by J. K. Wise
Alec stands a few feet away from us holding a short, silver handgun in his shaking, lifted arm.
“Hey, man,” Will says, taking a step forward.
Alec spins with the gun, pointing it from Jared and Will. The crowd shrieks, and Will throws his hands up in the air. “What are you doing? Are you crazy?”
The circle widens as people push away from the center, this chanting, screaming mob silenced into a scurrying retreat by a single gun.
I feel Jared’s hand tense on my shoulder as I try to stand up. His right hand is useless and probably broken. “Stay down, Mel,” he says over his shoulder.
Alec turns the gun back to Jared.
Breathe, breathe.
I push Jared’s hand off my shoulder. I don’t think. I just move. I stand and face Alec, whose face hardens when his eyes meet mine. I swallow, and I breathe. “What are you doing, Alec?”
“I came here for you. And for him,” Alec says, pointing at me, then Jared.
“Put it down, Alec.” For once, I find my words, and they are strong and clear. “You can’t make any of this about you. What’s happened in this town, what’s happening all around us…none of this is about us. We’re too young to be the story.”
“You two are the story,” he spits through quivering lips. I can see the tears in his eyes even though his face is grim and tense. He looks younger than seventeen, his face lit by the blue lights from the TV cameras, shining off the metal of the gun and off the sweat that drips down his cheek.
We are children, playing with words and guns that aren’t toys. His eyes are on me, but the barrel still points at Jared. I keep talking. I’m aware of the stillness around us. All of these people and one boy with a gun. Not one steps forward to take him down.
“No, we aren’t. There isn’t a story. The story is made up. We’re just kids. It isn’t about us. They made up a story about us.” I say.
“Shut up,” Alec whispers.
I keep my eyes on him, and I move to stand next to Jared who is panting with nerves. My breath is steady. My intention is clear. I walk one step past Jared and keep talking.
“We’re kids. We wait for someone to tell us what to do. We sit in class, waiting for the assignment. We wait for the whistle to blow before we start moving. We watch, looking in from the roof or from the couch or through the glass to the backyard.”
Alec’s shoulders lift and fall and he stands and shakes. Tears fall down his cheeks.
“They shot my dad. They shot him. On your street. And he watched them,” he says with one, wretched sob. He nods to Jared and turns the gun sideways.
Jared’s hands are up, his fingers spread wide. “I didn’t know that was your dad. I went for a run. I saw some guys stop a truck. I didn’t know what was going to happen.”
“Shut up,” Jared says, his voice strangled by the words.
“I was there, I saw it all, but it happened fast. I wanted to help-“ Jared says.
“Shut up!” Alec screams. “And what you said about me--I didn’t hurt Melanie that night at the party. I just wanted to talk to her.” His eyes are wild.
No thought. Just movement.
I take three quick steps.
“Stop,” Alec cries, pointing the gun back over to me. The crowd inhales together.
I think one word. Breathe. Everything else disappears except Alec.
I step forward and put my hand over Alec’s, holding his shaking knuckles while his finger quivers on the trigger, the barrel still pointed at my chest. His face is wet with tears and sweat.
When I pull my hand slowly away with the gun, his fingers go slack. Alec’s body goes limp. Jared jumps forward and tackles him, his arms wrapping around him. They fall to the ground together, but Alec doesn’t fight back.
Riot police push through the wall of people who stand so still, it’s as if they aren’t even breathing. The gun is heavy; its grip dangles from my fingers. An officer pushes me down and takes the weapon out of my hand. Sound erupts from the silence, the tension collapsing into screams, yells, and cries. Lights flash as the whole world takes a picture at the same time.
It’s too much. I’m surrounded by a blur of sound and brightness. I can’t find Jared. Up becomes down, and I’m in a spin. All of the blood rushes out of my head. I hear the chants, loud, but distorted.
Ja-red, Mel-a-nie.
Chapter 32
Side by Side
The tear gas burns in my throat and my eyes. I try to shield Melanie from the worst of it. The helicopters overhead churn, diffusing the sick, sweet air. I flatten against the building next to Will, Robbins and Corrina. There are more people here than even a few minutes ago. Police in full riot gear stand between the five of us and the crowd who chants our names. Ja-red, Mel-a-nie. It’s wild.
“Are my parents here?” Melanie asks in a voice that I wouldn’t be able to hear if her face wasn’t cradled into my shoulder. She coughs, and I hold her head against me to try to make it better.
“I don’t see them,” I answer. She is drained and shaking. All those people, and only Mel had the guts to talk him down. She saved my life, and maybe a bunch of other lives too. Maybe even Alec’s.
