Be Not Afraid

by Cecilia Galante

  “No.”

  “All right.” He nodded a few times, resigned. “You know, from where I was sitting up on the altar, I couldn’t really tell what was happening. There was so much commotion around you that it was difficult to make anything out.” He lifted his cane and then set the tip of it back down again hard, as if squashing a bug. “Well, as long as you’re all right. That’s what counts. I went looking for you in the main office afterward, but they said you had gone home.”

  “They called me right away.” Nan patted his shoulder. “I drove over and got her. Thank you, Bill. For stopping by. I appreciate it.” She nudged me.

  “Yes,” I said. “Thank you, Father.”

  We watched him leave, waving as he beeped his car horn and disappeared down the street.

  Dad’s first response after hearing the details was not quite as concern-filled as Father William’s. He turned on me as Nan finished relaying the events, his dark eyes snapping. “Do you know this girl?”

  I shrugged, chasing a wayward pea around my plate. “Not really.”

  “Marin was invited to her house earlier in the year,” Nan volunteered. “Remember? They live near the Woodruff family, over in Liberty Hills.”

  Dad grunted. Liberty Hills was a wealthy enclave a few miles outside of Fairfield. He’d even been on a team that had built some of the houses there. But Dad wasn’t impressed with things like that. Working hard and earning your living was his big motto in life, not the number of big houses and television sets you owned. “She invited you to her house, but you’re not friends?”

  “No.”

  “Why not? What happened?”

  “Nothing happened.” I caught the pea, smashing it flat beneath the tines of my fork. All Dad needed to hear was that Cassie and I had argued and he’d be on the phone with her parents. If I told him what really happened, he’d be on their front porch. With a gun. “We’re just … different. I don’t know. We didn’t have anything in common, so we just … didn’t end up becoming friends. It happens. No biggie.”

  He snatched at a forkful of food, gesturing with it as he spoke. “Okay, then, here’s what I don’t get. There’s got to be eight or nine hundred kids in that school, right? So why’d this girl stop in front of you? And if you’re not even friends, what the hell does her saying ‘It’s you’ mean?”

  “John,” Nan chided. “Please. Your language.” The pink shape in her chest was pinker now, and the size of a small cherry.

  A muscle pulsed in Dad’s jaw. “Answer me, Marin.”

  This was the way we talked to one another now, about everything, each of us having settled into a new, suspicious place with hard edges and harder words. I was starting to hate him for it. “Maybe because she’s crazy?” I said. “Or confused?”

  He waited, still looking at me.

  “I have no idea why she stopped in front of me. It was totally random. She could have done that to anyone.”

  “But she didn’t,” Dad pointed out. “She stopped in front of you.”

  I bit the tip of my tongue. Hard. “Well, whatever. I don’t know what to tell you. And I don’t know what she was talking about either. I already told you, the girl’s nuts or something.” I paused, tasting blood. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

  Dad stayed quiet, staring at me. His jaw was moving up and down so hard I could hear his teeth clicking.

  “What?” I said.

  “There’s something you’re not telling us.” He clenched his fork. “I can feel it.”

  “What, do you think I’m secretly friends with Cassie Jackson?” I tried to laugh, but the sound got trapped in my throat. “Do you think we talk in code or something, just the two of us? Oh, I get it. That’s what we were doing today! We were talking in code, in front of the whole school, right in the middle of Mass.”

  “There’s no need to be sarcastic, Marin.”

  “I don’t know what you want me to tell you!”

  “I want you to tell me the truth.”

  “I am telling you the truth!” My voice quavered. “Why won’t you believe me?”

  He held my gaze until I couldn’t look at him anymore. “I don’t know, Marin.” He dropped his fork, letting it clatter against the plate. “I just don’t know what to believe anymore.”

  Anymore. As if I’d been some sort of poster child before, an obedient, perfect little girl. He was still frustrated by the whole thing with my eyes, acting as if I was purposely keeping myself afflicted or stuck, playing some weird game that had to do with Mom dying. He thought that was the thing that had changed me. But the truth was, I’d become someone else long before it had arrived. He just didn’t remember anymore.

