You Are the Everything

by Karen Rivers

  Inside the horse head, it smells like plastic.

  Yellow plastic.

  You start to gasp. You’re panicking before you’re even aware that the smell is the smell of the mask on the plane. You can’t get your breath. Great. You crouch down, then slide down to the floor. Gasping, gasping. You can’t breathe. In, out. Out, in. You’re drenched in sweat, shivering. You’re going to die, here on the floor of the feedstore. That’s probably ironic but right now all you care about is that you’re going to die.

  Umbrellas, you think. Conundrum.

  “Are you okay? God, I’m so sorry! I was just horsing around. See what I did there? Horsing around?” He has pulled the horse head off you, awkwardly. You stay there, curled up, like a collapsed runner at the finish line of a marathon, breathing raggedly, unable to straighten your body.

  “Do you need some water? I’m seriously sorry.” His head is bent over so close to yours that you can smell his breath.

  You can see the freckles across his nose, a picked-at zit on his cheek that has scabbed over. You hold up your hand and whisper into his ear, “Fuck off, Benedict Cumberband.”

  He shakes his head, standing. But not before you’re hit by a waft of cereal milk and cinnamon gum. “It’s Cumberbatch. If you’re going to call me by the wrong name, it may as well be the right wrong name.” He sounds slightly less confident than before. He holds out his hand, like he wants to help you up, but you ignore it and he drops it down by his side, looking at it like he’s not sure what it’s doing, like it’s operating without his authorization, a feeling you’re awfully familiar with. “Sorry,” he mutters again.

  Your heart still feels wobbly and so you hate him, but your breathing is starting to slow. You can feel sweat trickling down the back of your neck. It’s too hot. It’s too hot for what you’re wearing. It’s too hot for plastic horse heads. “I hate you,” you whisper. Then, louder, “Forget it. Forget all of it.”

  “You don’t mean that,” he pouts. “You find me charming.”

  You shake your head, staggering to your feet. “Whatever, Ben.”

  “I think I’ll bring you that feed myself, ” he says. You can tell he’s trying to sound confident, but he’s failing. “There’s something really fascinating about you.”

  “Sounds stalker-y,” you say, rallying. “Cumberbutt, I’m telling you, that might fly in London, but in America, we don’t take kindly to that kind of crazy.”

  “See you at school, Pixie,” he says. “I’ll show you around.”

  “I think I’ll manage,” you say. “Long hallways, numbered classrooms, right? The gym is the big open space with painted lines on the floor? The cafeteria is the room with the food? Thanks, though.”

  “That’s my truck, by the way!” he calls after you. “I’ll make you a deal on it!”

  You wave your hand in the air. “No, thank you! I’m really more of a car girl, I think.”

  You push the door open and the warm outside air hits you hard. It’s even hotter outside than it was inside. You’re dressed all wrong. Layers are useful but also stupid when it’s 90 degrees. You need to get home, change into a T-shirt and jeans, saddle up Midnight for a ride up the hill to the stream, let him wade through the water, the icy coldness pouring over your legs.

  The thing is, you don’t remember learning to ride, but you must know how.

  Do you?

  You pause, confused. You know you ride him all the time. You know you do. You wouldn’t get that wrong.

  But when did you learn? Who taught you?

  You swallow hard. There’s a bad taste in your mouth: smoke and acid. It’s best not to look too closely at the details sometimes, that’s all. The details can trip you up.

  You can see your dad, waiting in the car, pretending not to be watching you impatiently, because Chopped starts in twenty minutes and he hates missing it and refuses to figure out how to record things on the cable box.

  You wave at him.

  Every time you do something alone, your dad acts like you’ve just crossed the finish line in first place but he’s always been like that, even Before. It’s the completely true and totally cringeworthy story of your life. You can count on your dad being there with, say, a huge sign that says go elyse go at a debate meet, and a ridiculously gigantic bouquet of flowers at every band concert. If you’d ever won first place in anything, he’d probably have had a stroke and dropped dead on the spot, so luckily you’ve never been the first across any finish line.

