That's Not What Happened

by Kody Keplinger

  “There was some good material in your essay,” he said. “But not enough of it to warrant a better grade.”

  “Can I redo it? For a higher grade?”

  He shook his head. “I’m afraid not. This isn’t middle school anymore, Ms. Bauer. Things are going to be tougher. What you can do is use all of the information I just gave you as a road map for how to write a better essay next time.”

  At first, I was angry. It was the first semester of my freshman year. He was being way too hard on me, I thought.

  But then, when our next essay was due, I did pull out the marked-up copy of my old assignment. I doubled-checked my names and dates, instead of repeating myself I found new material to work into the essay, and I actually used sources beyond just our textbook. And a week later, when Coach Nolan handed it back to me, he did so with a smile. There was a red A at the top of the front page.

  Well, A-minus. His class wasn’t going to be that easy.

  I’d never felt so proud of myself for a grade before. And I think that was his goal. He made us work hard so that, when we succeeded, it was a real triumph.

  Coach Nolan saw the potential in all of us, and just like with Miles, he tried hard to get us to be the best versions of ourselves. Sometimes that meant pushing angry boys to get their act together. Sometimes it meant staying after class to mark up an essay. He provided the map, but we had to reach the destination on our own, so that, when we arrived, it meant so much more.

  Thomas Nolan was an award-winning coach.

  But if you ask me—or Miles, or almost any of his former students—he was an even better teacher.

  “So what are you going to do with the letters?” Denny asked. It was two days after graduation, and he, Miles, and I were sitting on the tailgate of my truck in our spot, way out in the woods.

  “No idea,” I admitted.

  It had been a couple weeks since my meeting with Kellie at the café. After talking to her and then, that night, reading Miles’s letter, I’d begun to rethink my whole plan. Not that it had ever been much of a plan to begin with. I’d been so sure that distributing the letters, getting the truth in front of people, was the only answer. It hadn’t really occurred to me that those truths might cause even more pain for some of us.

  “My mom saw Sarah’s dad at the grocery the other day,” Denny said. “He told her that the book will be out next spring.”

  My stomach clenched, the pain a mixture of dread and loss. I know Sarah’s parents will never look at me as the same girl who used to have sleepovers at their house. No matter what I do with these letters, that damage has been done. In some ways, knowing that feels like losing Sarah all over again. I still care about them. I never wanted to hurt them. But God, I really don’t want that book published. Not just because of Kellie and my guilt over the part I played in what happened to her. But also because Sarah wouldn’t want it.

  I’m done pushing people into doing things they don’t want to, even if I think it’s better in the long run. We’ve all had our stories used to advance someone else’s agenda in some way or another. I won’t do that to my friends. Not again. Not anymore.

  But that doesn’t answer Denny’s first question.

  “I can’t just destroy them,” I said. “The letters. I don’t know what to do with them, but … I can’t let them go to waste, either. It just seems wrong.”

  “Did you write one?” Miles asked.

  I shook my head. “No. Not yet. I don’t know if I should bother now.”

  He shrugged and reached down to scratch behind Glitter’s ears as the yellow dog sidled up to us, her tail wagging. She seemed just as happy to be back in our secret place as we were. I suspected her motivations came more from the freedom to track the scent of squirrels and pee on new trees. For us, though, it was bittersweet. None of us had said it out loud, but we knew this was likely the last time the three of us would be here together again now that we’d graduated.

  I looked over at the tree Miles had carved the “6” into years ago. I could feel Miles watching me, could feel his eyes follow my gaze long before he reached out and wrapped his fingers around mine. “You should write a letter,” he mumbled.

  “I thought you were against the whole letter thing,” I said.

  He tilted his head at me. “It didn’t turn out as bad as I thought.”

  I smiled, feeling the heat creep up my cheeks, only this time I reveled in the way he made me blush instead of fighting it.

