Put Me Back Together

by Lola Rooney

  But it wasn’t.

  “I like it,” I heard a voice say.

  He was sitting off to my left, blocked from my view by several bodies and easels, yet I still leaned back when he spoke, as if that would better hide me from him. I’d thought he’d skipped class because the spot next to me was empty, but apparently he’d been there all the time.

  Lucas.

  Just the sound of his voice made my hands tremble. I hadn’t seen him since our kiss, though he’d texted me multiple times and I was pretty sure he’d come by my apartment on Sunday night and waited for a while at the door of the building when I hadn’t buzzed him in. Mariella had called to tell me a good-looking guy had asked if he could come in, that he was a friend of mine, but she’d told him that he should wait for me to let him in. I’d thanked her for that. (She wisely had not asked anything more, but I knew that wouldn’t last long.) I wished I was stronger than this, but the truth was I couldn’t bear to face him.

  And now we were stuck in a very small classroom together.

  “The way she painted the sky is incredible,” Lucas went on. “Both the texture and the range of colour she used. The figures are indistinct, yes, but I think that makes them more compelling. The stroke of red paint here, over the head of this figure, draws the eye, and the darkness of the trees closing in gives the impression of being trapped. Overall, I find it haunting. And beautiful.”

  Professor Wilkins thanked him for his contribution then gave the painting her own evaluation, which I hardly listened to. Lucas’s words had stirred up a storm of conflicting emotions in me that I could hardly make sense of, and anyway I didn’t have the time. Class was ending and I had to get the hell out of there. I didn’t have anywhere to be. But I sure as hell didn’t want to find myself alone in the room with Lucas.

  Grabbing my backpack, I gunned it for the classroom door without looking around to see where he was. I figured if I rushed, I’d certainly get ahead of him. Lucas never rushed anywhere. But I was wrong. I was the second student to burst out of the classroom doors and there he was, leaning against the lockers across the hall, waiting for me.

  I didn’t want to catch his eye. I wanted to brush past him as if I hadn’t even seen him. I wanted to run like hell. But those honey-coloured eyes held me in place and I knew that running from him would be no use. He would only follow me.

  He was standing in almost the exact same spot Emily had stood in earlier, so I walked forward and took my place beside the window. I was next to him now, no longer in his line of vision, but he didn’t turn his head. He just looked down at the floor, his hands in the pockets of his jeans. He was wearing a close-fitting white shirt and his hair was wet—from the rain, I had to assume. He looked so beautiful I had to look away. I’d always found it painful to look with longing at the things I couldn’t have. Instead, I looked out the window at the brown, waterlogged grass surrounding the building. It had shocked me that morning to find the first spring rain melting the snow Lucas and I had walked through. It was almost as though the entire night had never happened. Except that I couldn’t stop thinking about it.

  “Thank you,” I said quietly.

  I felt his eyes flick to my face, felt the heat of his gaze like rays of sunlight against my skin. Until he looked away.

  “I was just telling the truth,” he said. “It’s a beautiful painting.”

  “That’s not what I’m thanking you for,” I said, and as soon as the words were out of my mouth I knew they were the wrong ones. Because they made him turn to me, his eyes falling on me for real this time. I’d only wanted to express, that the kiss, his kiss, had meant the world to me. I’d meant it as a goodbye. But instead he was reaching for me, one hand grazing my cheek while the other nudged my hip, pulling me toward him. My hands pressed against his chest, stopping him from pulling me in any farther, but it didn’t matter. I was already in his arms.

  His scent surrounded me, a mixture of laundry detergent and the woodsy smell of his cologne and something else that was just him. I breathed it in greedily, as though it was my oxygen, as though I knew that the second I turned away from him I would be unable to breathe. I had to store him up for later. I hate to take in as much of him as I could just to survive.

  “Katie…” he murmured, sending a thrill through my body.

  He tried to coax me to raise my eyes to his by tugging lightly at my cheek, but I wouldn’t. Instead I stared at his lips, those lovely, soft lips. I felt wobbly all of a sudden just looking at them, and a second later I realized why. I was going to cry.

