My Life After Now

by Jessica Verdi

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  How did I get myself into these situations?

  “It’s a long story.”

  “I like stories,” he said.

  “Well, this is a grown-up story.”

  He studied me. “Are you a grown-up?”

  “I…”

  Good question. I sure as hell didn’t feel like one right now.

  Finally, finally, the woman came out of the office and collected her children. She didn’t even say thank you. I watched them leave.

  “Number sixty-eight?”

  I turned—the office lady was looking at me expectantly. I was the only one left.

  I took a deep breath and followed her into the office.

  “I’m Diane Sullivan, the clinic’s social worker,” she said, extending her hand. “It’s nice to meet you”—she took my ticket and consulted her chart—“Lucy M.”

  I shook her hand and sat down.

  As Diane flipped through my file, my heart was sprinting. I’d never believed in psychics or clairvoyance or that kind of thing, but my intuition was screaming at me right now. Somehow, I knew something was wrong. I could feel it.

  Diane looked me in the eye. Her expression was smooth.

  “Lucy, your rapid HIV test result is reactive,” she said in a calm, neutral tone.

  I stared at her. What did that mean? Didn’t she know this was not the time for being cryptic? “Reactive?” I repeated.

  “Yes. That means you have received a preliminary positive result.”

  Positive. That was a word I could understand.

  An involuntary gurgle escaped my throat, and suddenly the world was closing in on me, disappearing from the outside edges in. I thrust my head between my knees.

  Positive.

  I couldn’t breathe.

  Why can’t I breathe? I asked the demons in the room. Their black, beady eyes were on me. I felt them. Where’s the air? What did you do?

  The demons didn’t say anything. They just watched me. Judging. Planning.

  Something touched my back. I jumped out of my skin. “Don’t touch me!” I shrieked at the demons, spending the last of my air. “You’re trying to kill me!”

  But the voice that answered didn’t make sense. It didn’t match the demons’ greedy, evil faces. “Lucy, breathe with me. In…out…”

  How do they know my name?

  But I obeyed. I had no choice.

  “In…out…that’s right…in…”

  I gasped and choked. The oxygen that did manage to get in was soothing.

  “Very good, Lucy. In…out…in…”

  After a few minutes, I was able to sit upright again. I opened my eyes. The demons were gone. Or hiding.

  Diane was back.

  My natural breathing returned, and I didn’t have to focus on getting air anymore. But I still felt sick to my stomach.

  “Are you all right, Lucy?” Diane asked, calm as ever.

  No. Of course I wasn’t.

  But I was coherent enough now to know that she was talking about my immediate state, not the bigger picture. I gave a tiny nod.

  “Now, we have a lot to discuss.” She flipped through my file again, taking her time to review the pages where Marie had written my answers down. “Given your established risk behaviors, it’s crucial that you make some changes so you don’t expose anyone else to the virus.” She looked up at me. “And it’s also very important for you to have a reliable support system to help you work through this confusing time. Have you thought about who you will discuss your result with?”

  I stopped listening to Diane and her social worker dribble.

  My risk behaviors, she said. I didn’t have risk behaviors. I just made one stupid mistake. I didn’t deserve this.

  Suddenly, I couldn’t sit in this room one second longer.

  I pushed out of my chair and ran. Diane called after me, but I shut her out. I ran down the hall, through the waiting room, through door number one, up the stairs, through door number two, and into the real world. I didn’t care that people were staring. I didn’t care that I looked like hell. I just kept running.

  I ran until my feet screamed. Then I slowed to a walk and glanced at a street sign. I’d gone over forty blocks. But I kept going.

  I felt empty. It’s the only way to describe it. I couldn’t think, I couldn’t cry. Positive. It was as if the word was some sort of incantation, and now that it had been uttered, a spell had been cast. Diane had sucked all the reason, hope, and life out of me, and all I’d been left with was a hollow shell of a body and a brain that wouldn’t work.

  So I walked.

