Dinner with Chirag did not go the way I planned. I ordered a half dozen oysters, but I didn’t like the way they tasted, not anymore. Still, I forced myself to eat them because I didn’t want Chirag to notice another thing that was different about me. He’d have asked, with his scientific curiosity, for an inventory of which tastes and smells have changed for me. So I kept quiet and ate my oysters, telling myself that without the medicine making me tired and achy and scared of sunshine, I could at least act the way I did before.
I was forcing the last oyster into my mouth when my knees accidentally brushed against Chirag’s under the table. Reflexively, he pulled away from my touch, the way you do when you’re out with a total stranger. With someone you don’t want to touch.
Maybe I expected too much. After all, I’d only been off the pills for two days and I was already trying to re-create one of the most romantic nights we’d ever spent together. Maybe there are more steps I have to take before I can go back to being the girl I was before.
Step one: Stop taking the pills.
Step two: Stay awake in class and go back to being the teacher’s pet.
Step three: Start running again.
This morning, the fog is so thick that I can’t even see the track behind the school, but of course I know it’s there. That track is the reason I got up so early this morning, the reason I’m dressed in my old running clothes. I left my parents a note telling them I’d gone to school early.
It’s not like I expect I’ll be as fast as I used to be. I’m out of practice. My muscles are weaker. I just want to make it around the track a few times. If I do well enough, I might be able to run with Chirag after school one day this week, just like we used to. I won’t be strong enough to race him, not yet, but still—it’d be a little bit of the old Maisie, the girl he used to know. The girl he fell for. The girl he wanted to touch.
The girl who wanted to touch him.
I pay the driver and walk across the parking lot and toward the track. This is where I used to win medals and receive cheers. Where Chirag used to wait at the finish line, shouting for me to run home.
I bend down and tighten the laces on my sneakers. These are my old running shoes, the backup pair that sat mostly forgotten in the bottom of my closet. I was wearing a newer pair the day of my accident and I haven’t seen them since. I imagine they’ve long since been thrown away in the hospital Dumpster, along with the clothes I wore that morning, the clothes they had to cut off of me.
Or maybe by the time the ambulance came, my clothes were almost gone, burning away into smoke and ash. Maybe the rubber on the bottom of my sneakers melted; maybe the laces caught fire.
I stretch carefully, hearing Marnie’s voice ringing in my ears: No rigorous exercise. Out loud—there’s no one here to listen at this hour—I say, “I won’t be rigorous, Marnie, I promise. Just a few laps around the track. I feel great. I can do it. I know I have it in me.”
I imagine Marnie’s answer: It doesn’t matter if you have it in you or not, Maisie. It’s dangerous.
I step onto the track, savoring its texture beneath my feet. I start out slow, barely more than walking. Out loud, I say, “The last time I went running, I nearly died. I think I’ve set the bar pretty high on what qualifies as dangerous.”
In answer, it’s not Marnie’s voice I hear, but my mother’s: Stop running, Maisie. The doctors said—
“Screw the doctors, Mom. They also said I had to take those pills. I haven’t taken them for days and I feel better than I have in months.”
I shake my head. Just a few gentle steps in and I’m panting. Hard. The cool foggy air feels thin in my mouth and going down my throat, barely filling my lungs, like it doesn’t have as much oxygen as air is supposed to have. Between labored breaths, I manage to say, “Screw the doctors. Screw the pills.”
I repeat it with each step: “Screw the doctors. Screw the pills. Screw the doctors. Screw the pills.”
It’s a good thing no one else is here at this hour to hear my labored words. Every muscle in my body aches in protest: The skin on my left side feels tighter than ever, like it’s stretched to the limit, barely able to hold my body together. I imagine that if I were to look down my shirt, I’d be able to see the bones of my rib cage beneath a layer of skin that’s been stretched to translucence: thin as tracing paper, dry as desert grass. Even my feet hurt; the calluses I’d built up after years of running have disappeared, leaving my toes soft and vulnerable, like a child’s.
