by A. J. Pine
Supergirl isn’t real. Neither is Spock.
His response comes quick.
WE were real.
And now we’re not. As soon as I finish the sentence, I drop the phone on the counter of Dee’s work desk. Then my fingers grip the drawer knob, and I pull.
Needles, organized like silverware, partitioned based on size. I grab a small one and tear it open, not entirely sure what I’m going to do, only that I have to do something.
The first few seconds of meeting someone are the most important. When I glance up from the drawer, needle in hand, I take in a sharp breath at the person I see before me. I didn’t count on Dee’s vintage framed mirror, the one that turns her desk into a vanity. But there it is, and looking back at me is a girl I’ve never seen before, virtually unrecognizable with her swollen eyes and blotchy skin. Black tracks of mascara, carried away by tears, line her cheeks. The hair shines bloodred, shocking against her pale skin, and poison blooms from her chest.
I hear a sharp intake of breath and look to the door, but no one’s there. That’s when I realize it’s me. I throw the needle on the floor and grab my phone, but the tremors wracking my body make it impossible to type. So I stagger to the front door, two options in front of me. Either this or the needle.
I somehow manage to get the door unlocked, and Spock practically bursts inside.
“Zoe—” He rakes a hand through his hair, and when he looks at me I see pure anguish in his tormented gaze. What must I look like to him? Who is the person he sees? Because I didn’t recognize her at all. “What the hell happened? Are you okay?”
I know he wants to reach for me, but I stand with one arm wrapped around my torso, the other thrust in his direction, phone in my trembling hand.
“Call Jess,” I say, my voice a hoarse whisper. “I need help.”
And then I collapse against the wall. Spock wraps an arm around me, and I let him, if only to make sure I don’t slide to the floor.
He nods. “I’ve got you,” he whispers.
“There’s a needle on the floor in Dee’s room,” I add, and Spock inhales a sharp breath. I shake my head. “I didn’t use it. But I was going to. She can’t know. Please don’t let her see me like this,” I plead, burying my head in his shoulder. I feel him nod as I breathe him in, but even with his arms around me and the scent of him so near, I don’t for one second let myself believe in the fantasy that was us. Because this right now—this is reality, and our story can’t possibly have a happy ending. Spock—Zach—is just a good guy fulfilling an obligation, and because I need his help, I let him.
He gets me to the couch, and I stay put after that, huddled and wrapped in a blanket, listening to Spock’s call to Jess and for what I know has to come next—everything crashing down.
“Hey, Jess. No, it’s Zach. Yeah. Zoe’s back in Chicago, and she needs you. Now. Okay. The door’s unlocked. I won’t leave her.”
I close my eyes and drift off.
He won’t leave me.
But when I wake up, Spock’s gone.
Chapter Twenty-eight
Jess lies next to me in my bed, her laptop separating the space between us. When I woke to find her instead of Zach next to me on the couch, she coaxed me into my room, promising Damon and Stefan Salvatore. Now I wake her screen to find it still on the Netflix page, an episode of The Vampire Diaries still paused. I close out of the show and search my browser for a hospital I’ve heard my parents speak of before. It’s where my mom went when Zach and I were toddlers.
Jess’s eyes flutter open, and I close the laptop.
“What’s the matter? Are you okay? Shit. I didn’t mean to fall asleep.” She sits up.
The corners of my mouth quirk up.
“Hey,” she says. “Did you just almost smile?”
At this I offer a soft laugh, even though my eyes well with tears again.
Jess grabs her phone.
“Four a.m. Did you sleep at all after I got here?” she asks.
I nod. “I think so. For a little bit. Jess, I’m sorry—”
“Whoa, lady. Stop right there. I don’t want to hear any apology. This is me, Zoe. Remember how much I sucked at the whole friendship thing when we first met? Let me do now what I couldn’t do back then.”
“But Adam . . .”
“Adam was more than happy to hang on the couch for the rest of the evening, ESPN all to himself. He’s probably spooning with the remote right now.”