  “I can’t even believe you.” I stood up, balling my fists. “You’re being such a jerk.”

  “Marin!” Nan pleaded. “Sit down, sweetheart.”

  I ignored her. “Why are you acting like any of this is my fault? I didn’t do anything. I was just sitting there, minding my own business. She’s the one who flipped out, okay? Not me!”

  He studied me for a moment, his jaws still grinding his food. A new S-shaped glob glowed bright yellow under both cheeks, getting darker behind his nose. The original sinus infection had cleared up somewhat, but his allergies, which flared up in the spring, were a source of constant annoyance.

  “Okay,” he said. “Fine. If you’re telling me you’re not involved in something with this girl, then I don’t have any choice but to believe you.”

  “But you don’t believe me.” I stared at him.

  “No, I do.” There was a catch in his throat, and he cleared it. “I just … I don’t want anyone pushing you around, okay? I mean it.”

  It was this kind of seesawing, this up and down between hate and love, that threw me the most. It was hard to hold on to either one, harder still to know which one to trust.

  “Yeah, well guess what?” I shoved my chair against the table. “That includes you, too, Dad.”

  I braced myself for his comeback as I stalked out of the room, a flying barb that would hit me in the neck, but there was nothing.

  Behind me, the silence screamed.

  I went out back, fastened my helmet under my chin, and unlocked my bike, a silver Aggressor that Dad bought me last year for Christmas. My fingers were shaking, and my legs felt like jelly. I stomped hard on the ground—once, twice, three times—and shook out my arms.

  Nan appeared on the back porch, rubbing the space between her knuckles. “You’re going for a bike ride now? It’s almost dark.”

  “It won’t be dark for at least another two hours.” I swung my leg over the seat. “I’m just going to Lucy’s. I’ll be back.”

  She sighed. It was a heavy, weighted sound that made something twist inside my stomach. I knew how hard it was for her to watch Dad and me fight. But I didn’t know what to do about it. “You have your phone?” she asked.

  I patted my back pocket. “Don’t worry, Nan. I’ll be fine.”

  I rode off, feeling her eyes on me. She would stand there the way she always did whenever I left on my bike, one hand inside her apron pocket, her lips moving silently, until I crested over the first big hill and she couldn’t see me any longer. The familiar pop and snap of gravel sounded beneath my tires, and my thighs burned as I pedaled harder, not stopping to coast even as I went downhill, squeezing the handlebars with a grip that turned my knuckles white. The pain felt good, directly proportional to the buzzing ache inside my head, and I pushed down harder, as if to squeeze it out of my pores. The dirt road went for a mile past the farmhouse, and I rode it almost to the end without pausing, relishing the feel of dust and wind against my face, the explosion of freedom that always accompanied such treks.

  A green Jeep Cherokee appeared around the bend. It seemed to brake as it saw me, and I moved over, giving it room to pass.

  “Marin?” I heard my name float out behind me. I braked hard and glanced over my shoulder.

  The Jeep was backing up; a thin arm with a chambray shir
tsleeve settled along the window ledge. A little farther up, I could see a blue shape inside the wrist, smooth along the edges, darker in the middle. I froze.

  “Marin?” Dominic Jackson said again. The Jeep was stopped right alongside me now. If I reached out and stretched a little, I could touch his arm. “Holy shit, I can’t believe I caught you. Where are you going?”

  I opened my mouth, but nothing came out. He remembered my name? “Oh, I’m just out for a ride.”

  “I can see that.” He grinned, his eyes taking in my bike for the first time. “Nice bike.”

  “Thanks.” How much of a dork did I look like right now with my helmet and my sunglasses on? I didn’t want to think about it.

  “I was just on my way to your house,” he said. “Like, right this second. To talk to you.”