  Kath is the athletic one. Not you.

  Was.

  “What, Dad?” you say, sliding into the passenger seat. “You look like you’re about to burst into applause, give a standing ovation.”

  Your dad turns down the stereo, which is blasting classical music. You shiver. Flutes. Bile rises in your mouth. “Seriously, Dad, turn that off.”

  He reaches out and taps the button. The sound of a pop song you’ve never heard floods through the car. You relax a little. “Great job!” he says. “How did that feel?”

  “Dad.” You roll your eyes. “I ordered food for Midi. It felt like a feedstore. It felt like I ordered food for a horse. It’s no big whoop. I don’t know why we couldn’t take it now, though. Why does it have to be delivered? It’s just food! We could probably jam it all in the back, somehow.”

  He shrugs. “New car smell!” he says. “Once we start using it for animal stuff, then it’s got that . . .”

  “Old animal food smell?”

  “Exactly,” he says. He starts the car and pulls slowly out of the parking lot, like he’s avoiding the nonexistent pedestrians and rush of imaginary traffic. He signals and looks both ways before inching out onto the main road. Then, “I’m proud of you, kiddo. Baby steps.”

  “Come on, Dad. I didn’t do anything! I just don’t like crowds of people pawing at me in case touching me is magic, which isn’t that weird when you think about it. Most human beings don’t like to be touched. The feedstore had no pawing crowds. Like, literally no other customers. Anyway, can I go out tonight? Me and Josh Harris are going to go to a thing.”

  “A thing?” He coasts to a stop at a stop sign. The road is completely empty in all directions, but he remains stopped. The phrase “abundance of caution” jumps into your head.

  “Dad, drive,” you say. Next to the car, there is a tree that at first glance looks like it is covered with crows, but when you look closer, you realize that they are shoes. Shoe tree, you think. You remember drawing one once. A project about Wyoming you did for school? “The shoe tree,” you mumble. Your brain is reaching for something it can’t grasp. You look back at the road. “Dad, there are NO OTHER CARS. Go already!”

  He presses the gas and the car tentatively rolls forward. “What kind of thing? Will there be crowds?” He speeds up a little and you relax, the shoe tree behind you.

  “Nothing.” You roll your eyes. “There are no crowds in this town, period. It’s not like at home. I mean, it is home now, but you know what I mean. Anyway, we’re just going to hang out, you know?”

  “Okay,” he says, slowly. “But you wanted a horse, you have to exercise your horse, that’s part of the deal.”

  “I’m going to ride when I get home! Don’t worry about it! I already planned to! I was just asking about later.”

  He smiles. “You can go out later, of course. I’m just curious because you don’t usually ask, you usually tell. So it makes me think there’s something else you want to tell? About later?”

  “Geez,” I mutter. “Just trying to do the right thing here.” Then, louder, “Nothing to tell, Dad. Sorry. School starts next week, it might help if we know more than just each other, you know?”

  “I’m making duck confit tonight. Will you be home for dinner?”

  “I guess.”

  “Fair enough then,” he says. He starts to hum. It sounds a little like The Pris
oner’s March.

  “Dad,” you say.

  “What’s that?” he says.

  You barely get the window open before you throw up. The puking sneaks up on you all the time. You have almost no time to react before it’s happening.

  “So much for that new car smell,” he says, sadly.

  “Sorry, Dad,” you groan. “I don’t know what happened. I guess I just . . . Maybe it was something I ate.”

  He shrugs, but he looks really annoyed. “Cars can be cleaned,” he says. “Let’s get you home and cleaned up. You may not want to go out with Josh tonight anyway. Wonder if you’re coming down with something.”

  “Josh Harris,” you say, “All one word.” But he’s not listening. Then, “I’m not sick. You know it sometimes just happens. It’s not the flu, the plane crashed.”

  Your dad doesn’t seem to hear you, or at least, he doesn’t answer. He’s turned the radio up again and his eyes are on the horizon, where the sun is shifting slightly lower in the sky. Soon it will disappear behind the mountains, which are all around your little town, leaving them to cast shadows over everything, making the evening light gray and cool.

