Me and Me

by Alice Kuipers

  I slot away a cookie sheet. Together we wrap the muffins. I message Alec. He messages back when Lucy and I are outside D’Lish, locking up.

  Alec:

  Can we meet alone instead?

  Lark:

  I promised Lucy.

  Not that I remembered.

  Alec:

  Can you un-promise?

  We need to talk.

  My heart sputters. What does that mean?

  Lark:

  Where do you want to meet?

  Should I be worried?

  Alec:

  When I say talk, I might mean something else . . . ;-)

  Meet u at the play park by my house?

  Lark:

  Okay. Lucy will get over it.

  Something else sounds good . . .

  really good . . .

  Lucy elbows my arm. “Is he going to meet us?”

  “Would you mind if I bail?”

  She rolls her eyes. “Would you mind if I mind?”

  “Of course I’d mind! I can see Alec tomorrow. Let’s go see the band. You and me.”

  She elbows me again. “No. Don’t worry about it. Go. Get some.” She pulls out a clove cigarette. “Who am I to stand in the path of true love?”

  “It’s not love. And I’m not getting some.”

  “Yeah, you tell yourself that.” She lights her cigarette. “Alec and Lark sitting in a tree. F.U.C.K.I.N.G.”

  I giggle. “Maybe it’s a bit love. Thanks, Luce. See you later.”

  I hum a few bars of a possible song to myself as I put in my earbuds, and then I longboard away from Lucy in the bright moonlight toward the play park where Alec is waiting for me.

  Day 17: afternoon

  After school on Tuesday, Alec drives us over to the hospital. We get out in the parking lot, and I am taken back to the last time I was here. Three years ago, Dad walked me to the car. As he opened the passenger door, I turned to look up at the blank windows, wondering what would happen to Mom’s body. Loss grabs my heart and clenches.

  Alec says, “Hey, Planet Lark, all okay?”

  I nod minutely.

  He takes my hand and interlaces his fingers with mine. We figure our way through the warren of hospital rooms and find Annabelle’s ward. When Suzanne opens Annabelle’s door, she manages a wan smile.

  “I was hoping we’d be out of here before now,” she says.

  Annabelle’s blond hair spreads out in damp tendrils on the pillow. There is a red blotch on her left cheek.

  Her mom brushes that cheek and says, “Did you know that patients in comas often end up the victims of medical errors? Annabelle’s allergic to lanolin. I told them.”

  She slumps in an armchair and gestures for me to sit on the only other chair. Alec stands awkwardly by a cabinet on which several vases of wilted flowers are parked. Suzanne falls silent.

  I put my hand softly on Annabelle’s—it is so small and warm beneath mine. And so very still. The only sound is the soft in-and out-takes of her breath. Her eyes seem to be moving beneath her closed lids. As I watch, a tiny tear appears at the corner of her right eye. It slides down her cheek and slips onto the white bedsheet, where it leaves a watermark. The watermark begins spreading, as if more water is coming from somewhere. The colour of the water darkens, browning.

  I sense a static, a shimmer in the air. I glance up and see my bedroom, notes for a song scattered on my desk.

  I gasp and let go of Annabelle’s hand. What’s happening?

  Alec touches my shoulder. “You okay?”

  “Um . . .” Everything is as it was. I touch the bedsheet. It’s dry. “I’m fine,” I say. “Yeah. Just . . .” I catch Suzanne’s gaze. “I’m sorry,” I say.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Day 1: early

  Tangled branches overhang our yard. It’s not even nine in the morning, but the heat is rising already. I’m listening to St. Vincent while Dad picks tomatoes. Their leaves smell rich and dense, almost spicy. I flick through my cell to check, again, if there’s been any update. Nothing.

  “Do you think we can go now, Dad?”

  “Of course. You ready?” He winces slightly and puts one hand to his chest.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Dad?”

  “Just a little twinge. It’s nothing to worry about, remember?” He wipes his hands on his pants and pulls the car key from his pocket. “Let’s go.”