Alec with a gun. So much hatred. His dad, shot.
A rush through me, just like that. I want my dad. Where is he? At home? With Mom? The burn of tear gas in my throat turns to a lump of sadness. I want my lying, cheating parents.
My living, breathing parents.
Through the plastic riot shields held in front of us, the crowd parts as soldiers march into the clearing where Alec lies handcuffed and face down. The helmeted men form a square around him, pick him up by the arms, and set him on his feet. His head is down. His shoulders shake as the crowd cheers louder than at a pep rally.
“No! No cheering.”
A few people nearest to us hear my cry. They turn to the rest, yelling over the mayhem, trying to get me heard.
It happens slowly at first, the silencing of the crowd. Hushing sounds sweep through the crowd.
“This isn’t a pep rally. It’s a tragedy.” The crowd becomes as quiet as they were a few moments ago when Alec pointed the gun at my head.
From the other side of the building, another group of soldiers pushes people out of the way. A parade of men in dark suits walk briskly toward us. Some of them hold radios to their ears, and their eyes scan the crowd. Our audience watches like it’s the final episode of their favorite show. One of the riot cops waves his shield and shouts out to them, and then he points at us.
“Holy shit. Are we in trouble or something?” Chris asks under his breath.
“In trouble for what? Having a gun pointed at our heads?” Melanie has a hold on my arm, and I have this thought that if I never let go of her, I can handle whatever happens.
“Jared Portillo? Melanie Stillman?” one man asks, holding his radio to his ear as if someone else were telling him what to say.
“Yes?” Mel answers.
“Please come with us.” He nods to the police who nod back and move behind us. Chris, Will, and Corrina start to step forward with us too.
The Suit holds up his hand. “Just these two. Governor Brewer would like to speak with you both. We have a helicopter waiting for you.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Chris says again, just for our ears.
“Are we in trouble?” Melanie asks.
“I’m not leaving my friends in this mess,” I say.
“You’re not in trouble. Your parents are waiting for you with the Governor. She wants to talk to you. Your friends can meet you later.”
I grab onto Mela
nie’s hand. “We’re not going anywhere. The Governor can come to us if she wants to talk. She can take a look around too.”
The man isn’t listening to me anymore. He’s talking into his radio.
“Come one, let’s go back inside,” Will says. He turns to walk away from the riot police and into the Theta Chi back door. Corrina takes Mel’s hand and starts to lead her away too.
“We’ll stay, Jared. We’ll stay out here and wait for you.”
“Until we have somewhere to go to school,” a girl yells.
“Until they open up the Southside,” calls out another voice.
Corrina turns. “Hell yes!”
From inside the electric silence, voices wake up.
“Until we have clean water.”
“Until my street is safe.”
“Until my dad is out of jail.” Chris’s voice is loud behind me.
“Until Jenny Hepburn goes to Prom with me,” a deep voice calls out, and everyone laughs. All the wants and wishes that pushed the whole town into the dark become voices that are lights in the night.
Mel looks up at me, weak and beautiful and strong at the same time. She starts to say something, and I lean down to kiss her. At first, I think she’s laughing, but then, she opens her mouth with a sick, choking gasp.
Something isn’t right. Melanie isn’t right. I scream her name and shake her. She gasps again and again, her mouth opening and closing like she’s trying to say something. In two seconds, the color of her face changes from pale to ash. Then, her eyes roll back into her head.
“Melanie—” I scream again. I hear my own voice like a faraway siren.
She falls back, just like at the bonfire, but this time, I’m next to her to catch her before she hits the ground. She is limp in my arms. Somewhere, Corrina cries. The police jump to us, helping me hold her.
“We need a doctor. Melanie Stillman is unconscious,” I hear the man say, distorted and ugly, like an underwater voice. He listens to the radio, and then talks into it, “We’re on our way.”
. . . . .
I watch every breath that she takes. The machines in Melanie’s room beep randomly. The shrill alarms on her breathing machine blurt out every few minutes for unknown reasons, making her start in her sleep. Every time she jumps, I jump with her, hoping the noise will wake her. I track the movement of her closed eyes and memorize the tiny blue veins that weave through her delicate eyelids. I count her eyelashes and memorize the pattern of the freckles on her nose. I don’t even care if I’m being creepy. I never want to take my eyes off of her again.
The back of my throat still burns from tear gas. Just outside of Mel’s door, distorted messages echo from hand-held radios on dozens of official-looking people waiting in the hallway. They’ve been showing up since our helicopter landed on the roof of the hospitals. The helicopter was Goveror’s order, they told us. All of the sudden, Melanie and I are super-important. I don’t understand it, but I’ll take it. No one is asking me to leave her side.