  20.

  You find yourself arriving at the barn, having ridden, without remembering where you rode. Your legs ache pleasantly. Midi is sweaty.

  It’s not shocking, not really.

  Not anymore.

  Still, there’s a mild jolt of “uh-oh” when you look down and see that your jeans are soaked and Midnight’s flanks are muddy and you’ve already been wherever you went. Evidence. You have evidence. You shake your head hard from side to side as though that could dislodge a better image of what happened, of where you were. But there isn’t a single image stored, just the feedstore, the horse head, then now, muddy jeans, sweaty horse.

  You feel in your pocket for your phone but your phone is not there. If it were there, maybe there would be photos.

  Maybe.

  If you had taken any.

  Your dad is in an empty stall in the barn, sanding a piece of wood that is going to be a sign at the gate at the end of the driveway. “Schmidt’s Creek” he’s calling your new home, which he finds wildly funny, as a pun on both your name and a TV show that he watched while you were in recovery. “In Recovery” is sometimes something you think of as an actual place, a holding tank where you existed in another space and time, a sort of purgatory that you can’t remember but also can’t forget.

  “Hey,” you say.

  “How was your ride?” he says, looking up, balancing the sanding block on his bent leg. “Getting cool up there?”

  “Yep,” you say. “Sure is. I have to go take a shower. How’s that duck coming along?”

  “I’ll get Midnight settled for you,” he says. “I’ll make you a taco. Turns out the duck is still frozen. Can you believe that?” He shakes his head. “Your mother forgot to take it out of the freezer.”

  “Thanks, Dad. Sorry about your duck, I guess.”

  “You okay, kiddo?”

  “Sure, why wouldn’t I be?”

  He gives you a funny look. “No reason.”

  “I’m fine. I wish you and Mom would stop acting like I’m going to break. I’m not! If I were breakable, I’d already be broken.”

  “I know! Go! Shower! Have fun doing whatever nothing that you’re doing!”

  “Thanks, Dad. I’m sorry. I don’t know why . . .” You wish these little pieces were the ones that you forgot, the awkward way you don’t fit into your present.

  You give Midnight a nuzzle, nose to nose. “Hope we had fun,” you whisper. Midi pulls back a little, rolls one eye at you. You take a big lungful of horsey air and hold it in, letting it out slowly. Your dad starts sanding again, the sandpaper scratching against the wood. You lead Midi to his stall and go through the motions of taking off his saddle, brushing off all the dirt and leaves and muck that have stuck to him. His flank quivers. “You okay, boy?” you say.

  “I said I’d do it,” your dad says, quietly, from the door.

  “I like doing it,” you say. “It’s fine.”

  “Won’t you be late?”

  You shrug. “It’s not a big thing, Dad. It’s not important.”

  “Sounded like it might be, that’s all.”

  You finish with the brush. “I’m just going to turn him out for now, okay?”

  “Sure.” He stands there, staring at you, like he’s waiting for something.

  “Dad,” you say. “Just stop.”

  “Dads worry, it’s what we do.”

  “Well, you shouldn’t.” You put the brush away and hang the saddle. “Later, Dad.”

  “I’ll come up and get that taco going for you,” he says.

  “You know what? I’ll eat after. I’m not hungry. I feel sort of sick from before.”

  “If you’re sure,” he says. “I’ll get Midnight here taken care of and finish this sign.”

  “I’m sure.”

  “Well, if I don’t see you tonight, have fun!”

  “Everything doesn’t have to be fun!” you say. “What is everyone’s obsession with fun, anyway?”

  “Better than not having fun, I guess,” he says. His brow is wrinkled up in his worried way, which makes you feel inexplicably furious.

  “Sure, I guess,” you relent. “Anyway, I’ll see you later.”

  “Midnight curfew,” he says.

  “Whatever, Dad.” You roll your eyes. “Midnight.”

  “Twelve thirty, then,” he amends.