  We sit at a traffic light, time slowing down. The song I was writing when I was in the truck with Alec—yesterday, a thousand years ago—plays in my mind. I swallow back nausea.

  It was a total freak accident. Alec hit his head on a rock, which caused him to lose consciousness. Your head is, like, a danger zone. A six-year-old boy falls from a low wooden beam at the play park. Brain is damaged forever. A ten-year-old stumbles at the shopping mall. Is in a coma. For, like, years. A fifteen-year-old from a small town outside Edenville gets his four-wheeler stuck under a faulty garage door. The door crushes his head. Dead. Trust me. I’ve been Googling this crap all night. Who knew the fabric of life was so thin? Not Alec. If he’d dived a centimetre to the right, a centimetre to the left. If he hadn’t hit his head at that exact spot, well, he might have been the one to save Annabelle. If I’d swum to him instead of Annabelle, he might not have lost consciousness, swallowed so much water. He might just have had a headache. Or a bruise. Or nothing. Thinking that I might have saved him stirs memories of blood, of him sinking, but when I try to picture that moment, I’m dizzy. I hear screaming. Pain radiates through my chest.

  Dad eases the car from one lane to another. “Did you call them?”

  I shake my head and stare out the car window.

  “Sweetheart, you should call before we show up. I know you’re upset they haven’t let you see him, but you have to call his family.” Dad pulls the car over to the side of the road and gives me a look.

  I get out my phone and press in Alec’s home number, which I got from the class list.

  A woman answers. I recognize her voice: it’s Alec’s mom, who I met briefly at the hospital yesterday.

  “Hi, it’s . . . it’s Lark.”

  There’s a long pause, so I wonder if she’s still there. Then she says, “How can I help you? I’m only home to get a change of clothes. I’m on my way back. To the hospital.”

  “I’m sorry to bother you. I just wanted to know . . . How is he?”

  “No change.”

  I can’t stop tears. “Can I maybe . . . Can I come and see him?”

  “There’s really no change.” She falls silent. “Just family, Lark. We just need time.”

  I nod, although she can’t see me, and tears slip down my cheeks.

  Dad catches my look and swings the wheel to aim us toward home.

  “Maybe tomorrow,” Alec’s mom says. “Maybe tomorrow.”

  Day 3: period three, almost

  The first day of the school year, third period, and my classmates are heading into English with Mr. Hidlebaugh.

  Alec’s thumb circles my palm

  and shivers spread through me.

  The message vanishes. I press the screen several times, my heart racing and my breathing fast: what does it mean? I can’t find any record of it or the sender anywhere. I look up and realize I’m alone in the walkway; the bell has rung, my class has started, and I feel like I’m about to throw up.

  I jam my cell into my pocket, my teeth chattering but not from cold, and I walk away. I have to get out of here. As I leave, the front doors of Edenville High swing shut behind me.

  Our school is at the top of the only hill in the city. Edenville is one of the flattest cities in the world—a driver almost never has to use a handbrake. Not that I passed my driving test. I hurry away from the old building with its quirks, down the hill, past my bus stop. I check my phone for the bus times, but I’ve just missed one.

  Far above in the blue sky, an airplane soars. The trees already have curling leaves, brown, red and
gold fluttering in a light breeze. This is an ugly part of town, but there are beautiful trails by the river where I’ve just decided I’ll go. Maybe there I’ll find some peace.

  I pass the drugstore and realize I forgot to eat breakfast. My stomach tightens with hunger, so I duck inside to hunt for a chocolate bar, taking ages to select the one I want. I join the lineup to pay. The woman in front of me is chatting with the clerk about a store card. Just as well. I’m in no rush. I tune in and out of their conversation. Sometimes other people’s conversations spark ideas for songs, but right now, the thought of writing a song makes me want to puke. I stare at a shiny nail polish bottle on a sale rack. I only have two dollars, and I don’t seem to have my debit card. I tell myself I don’t need it; I don’t even wear nail polish with gold sparkles. I glance at the store clerk, who’s not watching me. There’s no one behind me in the lineup. My fingers pluck the bottle from the counter.

