Notes to Self

by Avery Sawyer

  “It’s okay,” Mom answered, as Susan used one of those card thingies to open the door to her room. She sounded a little defensive. “The doctors say she’ll be fine. We’re very lucky.”

  “I feel pretty decent,” I sat down on one of the hotel beds. “But my best friend Emily is still in a coma.” I stared down at the hotel carpeting, trying to get my face to stop itself from crumpling up. I didn’t want to cry today. But just saying the word coma out loud upset me, because I’d been doing research online the night before and the truth is, it’s far rarer for people to wake up from them than not.

  When I had myself under control, I raised my head to see Mom and Susan looking at me uncertainly, waiting to see what I would do. I wanted them to talk to each other, to make up, so we could be a family of three instead of just two. “I’m going to the pool,” I announced. “You guys should stay here and talk.”

  “But…” Susan started to say.

  “Robin…” Mom began.

  “Please,” I said. “I’ll be fine. I have my phone. Just talk.”

  I disappeared before they had a chance to stop me. I hoped they wouldn’t start fighting. What could possibly make two people give up on each other like that? I half wanted to stand by the door and eavesdrop, but I headed for the elevator bank and found the pool like I said I would. The sun was just below the horizon. I saw a few stars already, the brightest ones, and laid on a lounge chair to look at them. I’d felt normal for so long, I was surprised when the world seemed to telescope. I was so sure I could reach out and touch one of the stars that I actually tried it. I raised my arm and grasped at nothing. It was a good thing I was alone…I must’ve looked like a total nut job. The pool was quiet. The only people I saw were subdued, as if they’d had a little too much theme park stimulation that day.

  I thought about Mom and Susan up in the hotel room, hopefully making up, and I couldn’t help but feel angry with my mother, angry with both of them, for letting whatever this was—this fight, this estrangement—go on as long as it had. How dare they, when people got sick and hurt every day and didn’t get the chance? How dare they give up like they had, when other people didn’t have a choice? I vowed to never let something like that happen to Em and I if she ever got better. I wanted us to be like sisters, but better than sisters. Sisters that didn’t fight. Sisters that didn’t leave.

  An hour later, Susan appeared and sat down on the chair next to me. “Hi there,” she said.

  “Hey,” I answered, sitting up so quickly I felt light-headed. Had I been sleeping? It felt like it, but I didn’t remember dreaming. The sky was black but the pool area was all lit up. It was very pretty. This was a more luxurious hotel than I’d ever stayed at in my life. Not that I stayed in many. I hoped when Mom became a lawyer we’d be able to do stuff like stay in fancy hotels in big cities. The worst part about being poor is it’s so farking boring all the time. “Where’s Mom?”

  “She’s resting. We had a good talk. She hasn’t been sleeping well, poor dear. I should have flown down here the moment I got her e-mail about your accident.” Susan leaned back in her chair. She looked sad, but I wasn’t sure why. It was annoying not knowing what was going on between this strange woman and my mother. Why were they so mysterious? “You have no idea how much mothers worry. I sometimes wonder if, the moment you have a child, you stop really sleeping forever.”

  “What did you guys fight about?” I asked.

  She looked at me, as if deciding something. “We fought about…choices.”

  “Choices?” What the hell was that supposed to mean?

  “Robin, I’m going to tell you a few things that I hope you’ll try to understand without getting angry. I have your mother’s permission to do so, but if you’d rather talk to her about it, I understand.” This sounded juicy. Finally. “It’s fine,” I said. “Just tell me. Am I adopted?”

  She laughed. “No, you aren’t adopted. Can’t you tell? You look exactly like your mother. You two even make the exact same facial expressions. It’s incredible.”

  “I guess.”

  “Gracie is my daughter,” Susan said. “I am your grandmother, not your aunt.”

  “Wait, what?” I did some math in my head. “You’re Mom’s…mom?” Whoa. This was big.

