“Mom?” Josie dropped the vase on the bureau and dashed to her mom’s side. “Mom, are you okay?”
Her mom continued to roll from side to side, pawing at the air. “Get it off! Get it off me!”
“Mom, it’s a dream. It’s just a dream.” Josie reached out her hand and laid it on her mom’s leg.
Instantly, her mom sat up, gasping for breath like a woman drowning. Her eyes flew open and looked frantically around the room, wild and unseeing, finally settling on Josie.
“Josephine,” she said breathlessly.
“Mom, are you okay?”
“Yes.” Her mom ran a hand through her dark, wavy hair, which hung lank and damp in her face. Josie noticed for the first time that her mom was drenched in sweat. “Yes, I’m fine.”
“You were screaming,” Josie said.
Her mom looked up. “Was I?”
Josie nodded. “Screaming and crying, and you were fighting with something that wasn’t there.”
“I see.” Her mom sat for a moment, staring into the dark hallway silent and lost, as if she’d forgotten Josie was in the room. “Did I say anything?” she said at last.
“You said ‘Get it off me’ and ‘I don’t know’ like a bazillion times.”
Her mom slowly turned and looked at Josie. Her cool, collected demeanor was back. “Don’t exaggerate, Josephine,” she said calmly.
But Josie wasn’t going to be sidetracked. “Mom, what the hell is going on?”
Her mom sighed. She swung her legs over the bed and slipped her feet into a pair of slippers. “It was just a dream.”
“A nightmare.”
“Yes, I suppose.” Her mom cast a cursory glance at the smashed lamp, then dismissed it and walked down the hall.
Josie trailed after her. “You suppose? Mom, you’re drenched in sweat. And did you see what you did to the lamp?”
Her mom didn’t even glance over her shoulder. “I saw.”
“Well?” Josie pressed. “What were you dreaming about?”
Her mom walked into the kitchen and flipped the switch, flooding the room with stark, fluorescent light. She took a deep breath, letting it out slow and steady. Then she smiled, her face and body completely relaxed, and sat down at the table. “I don’t remember.” Josie’s mom pressed the palms of her hands to her eyes. “I think perhaps I’m tired. Could you make me a cup of tea?”
“Tea?” Her mom hated tea. She was a gourmet, organic coffee drinker all the way. “Mom, you never drink tea.”
Her mom jolted. “Yes, well . . .” Her voice trailed off and she averted her eyes. “I’m trying to be healthier. I think the coffee has been affecting my sleep.”
It was true; her mom looked exhausted. Her face was sagging, her eyes sallow and ringed with purple, and she’d completely lost that girlish lightness she’d always possessed.
Josie set the kettle on a burner and went to the pantry. Did they even have tea in the house? She’d never seen any. She instinctively grabbed for the black canister that held her mom’s favorite French roast. It felt lighter, less dense, and when she popped it open she found that the custom ground coffee had been replaced by bags of Earl Grey.
“Mom,” Josie began tentatively, as she draped a tea bag over the side of a mug and poured the scalding water into it. “Maybe you should take some time off work? You’ve been going at it pretty hard.”
“I’m fine!” her mother snapped.
Josie flinched. “Okay.”
Her mom immediately shook her head. “I’m sorry. Perhaps you’re right.”
Josie sat down across from her. Her eye drifted up to the sunflower clock above the kitchen window. It was just a few minutes after four o’clock.
Her body went rigid. Was it possible? Josie was having another dream about Nick at the same time her mom was having a nightmare, once again at 3:59? That couldn’t be a coincidence.
“I’ve been having strange dreams too,” Josie said tentatively. “Every night at the same time.”
“What time?”
“3:59.”
Her mom’s chair scooted back across the linoleum floor with a screech. “I’m tired,” she said, pushing the untouched tea away from her. “I’m going to try and get some sleep.”
“Mom?”
“I’m going to bed.” Her mom swept out of the kitchen, switching off the light as she disappeared through the doorway. “And I suggest you do the same.”