  There’s something about New York City that gives you permission to just be. There’s no need for pretense, no need for masks. You can be real, without risk. The buildings are your protectors, the streets are your tethers. The people…you will never see them again. Even when they’re right in front of you, you don’t see them. Not really. Just as they don’t really see you. New York is beautifully anonymous.

  As one wave of New Yorkers disappeared underground, another emerged. I took my time, watching them. Each one of them on their way somewhere, each with a purpose.

  Except me. I was still empty.

  The sun was low in the sky when my bag started vibrating. I ignored it.

  I passed a homeless man. He was reading a thick book, and a dog was curled up on a blanket beside him. I gave him all my money. Fifty-six dollars and ninety-three cents.

  “God bless you,” he said.

  It’s a little late for that, the voice in my head responded.

  Somehow, I made it back to the parking garage. Somehow, I got in my car and made it go. And somehow, I ended up back at home.

  12

  On My Own

  “You’re home early,” Dad said cheerfully.

  I was? It felt like years since I’d been home.

  “Did rehearsal let out early today?”

  Oh yeah. Rehearsal. That’s where I should be right now if the world made sense.

  He looked at me curiously. “Are you feeling okay?” He placed a hand on my forehead.

  No. I’m not, Dad, I wanted to say.

  “Answer me, Lucy. Are you sick?”

  Ha. Am I sick? That’s funny.

  It took a while to for me to realize that I was actually laughing. Out loud. Hysterically. Manically.

  Dad got on the phone. “Seth, are you on your way home yet? Something’s wrong with Lucy…No, I don’t know…She came home early and she’s acting strangely and she’s really pale…I don’t know…Okay…Okay, bye.”

  Dad placed a glass of water in front of me. “Drink,” he ordered.

  I was still laughing. I didn’t want to be. But I couldn’t stop. I felt possessed. Dad physically put the glass in my hand and guided it to my mouth. “Drink,” he said again.

  I managed to gulp down a mouthful of the water. It was cold and I felt it travel down down down through my body.

  My body. My poisoned, tainted body.

  The lingering giggles transformed into huge, heaving sobs.

  “Lucy, please talk to me. What’s going on?” Dad pleaded.

  I swallowed and, through chattering teeth, attempted speech. “I…I’m…” I began. But what was I going to say?

  Positive. I couldn’t say the word out loud.

  “I…think I have the flu,” I managed. “I need to go to bed.”

  “You must have a fever—you’re delirious,” Dad said. “I’m going to call the doctor, see if she can see you tonight.”

  I shook my head fiercely. “No, no doctor! I’ll be fine.” I booked it upstairs to my room before he could argue.

  You are nothing but a stupid, spoiled child, I told myself over and over again.

  I knew now that there was no one to blame but me. I’d made excuses for running off with Lee, blaming Lisa and Ty and Elyse for messing with my head, and messing with my life. But no one had forced me into his bed that night. This was my fau
lt.

  I’d had everything. And then a few things didn’t go my way and I ran away and threw a tantrum like a two-year-old. Of course I was being punished. That’s what happens to kids who act out.

  • • •

  I shut myself off from the world. Tuesday and Wednesday came and went without me ever seeing the sun. I didn’t go to school; I didn’t go to rehearsal; I didn’t return Evan or Andre or Max or Courtney’s barrage of calls. I didn’t listen to music; I didn’t put on the TV; I didn’t do any schoolwork. I didn’t shower. I barely ate.

  I didn’t sleep much, either; my head was teeming with answerless questions:

  Will I get AIDS?

  Will I die?

  Will my dads hate me?

  Will my friends abandon me?

  Will I ever be able to have sex again?

  Will I ever be able to have a baby?

  Will I ever be able to be on Broadway?

  Will I have to go on medication?

  Will anyone ever love me?

  • • •

  I don’t know what day it was, maybe late Tuesday. But it was definitely the middle of the night. The house was quiet and dark.