There’s a knock on the open door. Mr. Stillman walks in, and I instantly feel like I’m going to hurl. My hand throbs, a reminder of the last time I saw him standing in my kitchen with Mom.
He acts like he doesn’t see me and walks to the other side of the hospital bed.
“Melanie. Honey. I’m here. Mel. Wake up. I’m here now.” His voice breaks as he takes her hand.
Dad and kid. It makes my heart hurt. God, I miss my parents. They’re liars, but I miss them.
“Hey Mr. Stillman. I didn’t recognize you without my mom attached to your face.” I feel like an asshole even as I say it, but I can’t help myself. The ugly just spouts out.
He turns to me with tears in his eyes and a look that makes me sit back a little. We stare at each other. My brain is an ugly flipbook of pictures from the last few days, and Mom’s face right before I punched the kitchen wall tops it all off.
“You should leave,” he says.
The ugliness wells up faster than his tears. “Mel wants me here.”
He drops her hand and takes a step closer, leaning over her body on the hospital bed between us. “You pushed her away from home and put her in the site of your friend with a gun.”
“You slept with my mom, you asshole. You pushed her away.”
We stare at each other over Mel. We are damaged, dangerous people. This is the same Mr. Stillman I’ve known all my life. But not. And I’m not the same either.
Melanie’s hand on mine. She’s awake. A rush to my head when I see her eyes open. Only a sound comes out of my throat. I can only think the words: Thank you, God. Tears on my face as soon as I see her blink.
Both Mr. Stillman and I drop down to her level on either side of the bed. Mr. Stillman picks up the mask over her mouth and sets it to the side.
“Dad. Where’s Mom?”
There are tears in his eyes when he answers. “She’s outside. I’ll get her?”
Mel nods.
He starts across the room but turns back by the door. “We were so worried, honey. We couldn’t find you.” He hesitates, like he is waiting for Melanie to say something. When she doesn’t, he wipes his tears off his face with the back of his hand, his face crumpled.
Mel doesn’t let go of my hand. When we’re alone, she asks, “What happened to me?”
“You passed out.”
“Where are we?”
“University Medical.”
“I couldn’t breathe.”
“Melanie…” I try to stop her, to save her breath.
She brushes her fingers across my other hand, a whisper of a touch against my swollen knuckles, black and blue. “I’m so glad you’re here.”
I’m so happy to hear it, my laugh is awkward and strange, like a stepped-on duck, blurted through the tears running thickly down my face. “I’m not leaving…” I wipe my face with the edge of her sheet and lean forward. I run my fingers over her smooth eyebrows, down the side of her cheek.
“Are you going to kiss me?” she asks.
“Yes…
Chapter 33
Don’t Think
I sit in my corner of the locker room. My teammates leave me alone. It starts with my breath, like it always has. My toes are curled over the edge of the block. I take my mark and look down into the water, stretching the back of my neck. When I look up, the end of the lane waits for me, and just beyond, the photographers crouch, aiming their long lenses at me. Even the overflow stands are full, and the crowd chants my name. Mel-a-nie. Mel-a-nie. I circle my arms high over my head, forward and back, trying to keep warm. It’s just my breath and heartbeat. Breathe. Focus. Get warm.
I’ve had to work this year at living out of water. I haven’t had a choice. Jared and I have been in the spotlight since the Governor appointed us to the task force. It’s all a part of trying to rebuild. I don’t get it, but people listen to us.
It’s been hard to swim and train and also travel around the state. The Governor’s office set up these Teen Town Hall meetings all over the place. At first, it terrified me to speak in those circles, and the questions at the end of the press conferences were always the worst.
Questions about me and Jared.
Questions about me and Alec.
Questions about why I ran away.
None of those questions are going to help me in this race. This is what I’ve been training for this year since I got out of the hospital. For two years, really.
I jump up and down at the side of the pool, warming up and trying to ignore all the press and the cameras snapping at me. I block it all out, like I used to block out the world.
Breathe. Breathe. Before I step onto the block, I look over to the stands.
There he is. Jared, smiling and sitting next to Chris. I nod in his direction, and the people in the packed stands scream together, but just my name this time. Mel-a-nie. Mel-a-nie.
Don’t think. Don’t think, I think.
My toes curl over the side of the block. I never hear the shot, but my body does. I fly off the block, skimming the top of the water, and then, I’m in my stroke.
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