Josie sat at the table in the dark as she listened to her mom stomp down the hall. Her bedroom door slammed, then the house fell oddly silent.
What the hell was going on? Even based on her mom’s behavior lately, this was totally outside the norm. Josie had never seen her mom so tense and on edge, snapping at every little thing. Work and her failing marriage were taking a toll. Josie slumped forward at the table, resting her chin in her hand. What could she do to help?
Out of the corner of her eye, Josie thought she saw an object pass by in the darkness outside the kitchen window.
It was just a split-second image, as if something had been illuminated by a camera flash before fading back into the darkness of the night, but Josie could have sworn she saw what looked like a large wing soar past the window. Then in the distance, another animalistic scream.
An eagle? Josie thought. A wing and a shriek; it made sense. Or maybe an owl. Weird that it would be so close to the house; it must have been hunting something. Josie was oddly relieved. At least it wasn’t the exotic man-eating cat supposedly responsible for all the unexplained deaths recently. That was something.
Josie yawned. If nocturnal birds were out hunting, it meant she needed to be in bed, sound asleep. Back to school in the morning, back to face the hell that was her social life. She was going to need all the sleep she could get.
TWELVE
12:45 P.M.
“ARE YOU OKAY?” PENELOPE BLURTED OUT WHEN Josie took the seat across from her in the cafeteria.
“You mean more or less okay than I’ve been for the last few days?”
Penelope cocked her head to the side. “Either?”
Josie shrugged. Between the dreams, her mom, and the nightmare that had become her existence at school as teen-gossip topic du jour, okay wasn’t really a word that applied to her life anymore.
“That good, huh?” Penelope said, reading between the lines.
“That good.” Josie unwrapped her bean-and-cheese burrito and cracked open a soda while Penelope munched on a bag of Fritos. They ate for several moments in silence, until Josie heard a laugh from the corner of the cafeteria. A light, glittery giggle, and one she knew only too well. Before she could stop herself, she turned around and saw Madison sitting next to Nick at the varsity track team’s table, her head buried in his arm.
Nick turned and at that moment caught Josie watching him. His eyes flicked down to Madison, still snuggled next to him, then back up to Josie, a look of apology in his eyes.
Yeah, like that was good enough.
“You’ve got to ignore it,” Penelope said in her matter-of-fact way.
Josie turned back to her. “Ignore it? How the hell am I supposed to ignore it?”
“I don’t know,” Penelope said. “But you’ve got to figure it out. Stat.”
“Why bother?” Josie threw her arms wide. “Everyone already knows. It’s only matter of time before I’m the butt of every joke at the school.”
“Oh, you already are.”
“What?”
Penelope nodded. “Yeah, apparently the new word for when your boyfriend cheats on you with one of your friends is Byrned. It’s trending on Twitter. Even more popular than the unexplained animal attacks.”
Josie groaned and sank her forehead onto the table. She appreciated that Penelope always called it like she saw it, but every once in a while a little tact might have been helpful.
“My point is that you’ve got to start acting like it doesn’t bother you. Or at least don’t stalk him at track practice, okay?”
“Is t
here anything I do that’s private anymore?”
Penelope shook her head. “Zeke and Zeb told everyone about it in homeroom yesterday. By lunch, it was all over the school that you were stalking Nick and Madison.”
“Shit.”
“And it’s not going to help you, okay? You don’t want him back.” It wasn’t a question. It wasn’t a suggestion. Penelope was laying down the law. “So do what you have to do to move on. Because Nick and Madison already have.”
3:30 P.M.
As soon as she got home, Josie made a beeline for her bedroom.
Time to purge.
Penelope was right. She’d been pining away for Nick, waiting for him to realize how miserable he was without her and to ask if she’d take him back. But no more.
She plugged her iPod into portable speakers and scrolled through her song list until she found suitably angry music. P!nk. Perfect breakup music. She pumped up the volume and hit play.
