The Window

by Amelia Brunskill

  Blood rushed in my ears and the space around me contracted. The wave was coming, so close I could touch it, hear its roar.

  I stood up and left the classroom, ignoring the protest of Mrs. Wristel, ignoring everything between me and the door.

  I was aiming for the bathroom, but I didn’t make it that far down the hallway before I had to crumple down against one of the lockers. My head between my knees, I counted breaths, trying to force myself to calm down, to not let myself spiral out of control. I tried not to think about her, not to think of anything but the count of air going in and out of my lungs.

  I was at over three hundred breaths when I heard footsteps coming in my direction. I kept my head down, hoping that whoever it was would ignore me and keep going. Nothing to see here, I thought. Please keep right on moving along. Instead, the footsteps slowed and then came to a stop.

  Reluctantly, I looked up, expecting it to be one of the teachers, or maybe Mrs. Hayes—someone who felt morally obligated to intervene.

  But it was Nick Anderson, towering above me.

  “Hi,” he said. Almost like he expected to see me here, like it was completely normal for me to be sitting in the empty hallway with my arms wrapped tight around my legs as though practicing for an earthquake drill. “Mind if I sit?”

  I gave a stiff shrug. “It’s not my hallway.”

  While my tone was hardly welcoming, he smiled and eased down beside me, stretching out his legs.

  “Shouldn’t you be in class?” I asked, irritated at how comfortable he was making himself. Which might have been hypocritical, given that I should have been in class myself. Then again, I had been crying; his excuse was less clear.

  “Bathroom break,” he said. “I guess that’s what happens when you start off the day with a Big Gulp.”

  “I didn’t think people actually bought those things.”

  “Sure they do,” he said. “I mean—they’re so big. And so cheap. They’re like everything good about America.”

  I made a sound that could be charitably described as a laugh. Then I leaned my head back and stared at the wall across from me. There was a big banner posted across the top of the lockers for a dance that had been held the weekend before. The lettering was done in metallic gold, and there was liberal use of glitter glue. Subtle it was not.

  “Did you go?” Nick asked, tilting his chin toward the poster.

  “No,” I said. “But not for lack of publicity—I have five flyers for it stuffed in my backpack.”

  “Five?”

  I nodded. “I counted. I keep meaning to throw them out, but I only remember when I get home.”

  “Why don’t you throw them out at home?”

  I shrugged. “I worry my mom might find them and get all wistful and hint-y about how maybe I should’ve gone.”

  “Let me guess: was she the homecoming queen?” he asked with a laugh. “Trying to relive her glory days?”

  That hadn’t occurred to me, honestly. I realized I didn’t actually know if my mom had been the homecoming queen—didn’t really know anything about her life at that time, about what she’d been like. It was a jarring thought.

  “Maybe.” I paused. “I don’t think that’s most of it, though—it’s more her wanting me to be okay and, you know, involved. Like if I’m around other people enough, I’ll be all right, or at least I’ll be someone else’s problem for a while.”

  His smile flagged.

  Maybe that was too much. Then again, too much or nothing at all was all I had. Whatever. It was his own fault. He should have left me alone to begin with—just kept on walking. I didn’t understand why he hadn’t.

  We sat there, staring at the poster’s gold lettering.

  “I liked Anna,” Nick said quietly. “I always liked her.”

  I turned my head, surprised into looking at him directly for the first time since he’d sat down.

  “I’d thought about asking her out before…” He faltered.

  Before she died, I filled in. You can say it, I wanted to tell him. It won’t make it any more real than it already is, can’t hurt me any more than it has.

  He shook his head and continued. “I didn’t, though. I don’t know why. Maybe I was waiting for something, but I can’t remember what anymore.”

  He stared at the ground and then rubbed his neck and sighed.

  “I’m sorry—I didn’t mean to talk about that. It was stupid to bring it up.”

  I opened my mouth to respond, not knowing what I was going to say, except that what he’d said wasn’t stupid. That it was, in a way, nice to hear someone talk about how they felt about her, instead of how sorry they were for my loss, instead of looking at me with big eyes as if waiting for me to come apart. That was too many words, though, and I didn’t trust myself to say them. So we just continued to sit there, the only sound between us the muffled noise of distant classroom discussions.

  After a few minutes, he stood up, stretching his arms above his head as if to break some tension there. “I should probably head back to class before someone puts out an APB,” he said. “See you later, Jess.”

  “See you later,” I echoed.

  * * *

  —

  I WENT BACK TO ENGLISH a few minutes before the bell rang. I didn’t explain myself, didn’t mouth an apology to Ms. Wristel; I simply sat down at my desk and started taking notes. Not very good notes, not the kind of thorough, verbatim ones I used to take. Because in truth, I wasn’t paying close attention. I was thinking about Nick, about him sitting with Brian and Charlie at the funeral. About how before, I hadn’t understood why he’d come.

  * * *

  —

  WHEN I GOT HOME, MOM was leaning against the kitchen wall, one hand holding her phone, the other gently pressed to her temple.