  “Katie, what happened?” Lucas asked me as I retreated from him, pulling my body away from his. It felt like wrenching off one of my own limbs. “Just tell me. Talk to me.”

  But what could I say? How could I explain? There was no way he would ever understand that the girl he thought he knew didn’t exist. The Katie Archer he knew wasn’t real. There was just me, and I was far more trouble than he could handle.

  His fingers were still caught in the ends of my hair, his body still just a hand’s breadth away. He still thought I was with him, but I was already gone.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, grabbing my things and pulling away for real. My eyes were wet but the tears hadn’t yet started to fall as I looked at him one last time. Then I walked quickly down the hall away from him.

  13

  When the day finally came, I felt nothing.

  I’d taken to sleeping on the couch, not only because I’d been staying up watching movies later and later into the night in an effort to make the days last longer, to stop tomorrow from coming, but because it was like an island in the middle of my apartment. From the vantage point of the couch, I had a good view of the two biggest windows so I could watch for intruders with ease. And since it was only five feet from the door, I could more quickly make an escape if I needed to. But I wasn’t paranoid or anything.

  It had been days since I’d gotten a text from the unknown number, which didn’t fool me one bit. There was always a calm before the storm. But it had been a nice little break. A girl could only be called a “motherfuckinglyingbitchwhore” so many times before she developed a complex. And I was already sporting a pretty big complex of my own. I didn’t need any extras.

  Now, as I sat up on the couch on the day of days, I gently palmed my cell from the coffee table and took a breath before turning it on. Nothing.

  Phew.

  Well, no threats from the unknown number anyway. There were three calls from my mother and a call and two texts from Emily, all of which I ignored.

  Lying back on the cushions, I gazed out the window across from the couch at the gray day outside and marveled at my own calm. I felt numb, really. I felt nothing. It reminded me of an article I’d read once about a Japanese man from Osaka who’d been the only person to survive the bombing of his neighbourhood during World War Two. He’d described how he’d walked aimlessly through the rubble afterwards, all alone, and that for many hours that day he’d believed that he had died while everyone else had survived. He’d thought he was a ghost.

  That’s how I felt when I woke up that day. As though I wasn’t real. As though I hadn’t survived, although I had. As though I was nothing.

  I walked to school through a drizzle that left my hair in a frazzled mess. I’d left my phone at home for the day, marveling that I’d never thought of this solution before. Let Mom and Em worry about me if they wanted to—I was going incognito. To someone passing me on the street I’m sure I looked like any other person rushing to get out of the rain, going about their errands and daily life, as if the day had no meaning at all, which was amazing to me. The only difference in myself I could really feel was a trembling, not of my limbs, but deep inside me. I felt as though a strong wind could bowl me right over.

  All the rules were in place today. This was, after all, the day they were made for. I avoided my coffee shop, knowing it might have the radio playing, wore my biggest noise-cutting earphones just in case, and inside the school buildings I
kept my eyes averted from every TV screen. I spoke to no one, took copious engrossing notes in class, and tried to emulate my morning self as much as possible: say nothing, feel nothing, be nothing. Before I knew it, my school day was over and I was on my way home.

  My only mistake was stopping at the newsagent at the edge of campus to buy a Snickers bar—my reward for not staying home all day hiding under the covers. The daily papers were all stacked neatly on the counter, ready to be taken away to wherever unpurchased newspapers went at the end of the day, and as I struggled to fit my change into my wallet I happened to glance down at them. The headlines jumped out at me, all reporting the same thing, all in bold, block type. Because this was the biggest news story of the year. And it was right there in front of me.

  Evil Gets Cut Loose

  Killer Walks Free

  Kid Killer Comes Home

  The coins fell through my fingers and scattered on the pavement.

  “Are you all right, miss?” the old man behind the counter asked, glancing down at the change that I hadn’t bothered to pick up.

