Dear Cassie

by Burstein, Lisa

  When we’d gotten back to the cabin, Rawe sat us on our beds and asked us if we wanted to talk, like the way she had seen me the day before had jogged her memory that she was supposed to be “helping” us in more ways than just Assessment Diary word count.

  None of us had spoken. Not like Troyer would have anyway, but even Nez kept her mouth shut. It was clear that the more Rawe tried to get us to talk, the more we burrowed into ourselves. But it was impossible to burrow into yourself without thinking about why you didn’t want to talk in the first place.

  I was starting to wonder if that was the whole point.

  I stood above Troyer’s bed and shook her. Fortunately, I didn’t have to worry about her making noise, so I could be sure she wouldn’t scream and wake Nez up. Nez could not be a part of this mission. I needed Ben to myself. It would have made sense to bring her so she could have kept Ben busy while I snatched his cigarettes, but his cigarettes were hidden under his mattress. So I would have to be right there watching Nez keep him busy while I tried to snatch the smokes.

  I definitely wanted his cigarettes, but I didn’t want them that badly.

  When Troyer’s eyes opened, like white saucers in the dark, I said, “Come on, I need you.”

  She didn’t move right away, just looked at me, her sleeping bag pulled up to her chin, her face peeking out like a pea from a pod.

  “Troyer, seriously,” I said, showing her my flashlight. I swept it over me so she could see I was totally dressed, complete with my boots.

  She grabbed her pad and scribbled, Why? Where?

  “Please, Troyer,” I said. I didn’t want to get into why and where because the more time we spent in the cabin, the better chance Nez would wake up.

  Troyer sat and indicated Nez across the room.

  “Screw Nez,” I said.

  She took out her pad and scribbled on it again. If she finds out we went without her she’ll kill us.

  “I’ll take care of her,” I said, even though I had no idea what that meant.

  Troyer bit her bottom lip and got dressed.

  We closed the cabin door quietly behind us and once we were far enough so our flashlights couldn’t be seen when we turned them on, Troyer held my arm.

  “What?” I asked.

  She looked at me. She didn’t have to write her question down. I was starting to understand her facial expressions. She was asking me why we were doing this.

  “I need a smoke,” I said.

  She continued to look at me, her eyes hooded.

  “Yes, that badly,” I said, trudging in front of her. I heard her follow behind me.

  We were going to get Ben’s cigarettes. I sure as hell didn’t know how, but we were going. If Nez could shimmy in that cabin twice and hook up with two different boys and not get caught, I was definitely going to be able to get in there and find the cigarettes hidden under Ben’s mattress. I didn’t even bother telling Troyer that I was bringing her with me because I knew what she had done at the stable. I was saving that in case I ever needed it.

  “You’ll go in first and check things out,” I said. “You’re so quiet they probably won’t even notice you.”

  I heard Troyer stop walking behind me. I turned and saw her arms smack at her sides.

  “What?” I asked.

  She tilted her head.

  “Yes, I know this is for me,” I said.

  Her head stayed tilted.

  “Fine,” I said, “I’ll go in first.”

  She nodded and we kept walking past the dining hall. I considered forgetting the cigarettes and breaking in there so I could sit on a real toilet. Flush a real toilet. Turn on a faucet with clean, cold water, not pump water. It was weird the things I’d started to miss. You would think it would be my cell phone, the Internet, music, even TV, but no, it was the feel of my ass on cold porcelain. It was a shower without a time limit. It was a bed I didn’t have to check for fleas.

  It was froofy-smelling soap.

  We hit the soccer field. The grass was high and wet with dew; I could feel the dampness coming through the legs of my uniform. I looked behind me—Troyer was still following. I could hear her breath, steady like the chug, chug, chug of a locomotive.

  “Do you need a break?” I asked.

  She shook her head, like she was saying, Let’s get this over with.

  I could feel the stars above me, so many of them that they were fighting for space in the sky. So many that it seemed like some of them might fall out—overflow like a cup of soda fizzing over.

  Overflow like the cup of feelings Rawe had described.