I laugh again, and with it a tear frees itself and races down my cheek. Jess doesn’t say anything, only smiles softly at me, her being here meaning more than I can articulate.
“I think I need help,” I tell her.
She bites her lip and nods, and now I’m not the only one crying.
“There’s a place in the suburbs. I can . . .” I have to pause, to breathe, to hold myself together, but Jess grabs my hand, cups it in both of hers.
“You don’t have to hide yourself, Zoe. Not from me.”
I let out a long breath, and with it a small stone is chipped away from the weight I’m only just beginning to realize I’ve been carrying.
“He was right,” I say, and Jess doesn’t have to ask who. “I’ve been hiding for longer than he’s known me. For longer than you’ve known me.”
Jess nods.
“It’s okay,” she says as she grabs a tissue from the nightstand and hands it to me. “We’ll find you.”
I blow my nose, every part of me feeling heavy and swollen and exhausted.
“I’m scared,” I admit. What if I’m too far gone already?
She shakes her head. “You’re brave. And so strong. Isn’t that what you tried to make me see in myself?”
I force a smile, remembering how only months ago the tables were turned, Jess on the edge and me pulling her back. All it takes is one night—one night to change a life completely, and now here we are.
“There are things I need to tell my family, about Wyatt. About the night he died. I don’t know if I can do that part. I’ve lost so much already.”
Jess brushes my hair out of my eyes.
“Zoe. Your family has been through so much. But I could see how much you all love each other. Whatever it is, they’re still going to love you.”
But if they can’t forgive me, none of that will matter. I think of the way Spock looked at me last night, the way I saw myself in Dee’s mirror. I couldn’t take it if Jess looked at me like that too, so I don’t tell her the rest of the story, not yet. I save that for the one person who’s been looking for the truth, who can’t let Wyatt rest without it.
I’m afraid to ask my next question, but I won’t be able to go without knowing.
“Spo—I mean, Zach?” I try out his new name on my tongue and then let out a small, bitter laugh. There is nothing new about that name. It’s who he’s always been. I gave him a new identity—forced him into hiding with me—and together we got lost.
“He didn’t want to leave, Zoe. But he said he had to—that it was what was best for you.” Jess hesitates, but I can tell there’s more, so I simply nod for her to go on. “He told me about his past. That he’s been a recovering addict for four years.”
Another tear slides down my cheek as I understand what this must mean for him, having to rehash the part of his life he thought was behind him just to help me.
“He said whatever kind of help you got from here, he knew no therapist would let him be a part of it, that you would need a clean break to start fresh.”
I blow out a breath. “Because he’s gone through it,” I say.
“Because he loves you, Zoe. He was a mess when he left, honey, but said he had to, that it would be selfish for him to stay.”
I look around the room, finally noticing why it feels so empty. It’s not just Zach who is gone. Every trace of him having lived in this room is gone too.
“Should I call your parents?” Jess asks, but I shake my head. I am long overdue for initiating some family contact.
“I’ll
let them sleep a little longer, and then I’ll do it. Will you stay until I do?”
Jess smiles and grabs the laptop, bringing up Netflix again.
“I’ll stay as long as you need.” She cues up another episode. “More sexy vampires?”
* * *
Dee sits in the kitchen at her laptop, her usual for a Sunday morning. When she sees me, suitcase parked behind me in the frame of the kitchen’s doorway, she offers me a soft smile.
I lay a check on the counter. “I’m paid up for the full ten weeks,” I say. “But let me know if I owe you anything more. I may have stained the rug in the bathroom with my hair situation.”
Jess waits on the couch in the living room, letting me and my new and now former roommate have a moment for good-bye.
Then Dee, this girl I’ve only known for a month, gets up from her stool and strides toward me, wrapping her arms around me in a hug so strong I have to hold my breath. Yet at the same time, her touch fills one of those tiny spaces that needs mending, and I’m overcome. I don’t want the space to breathe because as soon as I exhale, the tears may start again.