Josie grabbed her plastic garbage can and planted it in the middle of her room. Everywhere she looked, something reminded her of Nick. A memento, a tchotchke, a gag gift. Little things, sentimental only because she’d given them that power.
The movie ticket from their first date was pinned on her corkboard. She ripped it down, sending the pushpin spiraling off to the other side of the room, and dropped the ticket in the trash.
She caught sight of the three-inch-tall lime-green bunny that sat on her dresser. Nick had won it at the county fair in one of those rigged ringtoss games and given it to her. Josie snatched it up and launched it into the garbage.
“Two points!”
This was turning out to be more fun than she’d thought.
Photos, gone. Concert-ticket stubs from his favorite band, gone. On the dresser, Josie grabbed an old vase with a red silk rose sticking out of it. They’d gone to Ocean Beach for the day and he’d bought the fake rose from a boardwalk peddler while they were chowing down on hot dogs and French fries beachside. Josie had put it in her favorite vase—an old fifth-grade art project that converted a wine bottle into a mosaic piece of “art”—and given it a spot of honor on her dresser. Now she wanted nothing more than for both flower and vase to be out of her sight. She was about to dump both in the trash when she paused.
The vase was different.
Crazy, Josie realized. A standard wine bottle, probably one of her mom’s favorite chardonnays that seemed to fill up the recycling bin with alarming frequency these days. It had been covered with small squares of chopped-up glossy magazine pages—bits of color and texture, movement, and shadow all layered upon one another to form a pop-culture mosaic. The bottles had then been covered in two thick layers of glue, left to dry for what seemed like months, and finally sent home on the last day of school as the prized fifth-grade “art” project.
But Josie had loved that stupid thing. She remembered how her parents had donated magazines to the cause. Her dad’s Newsweek stack and her mom’s bedside collection of InStyle—both had been ravaged for just the right colors and patterns. And the fruit of her labor had sat on her dresser for years.
Only this wasn’t it.
Sure, it looked similar, but right away, Josie could tell it wasn’t hers. The color scheme was off—all pastels and muted colors, while Josie’s bottle had been covered with vibrant hues. And it was clean. Every other item on Josie’s dresser was blanketed in a light coating of dust, but this vase and the silk flower it held had been recently dusted.
Josie was still pondering the weirdness of the vase that was hers and yet wasn’t, when her cell phone rang. She didn’t even look to see who it was before she answered.
“Hey, Josie.”
Blood thundered in Josie’s ears, blocking out P!nk, and all of the bravado and girl-power strength she’d managed to conjure up during her purge drained from her body in an instant at the sound of Nick’s voice.
THIRTEEN
3:51 P.M.
“ARE YOU THERE?” NICK ASKED.
Josie’s mouth was dry. “Yeah.”
“Oh. Good.” Nick paused. After a few seconds, Josie heard him clear his throat. “I’m glad you finally took my call.” He paused again as if waiting for Josie to respond, but she couldn’t have if she wanted to. Her brain had seized up, and all ability for rational thought had abandoned her.
“I wanted to talk to you before you saw me at school. I mean saw us at school. Madison and me, but . . .” His voice trailed off. “But yeah, I understand why you didn’t want to talk.”
Yeah, sure he did.
“I feel . . .” Josie heard him swallow. “Bad.”
Bad? He felt bad?
Nick didn’t wait for a response. “I guess I just want you to know that I didn’t mean for this to happen.”
“Oh. Okay.” How exactly was Josie supposed to respond to that?
“I know I should have told you that Madison and I had been spending time together after you started working at the Coffee Crush. I mean, it wasn’t anything at first—I just really needed someone to talk to. And then . . . well . . .”
And then you slept with her. Yeah, Josie had that part pretty clear in her mind.
“Not that I’m making excuses,” Nick continued. “I know I hurt you. But . . . I don’t know. Maybe you’ll be better off without me.”
Josie laughed out loud. She couldn’t help it.
“What’s so funny?” Nick sounded hurt.