  “Thank you,” I heard her say into the phone. “I appreciate that.”

  She nodded and pressed her hand to her head a fraction harder, like she was trying to forestall a headache.

  “Okay,” she said. “Well, I guess that’s what we expected. I guess it makes sense.”

  I dropped my backpack on the couch and headed into the kitchen to get some water. Mom started when I walked in. “Hi, sweetheart,” she said, covering the receiver. “I’ll take this upstairs. Back in a minute.”

  I shrugged and grabbed a glass from the cupboard.

  “Yes, I’m still here,” I heard her say as she headed up the stairs.

  The water came out of the tap incredibly cold, just how I liked it—the cold giving it almost a mineral flavor, the way I imagined granite might taste. Anna once wrote a story after I told her that, a story about a girl who turned to rock and ice after drinking from a mysterious well. I’d asked her if the girl was supposed to be me. She’d said no. She’d paused first.

  I was reading in the living room when Mom came back downstairs. “Sorry about that,” she said.

  “It’s fine,” I said as I flipped the page. “Who was it?”

  “Hmmm?” she said, opening the fridge door and starting to poke around inside. “Oh, that was Stan’s Furniture. There was an issue with the table I picked out, so it’s going to take a bit longer than we expected.”

  “That’s too bad,” I said.

  “Yes,” she said. “It is.” Her voice held more emotion than I’d expected, given that we were talking about a kitchen table. Maybe, I thought, I wasn’t the only one who should be taking part in structured activities.

  ON THE FIRST DAY OF track, I was horrified to discover there were a number of girls on the team who were extremely comfortable changing around other people. They were unselfconscious to a degree I simply could not understand—pausing, shirt off, bra off, to expound on nonurgent topics like their plans for the evening, or what fast-food places they were applying for work at. I held my bag of clothes tight to my chest and se
lected a locker as close as possible to the lone private changing room.

  The curtain of the changing room was drawn, and a pair of bare feet was visible underneath, so I sat and waited on the bench in front of my locker. As I waited, I put my bag on my lap and pretended to search through it in order to avoid looking at my half-naked peers. My track uniform hadn’t arrived yet, so my bag contained a pair of sweatpants and a loose T-shirt—a vastly superior outfit to the actual uniform, a sleeveless shirt and track shorts that ended a scant two inches below the crotch. Given how cold it still was outside, the tininess of the uniform seemed both indecent and inhumane.

  I only looked up from my bag when I heard the clatter of the changing-room curtain being pulled back. Lauren stepped out and started when she saw me.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked as I stood up. Her tone indicated that the surprise wasn’t a pleasant one. Then she glanced down, took in my bag. Something shifted in her face. “Oh, are those Anna’s things? I’d wondered when someone was going to come get them.”

  “No, these are my things,” I told her. “I joined track.” I paused. “Who would I ask about getting access to Anna’s locker? Mr. Matthews?”

  “No way, none of the male teachers are allowed in here—that’d be lawsuit city.”

  “Okay, who, then?”

  “Find one of the female coaches—they’ll be able to pull the locker codes and open it for you. If you want to do it after practice, then someone’s usually still around doing grading in their office.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “Do you know which locker was hers?”

  Lauren sighed, as if she’d felt she’d already been more helpful than necessary. Then she relented and pointed. “That one,” she said. I followed her finger, and there it was—the locker right next to the one I’d chosen.

  * * *

  —

  OUTSIDE, THE WEATHER WAS OVERCAST and cold. It had rained earlier in the day, and the red track glistened against the wet grass, which was muddy and patchy as it began its gradual recovery from winter.

  “Welcome back, you guys,” Mr. Matthews said as everyone huddled together on the bleachers. “I know the weather isn’t the best, but thank you for coming out. We’re going to have a great season this year.”

  The words seemed like the right thing to say, the sort of cheery “we’re all in this together” speech that coaches are supposed to give, but the tone was subdued and the smile on his face didn’t reach his eyes. Of course, the damp cold meant no one exactly seemed enthusiastic. Well, no one except Sarah, who’d been weirdly bright-eyed from the moment she’d whipped her hair back into a ponytail in the locker room.

  Mr. Matthews coaxed us onto the field, where he started us off with some laps. After that, we moved on to drills, which involved a lot of starting and stopping and changing of direction.

  As I stumbled back and forth, my teammates running alongside me, a couple of things soon became clear:

  • Running was harder than it looked;

  • Sarah was by far the fastest person on the team;

  • Sarah was very fast.

  The first thing was concerning and the last two were surprising. Sarah had said that she liked track, but I’d had no sense of how good she was or how seriously she took it. It was like finding out that your lab partner who “enjoyed swimming” was going to the Olympics.

  I’d somehow expected that by joining track, I would enjoy newfound proximity to Mr. Matthews and be able to spend plenty of time during practice observing him and gaining useful insights into his character. While the proximity part was true, as practice continued, I came to the disappointing realization that the latter part was pure delusion. Because at least so far, it looked like I’d be spending every minute of track either frantically trying to keep up or trying not to keel over from exhaustion.