  Denny, either oblivious to this or pointedly trying to shut down the moment (I’m going to guess the latter), spoke up. “That’s not a bad idea,” he said. “Maybe writing your own letter will help you figure out what to do with the rest of them. It can’t hurt.”

  He was right that it couldn’t hurt, but here I am, the end of the summer, and I’ve written all of this down, hoping it would give me an answer, and I’m still just as confused as I was when I started.

  Now I’m sitting here at my computer, staring at this massive document with all of our letters weaved in. Well, all of them but one. I don’t have Kellie’s letter, but her story is in here, too. Except, of course, that it’s her story through everyone else’s eyes. Just like it always has been.

  If I try to publish this, then, sure, some of our stories will be out there, in our own words. Part of the story will be set straight. But I’ll be taking Kellie’s voice from her all over again. Even without her letter, I’ve depicted her, speculated. I have no more right to put her story out there than the McHales do.

  But if I do nothing, if I hit “delete” on this document, then none of us get our story told. We’ll all be forever stuck as the versions of ourselves seen in newspapers and TV movies. And hell, even if I do publish this, that might be the case, anyway. The world has mostly moved on from the VCHS massacre. It’d be hard to change the accepted version of the narrative that’s been out there for years.

  If it’s going to happen at all, it’s got to be soon. It won’t be long before the McHales’ book is out. People will be thinking about the shooting again. It’s our chance to make people take notice. Our chance to be heard.

  Maybe the reason I can’t make a decision on this is because it’s not my decision to make?

  Whoa—wait. That’s it.

  It’s not my decision. I shouldn’t be the one making the choice about what to do with these letters.

  But I think I know who should.

  Dear Reader,

  Damn it, I really didn’t want to do this.

  When Lee texted me in late August, asking me to meet her at the café on a Saturday afternoon, I almost didn’t reply. I’d hoped our last meeting would be it—the last time I’d ever have to see anyone from that awful town ever again. But in her message, Lee promised that this would be the final time she’d ever contact me, and I don’t know, I guess I was intrigued. So I went.

  She was there with Miles, that quiet kid with the beanie. They were sitting side by side, looking at each other’s face in that way that feels disgustingly intimate. When I pulled out the chair across from them, I made sure the legs scraped loudly against the floor, and they both looked up.

  “What do you want?” I asked, sitting down and folding my arms over my chest.

  Lee didn’t bother with the small talk, which I appreciated. In fact, she didn’t say a thing as she reached into her pocket and removed a small object. When she passed it across the table to me, I realized it was a dark blue USB drive.

  “What’s this?” I asked.

  “Our stories,” she said. “Denny, Ashley, Eden, Miles, and me. They all wrote letters, telling their stories, and I put them all together.”

  “And you’re giving this to me why?”

  “After I saw you in the spring, I didn’t know what to do,” Lee explained. “I had these letters, because I thought telling the truth would help. But then I talked to you and I realized that … that it maybe wasn’t my decision.” She looked down, shame coloring her cheeks a bright shade of pink. “I was confuse
d, so I decided to figure things out by writing it all down—everything I’d done. I’d hoped putting it on paper would help me figure out what to do. And it did.”

  “Spit it out,” I said.

  “I figured out that I wasn’t the person to figure it out,” she explained. “You are.”

  I rolled my eyes. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

  “Believe me, she’s not,” Miles said. I almost didn’t understand him at first. The kid really doesn’t speak clearly.

  “You can destroy it if you want,” Lee said. “Or you can publish it. Or anything. It’s yours now. I asked, and all of the others gave permission for you to use it—or not use it—however you choose.”

  “All of them,” I repeated.

  “Yes, even Ashley,” she said, answering the question I hadn’t asked. “She’s still upset with me, but … I think she feels bad about what happened to you.”

  I rolled the drive between my fingers, watching the light from the café window gleam off its plastic casing. “Why do I get this? Why not someone else?”

  “Because,” Lee said, “of all of us, you’re the one who has suffered the most.”