“You fit here, Blue . . . I mean, Zoe. You’re a city girl if I ever saw one. The room is yours again if you need it—when you need it.”
I nod against her, wondering how with all I’ve done to alienate and hurt those I love, I’ve found someone new to love me.
When she releases me, I don’t break down or apart. I’m still standing, ready for the next step.
“Where are you going?” Dee asks. “Home?”
“Eventually,” I say. “But first to get help.”
She reaches for my hand, squeezes it in her own. “The room is yours,” she insists. “I’m counting on you coming back.”
I thank her and turn back to Jess.
“Just one more call, I guess. Right?” I say, saving the hardest for last.
“You got this,” Jess says, and she watches as I pull out my phone, dial my home number, and hit Send.
Chapter Twenty-nine
I drive myself to the hospital, needing to do it on my own if only to prove that I can. And since it’s halfway between the city and home, it just makes sense to meet in the middle.
Once my mom shows up in the waiting room, things start happening fast. According to the paperwork I’ve filled out and the fact that I had to turn over my cell phone to either the hospital or a guardian—thanks, Mom—I’m agreeing to cut off communication outside of my immediate family for the next three weeks, all part of the treatment.
“Just one more text,” I say. Before I turn off the phone, I send one last message to Spock.
Thank you.
But I don’t apologize, even though I want to. That’s the one thing Jess made me promise—to stop saying I’m sorry for the things in my life I can’t control. I said some awful things to Spock, and there’s so much I wish I could take back. But that person wasn’t me—not really. And I hope if anyone will understand, it’s him.
I turn off the phone as soon as I hit Send.
My mom finishes up the paperwork at the registration desk, and when I hand her the phone, she doesn’t ask who my last message was for.
It’s in the medical history/psychological evaluation that my mom and I are forced to talk—to really talk—for the first time in years. Dr. Greg, the one doing the evaluation, gives one direction. Tell me about your hair. Then he sits back and listens as I tell my mom everything she’s never known about me.
I stopped drinking because the first time I got out of control, I almost killed myself. She’s always thought it was because of her history and nothing else.
I dyed my hair from blond to black, from black to blue, and now blue to red to erase the girl I was before each time I did it.
And the night Wyatt died—this part comes out in violent sobs—I knew what his plans were and didn’t tell anyone or try to stop him.
My mom holds me as I cry, stroking my hair. Even as the shameful admission about my brother’s death pours out of me, she doesn’t let go, doesn’t stop for a second, not one falter, as she soothes me with her touch.
“Oh, Zoe,” she finally says when my breathing returns to something resembling normal. “Zoe, honey. Wyatt was never one to be controlled. Even if we knew what he was doing that night, who’s to say we would have found him or that we could have stopped him. Wyatt always finds . . .” She pauses, corrects herself. “He always found a way to do what he wanted, and we let him because he was Wyatt.”
I lift my head from her tear-soaked shoulder, letting my swollen eyes take in hers.
“I trusted him,” I whisper, my voice hoarse and unrecognizable. “I trusted him to be okay. He was always okay.”
She cups my cheeks in her hands, kisses my forehead even though my hair lies matted against it, soaked with sweat.
“It’s okay, Zoe. We’re going to be okay. I see you, sweetheart. I see you, and I love you, and it’s okay.”
Then she holds me while I finally let myself cry—heaving, wracking sobs—for my loss, my guilt, my need to keep up the show so no one else would have to worry. I cry for the me I thought I was and the girl I hope I still can be. I cry not because I need help but because I’ve been so afraid to ask for it. But I asked, and I’m here, in the arms of someone I thought would never forgive me.
“There’s nothing to forgive, Zoe,” she tells me. “There never was. We can grieve, and we all should. But I get it now. Blame won’t bring him back. Nothing will. We have to find a way to move on, though. Together.”
* * *
Grief counseling, addiction counseling, treatment for depression—oh my.
The first three weeks are only the start. I have a long way to go, but for the first time in a long time, I’m traveling in the direction of recovery.