  “When I was fifteen years old—your age, actually—I discovered I was pregnant.” She stopped, gathering her thoughts. It was totes strange to hear intimate stuff from this lady I hardly knew, but it seemed important to her to tell me. I tried to keep my face neutral and, like, kind, so she wouldn’t stop talking. I wondered…why now? Did my little brush with mortality change things somehow? “It was a very big scandal then, huge, awful, and I didn’t know what to do. I was very scared. My parents—your great-grandparents—were disappointed. I’d always gotten good marks in school and everyone had assumed I’d be the one Larson, the first Larson, to attend college. The pregnancy meant that would be impossible. But then my mother had a suggestion. She said I could have the baby and let them adopt it, adopt her, so that I could continue my education. It seemed like the perfect solution. And it wasn’t unheard of. I’d be Gracie’s older sister instead of her mother. So that’s what happened. And I did go to college.”

  “Oh,” I said. It didn’t sound so terrible. Actually, it sounded like my, um, great-grandparents were pretty nice to step in like that. It’s too bad everyone had to lie about it, but still.

  “I guess all would have been well, but when your mother found out the truth many years ago, she was angry. She didn’t like living in the small town we grew up in; she thought I’d abandoned her and had a great life because I gave her up. She felt I didn’t live up to my responsibilities, that I’d taken the easy way out. And maybe I did.” Susan’s eyes shined with tears. I felt bad for her. I couldn’t imagine making such a big decision, but then again, I couldn’t even really imagine having sex. Then I thought about how Reno’s kiss felt, how the heat of it had spread through my entire body. How I thought about it for hours the night after it happened, not able to sleep, imagining it over and over again. Actually, maybe I could imagine it.

  Sometimes when I was out in public, I had this incredibly weird thought: everyone has sex. Like, everyone. At some point. At least once, unless they’re, you know, a priest. It seemed impossible and even gross, especially when your eyes landed on someone old. But it was true. Now, though, in this moment, the “everyone has sex” revelation seemed stupid. Now I was more interested in the fact that everyone, no matter who they were, carried pain around with them. Everyone had gone through something that hurt. Everyone had lost someone or something they loved. Life wasn’t perfect for anyone. It should’ve depressed me, but the truth was it made me feel closer to people, even strangers. Even Susan.

  “I…that sounds like it must have been really hard,” I said. All my judgments from before, about how I’d never let something come between Em and I, dissolved from my mind. This was different. I couldn’t know what Susan had been through, not really. Just like Dee Winters or Josie Palomino or Maria Regan couldn’t know what I had been through. All I wanted was their compassion. All I could give Susan was mine. “But I’m still glad you’re here now. Is she…over it?” I asked. I thought about what Mom had said earlier, about Susan being a dreamer like Dad. She’d been left twice. I wanted to go to her, to promise her I’d always be around. Was it possible, though, for one person to promise that to another? In a world with Sling Shots and dares and brain injuries and stupid decisions? In a world where everyone makes mistakes?

  “Not over it, exactly, but I think things will be different now.” Susan looked wistful, as if she was thinking about all the lost years. “I just wish it hadn’t taken something as frightening as your fall to bring us all together.”

  “It’s okay.” I looked at my aunt, I mean my grandmother, and wondered what it felt like to live as long as she had, cut off from her family. By choice, sure, but also by fear. It had to be terrifying to reach out and connect to anything when your first sc
rew-up hurt that much. No wonder she lived on a houseboat all alone. It was the only way to be safe. For the first time since I woke up in the hospital and Emily didn’t, I felt a little less guilty about what had happened. Maybe we all made mistakes so it would be easier to forgive other people’s. “It’s really okay. I don’t think you did anything wrong. It’s just sad is all. I’ve missed, like, knowing you.”

  Susan/Grandma let out a breath I didn’t know she’d been holding and gave me a hug. “You are a gift, Robin.”

  “Tell that to the assholes at school,” I said. I snapped my mouth shut. Not the most appropriate thing to say.

  “Has it been hard?” she asked gently.

  “Uh, yeah. I didn’t say much to Mom because I know she’s been really stressed out. But everyone pretty much hates me. They miss Emily, and they think it’s my fault she’s ...hurt.” I looked at the pool’s blue water. There were lights on underneath the water’s surface. It was unbelievably clean. Clean as only something meant for rich people could be, because it took a huge staff to keep it like that.