  “Don’t pity me.”

  “I don’t,” she said. “But I do feel guilty. We all do. We saw you being silenced, we saw your voice get taken away, and we didn’t do anything to help. So this is our way of trying to give you control of your story again. Use it or don’t. We’ll be okay with whatever you decide.”

  “Lee, we better get going,” Miles said, checking the time on his cell phone.

  “Right.” She stood up, pulling her purse over her shoulder. “We’ve got a long drive ahead of us. We’re making a road trip to California,” she added to me, as if I cared about her plans.

  I glanced out the window, at the old pickup truck I recognized from the last time we’d met here. Now the bed appeared to be loaded with what I could only guess were boxes and covered with a blue tarp. “You’re driving across the country in that piece of junk? It looks like it might break down at the next exit.”

  Lee smiled. “It’s tougher than you’d think.”

  As she and Miles moved toward the door, I called after her. “Lee.” She turned and looked at me. “You said this was the last time you’d contact me.”

  She nodded. “I promise.”

  “Thank you,” I said. “And … have a safe trip.”

  She smiled, waved, and stepped out into the parking lot with Miles at her side. I watched through the glass as her truck pulled away, fading into the distance as it headed west.

  * * *

  I’d thrown the thumb drive in a drawer when I got home and told myself to forget about it. I considered destroying it, smashing it with a hammer or tossing it into a fire in some symbolic gesture. But I didn’t own a hammer, and I wasn’t sure if a hard drive would burn or how long it would take. So instead, it ended up in the drawer at the bottom of my desk, where the old batteries, unused cables, and slightly cracked cell phone cases went to die (because apparently I’m a hoarder who never remembers to just throw things away).

  And I did forget about it. For a while.

  Then, several months later, the fourth anniversary came. I’d been at Walmart the night before, buying food that I could stockpile in my dorm room so I wouldn’t have to go out in public the next day. I always skip classes on the anniversary. I tell everyone I have a cold. It’s spring. The weather is changing. Sinuses are the worst. Etc., etc. So far, no one has noticed that my colds coincide with the Ides of March.

  Anyway, I was buying groceries for my upcoming anxiety hibernation, and I saw that damn book.

  It was there by the cash register, where all of the bestsellers go. Sarah McHale’s face staring out at me. The face I’d seen only seconds before the monster killed her. And, of course, there was the cross.

  Not my cross. Not the one they found in the bathroom—the one Sarah McHale had never even seen but somehow ended up being buried with. It was another cross. But that didn’t matter, I guess. It got the point across, it sold the story, who cared if it was accurate?

  I stared at that book for a long time. Long enough that the woman in line in front of me noticed.

  “Have you read it?” she asked.

  I looked at her, and for a minute a bolt of fear shot through me. Did she know who I was? Was she going to lash out at me? Spit on me? Scream at me in the middle of this Walmart checkout line? I could feel my body starting to fold in on itself, but I forced it to be steady.

  You’re fine, I thought. She doesn’t know. No one knows. You are Renee now.

  The woman was still looking at me, and I had to remind myself of the question she’d just asked. After too long a pause, I managed to shake my head.

  “It’s great,” she told me. “The most moving book I ever read. I’ve already read it twice, even though it just came out last week.”

  “Just in time for the anniversary,” I said.

  The woman must not have heard the note of bitterness in my voice, because she just nodded vigorously. “It’s so hard to believe it was four years ago. It was such a tragedy. I wonder how those other kids are doing. The ones who survived, I mean.”

  “Next customer,” the cashier said, and the woman moved forward and began placing her items on the conveyor belt.

  “Are you going to buy it?” the woman asked, looking back at me. “You should. It’ll change your life. That girl was such an inspiration. It really reaffirmed my faith.”

  “Not today,” I said.