  My inner tremor threatened to take over my entire body as the awful memories pulled at me, trying to drag me back there—Brandon’s dirty fingernails as he gripped the knife. Tommy’s high-pitched scream ringing in my ears. My dirty running shoes pounding on the forest path as I ran and ran and ran—but I resisted with all my strength. I didn’t want to go back there ever again. I wouldn’t.

  “I’m great!” I said with forced enthusiasm, jamming a bite of chocolate into my mouth and chewing as though my life depended on it. Then I turned away and left the headlines and the memories behind me, where they belonged.

  As I pulled open the door to my building I noticed the sun was going down. I’d made it through the day in one piece. Nobody had attacked me. Nobody had found me out. I’d survived this day just as I’d survived every day leading up to it, and I was going to keep surviving. The day had just been one long boring bout of nothing.

  In a sick way, it was kind of a letdown.

  In the doorway I quickly checked my mail slot, spying a manila envelope waiting for me through the little holes in the metal door. My name was printed in small, neat writing on the front, and there was no stamp, which meant that whoever had left this for me had been inside the building. I set the envelope down on the table in the lobby, staring at my pale face in the mirror hanging above it.

  Evil Gets Cut Loose.

  Maybe Brandon hadn’t sent me a text today because he’d planned to leave this for me instead? I knew logically that this wasn’t possible. It would mean his travelling all the way from Vancouver to Kingston in just a few hours. He’d only been let out this afternoon, and I was pretty sure the terms of his release barred him from leaving the province. My nagging worry that he had an accomplice made my fingers shake as I picked up the envelope again. I knew I was being silly. What danger could an envelope possibly pose? It was light enough that I felt nearly certain it contained nothing other than paper. So no bomb to blow me to bits, then. Another empty threat, maybe, written out by hand this time? I’d never know unless I opened it, and yet I couldn’t seem to convince my fingers to tear the seal.

  As I approached the stairs, dragging my feet now, all my earlier excitement doused in anxiety, I squinted down at my own name. The handwriting seemed familiar to me, which meant it couldn’t be Brandon’s. I’d never seen him write anything down. I puzzled over this for a moment until the photo of Turner I’d taken on my phone flashed through my mind and I suddenly knew whom the envelope was from. All that extra anxiety lifted from my shoulders and floated away. I knew his handwriting because I’d watched him writing out his name on the missing cat flyers we’d plastered all over town. The envelope was from Lucas.

  It had been nearly two weeks since the moment Lucas and I had shared in the hall outside of class. Since then we hadn’t spoken once, and he hadn’t called or texted me, either. I was back to my old tricks, avoiding any places on campus where I thought he might be and keeping my head down in class so as to not catch his eye. But this time I noticed he was doing the same. He’d even skipped class last Friday. And earlier this week when we’d had our closest call, somehow managing to end up at the door to the art studio at the same moment—keeping your eyes down all the time did have its drawbacks—I’d stepped back, murmuring an apology, my eyes drifting up to his face, but he’d kept his averted. His demeanour had been one of annoyance, as though I’d been holding him up. His face has been stonily blank as I’d walked passed him through the door, just inches from his chest. The gravity that always pulled me toward him had screamed at me to throw myself into his arms, but I’d held back. Gut-wrenching as it had been to have Lucas look at me like I was a stranger, it would’ve been like an actual knife in the stomach to have had him peel me off his body, that same stony expression telling me he wasn’t interested, he never had been.

  When his coldness came back to me, freezing my heart solid, I had to remind myself that I was the one who’d told Lucas to stay away from me. He was just doing as I asked. And when I was out grabbing a bite Sunday night with Em and her friends and spotted him across the room with that redheaded vixen Taylor plastered to his side, I had to remind myself again. And again and again and again. This was what I’d wanted. This was what I’d asked for. He was moving on. He was doing just what I’d told him to.

  “That Taylor’s so full of herself,” Melissa offered, pushing her basket of fries my way. “I’m sure he doesn’t want her around.”

  “She throws herself at everyone,” Sally agreed. Then, in a moment of real clarity, she added, “I should know, so do I.”