  Obviously the feelings had always been there. The venom-like sickness that I felt—fear and repulsion, instead of the joy and excitement I should have felt if I were someone who wanted to have a baby, who could have a baby.

  It had been there, was still there, but I’d managed until reading Amy’s letter to keep it inside. Now it was out and my whole body felt exposed, like I had bathed in acid.

  I felt my face burn, the shame and anger of what happened with Aaron slapping me in a new and even more embarrassing way.

  Searching out stale cigarettes was all I had to combat that now. With the words of Amy’s letter affixed to my brain, I felt like anything I had even sort of believed about Aaron and me was a total sham. Sure, it had turned into shit before all this, but I had believed he really liked me, had real feelings for me. But now I knew I was just another girl he’d tried to fool—and I had fallen for it.

  I had ruined myself for it.

  I saw the boys’ cabin in the distance and stopped. It was dark, so quiet, so much the place I should not be breaking into. But I had walked all the way here.

  “I’ll go in the side window like Nez,” I said. “Since you don’t want to go in, you wait here and be a lookout.”

  Troyer took her pad and scribbled, How will I warn you?

  It was a good question. It’s not like she was going to yell, or make a hawk call, or any call for that matter. I doubted she could write loud enough for me to hear.

  “Throw something,” I said.

  I walked to the side of the cabin. The window was open.

  Easy.

  I took my boots off and only then wondered how I would be able to figure out which bed was Ben’s without waking up the whole cabin. Well, except of course Nerone. I definitely should have listened to Nez instead of ignoring her when she discussed her and Ben’s sexcapades. At least to hear which bed they had been on.

  I heaved myself up and into the dark cabin. Luckily, there was enough space for me to get in without hitting either of the beds against the wall. I turned and looked at my boots on the ground outside. Hopefully a bear wouldn’t come and eat them. Of course, if there was a bear around, it would probably eat Troyer, too.

  My eyes were already adjusted to the dark and I could tell Eagan’s bed right away, could see his braces shining in the moonlight as he snoozed with his mouth open. I didn’t know what the boys had done that day but they were surely as tired as we were, if not more so. Nerone was a total hard ass, even if he did sleep like he was in a coffin.

  I looked at the next bed. Stravalaci was snoring like he was saying achoo, over and over again. He didn’t look so scary while he was sleeping. He kind of looked like a little boy. His hair was mussed and his mouth was open slightly—certainly not the face of someone who dreamed about guns and Nez’s ass.

  Across the cabin I saw Leisner’s and Ben’s beds. Leisner was clutching his pillow to his chest like it was trying to float away. I considered sucker punching him, but his wailing would probably wake the whole cabin. Ben was sleeping on his side, his body moving up and down in his red sleeping bag, like a beating heart.

  I would have to make one quick move, grab the cigarettes from under Ben’s mattress and get the hell out of there before he or anyone else heard me. I stood above Ben’s bed and watched him breathe, watched his lips, realizing I could just as easily suffocate him or kiss him as take his smokes. People were so vuln
erable when they were sleeping.

  People were so vulnerable all the time.

  I reached under his mattress, trying to keep the springs from creaking, trying to slow my heart even though I was so close to him, to his bed. I rooted around, flying blind, my hand going deeper and deeper but coming up empty.

  I almost screamed when Ben grabbed my forearm. He didn’t say anything, kept holding it tight, his skin on mine. So tight it kind of hurt. So tight I kind of liked it.

  “Cassie,” he whispered. “I knew you’d come.”

  “Not for you, for smokes,” I hissed. I was trying to talk as little as possible. I was in a minefield of sleeping teenage boys.

  “Nice excuse,” he said, still holding my arm. I could see his eyes shining in the dark, dancing over my face.

  “What stinks in here?” I asked. I’d smelled it when I first entered the cabin, but it was stronger now, noxious and rancid.

  “Someone left a skunk in the pit toilet with Leisner the last time he took a leak,” Ben said.

  “Someone?” I asked.

  He shrugged.