  But then, when the woman was gone and the cashier was asking for my items … I don’t know why I did it. Self-destructive behavior. Morbid curiosity. Because part of me wanted to hate-read it. Take your pick. But I reached out, grabbed the copy at the front, and tossed it onto the conveyor belt.

  “Glad you changed your mind,” the cashier said as he scanned the book. “You won’t regret it.”

  I already knew he was wrong.

  When I got home, I barricaded myself in my room and changed into sweatpants.

  The next day, I tried to do anything I could to keep my mind off the shooting. I tried listening to the happiest, most annoyingly upbeat music on my iPod. I tried watching some romantic comedy one of my friends had recommended to me. I even tried studying for my organic chemistry midterm. But nothing worked. My thoughts kept circling and circling, always coming back to that day four years ago. That bathroom. Those girls. That gunshot.

  And then there was freaking Ashley Chambers.

  When I logged into my email, I had a message from her. I don’t know how she got my contact info. From Lee or Eden, I guessed. But she’d decided to reach out to me. On that day of all days. I was so furious, just at the sight of her name in my inbox, that I almost deleted it without reading.

  Curiosity beat out indignation, and I opened the email.

  It was short. Just a few lines. She said she’d been thinking about me since last year, when Lee started telling people the truth about Sarah. She said she was sorry, and that she wanted to reach out sooner but was nervous. She hoped I was doing okay, and she understood if I didn’t want to write her back.

  Well, that was good, because she wasn’t going to get a response from me. I deleted the message and closed my laptop. Maybe it made Ashley feel better to apologize, but it made no difference to me. And I really wished she’d chosen another day to send that email.

  I climbed back into bed and pulled the comforter over my head.

  Maybe this sounds weird, but my shoulder hurt. A phantom ache left behind from a bullet wound four years old. It was faint, but there. A reminder that no matter how much that physical scar faded, the hurt might never end. I could go by Renee. I could craft a new history for myself. But this was something I could not escape. Not really.

  Eventually I gave into the temptation and picked up the book. It was still in the shopping bag next to my door. It was the last thing I wanted or needed to read right then. But the pull was too strong, and I was weaker than I’d
let anyone know.

  So, yeah, I read it. I read every damn page. And it made me feel just as awful as you’d expect.

  I was only brought up in the book a few times. A passing reference to “rumors” that Sarah’s story wasn’t true. No mention of my name. No mention of the abuse my family and I endured. I was barely more than a footnote.

  Maybe you’d think that would be a relief. Better than having my name dragged through the mud again, right? But, no. It felt worse. So much worse. At least when people hated me, they heard me. They didn’t believe me, but my voice was out there. They tried so hard to stamp it out, to silence me, but I’d kept yelling.

  Until I just couldn’t do it anymore.

  But in this book, it’s as if I didn’t exist. As if that day didn’t even happen to me. I’d rather have my name smeared all over those pages, to be condemned as some kind of devil-worshipping monster, than to have Sarah’s parents tell her story as if I don’t exist. As if nothing that I said, nothing that I survived, even registered with them at all.

  I had no idea I’d feel that way until I read that book, until I threw it across my dorm room so hard that it bounced off the wall with a loud thud. I thought I’d been telling Lee the truth when I said I wanted to move on, that I didn’t want my name or my story or anything out there. And I still felt that way. Still felt like the truth would bring me nothing but pain that I’d been fighting so hard to put behind me. If I had tried to speak up when she asked, tried to write one of her stupid letters, it just would have gotten me the same abuse I’d dealt with four years ago.

  But there I was, being ignored, forgotten, pushed out of my own story entirely. And damn if that didn’t hurt just as much.

  I didn’t know what I wanted.

  I still don’t know what I want.

  For a long time, I just sat on my bed, staring at the book where it lay on my floor. And it was only then that I remembered that USB drive Lee had given me months ago, on her way to California. I’d actually managed to forget for a while. I hadn’t wanted anything to do with it before, but all of a sudden, I had to know what was on there. I had to read another version of this story.