  “I know he misses you,” Em said.

  But it really didn’t seem like it. Later that night Anita accidentally mentioned that she’d seen him at a couple of parties, hanging out with Eric and Oleg. He was out with his old friends, whatever had been holding him back apparently no longer an issue. It occurred to me that maybe what had been keeping him from his other friends was me. Now that I was out of the picture he was free to go back to his real life, the life he fit into just right, the life that had been waiting for him.

  I thought bitterly, He’s probably glad to be rid of me.

  So then what the heck was in this envelope, and why had he sent it to me?

  I still hadn’t opened it when I reached the top of the stairs and found Mariella and Ethan at my door.

  “Oh thank God, Katie!” Mariella said as she looked up from her phone. “I’ve been texting you like crazy. Stefano’s totally going to fire me. I’m already thirty minutes late and you know how he gets.” I did know. Mariella was always going on about her Nazi boss at the spa where she worked as a masseuse. She was sure he had it out for her.

  “What is it? What’s wrong?” I said, glancing nervously at Ethan, who looked back at me with a blank expression of extreme boredom. Count on a five year old to find his mother’s hysteria totally uninteresting.

  Mariella hefted her enormous purse back onto her shoulder. I was always wondering what the heck she kept in there to make it so heavy.

  “I know it’s a total imposition,” she said, “but my mama’s sick and my stupid brother, Ray, took off on a road trip to the Maritimes—like winter’s the best time to go sightseeing—and if I don’t make it to my shift, Stefano’s going to fire me for sure and give all my shifts to that skinny biatch Cecily. So I’m begging you.”

  She looked at me pleadingly as I tried not to show the rising panic I was feeling inside. She hadn’t actually said the words yet but I could see where it was going. I felt my windpipe closing up, my ability to breathe dwindling as I gripped Lucas’s envelope in my fingers, crinkling the paper. Today had been going so well. I might have even called it a raging success. I’d planned on spending the evening sketching and eating cookie batter and maybe, if I felt up to it, calling my mother back. My grand plans shattered at my feet as I looked into Mariella’s pinched and worried face.

  Please don’t do this to me. />
  “Save my life?” she said with a grateful smile as Ethan stepped forward and took my hand. He stuck his tongue through the hole a missing tooth had left in his smile and wiggled it at me as his mother put a bag of toys down at my feet.

  His hand felt like a grenade in mine. My palm was so sweaty against his that I was sure his fingers would slip right out of my grip and we’d both be blown to bits.

  “I’ll be back at nine thirty, ten o’clock at the latest,” Mariella said, slapping a Post-It on Ethan’s forehead that had her work number on it. “He’ll eat anything you put in front of him and his bedtime’s at eight. Just leave him on your couch or whatever. I can just come and grab him when I get home.”

  Before I had fully processed what was happening, she was already going down the stairs, waving goodbye.

  “Wait, Mariella,” I cried. “I don’t know if I can—”

  I heard the door in the lobby closing behind her with a click and just like that Ethan and I were standing in the hallway, alone. Nine thirty…that was four and a half hours from now.

  I swallowed hard and stared at my front door, because it was better than staring at Ethan. Just looking at him made me feel as though I might pass out.

  “Did you forget your keys?” Ethan asked, pulling his hand from my grip and reaching for the zipper of my purse. “My mom always finds hers hiding right at the bottom in the same old place, but she swears a lot before she remembers to look there.”

  “Right, keys,” I whispered, shakily pawing through my purse until I found them.

  I swung the door open and Ethan ran inside with his bag of toys, bouncing onto the couch and turning on the TV. “Do you have Treehouse? Do you have Nickelodeon?” he asked, already clicking the remote, though the screen remained blank.

  He gave me a horrified look. No TV?

  I grabbed a DVD off my bookcase, thanking Jesus that I had a childish taste in movies, and threw it into his hands. “Here, watch this,” I said as I practically jogged down the hall away from him. “I just have to make a phone call, okay?”