  After one particularly grueling series of sprints, Sarah came over and elbowed me roughly in the side. “Fun, right?”

  I narrowed my eyes at her, noting that her eyeliner hadn’t so much as smudged, while I had sweat pouring down every inch of my body.

  “You may be the devil,” I managed to get out.

  “Aw,” she said. “You’ll learn to love it.”

  “I think I’m going to vomit. Or faint. My body can’t decide which.”

  “All part of the process,” she said.

  “You should’ve warned me.”

  “Oh, don’t be such a baby—you’ll be totally fine. Anyway, this part isn’t so bad—it’s tomorrow that you’ll really feel it.” She flashed me an evil smile and elbowed me again.

  I was about to object to all the elbowing when she called out, “Isn’t that right, Mr. Matthews?”

  I turned to see him passing close behind us.

  He slowed down. “Isn’t what right?”

  “I was telling Jess that feeling rough the first day is normal.”

  He turned and faced me for a moment. “Completely normal. Don’t worry about it.”

  “See?” Sarah said to me. “And besides, you have a good build for running. You’ll probably turn out to be a natural.”

  “Like Anna,” I said, carefully watching Mr. Matthews’s face.

  For a moment, his eyes flicked away, and he took a breath. I wondered if in that moment, he saw her, caught a glimpse of her face. If the sound of her name destabilized his heart.

  “Yes,” he said. “Like Anna.”

  And I thought I saw something in his eyes, thought there was something more he wanted to say. Then one of the other girls called out, yelling that she thought she’d pulled a muscle. He jogged off toward her, leaving me to wonder what he would’ve said, or if he’d even been planning to say anything at all.

  * * *

  —

  WHEN PRACTICE ENDED, I LET Lauren use the changing room first. It was meant as a nice gesture, as thanks for her help before. It went utterly unacknowledged, of course.

  After changing, I roamed the halls, searching for a lit classroom containing a female coach. The one I found was Ms. Turner, who also served as the school’s algebra and geometry teacher.

  The two of us hadn’t interacted since I’d been called out of gym, since she’d stood beside Mrs. Hayes and watched as I’d left the room.

  We didn’t speak of that day now, when I entered the classroom and she looked up from grading papers. We barely spoke, yet soon we were trudging back to the locker room together, and then she was having me hold out the locker code book so she could squint between it and the lock as she twisted the knob to first one number, then the next. It took her two tries, with vigorous resetting in between, before the lock popped open.

  “There you go,” she said.

  I nodded and she nodded back. She looked relieved, I thought, that I didn’t need anything more from her.

  I sat on the bench and waited until she and the last remaining stragglers from the track team had left before I started to go through Anna’s locker.

  The top shelf was relatively tidy. A stick of unscented deodorant stood on the left side, and beside it were a hairbrush and a pile of plain hairbands.

  The bottom shelf was pure chaos. A pair of loose socks I rolled together and tucked into her shoes, and then I gingerly removed and folded a T-shirt and a sports bra before packing them into the gym bag.

  Toward the back of the locker, I found another, clean pair of socks that she’d already rolled together. When I picked them up, my fingertips encountered something hard underneath the cotton. Something solid and circular had been tucked up inside them. Slowly, I undid the roll and pulled out the object.

  It looked like a makeup compact. When I opened it, though, I realized that it was something else entirely—something I’d seen before, in health class, but never held in my hand. A round, plastic dial of birth control pills, half empty.

 
I stared at it, the smooth plastic cool against the palm of my hand.

  I had wanted something tangible, and here it was. Proof that she really was hiding something from me. From everyone.

  We got attention, of course. Two girls in a bar, girls who obviously shouldn’t be there. Got attention, especially when a song came on that we liked and we danced—arms up, hair flying.

  It felt like a game, one that Lily and I were too smart to lose. Because two beers in, we were so very, very smart. Smart, and beautiful like diamonds that could cut right through the soft flesh of the men who watched us.

  Their desire was a joke, because we didn’t want them back. Even if we had, she had a boyfriend and I, I had common sense. I believed that back then.

  SEX AND DEATH.

  Before Anna died, I never really thought much about either of those things. Now it felt like those were the only two topics available.

  Sex I’d always actively avoided thinking about. The whole thing seemed horrifying, frankly. Even leaving aside the specific mechanics of the act, that amount of touching, that amount of skin seemed utterly repellent.

  I knew Anna didn’t feel the same way. I’d accepted, on some level, that she probably had some kind of physical relationship with whoever she was meeting, but the pills…the pills felt like damning evidence of how far apart we’d drifted, of how many milestones I’d missed.

  Dying, on the other hand, I hadn’t avoided thinking about as such. I just hadn’t spent any real time considering it. It had seemed like a pointless thing to spend any mental energy on. Where life was concerned, the options were binary: you were either alive or not.

  Which had suited me fine, until now. Especially since in my experience, all dead people were old or strangers. Which didn’t mean that death wasn’t sad, didn’t mean everyone got as many years as they wanted. It just was what it was.