  I close the nail polish bottle into my fist. Cold, hard, small. I push it into my jacket pocket, my heart hammering. A thrill charges through me, mixed with total stress. What am I even doing? The clerk is going to know. Now it’s my turn to pay, so I slide the chocolate bar over the counter and say something like, “Thanks.” Or “Bye.” Or “Have a good day.” Or nothing. I can’t even remember what I say, because I’m hurrying out of the store, stolen nail polish in my pocket.

  I’m halfway down the block when the buzz comes. I got away with it! I check over my shoulder. Yep. I got away with it. Then all these other thoughts take over, like: What the hell am I doing? Dad would be furious if he knew. This is dumb. It’s as if I can hear my brain arguing with itself.

  I arrive at the river, where a solitary paddle-boarder passes under the bridge. Traffic rumbles faintly as I lose track of time, watching the water, thinking of Alec going under, Suzanne crying out to me. I lean against a tree and take a couple breaths, my fingers playing with the little bottle in my pocket.

  I press the fingertips of my other hand to my temple and sink to the ground, breathing in the smell of burning leaves from someone’s backyard bonfire, and the words of the song from the day of the accident come back into my head. Suddenly the idea of working on a song doesn’t make me feel sick; it makes me feel alive. A line I love, one I memorized from the writer Anne Lamott, spins in my mind: “Things that catch us off-guard, that break in on our small bordered worlds. When this happens everything feels more spacious.”

  I open up my cell. There are a bunch of messages from my dad and Lucy. They’re worrying about me, about where I am. I should answer them, but instead I flip to Do Not Disturb. I let words whirl and grow in my mind, and I jot down possible lyrics. We’re caught off-guard. It doesn’t have to be this hard. Small bordered worlds. Leave a taste but no trace. After working on this idea a while, I open up the lyrics I wrote that day by the lake. There are some good lines in the opening.

  Wanna give your heart to me

  The fire in the woods

  Cut down, cut down just one tree . . .

  A shattered moment

  Take a sliver and look to see

  Inside it’s seven years bad luck

  The remnants of how we used to be . . .

  I realize that the first line, although I love it, isn’t part of this song. Sometimes it takes a while to find the right opening, but I see it now. I cut the line and save it for a possible future song, and then I rework what I have left.

  A moment in pieces

  Take a shard of me

  Look deeply inside for remnants

  Of how we used to be.

  Part the water, slide in a ripple

  Find yourself in time

  Find me.

  A melody plays in my mind. The sound fills me up, pushing out Suzanne’s desperate plea. I make more notes and then decide to turn to another song of mine—“Colony.” Dad and I live on Colony Street. As I write, I imagine settlers bringing a wagon to the prairies, building a house with sod. Eventually I save everything, psyched about how much work I just got done. I can’t wait to share this with the band; I can’t wait to sing these songs.

  My dad is digging in the front yard. He loves yardwork and gets sentimental about flowers. It’s hard getting roses to behave in this part of the world, he tells me, and this fall afternoon, he tenderly prunes the rose bushes. The day has drifted away like the clouds overhead, leaving soft light. The heads of the flowers are droopy, and the air smells of their fading petals. He raises his chin at me.

  “Not checking texts?”

  “Sorry.”

  “Lark, I was worried about you. I came to pick you up after school—remember? We made a plan. You weren’t there. Lucy told me you walked out after lunch. She said you were a total space cadet before that. Her phrasing.”

  “I didn’t remember you were coming to get me.”

  “What’s going on?”

  “I had to think.” I switch my cell from Do Not Disturb and read over his messages, so I don’t have to look at him. “Yep, messages from you,” I mumble. “And Lucy. And all the band. Sorry. Again.”

  “I bought sausages.”

  “Did you get any onions?”

  “Everything on the list is there.” He ducks back to his roses.

  I’m the cook in our house now, though after Mom died, neighbours and Reid’s mom fed us. I sit on the front step, stretch my arms up, reach for the sky. My shirt rises up, and the air tickles my tummy.