  I felt my arm go limp. Ben had defended my honor. Or maybe he just thought Leisner was as big a tool as I did. Either way, he was doing whatever he could to be my knight in shining armor.

  Unfortunately, I was no princess.

  “Can you please let go?” I said, trying to pull away, but his hands were strong. All that drumming practice turned his fingers to vices.

  “You sure you want me to?” he said, starting to move his thumb back and forth on the soft underside of my wrist.

  I hated that he’d asked, because for the old Cassie, Cassie pre-Aaron, pre-everything-that-happened-with-Aaron, the answer would have been no. But things were different now. I was different now.

  I wished that I could just lie down next to him, put my head on his shoulder and hold on like I had that day in the lake. Stop fighting him. Stop fighting everything.

  “Don’t make me ask again,” I said, trying to ignore his thumb, the pulses it sent up my arm as it played with the bottom of my palm.

  He let go. “I’m not going to force you.”

  “So where are they?” I asked, rubbing his touch away from my wrist. It was hard to breathe, hard to think. Even in the dark Ben could see right through me. Even in the dark I couldn’t help staring at him.

  “Not here,” he said, sitting up. His bed squeaked under his weight.

  “Why do you have to make everything so difficult?” I asked. I would never have admitted it, but I meant everything, including that overflowing cup of feelings I was trying to keep safely in my head.

  “Because it’s the only way I can get you to talk to me,” he said.

  “Why do you want to talk to me?” I asked.

  “You actually listen,” he said.

  “Fuck you,” I said, trying to deny that I could feel my stomach lift, that familiar weightless feeling.

  “Not exactly the response I was hoping for.” He shrugged. “But you did respond.”

  “So you’re never going to stop giving me crap,” I said.

  “I think we both know that’s not what I meant,” he said, leaning toward me, so close. “But it does seem like pissing you off has become my new addiction.”

  “Does that mean you had an old addiction?” I asked, wondering if he had been sent here for the same stupid reason I had. The reason that I now knew covered up something much more fucked up.

  At least for me, and considering what Ben had done to Leisner, probably for him, too.

  “You really think I’m going to tell you,” he said.

  “Good luck with your new addiction. The withdrawals are a bitch,” I said, knowing I had to get out of there before I allowed him to become mine.

  I snuck back to the other side of the cabin. Ben was dangerous. Whatever wall I’d built up after Aaron, he was attempting to sledgehammer it down. I needed to stay away from him, or his new addiction could be my downfall.

  I grabbed the bottom of the window frame and heaved myself back out. My boots were still there, which I hoped meant Troyer was still alive, too.

  Fucking Ben.

  The problem is, I like dangerous.

  17 Fucking Days to Go

  I had another dream about Aaron, but in this one we weren’t making out or doing the thing that did the thing that brought me all the way here. This one was about prom night. Not what really happened on prom night, but what my out-of-control sleeping mind made happen on prom night. What my anxiety-filled brain turned the already horrible night that was prom night into.

  I was still in the short, tight red dress I wore. The skin-to-fabric ratio was very high on the slut scale, so I felt as uncomfortable in it as I did in real life. But my shoes didn’t hurt, so I was wearing them when I parked the car. I didn’t have to take the time to put them on in Brian’s driveway. Leave it to dreams to make impossible shoes comfortable.

  Amy was in her light blue strapless prom dress and Lila in her spaghetti-strapped light purple one—just like prom night—but in my dream, Amy had her stupid yellow and green parrot with her. It was riding on her shoulder, digging its black nails into her skin.

  After I shut off the car in Brian’s driveway, the fucking bird kept repeating, Turn around, turn around, turn around, in that annoying squawk that he had.

  “Shut that bird up,” I said, “or I’m going to shut him up for you.”

  “He can’t help it,” Amy said, feeding him seed from her hand, trying to quiet him. The bird ignored the food, kept saying, Turn around, around, around, like a record that was skipping.

  “I thought you trained him and stuff,” I said. “Train him to shut up.”

  “Are you guys going to fight all night, or is Brian going to get to see me looking spectacular in this dress?” Lila asked.