  I got out of bed and flipped on every light in my room. Then I stripped off my pajamas and stood, naked and illuminated, in front of my full-length mirror. The person staring back was not me. She was a near-perfect copy, right down to the tiny mole on my left hip bone and the thin scar on my left hand that I never could remember getting.

  But her skin was like tracing paper, and the light made her transparent.

  And on the inside, she was all wrong.

  • • •

  Wednesday afternoon, Max and Courtney came by my house. It was quiet, and I was able to hear everything that was said downstairs.

  “Hey, guys, come on in,” Dad said.

  “Is Lucy here? She’s been MIA all week,” Max said, sounding worried.

  “And she hasn’t been answering her phone,” Courtney added.

  “She’s been home sick,” Dad replied, and then lowered his voice an ineffective smidge. “Between us, though, I think there might be something else going on. Do either of you know if anything happened that would make her not want to go to school? Something with Ty or Evan, maybe?”

  “I can’t think of anything,” Courtney said.

  “Me either,” said Max.

  “Hang on—you said all week? She wasn’t in school Monday?” Dad asked.

  “Nope,” Max said.

  There was a moment where I couldn’t hear anything. Maybe they were talking too low, or maybe they weren’t talking at all. Dad must have been putting the pieces together that I hadn’t been in school the day I came home all messed up. It didn’t matter. What was he going to do, ground me?

  “Can we see her?” Courtney asked.

  There was a pause, and then Dad said, “Let me check and see if she’s up for having company.”

  A few seconds later, there was a knock on my door and Dad came in. “Max and Court are here for you.”

  I rolled over in my bed so my back was to him. “No visitors,” I mumbled.

  “Honey, they’re worried about you. It might make you feel better to see your friends.”

  “No visitors,” I repeated, and covered my face with a pillow, shutting out the light.

  Dad stood there for a moment and then left. I didn’t bother listening to whatever excuse he gave my friends.

  • • •

  If I told my family and my friends the truth, everything would change. They would look at me differently, treat me differently. Of course they would—I was different. But right now I was the only one who knew it. And that was the safest place to be. Because if the world outside me became as unrecognizable as the world inside me had, I honestly wouldn’t know what to do.

  On the other hand, if no one knew, they would still be expecting me to be the same old Lucy. But how do you play the role of yourself when “yourself” no longer exists?

  • • •

  Because I adamantly refused to go see the doctor, my dads assumed there wasn’t anything really wrong with me and made me go back to school after two days.

  Thursday morning, I pulled into my usual parking spot to find Max waiting for me, leaning against his car, ankles and arms crossed. He didn’t move as I turned off the engine and got out of the car. He just watched me, his eyes hidden behind his retro, mirrored sunglasses.

  “Hey,” I said lifelessly.

  “Really? That’s all you have to say?” he said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean you disappeared, Luce. No calls, no texts, not even a Facebook status update to let the world know you were alive. The only reason I knew you were coming back today was because I talked to your dads. What the hell is going on with you?” he said.

  “I was sick,” I said.

  “You were so sick that you couldn’t even pick up the phone to let one of us know that you wouldn’t be in rehearsal? Since when is that how you treat your friends? We were worried about you.”

  “I’m sorry, okay? It won’t happen again.”

  Max sighed and dropped his arms. “Is this about Lisa being back?” His voice was a little softer now.

  “No.”

  “So what’s wrong?”

  “Nothing is wrong, okay?” I began to walk toward the school’s entrance. “Now let’s go, we’re gonna be late.”

  • • •

  The moment we walked into the drama club homeroom, a hush fell over the room. Time stopped, and I stood there like an animal at the zoo. Like a freak on display.

  They can see it, the voice in my head whispered. They can see through your skin. They know.

  I had to get out of there.

  In slow motion, I twirled back toward the door. All I had to do was get down the hall and out of the school and into my car and away from the prying eyes. Home schooling couldn’t be that bad—

  Then suddenly, as if on cue, everyone started talking at once. “Oh my god, how are you feeling?” “Where have you been?” “That wasn’t cool, Lucy; you don’t even have an understudy!”