  “I rewrote a song today, fixed a couple of lines. Worked on a new idea for another song too, for practice later.”

  “That’s really good.” He plucks a stem of sage and passes it to me.

  Holding the sage and inhaling its deep, warm smell reminds me of holding Alec’s orange roses. I realize I don’t know what happened to them. I lean back against the step.

  “It seems wrong that Alec is lying there, and I’m sitting in the yard just the same as before our date.”

  “Lark, what you’ve been through . . .” he says gently. “Also . . . three years is hardly any time at all.”

  “This isn’t about her.”

  “Of course it is. It was your birthday.” He bends down and tugs out a weed.

  We’re both quiet. I get up from the step and feel my stomach grumble. For the first time since what happened to Alec, I’m starving.

  “I’m going to make supper.”

  He grunts. “Next time we have a plan, put it in your calendar.”

  I laugh. “I don’t have a calendar. You know that.”

  Although I’m groggy, I make it to practice at Iona’s, and later, when I get home, I’m too awake to sleep. I wander to the bathroom.

  As I stare in the mirror, memories of the lake intrude, and I make myself look into my own eyes, forcing the moment Alec went under from my mind. Next thing I know, I’m retching into the toilet, remembering how Mom once held back my hair when I was vomiting. I’m sweaty and crying and a total mess. I try to wipe up the splatter with toilet paper and then fumble in the cupboard under the sink to find cleaning product. My hand touches a box, which I pull out: it’s hair dye, old stuff of Mom’s—she used to love to change her hair. The colour of this one is Smokin’ Hot. Next to it is a box of hair bleach and a large pair of scissors.

  I pull everything out and quickly clean up the mess in the bathroom. My stomach has settled, and suddenly my mind is clear of horrible images. I take a deep breath, but it isn’t until I see the scissors in my hand that I realize what I’m going to do.

  Day 7: Sunday afternoon

  I’m sitting on my favourite couch in Iona’s garage, playing with the jewel on my belly chain, which dangles out over my jeans.

  “You know what? I wasn’t sure this week at school, but I like it,” Iona says.

  I touch my hair self-consciously. “Yeah. It seemed like a good idea at the time.” It grazes my jawline and flops in my line of vision in a shaggy, Smokin’ Hot red.

  Nifty paces up and down. He puts his e-cig back into his pocket and presses the to
p of his nose.

  “What’s up, big man?” I ask.

  He sticks his tongue out like he’s dying of thirst. Then he shakes his head, which turns into him shaking his whole body. He works it out of his skinny arms and legs. “You know what, let’s get on with it. I just wanna play, you know?” He picks up his guitar and noodles.

  Normally he plays bass guitar and I’m lead, but now he’s playing the melody I sent him yesterday. He plays it first in F major, then again in D minor. The change gives it a different feel, exotic, sad, lost. The music fills the room, transporting me to strange lands, to a melancholia that only minor chords can bring.

  “Play that again,” I say, and I get up and do a couple of vocal warm-ups.

  He waits until I’m done before he plays. This time I sing the opening lyrics of the song I worked on by the river.

  “I’m shattered glass

  Shatter me, me, me

  A moment in pieces

  Take a shard of me

  Look deeply inside for remnants

  Of how we used to be

  Part the water, slide in a ripple.

  Find yourself in time

  Find me

  Part the water, slide in a ripple

  Find yourself in time.”

  Iona slides in on the drums, a slow four-four. Then Reid comes in on keys, the notes ballerinas. He’s an unbelievable player, so light and fluid.

  “A tiny sliver enters

  Turns my heart to ice

  Shows me the way our life could be

  Could be

  Part the water, slide in a ripple

  Find yourself in time

  Find me . . .

  “Something, something, something . . . I need a couple more verses . . .” I sing, smiling over at the others. They keep playing. I finish up:

  “Part the water, slide in a ripple

  Find yourself in time

  Find me.”

  Nifty adds a few bars of a possible harmony, lifting and joyful. It’s rough, but it works. His smile is infectious.