Pain is a warning that something’s wrong, Maisie.
“Screw the doctors. Screw the pills. Screw the doctors. Screw the pills.” The words are nothing like the old Step, breath that used to punctuate my runs. I try to pick up the pace—I used to believe I could outrun the pain, back when it was just the normal pain of running—but now it only hurts more. Each time my toes bounce against the pavement, I wonder what kind of damage I could be doing to my face. I remember the weight of it immediately following the surgery, the way my neck ached from holding my head up. I imagine that with each bounce, the sutures and staples that hold these features to my skull are coming loose. I imagine my nose, cheeks, and chin sliding right off of me, like melted cheese down a slice of pizza.
I haven’t even run a quarter of a lap when I stop.
I let out a shout, still panting. I kick off my sneakers and throw them across the track. Then I double over, my heart pounding, my breath ragged. It hurts. I mean, something always hurts: My neck from holding my head up, the nerves not yet fully integrated. My hand, the skin still too tight where it burned. My left side, protesting every time I twist my torso. But right now, it all just hurts so much more. I groan miserably.
Through the fog, I hear a voice. And not one of the voices in my head this time.
“Maisie?” Someone is jogging across the track toward me. “Are you okay?”
“Ellen?” I ask as my friend—former friend, I guess—comes into view. She’s wearing tight black leggings and I can see her muscles working beneath them. My legs used to look like that. “What are you doing here?”
“Running,” she answers, like it’s obvious, which it is. She’s been on the track team since freshman year, just like me—it’s how we became friends in the first place—but unlike me, she was never the type to get up at the crack of dawn for a practice run. I guess I’m not the only one who’s changed. “Coach says I actually have a chance at finals. Maybe even a scholarship now.”
Now. As in, Now that Maisie is off the team.
“Oh my god, Ellen, please just go away.”
“What?”
I blink. Did I just say that out loud? I really didn’t mean to say it out loud. I open my mouth to apologize. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay—” Ellen begins, but I cut her off.
“I’m sorry I’m not as much fun as I used to be, but I’m not a lot of the things that I used to be. I don’t even have the same nose that I used to have!”
Ellen looks as though she’s been slapped. I don’t think I’ve ever spoken to anyone like this, not even my mother. I take a deep breath, but when my ribs expand, the skin on my left side just aches all the more.
“I guess Chirag told you what I said on Halloween,” Ellen says finally.
“That’s all you can say? You’re only interested in how I found out that you don’t like me anymore?”
“I never said I didn’t like you anymore—”
“No, you just said that I used to be great and now I suck.” I can’t believe I’m saying these things out loud. I blame the run, the aches in my side and my feet and the back of my neck. The pain must be distracting me so that I can’t remember which are the things I shouldn’t say. I lean over and rest my hands on my knees. “Well, I’m sorry I’m not fun anymore. This”—I gesture weakly to my face—“isn’t fun.”
“Maisie—”
“Chirag didn’t tell me anything,” I interrupt.
“But then how—”
I straighten up. “I heard yo
u, Ellen! The accident didn’t affect my hearing, you know.”
Understanding washes over Ellen’s face. She’s picturing me crouched in the corner, eavesdropping like a little kid. Hiding from my supposed friends.
And she’s realizing that if I heard what she said, I also heard what Chirag said.
“Don’t say anything to Chirag,” I add quickly. “He doesn’t know I was there.”
“But, Maisie—”
“I mean it.” I turn away from her, walk a few steps. Without my sneakers, there’s only my socks between my feet and the track, moist with fog and dew. I shiver. My hair sticks to my damp forehead and I brush it away; I didn’t pull it into a ponytail before I started running. I haven’t worn it up since my accident. “Just don’t tell anyone, okay?”
“I really don’t think it’d be right for me to—”
“Listen, Ellen, the broken-down deformed girl who used to be one of your best friends is asking you for a favor. It’s the least you can do. Please.”