  “Oh.” For a single, preposterous second, I imagined that he had come to ask me out, that the two of us would walk over the bridge to Kirby Park and sit under the two willow trees next to the tennis courts. He would sit close enough that I could feel the soft material of his shirt against my hand, the heat of his breath against my cheek. “Marin,” he’d say. “If you only knew …”

  Except that he wouldn’t say that. This boy was here to ask me something else entirely.

  “About Cassie?” I asked.

  He nodded once, a solemn look on his face. “She’s in the hospital. They took her to Fairfield General this afternoon, and she had another fit there. It was actually worse than what happened at school.”

  I bit my lip, tried not to imagine it.

  “She got hold of some kind of scalpel or something nearby and carved a number into her face.” Dominic’s face paled as he spoke, and his lips twisted, as if he had just tasted something rotten. “It was really bad. It took a long time to stop the bleeding.”

  “She carved a number into her face?” I repeated.

  “Yeah. An eight.” He stared at me for a moment, as if I might tell him something, or explain the significance of such a horrific action. His upper body, framed inside the window of the Jeep, could have been a photograph. The light illuminated his smooth skin and turned the green in his wide, expectant eyes a pale emerald color.

  “God. That’s awful.” I looked away from him, stared at the black triangle of another farmhouse roof peeking out in the distance. It looked like a toy, a picture in a book. “So you just … I mean, you drove over here to tell me that?”

  “No. I’m here because I want you to come with me to the hospital. To see Cassie. She keeps begging to see you, Marin.”

  I jerked my gaze away from the farmhouse, fastened my eyes on Dominic’s face. “To see me?”

  “Yeah, you. She’s been begging us almost constantly, since this afternoon.”

  “Why?”

  “We don’t know. She won’t tell us. She won’t say anything except that she wants to see you.” He paused, studying me, waiting. “Do you know why?”

  “No.” The answer came out like a bullet. “I have no idea.”

  “Marin, listen.” He opened his door and stepped out of the car. “We don’t know what else to do here, okay? Even the doctor suggested it. Bringing you to the hospital, I mean. She’s at Quiet Gardens now. They transferred her there after they finished stitching her up at General.”

  “Quiet Gardens?” I repeated. “Isn’t that a mental hospital?”

  “Yeah.” Dominic nodded. “And her doctor really … I mean, he said it might calm her down if you came. You know, since she keeps asking for you.” He hesitated, realizing the weight of his request, and shoved a hand inside the pocket of his cargo pants. “Will you come with me? I mean, can you? You can ride with me if you want. In my car.”

  “Right now?”

  “Yeah. I told you, that’s why I’m here. That’s why I drove out.”

  “But I don’t know what she wants.” I squeezed the rubber grips on the handlebars, felt the stiff ribbing twist against my skin. “I mean, I don’t know what I could do.”

  “Maybe she just has to tell you something.” His fingers clutched the edge of the windowsill. “I don’t know. But she’s hysterical. She’s been hysterical for hours. They gave her something to calm her down a little while ago, so it’s not quite as bad right now, but I’m telling you, as soon as it wears off, she’s going to start asking for you again.”

  I looked down at my Keds, squeezed my eyes tight behind my sunglasses. This could not actually be happening.

  “Marin.” He took a step toward me. The movement brought him less than a foot closer to me, but I understood. He was here to make a point, and he wanted to make sure I knew it. “I know you’re probably still a little freaked out after everything that happened between you two at our house, and you have every right to be, but you won’t be alone with her. She’s in a private room. There’s doctors and nurses and stuff, and my parents and I are right there too. Nothing will happen. I promise. I’m pretty sure all she wants to do is talk to you.”

  A long, silent moment passed as I stared at the ground. My cheeks burned, remembering. Aside from Cassie and me, Dominic was the only other person who knew about the closet incident. He was the one who had heard my screams that day, the one who had flung open the door, only to stare down at me, horrified, as I cowered inside.

  “Maybe she wants to apologize,” he said. “You know, for what she did that day.”

  The ribbon of heat moved up my face, flushing out across my forehead. Cassie Jackson was the sort of girl who might apologize … if someone held a gun to her head. I chewed on the inside of my lip, tried not to think about what might happen if I went.