  “I’m sorry. That’s dreadful.”

  “Dreadful,” I agreed, and smiled. I liked the sound of the old-fashioned word. “I just miss her. She was my only friend.” Well, aside from Reno, I added in my head. But I wanted him to be more than just a friend.

  “You know, I always admired people who are picky about their friendships,” Susan said. “But now I wonder. I wonder if it’s best to be so choosy. Maybe we need more than just one or two other people to trust.”

  She was talking about Mom now. I nodded.

  CHAPTER 40

  MALAISE

  The cafeteria was out of the question when lunch rolled around the next day, so I went to the library. I ate my peanut butter and jelly sandwich quickly, before Ms. McIntyre, the librarian, would notice the smell of food in her midst. I stuck my banana in my backpack for later. If I ate it now, there’d be no place to put the peel. The word was that when Ms. M. found out Diego had left a peach pit in her black trash bin last year, she told him the next day she’d had a dream about removing one of his fingernails, whole, and using it as a bookmark. Another time, when she caught a kid dropping F-bombs like it was going out of style, she had announced that swearing was only allowed in her library if it was accompanied by a note from a physician. She was a nut.

  I tucked myself into one of the cushiony chairs with a copy of US Weekly and overheard Maria fighting with Josh Ramirez. They’d been dating for six drama-filled weeks. Apparently she had caught him texting a ninth grader with big boobs. I sunk down further in my chair. If Maria noticed I was there, she’d take out all of her rage at Josh on me. Is no place safe in this stupid school?

  “Who’s Leah?” Maria demanded. She was poking at a phone like she wanted to break it; it had to be Josh’s. I couldn’t help thinking about the gloat-y expression on her face the day after she’d spent an hour with Josh sucking face in a booth at Lou’s. She was convinced it was true love, of course, and Josh was too oblivious to say otherwise. Actually, it kind of seemed like he hated her. I didn’t understand that at all. Why agree to go out with someone if you were just going to act like you could hardly stand the person? All of his body language suggested he just wanted her to get to the eff away from him. Even if he was sweet to her when they were alone, it hardly seemed worth it to me.

  “Uh, my cousin. In Destin. You know, over by St. Pete?” Josh sounded bored. I rolled my eyes. Destin was nowhere near St. Pete. It was in the panhandle. Not that that had anything to do with whether Leah was actually his cousin. Or the size of her chest.

  Sometimes I do this thing where I imagine what life would be like if I’d been born a boy instead of a girl. It’s not like I’d really want that, I’m cool being a chick and all, but it’s weird to think about. I wonder if I’d turn into a dick-bag like Josh Ramirez or if I’d be nice like Reno. I wonder how the assholery on the part of dudes even begins. Do they say something mean a few times and get away it, or even get treated with more respect because of it? I suppose so.

  If Reno and I became a real couple, we’d never fight about texts. I knew that for sure. I also knew that if he would change his mind, and believe me when I told him I liked him, I wouldn’t go around the way Maria had, blabbing about it. If Reno and I were together, it would be easy. I sighed, careful to stay silent. I wished there was someone I could talk to about it.

  I didn’t want to read US Weekly anymore. Josh’s boneheaded comment about Destin made me want to look at a National Geographic, but I couldn’t stand up to go get one. Maria was still waving her arms around, this time about another girl named Shawna. I closed my eyes and pictured a map. I used to love maps.

  I won my school’s geography bee in fourth grade but lost in the first round at the National Geographic state competition.

  “What’s the capital of Illinois?” Dad asked in a deep, game show announcer’s voice. He was quizzing me from a set of index cards I’d made with Mom. She was at work. She’d had to pick up extra shifts because Fun Towne had cut back his hours.

  “Springfield. That’s too easy, let’s do the blue cards.” I said. The blue cards were harder; we had made four levels in all. In order to participate in the National Geographic geography bee, you had to be in grades four through eight, and I was in fourth. The idea of trying to beat out eighth graders was scary, but I was really, really good at maps. Especially memorizing stuff on them. Dad thought I had a photographic memory, but the truth was I just had a better memory than he did.