Much to my surprise, Ellen actually looks ashamed. “Okay,” she says finally. “I promise. But, Maisie—”
“Yeah?”
“Just because I won’t say anything doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t.”
The fog is starting, just slightly, to lift. In the distance, cars are rumbling into the school parking lot, teachers and administrators arriving ahead of students. In a few minutes, I’ll text Chirag to let him know that I don’t need a ride this morning.
Will he wonder why I came to school so early? Will he suspect, even just for a second, the real reason: that I heard him on Halloween, and I’m trying to prove him wrong, prove Eric wrong, prove Ellen wrong? Would he ever guess that I tried to run to prove that the old Maisie is still in here somewhere?
Would he know that I failed, just like I failed at dinner the other night?
Pills or no pills, right now, standing here—struggling to catch my breath, the taste of words I never thought I’d say out loud still sour in my mouth—it feels like being able to call Chirag my boyfriend is all that remains of the girl I was before.
I look at Ellen and nod. “You’re right,” I agree softly. “I’m just not ready yet.”
I have dinner at Serena’s house after school. We’re doing our calculus homework when my phone starts buzzing: text after text from my mother.
Maisie, it’s a quarter to eight. You have to be home to take your pills in fifteen minutes.
Maisie, it’s eight o’clock, where are you?
Maisie, it’s eight-fifteen. Do you have an extra set of pills with you?
Maisie.
Maisie.
Maisie.
I don’t come home until almost nine. When I open the door, Mom is sitting on the couch in the living room, her back to me. The TV is on, but she’s not watching.
“You’re late,” Mom says, instead of hello.
I shrug, heading for the stairs. “Less than an hour,” I answer. My parents never actually gave me a curfew; they didn’t have to worry that I might not be home in time to get a good night’s sleep before school the next day. That’s how studious I was. I’d insist Chirag have me home by eleven (even if I sometimes snuck out to meet him after midnight). I’d only sleep over at Serena’s if she promised we’d study. I was the kind of kid who gave herself a curfew.
No wonder Serena called me a goody two-shoes.
Mom stands up and turns to face me, her lips pressed into a thin white line, an expression I’ve gotten used to. “Didn’t you get my messages?”
“Come on, Mom.” I roll my eyes, starting up the stairs. “I don’t think an hour is going to kill me. I’ll take them now.”
“Do you have any idea how worried I was? When you didn’t write back, I thought—”
“What did you think?” I ask, stopping halfway up the steps and turning to look down at her. “You really don’t have to worry, Mom. I’m pretty sure the worst thing that’s ever going to happen to me has already happened.”
I turn back around and head for my room. Silently, I beg my mother not to follow. If she comes upstairs after me, she’ll watch me take them. Or not take them.
But the sound of her footsteps trails behind me like a shadow, up the stairs and down the hall. Before I can reach for the pill bottles, she is there, setting out my evening dose on my desk.
“What’s this?” she asks slowly, fingering the pills.
“What’s what?” I echo, playing dumb.
“Why are there multivitamins in here?”
I step toward the desk, trying to push her aside. “What are you talking about?” I grab a CellCept out of her hand and head to the bathroom with it in my mouth, lean over the sink to drink directly from the faucet. Maybe if she sees me take one—just one—she’ll back down and leave me to take the rest on my own.
But instead, when I come back to my room, the contents of all my pill bottles have been poured onto the desk and my mother is counting out loud. She looks like a mad scientist, frantically sorting. I can tell she’s struggling not to shout when she says, “Maisie, what have you done?”
“Nothing,” I answer, but inside, I’m kicking myself. I should have flushed the doses I was skipping with Nurse Culligan instead of leaving them in the bottles.
“How many doses have you missed?”
I swallow, considering whether to tell her the truth. I can feel the CellCept making its way down my throat and into my belly.
“How many doses, Maisie?”