“Are you actually trying to tell me that I’m better off because you cheated on me?” Josie said through bursts of laughter.
“I don’t know. Maybe?” She could picture his nonchalant shrug, which only pissed her off.
“Maybe? Like maybe you did me a favor by cheating on me? Toughened me up by breaking my heart? Saved me from pain by giving my necklace to her?”
“I didn’t give it to her,” Nick snapped.
“Oh yeah? Then why is the necklace you bought for me hanging around your new girlfriend’s neck, huh?”
Nick was silent for a moment. “I was going to return it.” His voice was strained. “But she found it in my room and wanted it.”
“Oh.”
“I didn’t know she was going to tell everyone I’d given it to her. That wasn’t my fault.”
“Right,” Josie said, her temper flaring once more. “Because none of this is your fault, right? You’re Boyfriend of the Year.”
“Look,” Nick said. He sounded angry. “How would you even know I bought the necklace for you? It’s not like you remembered our anniversary.”
Josie’s face burned. He was right. She’d totally forgotten their anniversary in the middle of everything else in her world falling apart. She was about to apologize when she remembered that whatever gift Nick had bought to celebrate their year together, he’d still been sleeping with Madison for almost two months. Suddenly, the gesture seemed hollow.
“So now you’re trying to blame this on me?”
“No,” Nick said quickly. “But you did forget our anniversary.”
Josie set her jaw. “You’re trying to make yourself feel better. I get it. But understand this—there is no scenario in this universe or any other that makes what you and Madison did acceptable, okay? There’s a special place in hell for backstabbing friends and cheating boyfriends, and the two of you have reservations.”
“You want this to all be my fault,” Nick said. “Fine.”
“It is all your fault,” Josie interrupted.
“Maybe you should take a look in the mirror, Josie. There were two of us in that relationship. Ever think that maybe this is partially your fault?”
“Are you kidding me?”
“You haven’t exactly been available lately, you know,” Nick said bitterly.
“Well, gee, Nick. My parents are going through a divorce.” Josie let the sarcasm drip from every syllable. “What did you expect?”
“You think you’re the only one with problems?” Now Nick was getting pissed off. “We’ve all got shit going on. Did you even know m
y brother has cancer?”
Josie caught her breath. Tony had cancer? How did she not know that?
“We found out two months ago. I wanted to tell you, but you never had time. I felt like you had too much going on, so when Madison and I were hanging out one night, I told her. The rest just . . . happened.”
So it was her fault, in a way. Nick cheated on her because he felt like she wasn’t there for him. Ugh, why hadn’t he told her? Or had he tried and she just didn’t notice? She’d been so wrapped up in her own drama, it was a real possibility.
Nick took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Look, I don’t want to fight. I just needed you to know that I didn’t mean to hurt you. And I’m sorry.”
“Okay.” Josie felt deflated. Her quick burst of anger had evaporated as soon as she heard about Tony’s cancer. “Thank you,” she said somewhat lamely.
“Good-bye, Josie.”
“Bye.”
3:57 P.M.
Josie’s hands were shaking as she tossed her cell phone onto the bed.
She wasn’t the only one going through life drama, but in her own pain and grief she’d managed to box out the one person in her life she cared about most. She pictured Nick’s face Monday during their last conversation. There had been something wrong, something he desperately wanted to talk to his girlfriend about, and Josie didn’t have time.
Josie leaned against the windowsill and stared out into the backyard. The yew bushes that lined the fence on all three sides were ridiculously overgrown. The lawn was mostly weeds, dotted with barren patches of dirt and a minefield of gopher holes. It seemed like everything was falling apart: yard, house, life . . .
Josie’s heart ached for Nick. He and his older brother were very close, and though Nick wasn’t always the best at expressing his feelings, Josie knew he must be devastated at the thought of losing Tony.
Maybe Nick was right. Maybe Josie was partially to blame. Maybe she did need to take a look at herself. Josie turned away from the window toward the old mirror.
Only Josie didn’t see her own reflection.
3:59 Page 5