In Cassie's Corner

by Mayer, Dale

  "I don’t care. I’m sure there had to be someone else driving. Now to prove it."

  "Whoa! Cassie, what are you talking about?"

  Should she tell him? About seeing Todd as a ghost?

  Hell no!

  She shifted into a cross-legged position, transferring the phone to her right hand. Dropping her free hand to the comforter, she traced the geometric pattern on her bedspread while working out the problem. He might believe her, but not likely. "He was my friend. I know he didn’t do this and I want to clear his name."

  "Cassie?"

  Jessie had to wonder what chaos he’d started. "You don’t have to believe me," she rushed in to say. "I know you didn’t know him the way I did, but—"

  "But I wish I did." Jessie sighed heavily. "It’s not lost on me that you knew him so much better and believed in him, while his own family blindly accepted his guilt."

  "Then help me. Help me prove his innocence."

  "Why? It’s not going to change anything. He’s still dead."

  "Is he? Do you think he isn’t here in spirit? Wouldn’t he want us to do this for him?" Cassie stood up and walked over to the window and pulled back the blinds. Night had settled in. She leaned on the edge of the frame and stared out in the blackness. "If I’d been the one to die, I’d want someone to clear my name."

  ***

  Todd sat on Cassie’s window ledge, alternately staring out into the night and watching Cassie as she slept. He could have spoken with her earlier, but he’d arrived during her phone call – to his brother, no less. It had saddened him. And it had bugged the hell out of him. He’d never taken the time to really connect with Jessie when he was alive. Now he found it was one more in the long list of things he regretted, now that it was too late to do anything about them.

  It figures.

  Cassie’s dark blond hair fanned across the pillow. Her face was puffy and swollen from the tears he’d watched fall earlier. A private scene she’d not have appreciated him seeing. His heart hurt. For her. For his brother. And most of all for himself.

  He hadn’t meant to die. In fact, he hadn’t realized he had until he was in the morgue, listening to the strange conversation going on around him. A conversation he’d been horrified to learn was about him.

  He had not been drinking and driving. And he didn’t give a shit what they said – they were wrong.

  Many people had seen him as a wild case doomed to an early end. But that wasn’t true. That had been his front, his bravado to hide the million insecurities inside.

  He loved Cassie – maybe even more now. The loving family he’d never had… There was just something about not being the one chosen to stay with his mother that had never quite healed. He’d understood – sorta. After all, Jessie was the younger kid. He’d needed Mom more. Todd was already more independent and through the divorce, more bitter. Older. He’d started to try things, experimenting like so many others of his age. But never drinking and driving – at least, not together.

  He wished he could remember. Why would he have done something like that? If he’d done it? It was a stupid stunt. Of all the things he might have called himself, stupid wasn’t one of them.

  Thankfully he had Cassie in his corner. Or maybe he was in Cassie’s corner.

  She believed in him. He’d been friendly with many kids – of all kinds, just never the popular 'in' group. That was his insecurity speaking, his need to be admired. His lack of confidence required people’s friendship, affirming he was worthy. Surely that many people couldn’t be wrong – could they? Especially not Cassie.

  For that he was grateful. He walked over to the bed where she slept and leaned down to run his fingers through her hair. He’d never put on airs around Cassie. He hadn’t needed to. She alone, knew the real him, including all his dark places. She shifted, murmuring in her sleep, sensing him even then.

  No one else could see him. No one else cared to.

  No one but her.

  ***

  Adam Spence reached for another beer from the pack beside him. The six he’d brought home hadn’t even made it to the fridge. No point now, he was drinking the last one. "I don’t know what to do for the funeral," he said into the phone.

  Sandra, his nag of an ex-wife, wouldn’t leave him alone. All he wanted to do was forget…and she wouldn’t let him.

  "He lived with you. Are you going to make the arrangements or not?" Her voice sounded rough. Probably too many hours crying. Blaming him. That was his life these days.

  Groaning aloud, he popped the top and took a healthy swig. "I don’t know what to do. You handle it. He was your son, too." Silence. He sighed. "Look, you make the arrangements and I’ll pay the bills and show up." When she didn’t answer, he figured that was a yes. Damn straight. "Good. Then let me get back to my drinking. I have some serious forgetting to do tonight," he said bitterly.

  "Is that all you care about? What about your other son? Did you ever think that he might need you right now?"

  "Jessie? Hell, he can’t stand me and you know it. He probably wishes I died instead of Todd."

  Sandra started to cry softly. "If he does it’s because you’ve never spent any quality time with him. The boy needs a strong father figure."

  "Not this father." Adam slammed the phone down and opened his throat, pouring the beer straight back. That was the problem with beer. It took too many to get a buzz on. He staggered to his feet, heading for the pantry and the bottle of whiskey he was sure he’d stashed there.

  Pulling it out, he gloated. That was more like it. He opened the cap and drank straight from the bottle. "Maybe now I won’t see my boy every damn time I turn around."