  Or if I didn’t.

  “Five minutes.” Dominic’s eyes were pleading. “I promise. Just so she can see you. And hopefully calm down a little. Please, Marin. I told my parents I’d drive over and try to get you to come. I’m on a mission here.” He laughed, waiting maybe for me to laugh, too, or at least smile. I did neither. “We don’t know what else to do,” he said. “We’re desperate here. Please.”

  I didn’t look up for at least another twenty seconds. And when I did, I could see the sun starting to set just behind Dominic’s shoulder. It hovered like a gold dinner plate in the horizon, watering the clouds beneath it in a milky hue. It was getting late. If I was gone too long, Nan or Dad would call my phone. Or worse, come looking for me.

  “Okay,” I heard myself say. “Five minutes. But then I have to go.”

  Five

  Dominic put my bike in the back of his Jeep and tossed at least fourteen empty Gatorade bottles onto the backseat to make room for me on the passenger side. I crawled in tentatively, trying not to touch anything, and held my helmet on my lap. The smell of deodorant, melting chocolate, and salty traces of sweat drifted up from the seat and then faded again. Crumpled peanut M&M wrappers littered the floor, and half an uneaten bag of Smartfood Popcorn was wedged into the driver’s-side pocket. A gold medal stamped with the imprint of a runner dangled from a green and yellow ribbon behind his rearview mirror, and between the seats was an opened CD case filled with rap music. Eminem. Run-DMC. Jay-Z. I wondered if his iPod was filled with tracks like these, if he had certain ones that he listened to when he trained for track season.

  He got in and turned the car around with desperate, jerky movements, as if I might try to jump out if he didn’t move fast enough. I braced myself against the seat, buckled up, and reached out to grab hold of the leather armrest. It would be just my luck to get carsick and puke all over the inside of Dominic Jackson’s car. I steadied my gaze on a point in the distance, tried to focus behind my sunglasses. Between us, the track medal swung back and forth beneath the mirror, throwing small shadows across the dashboard, and the empty candy wrappers skittered along the floor. Dominic didn’t talk until we were on the street again, a safe distance from the dirt road and the farmhouse. Then he sighed once, heavily.

  “Damn, Marin.” He turned his head to look at me. “I honestly didn’t know if I was going to be able to get you to come. Th
anks. I mean, thank you, really. You have no idea. Maybe my sister will be able to get some sleep now.” He left the sentence hanging between us.

  “She hasn’t been sleeping?” I asked.

  “No.” He moved his eyes between the road and me. “Not for months.”

  “Maybe because of the epilepsy.”

  “Maybe.”

  “That’s what they said she has, right?”

  “That’s what they think so far.”

  I looked out the window. The light was fading quickly, pale fingers of it draining behind the trees. A wedge of birds streamed in front of a slip of clouds. We were almost in town, which meant that in less than five minutes we’d be at Quiet Gardens, which as far as I knew, was the only mental hospital in Fairfield. Behind my glasses, I closed my eyes again.

  He’d been so kind that day after finding me in Cassie’s closet, trying to get me to calm down, asking question after question to find out what had happened—What’s your name? How did you get in here? Did Cassie do this? On purpose? Where is she?—and finally letting me go when I shrieked at him to just give me my clothes, that I had to get out of there, that I just wanted to leave. We’d never spoken another word since, had never even exchanged a wayward glance. Still, it would have been a lie to say that I didn’t look up when he swept by in the hall, engulfed by the other seniors, preoccupied with any number of things that had nothing to do with me, and wonder if he remembered.

  I would never forget.

  “I really like your bike,” he said. “It’s an Aggressor?”

  “Yeah. A three-point-oh.”

  “I’ve heard good things about them. They’re fast. You like it?”

  “It’s okay. I could go faster.”

  He smiled a little. “You like to ride?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “Me too.” He draped the inside of his wrist along the top of the steering wheel. The blue disk inside faded a bit as I looked at it.