I said, One-fifty, one-sixty-two, one-seventy-four. Where the hell was it? “Um, the mermaids. Well—”
A few rows back, someone snickered. Then coughed. Mr. Lensing took his glasses off again. “Can anyone help us out here?” he asked, a tired look on his face. “Yes. Richard.”
“The mermaids represent what is ultimately unattainable by the speaker,” Richard said, and the same person in back snickered again, at him. “When he says they won’t sing to him, he’s talking about his separateness from the rest of the world, the kind of dream-state he is in, all by himself. He says he’s underwater, with these mermaids who both accept and reject him. But it is the human element—the real world—that ultimately does him in, as is seen in the last line.”
I had finally located the right page, my eyes quickly scanning the very end of the poem: Till human voices wake us, and we drown.
“Very good,” Mr. Lensing said, clapping his book shut just as the bell rang. “Read—and be ready to discuss—The Waste Land tomorrow, people. And don’t forget, papers are due in one week!”
Everyone was talking now, books closing, backpacks zipping up, the sound of voices and shuffling in the hallway coming in through the open door. I shut my notebook and stood up, looking out the window at the parking lot and the gray, February sky above it.
“Caitlin.”
I looked up. Mr. Lensing, now behind his desk, was watching me. “Yes?”
“Wake up,” he said. “Okay?”
I nodded. “Yeah, sure. Okay.”
I walked out into the hallway, past the lockers and into the girls’ bathroom, which was thick with the smell of cigarettes and hairspray. A group of girls were crowded by the mirrors, checking lipstick and gossiping, but I pushed past them and went into a stall, locking it behind me.
“My point is,” one of the girls by the sinks was saying, “I just can’t even think about the prom yet.”
There was a hiss of hairspray, and then someone else said, “I heard Becca Plaser already bought her dress, in New York. It cost, like, five hundred dollars or something.”
“Oh, please,” the first girl said. “It doesn’t matter if you spend a million on your dress if you can’t get a date.”
I sat down on the toilet, then reached over with my right hand to carefully roll up my left sleeve. And midway up my forearm, I could see the bluish-black edge of the bruise coming into view.
“Well,” another girl said, “all that matters is that we will be beach-bound the night of the prom. It’s gonna be so cool!”
“So your parents said yes?”
“Yep. I mean, I was subjected to the whole Trust Talk and all t
hat. But we are in, for sure. No worries.”
I kept rolling up my sleeve until I could see the whole bruise. It was turning yellow in the center, less black than the day before.
“Yes!” I heard a slapping of palms, then someone laughing. The bell announcing the next period rang, ear-splittingly loud in the small space. I touched the center of the bruise with my finger, smoothing my fingers over its width. It still hurt, but the swelling was down.
I sat there, listening as the girls left, then ducked my head to check for feet under the other stalls. Nobody. I was alone.
I rolled down my sleeve, pulling it tight to the edge of my wrist. As if by silent agreement, since the night I’d told my parents how I had “slipped on the ice,” Rogerson had taken to only hitting me where I could cover it: arms, legs, shoulders. I wore only long-sleeved shirts, big sweaters, and turtlenecks, but at least now my face was off-limits.
After that night it was okay for a little while. He seemed sorry—although he never said so out loud—but I could tell. It was in the way he kept his hand on my knee, or placed his fingers in the small of my back, always keeping me close. In the Cokes and candy bars he bought me without being asked, CDs or magazines I liked dropped like offerings in my lap, surprising me. And most of all it was in the way he kissed me, his lips on my neck, or trailing down across my collarbone, as if I was beautiful or even sacred.
On Christmas Eve, I went to the pool house, where Rogerson cooked me dinner. Afterward, he slid a box across the table to me: it was white, and long, tied with a red bow. Inside was a silver necklace made up of tiny, interlocking squares, so shiny it glittered as he lifted up my hair to do the clasp. I thought then, as I had so many times before, how impossible it seemed that he could ever have hurt me.
That night, I slept with him for the first time. And it hurt, too, but in a different way, one I’d been expecting. And the pain didn’t linger, easily overshadowed by how good it felt to lie in his arms afterward, my head on his chest. I could see my necklace shining in the moonlight that was slanting through the window, and made a wish on it that things would be better now.