  You wave your hand and head up to the house, your feet sinking into the soft, muddy dirt. You try to think about what you should wear. What do survivors wear? Armor? Jeans? A dress? You can’t remember why going to this thing seemed like a good idea, but it did.

  It seemed imperative.

  Forgetting things, feeling like your brain is a sieve, is the most frustrating thing you’ve ever experienced. Your brain sticks, and scratches, like a record on one of Kath’s brothers’ record players that they set up in their garage like a DJ studio. You wonder if they still have that, if—even with her gone—they still spin their records, if there is someone in there who is not Kath, dancing. You sit down on the front lawn and pick a few daisies, string them together in a chain. The act of sticking your thumbnail through the daisies’ stems reminds you of Kath.

  Kath, Kath, Kath.

  Everything reminds you of Kath.

  “Kath,” you say. “What is happening to me?”

  “Well, figure it out. Duh. I’m a goddamn shooting star. Are you happy?”

  “Yes,” you whisper.

  “Focus on that then. Never rush to the ending, that’s my advice. And it’s actually really good advice for a change. Stellar advice, you might say. You’ll know how it ends soon enough.”

  “But why can’t I remember? What am I missing?” You reach for a daisy with pink around the edges, like it’s been dipped in paint. You add that one to the end and perch the whole thing on your head. “Am I going crazy?”

  You wish more than anything that she’d just answer already, that she’d give you some kind of a sign.

  You have to know.

  You want to know.

  Sort of.

  But there’s nothing more from Kath, just the wind bending the grass and the sound of your breathing, the steady thumping of your heart in your chest.

  21.

  And now, as abruptly as if you’ve turned a page and found that ten or so pages were missing, here you are.

  Did you say goodbye to your mom? Did you shower? You clearly changed—you’re wearing a floral dress that looks like something Sandra Bullock wore in Hope Floats, a non-80s, non-teen movie that, for whatever reason, Kath loved.

  Your hair is faded so you must have washed and rinsed and washed and rinsed and washed and rinsed a hundred times. Y
ou’re wearing cowboy boots that you don’t recognize: soft, perfect leather. Pale blue stitching in a pattern.

  You are sitting in the front seat of Josh Harris’s Volkswagen Beetle. You know it’s his but you don’t remember seeing it before. It’s a ridiculous car for him. He’s too big for it or it’s too small for him. He has to fold his body in order to fit into it, like human origami.

  “Nice car. Did you ever think about getting one that fit?”

  “Funny, Schmidt. But do you have to say it every time? I love this car. It was my mom’s.”

  “I’m sorry, I guess I forgot.” You feel queasy. “I’m so sorry. How could I forget something like that?”

  He shrugs. Something is different about him. He seems tired. Maybe even a little tired of you. But that can’t be. This is your perfect romance. You reach over and touch his arm and he puts his hand over your hand and suddenly you’re breathing again, but you didn’t know you’d been holding your breath. “Tell me again why we are doing this?” he says. “This Survivors’ Group? You look really, really pretty, by the way. You look amazing.”

  “Thanks. Why are we going? I guess because we survived. Maybe we’ll find our people there. That’s what would happen in a movie. We’d be a band of misfit friends, brought together by tragedy! It’s like a kind of sad party. This is our kind of party.” You think about it for a minute. “Not the kind of party with so much noise, you know?”

  “Won’t the others mostly be old? I think of survivors as being old people, who lived through cancer or were maybe drug addicts.”

  You shrug. “I have no idea. I didn’t even know Survivors’ Groups existed.”

  “I’ve heard of them. I’ve never wanted to go. It’s not the first time it’s come up. When I was little, my dad went to one and he wanted me to go but I was just a kid. I didn’t know what they were and I sure didn’t want to find out. Maybe it will be fun? Anyway, totally worth it to go there with you in that dress. I’ve never seen you in a dress. When did you get it?”

  “I have no idea, okay?”

  “Are you mad?”

  “NO! Yes! I don’t know! Forget it. Let’s just get this over with. You’re probably right, it’s a stupid idea.”