  He turned and fell onto the couch to stare out into the lonely black of night. The pain just wouldn’t quit. No matter how much he drank. Tilting the bottle again, he kept one eye on the vision of his son leaning against the porch door, his thumbs hooked into his jeans as always, with that mocking look on his face.

  "Go away. Stop haunting me." The bottle upended once more, emptying the last of the molten gold liquid. Angrily, he threw it at the vision.

  Todd jumped out of the way with a laugh as the bottle bounced off the wall behind him.

  A laugh Adam swore he could hear.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Tuesday morning it rained.

  Gray sheets filled the skies. Cassie stared out her bedroom window. She’d planned to wear a beautiful new t-shirt. Rain was not part of the program. Just then, Penny texted her. Cassie smirked. Penny was impressed by the weather, too. Not.

  Time had slipped away from Cassie. She needed to get moving or she’d be late for class. She’d spent too long on Facebook already this morning. Even dead, Todd was still the topic of choice amongst her friends.

  Penny waited for her at the front doors of the school. Cassie grinned at her curvy friend. The guys flocked around Penny every chance they could, but turned tail and ran when they understood her seriously scary brainpower. And Penny was as nice as she was smart.

  Cassie hadn't meant to ignore her all weekend; she just hadn't been able to talk to anyone – which wasn’t fair. Penny, although not a big Todd fan, was a Cassie fan and would understand how much she hurt.

  Her friend watched her, concern shining from her hazel eyes.

  "Hey." Cassie linked an arm around her friend’s shoulders. "Sorry. I’ve had a tough couple of days."

  "Yeah, I noticed." Penny squeezed Cassie’s arm. "Glad to see you looking more like yourself." The two walked in, arms linked, heads almost touching.

  "I’m getting there, but slowly," admitted Cassie. "It’s hard. I don’t want to believe what everyone else is saying about him. I know they didn’t know him like I did, but I didn’t expect people to go totally off on him, either. My dad’s been snarky mean about Todd since the accident. It's scary. I wish he’d stop."

  "Dads are like that and yours hated Todd. He’s probably happy Todd’s dead."

  Cassie stumbled. It sounded so wrong to hear people say thin
gs like that. She knew Todd was gone physically, but her heart and mind couldn’t quite accept it. And neither did she understand his current state. She lived in fear he’d disappear and never return. After all, she’d spoken to him on Saturday and only seen him in class yesterday. Not since, and that worried her.

  "Wow, aren’t you two cute?" Kendra, with a big blond brute-of-a-guy at her side, walked up to the two girls. Cassie stiffened.

  "Easy. Don’t let her get to you," cautioned Penny, keeping Cassie’s arm tight against her. "She’s just trying to piss you off."

  "I know," murmured Cassie, eyeing Kendra. "She’s succeeding. If she says one thing about Todd, I’m going—"

  "So your little Toddy bear killed himself, did he?" She snickered, sending a knowing look at the brawny brain-dead male at her side. "Drinking and driving. What an ass."

  "Cassie––" Penny warned, but it didn’t stop Cassie.

  "Todd wasn’t drinking and driving, and if you knew him as well as you’d like everyone else to think you did…" Cassie’s smirk grew at the outrage on Kendra’s face. "Then you’d remember how strict he was on that issue."

  "I knew Todd better than you ever did, you. How dare you imply anything else? Todd loved me. You were nothing to him." Kendra’s face turned a mottled red.

  Penny tugged hard on Cassie arm, dragging her down the hallway. "Don’t say anything. Do you want a detention – or worse, a suspension? She’s a bitch. Always has been and always will be. I don’t know what Todd saw in her."

  Cassie snorted. "Todd didn’t see anything in her. He couldn’t get past the assets sticking out in front of her."

  Penny snickered. "So true. But he was male."

  "You and I both know why she’s so popular, but the guys don’t get it. Todd couldn’t tell me what he liked about her. The conversation always came back to what he could get from her."

  "I can’t believe you two talked about things like that."

  "We talked about everything. That’s why it hurts so bad. You have your mom. I’m just don’t have that with mine. I’m always afraid she’ll involve my dad somehow. And he’s always so furious when boys are mentioned. You know how he was with Todd." She scrunched up her face and mimicked, "He’s too old for you. He’s too worldly for you. He’s too…He’s too…" She groaned. "Ohh, he never shuts up."

  Penny giggled. "And what you hate is he’s often right. Todd was too old for you. He was all those other things as well, but your dad didn’t understand. Todd was a special friend. He wasn’t your boyfriend."

  It was so nice to be understood. Penny and Cassie had fights over the ten years that they’d known each other, but that had settled down as they’d grown older and decided to be friends in spite of their differences, in the same way she’d built her relationship with Todd.

  Todd had talked about his girlfriends, and Cassie had asked him tons of questions about boys he knew. The insider knowledge had been great for her and her friends.