My brother flies into my room on a Saturday morning in August, waving a manila envelope in my face.
“What time is it?” I ask, my voice cracking as I speak my first words of the day.
“It’s almost one, Dracula,” Zach says, and I throw a pillow at him.
“Can you please update your vampire references? Seriously, I’m embarrassed for you.”
He laughs, and I join him, both sounds I’m still getting used to.
“Mail already came,” he says, moving to the foot of my bed where he sits, taunting me with the envelope again. “It’s a letter from Mom’s lawyer. She wanted us to open it.”
My eyes go wide, and I bolt up from my blanket cocoon. After my inpatient treatment, and Mom starting therapy as well, she decided to take the construction company’s offer to settle out of court. No trial. But Mom never told us what she was doing with the settlement. Said she wanted it to be a surprise.
“Gimme!” I squeal, and Zach relinquishes his grip.
I tear at the envelope, frantic but careful not to tear what’s inside. Unfolding the paper, I take in the words in silence while my brother waits.
“Hey, you have an audience,” he says. “Read aloud, please.”
I hold up a check, made out to the Wyatt Adler Foundation for Addiction Education and Counseling.
“Holy shit,” Zach says. “I guess Mom found a new project.”
I smile. “This is good for her, right?” I ask. “Good for Wyatt’s memory?”
He nods. “It’s good, Z.” He wraps an arm around my neck and kisses me on the cheek. “Oh, I almost forgot. This came for you too.”
Zach hands me an envelope, and my breath hitches when I see the return address. Old Town School of Folk. After admitting myself, I told Dr. Greg about my job, and he made a phone call to Bree part of my first session.
“Looks like I’m teaching this summer after all,” she had said. “Taylor’s going to have a hard time with this. She likes you way better than me.” But Bree’s laughter assured me that Taylor and the rest of the kids were in good hands. I made Bree promise to tell Taylor I wasn’t upset about the sketchpad and that I was sorry I couldn’t say good-bye.
My sketchpad. I’v
e been drawing since I got home, Wyatt again, trying to re-create what I lost. But nothing will be the same as seeing his face staring back at me that first time, knowing that I could find strength where I also found grief.
I shrug. “Maybe I have to fill out some paperwork for leaving the program?” I say, and I tear open the second envelope, this time with less zeal.
“Oh my God,” I whisper as the implication of what I’m reading registers.
“What’s wrong?” Zach asks, misreading my reaction.
“The photos,” I say. “Taylor—my student—she took photos of the first draft of my graphic novel for Wyatt. The book was ruined, but Bree put the photos in the showcase. This—this is a letter from a publisher who saw my work. They want to publish Wyatt.”
I laugh, even as my eyes grow hot with the sting of tears—happy tears instead of those filled with grief or guilt. Because maybe I didn’t lose everything after all.
Zach scoops me into a hug, and I can tell by his breathing that he is crying too.
“Lunch at the diner,” he says when he composes himself. “We have to tell Mom and Dad.”
“Yeah, sure. Just give me a few minutes to get dressed.”
Zach pauses at my door, gives me a knowing look.
“This is a good thing, Z. The best, actually.”
I nod as he walks out. Of course I know this. But the one person I really want to share this news with, I can’t. Not yet, at least. Three weeks of intensive inpatient treatment and six months of focusing on me and the permanent fixtures in my life, those that have been here before and after starting treatment. Because Dr. Greg—who turned out to be my assigned therapist—knows my history with Spock, he has advised me against establishing contact until my six months are up. And because Spock knew something like this would happen, he hasn’t tried contacting me either.
“I can’t force you to do it, of course. But this is what I believe is the best course of action for you, Zoe. Until you’re okay with you, it’s too risky to add a relationship to the mix, especially one that contributed to you ending up here in the first place.”
I do trust Dr. Greg, with my treatment, that is. But I lay none of the responsibility for my breakdown on Spock. If anything, his worry and recognition helped get me where I am now.