  Wait…maybe they didn’t know.

  “Some of us were pretty sure you were dead,” Elyse said, not sounding particularly concerned.

  My head scrambled to keep up. They were acting like this just because I was away for a few days? But that was so ridiculous! Kids stayed home sick and took mental health days all the time. Just because I’d gotten the perfect attendance award every year since eighth grade didn’t mean I wasn’t entitled to a break.

  But they really couldn’t tell. They didn’t know. I was so relieved.

  Courtney watched me from across the room. I couldn’t read her expression—it was something between scowling and questioning—but before I could go over and talk to her, I was sidetracked.

  Ty appeared in front of me and spoke to me for the first time since we’d broken up. “Welcome back,” he said. “Everyone really missed you.”

  “Not everyone,” I said, nodding in Elyse’s direction.

  “Okay, almost everyone,” he admitted with an apologetic grin. “I mean it, though—it hasn’t been the same without you.”

  His dark eyes burned into mine, and for the smallest moment I wondered if maybe he was talking about more than just the play. But then a warm hand clasped around my wrist, and I was being pulled out into the hallway.

  “Are you okay?” Evan whispered once we were alone.

  I nodded weakly.

  He took a deep breath. “So look…if you don’t like me anymore, you can just tell me. I can handle it.”

  I blinked, uncomprehending.

  “What are you talking about?” I asked.

  “I’m talking about what happened last weekend in your room. Things ended weird that night, and then you fell off the face of the planet for nearly a week.”

  “Wait—you think I was avoiding you?” I couldn’t help but laugh a little.

  “Weren’t you?” he
said, less sure now.

  “No, of course not.”

  “So what was it?”

  “I was sick.”

  He waited for more of an explanation, but I was overwhelmed and trying to keep it together and that was the best I could do.

  “So you…still like me?”

  “I still like you,” I said, and it was the truth.

  But as soon as the words passed through my lips, I knew I should have lied.

  13

  It’s a Hard-Knock Life

  Here’s the entirety of what I knew about HIV:

  1. It’s the virus that causes AIDS.

  2. It’s communicable through unprotected sex and needle sharing.

  3. It’s incurable.

  It wasn’t much; I needed to know more. So, one night that weekend, after everyone else had gone to bed, I went online. It only took a few quick keystrokes to discover that when it came to the subject of HIV and AIDS, the Internet was a bottomless well of overwhelmingly depressing statistics. But I just couldn’t look away. As the data piled up, my outlook became increasingly pessimistic. But at least I was beginning to get answers to some of my questions.

  I learned that, apart from sex and IV drug use, the two main routes of HIV contraction are breast milk and perinatal transmission—which means a mother passing it onto her baby. So, no, I would never be able to give birth to my own child.

  I learned that, for most people, HIV progresses to AIDS within ten years. For some, it takes longer, and for some, it happens much sooner. So, yes, at some point, most likely before I turned thirty, I would get AIDS.

  I learned that AIDS killed over twenty-five million people between 1981 and 2006, and several more million since then. So, yes, I was going to die. And not in the, “Oh, everyone dies someday, but only after they’ve lived an extra-long life and had kids and grandkids and great-grandkids” way. I was going to die in the far-too-young, oh-so-tragic way.

  I pressed on and learned what, exactly, that death would look like. It was ironic—I’d sung along to the Rent song “Will I?” about a thousand times without ever really thinking about the meaning behind the words. But now, for the first time, I understood why the characters were asking if they would lose their dignity. It was because that’s what AIDS does to its victims. There would be lesions and loss of bowel control and high fevers. But those are just super-fun bonuses of the syndrome—they wouldn’t kill me. There was no knowing what would finally take me out in the end. AIDS makes your immune system basically useless, so that you’re susceptible to all kinds of illnesses and unable to fight them off. So it could be cancer or liver disease or even pneumonia…but whatever it was, it was guaranteed to be undignified.