  Who did she have now?

  Taking her seat in English class, Cassie looked around and realized that she had loads of friends, but few really good ones. Penny was the closest of three. Todd had been the lone male in her circle.

  She frowned as a paper airplane landed on her desk. Scribbles covered one wing.

  Todd was a loser and he got what he deserved.

  Her back stiffened. How dare people talk about him like that? Todd hadn’t been a loser. People may have had that impression of him but they didn’t know him.

  The English teacher walked in, a note in his hand. "I’m to tell you all that Todd Spence’s funeral is going to be Friday afternoon at four, for those of you who wish to go and pay your respects. I’ll post this information on the board."

  Tears sprang to Cassie’s eyes as words of protest sprang to her mouth. She choked them back. She bowed her head, her fists clenched in her lap. Todd was dead. His body – that part of him – would need to be buried. Staring down at her hands, she refused to look around. She felt the stares, heard the half whispers. How difficult to realize she might be the only one to show up on Friday. Well, his mom and brother would be there. So would Todd. If he could, that is.

  Thoughts of him watching the ceremony brought a tiny smile to her face. He’d probably get a kick out of it. So far, though, he hadn’t sounded particularly enthralled with the changes in his life. Not that she blame him.

  Maybe she’d search out Jessie at lunch time. See if he had any news.

  With a plan in place, Cassie tuned back into class.

  ***

  Todd stuck close to Cassie throughout the morning, interested in this side of her. She seemed one person with him and then another without him. Being dead gave him a unique look into her life. Normal for everyone, he supposed. Still, he’d been amazed at the spat between Kendra and Cassie. Kendra was a bitch, always had been, and obviously had no plans to change anytime soon.

  But she’d ‘put out’ and that had been valuable. He grinned. Guys had needs, after all.

  He’d always been protective of Cassie, but now he had a big-picture view. A view that highlighted different priorities, put things in an order of relevance he hadn’t been able to see while he was alive.

  He knew Cassie needed help to find the truth about his accident. Mentally he went through his groups of friends. The only ones he’d trust around her were Bryce, Ivan and maybe Rob. But they wouldn’t help. They were law abiding and respectful and would believe exactly what the police told them. They’d listen to Cassie and agree to her face, to make her happy, then say later, among themselves, that she was overreacting, and overemotional because of her grief.

  His other so-called friends would laugh her off for the opposite reason. They didn’t like cops, never believed what they said and would avoid anything that would bring them into close contact with them.

  Maybe his brother? A pang struck. He wasn’t so sure he wanted those two together. Just the thought made his insides tumble around. Or they would, if he had insides.

  He placed a hand on his belly and pushed inward. His hand want right though the vision of shirt material and skin. There was nothing there. Holding up his hand he could see people through his palm.

  He wasn’t solid.

  Staring around the crowded classroom, he realized he couldn’t smell that stuffy stale odor he had always picked up in this classroom. And if he couldn’t smell, why could he hear and speak? Weird. Wonderful, yeah, sometimes – but the rest, well, he didn’t quite know.

  A funeral, huh? Funny, he’d never put any thought into his own death.

  Odd to think that the first funeral he’d attend would be his own.

  ***

  Lunchtime, as always, was nuts. Kids stayed in class to work on homework, others ran to the closest store for goodies, and all of them seemed to pass in front of, or around Cassie on the way to the commons room. She’d forgotten to pack a lunch. Well, not really. She hadn’t bothered was more like it. She’d lost her appetite. She had to force food down when her parents were around or they’d get on her case, but when they weren’t there…

  "Can I treat you to an iced coffee?" Penny appeared at her elbow.

  Cassie smiled. "That’s a good idea. Are you having one?"

  "Duh, girlfriend. You think you’re going to get away with drinking one of those in front of me? Of course, I am. Find us a place to sit and I’ll be right back." Penny disappeared in the sea of jeans and purple hair. Cassie surveyed the large room and rolled her eyes. She should have gone to buy the drinks and left Penny to find a seat. This place was chaos.

  Working her way down one wall, Cassie headed to the far corner of the large open room. Just as she was about to snag a corner foam cushion, a larger male plunked down in front of her.

  Outrage didn’t quite cover her reaction. Cassie narrowed her gaze and pinned Jessie in place. "A gentleman would let the lady have the seat, particularly as she was here first."

  Several of Jessie’s friends laughed and crowded around her.

/>   "There’re no gentlemen here, sweetheart."

  "Uh, did you say a lady? Where?"

  Their taunts wouldn’t stop. She tossed them a withering look before looking for another space.

  "Here, you can have it."

  The guys' laughter stopped as if it had been sliced off. They stared down at Jessie. Jessie stood up and motioned at Cassie to take the chair. "You’re right. You were here first. Take it, please."

  Curious, Cassie stared at him.

  He shifted, uncomfortable, either with her or with his chivalrous actions. Maybe those surprised him as much as they had everyone else.