  I turned to Lila. She did look spectacular—her dark brown hair was curled, her bee-stung lips were shiny with lip gloss. She always looked spectacular, even in my fucked-up dream.

  “AJ is usually right about things. We should probably listen to him,” Amy said. I could hear him finally nuzzle into the food in her hand.

  “There is no way I am missing my prom because of a bird,” Lila said.

  “If AJ’s right, we’re going to miss it anyway,” Amy said.

  AJ’s right, AJ’s right, AJ’s right, AJ repeated.

  “Enough. Let’s get this over with,” I said, like I didn’t already know what happened. Like I didn’t already know that our dates stood us up and we ended the night in jail, but this was a dream, so maybe I didn’t already know what was going to happen. Maybe this would end better, unless it was a nightmare. Even as a nightmare it had the possibility of ending better.

  Our heels clicked up the walk and we stood behind Lila as she rang the doorbell. AJ was still on Amy’s shoulder, like she was a pirate, a prom pirate. He tweeted a repeat of the doorbell sound right in my ear.

  “Damn,” I said, rubbing it. “I would rather he was still saying we should turn around.”

  “I’m telling you, we should listen,” Amy said, perching him on her finger and turning to look back at my car.

  “Why did you even bring him with you?” I asked.

  “I need AJ,” Amy said, rubbing him under his chin. “You’ll see why.”

  “Be quiet, you guys, someone’s coming,” Lila said. “And if you can, Amy, hide your bird. He’s weird.”

  “He’s right,” Amy said, her voice as robotic as her bird’s.

  I saw someone behind the obscured glass of the door, a blurry movement of skin and black. I guess this time instead of us ringing the bell over and over, waiting for someone to answer the door and free us, the door was going to be answered.

  So far, Dream prom: 1. Real life prom: 0.

  It was Brian, Lila’s boyfriend, who opened the door, a smile as big as a cantaloupe slice on his face. Aaron stood next to him, his auburn hair slicked back into a ponytail. Both of them were in tuxedos.

  Maybe this
prom was going to turn out better. I couldn’t stop looking at Aaron. It was hard to deny that, even considering how much I wished his penis would wither like a raisin and fall off, he looked really hot in a tuxedo.

  “We’re ready,” Lila said. “Let’s go.”

  “Not yet,” Brian said.

  I looked at him and looked at Aaron and realized there was no third guy. This mythical third date did not exist. Not in my dream and in all probability, not in real life. It was only the two of them filling the doorway to Brian’s house.

  Brian pointed at me and then at Amy. “One of you can’t come,” he said.

  AJ squawked, I told you, I told you, I told you, while Amy looked down at her shoes.

  I kind of wanted to look down at my shoes, too, but instead I asked, “What the fuck does that mean?”

  “We should have listened,” Amy whispered into her chest. It was covered in glitter like tiny lights. So much possibility in those lights, about to be snuffed out.

  “This isn’t our fault,” I said.

  Lila broke free from us and walked over the threshold, joining Brian and Aaron inside. She held Brian around the neck and kissed him—deep, long, making us all watch.

  Then the three of them looked down at Amy and me. The doorway seemed to have turned into an elevator that had gone up five flights.

  “What now?” I asked.

  “Aaron gets to pick,” Brian said, wiping Lila’s lip gloss from his mouth, as shiny as the glitter on Amy’s chest. He looked at her. He looked at me. He looked at her. He looked at me.

  “He shouldn’t get to pick,” I said. “He shouldn’t get to do anything.” I could feel anger, feel my stomach burn hot, my hands turn to fists, my teeth start to clench.

  “There are two of you and one of him.” Brian shrugged.

  “Don’t worry,” Amy whispered, “he’ll pick you.” I could see her starting to cry, her tears shiny, too.

  “I don’t want him to pick me!” I screamed. “I don’t want him to pick me!” I screamed again. I could feel myself scream it, the way in a dream it feels like you are trying so hard to be heard, but no one can hear you.

  I woke up in the cabin, slick with sweat, before Aaron gave his decision, even though I already knew what it was. He had picked both of us and done as much as each of us would let him get away with.