“What do you care?” I spit out finally. “You didn’t even want me to get the surgery. You said they didn’t have enough time to evaluate me.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I heard you and Dad at the hospital. He wanted me to get the transplant and you didn’t. He thought it was my chance to live a normal life, but you—” I pause. A lump is making its way up my throat, more enormous and rock solid than any pill. “You understood that I’d be a freak either way.”
Mom shakes her head, her hands curled into fists. Maybe if my face wasn’t so delicate, she’d reach out and slap me.
“How many doses, Maisie?” she repeats, ignoring everything I’ve said.
For the first time in my life, I want to be a lawyer, just like her. I want professional training to make my case. Then I could explain to her how well I’m doing without the pills. Maybe then she’d agree that I shouldn’t take them for a while.
“Since Sunday,” I say finally.
Mom shakes her head. “I’ve watched you take your pills since then.”
“I didn’t swallow them.”
Mom’s voice is louder as she echoes, “You didn’t swallow them?”
“I haven’t taken a single pill in days, and you know what? I feel fine. I feel better than fine. For the first time in months, I don’t have a headache. I can stay awake in class.” Mom looks horrified, but I continue, “Those pills made me sick. Being off them makes me feel better. Maybe Dr. Boden and his team were wrong.”
I guess the rest of my team would be angry at me right now, like I’m the one who dropped the baton in our latest relay race.
“Maisie, your face—”
“My face feels fine,” I say, though it’s not technically true. I still can’t feel it at all. “Stop acting like you’re such an expert anyway. You’re a lawyer, not a doctor.”
Mom surprises me by leaving the room. I hear her feet stomping down the hall and her bedroom door slamming shut. I sink down onto my bed, relieved that’s over. She’ll probably insist that I see Dr. Boden tomorrow or next week or something, but I don’t care. What’s one more trip to the hospital?
Besides, I want Dr. Boden to see how much better I am without the pills. He’ll take one look at me and realize that I’m the exception to the rule. Clearly, I don’t need the pills the way other patients do. Maybe my body has accepted my face already and we don’t need to worry that it’ll reject the foreign tissue. I mean, my case is already so unusual, what’s one more miracle, right?
/> I hear Mom moving around in her room, opening drawers and slamming them shut. She’ll send my father in to talk to me when he gets home from work. He’s working late tonight. He works late most nights these days.
I sit on my bed, looking anywhere but at the pile of pills on the desk.
The sound of Mom marching her way back down the hall makes me stand up, like I need to be ready to fight. She storms into the room with a file of papers in her hand, holding it out on front of her like a shield.
She picks out a picture of what looks like gray, muddied mush. It actually kind of looks like one of the oysters I ate on Monday night. I swallow a gag.
“Do you know what this is?” she asks. “This is a kidney in the early stages of tissue necrosis. And this,” she says, bringing out another photo, this time of what looks like a black, bloody rock, “is a kidney in the advanced stages of tissue necrosis. Do you want your face to look like this, Maisie?”
I don’t say anything. I don’t even shake my head. I ball my hands into fists to steady myself, even though my left hand aches when I do. Necrosis is what happens when tissue dies. I must have heard Dr. Boden and Dr. Woo use the word a dozen times. But no one ever showed me what it looked like.
“If you don’t take your pills, your immune system will attack your new tissue. It will turn black. It will bleed. It will die. It will disintegrate. Your face will disintegrate.”
Weakly, I insist, “I’ve been off the pills for four days—”
“And it hasn’t happened yet? That’s because the life cycle of immune cells is about a week or two. It would take five to ten days for the immunosuppressives to get out of your system. Five to ten days for your immune cells to start attacking the transplant.”
“Mom—”
“What?” she asks, so angry that she’s shaking. “I’m not a doctor? I don’t know what I’m talking about? You think I didn’t research every single aspect of your transplant?” She waves the papers at me. “You think I don’t know everything that could happen to you if your body rejects your new nose, your cheeks, your chin? You think I was going to let them touch one hair on your head if I didn’t understand every aspect of what they were doing to you?”
Faceless Page 15