  “Okay. Blue cards it is. Badlands National Park is in which state? Hint: you’ve never been there.”

  “South Dakota.” I answered, rolling my eyes. I’d only been to two other states beside our own: Michigan and Georgia. World travelers we were not.

  “Damn!” He grinned and shuffled the cards like a poker player on TV. I winced; I didn’t like it when the corners of my cards got bent.

  “Daddy, don’t swear.”

  “Sorry. Okay, next question: The most famous library of ancient times was located in…?”

  “Alexandria.”

  “You are correct, miss. The river that runs through London is the…?”

  “Thames.”

  “Bingo.” He ruffled my hair. Whenever I’d gone to Fun Towne with Mom during the last couple of weeks to pick him up from work, he’d made me show off in front of his friends by asking me geography questions. Of course, no one in his group knew the right answers so I could pretty much say anything. I didn’t, though. I always gave the right answers. The idea that someone could become a grown-up and not know where the Yucatan Peninsula was confused me. Didn’t they have to know? Wasn’t it important?

  Making the cards was good enough; I was just having Dad quiz me to impress him. I had them pretty much memorized. The real work would come when Reno and I timed ourselves filling in blank line maps. We’d see how quickly we could write down the name of every country and its capital. The rest of my class didn’t even know their state capitals yet. It was a lot harder filling in world maps with the names of rivers, islands, and mountain ranges. For some reason, I could not keep the names of the Japanese islands straight. I hoped that someday I could see them in person. Every time I learned about a new place, I wanted to see it. Reno and I spent a lot of time talking about when people would figure out the finer points of teleportation, so we could skip around the globe without having to bother with airplanes.

  The morning of the bee at Thacker Elementary school, I wore my nicest clothes—an almost brand new dress that I’d picked out with Mom, even though I didn’t like dresses. She said that if I won, the newspaper would take my picture, so I didn’t want to wear shorts. I wanted to look pretty. Kids in my class teased me a lot, calling me “Brain.” I didn’t mind it so much, but I tried to raise my hand a little less than I did in third grade. Dominating the bee would be a chance to get some respect for knowing the answers, instead of eye rolls. I hoped.

  Thacker had done the bee every
year for the last ten, so our principal took it pretty seriously. All the competitors were to report to the gym ten minutes ahead of the school-wide assembly. All you had to do to participate was sign up, so there were dozens of kids on stage. Most of them were fifth graders because the younger kids were too scared. We all took our places as the classes filed in and sat down in the bleachers. There were two microphones set up and one smallish podium to hide behind when it was your turn to stand and answer a question. When we started, I blocked out everything past that podium. I just looked at Principal Rogers and tried to pretend that he was quizzing me as practice. It worked. I got a lot of answers right. Every time I did, I heard Reno give a quiet “whoop!” We were a team. I whooped for him, too. All the other kids looked at us like we were crazy. They were out for blood.

  Every competitor was eliminated in seven rounds except for me, Reno, and one other girl named Lisa Chen. We went nineteen rounds like that, just the three of us, answering every single question correctly, so long that the audience of students got completely bored and started throwing stuff at each other. After a quick break and conferral, Principal Rogers announced that everyone was to return to class. We’d finish the bee, but we’d do it in a mostly empty gym. I was disappointed. By then, I really wanted to win, and more than that, I wanted everyone in the school to know I’d won.

  Lisa was eliminated right after the break. I guess she needed the crowd. She walked back to class scowling. “Just you and me, Saunders,” Reno whispered. His mom had insisted he wear a button-down shirt for bee day, but he had it untucked.

  “Say your prayers,” I whispered back. He smirked.

  Reno got the next question wrong. We both gasped. I thought he knew the altitude of Mount Everest. We’d studied that, hadn’t we? He looked shocked. If I got the next question right, it was curtains for my friend and glory for me. I gulped. I suddenly wished we hadn’t spent all those hours studying together. We never even considered the fact that of course it would come down to him and me. No one else at our school was crazy enough to put that kind of time in, learning the names of the world’s inlets and peaks, exports and minerals.