Aspen

by Rebekah Crane

“Want to get coffee?” Suzy asks.

  “I should probably head home.”

  “Please,” Suzy begs. “It’s been, like, forever since we hung out.” She flashes her wrist with the friendship bracelet.

  “Sure.” I nod. But even in Suzy’s car on the way to the Unseen Bean, I can’t stop thinking about how Leona could tell someone is following me. Or maybe she was just high.

  We order two chocolate macchiatos with whipped cream and Suzy pays. “I have a new favorite store, thanks to you.”

  We take a seat and sip our drinks while Suzy asks me question after question about the Crystal Dragon and the Grateful Dead and how I know so much. I tell her about Ninny and the Widespread Panic concert, and how I’ve had so many uncles in my life that I’ve lost count, and how Jerry Garcia died too young and too brilliant and we miss him every day.

  “Like the Ben and Jerry’s ice cream flavor guy?”

  “That’s Cherry Garcia. It was named after Jerry, the lead singer in the Grateful Dead.”

  Suzy sits back in her seat, taking a long sip of her drink and licking whipped cream off the top. “I can’t believe you were born at a rock concert. That is so rad. Being born in a hospital is so boring.”

  “But safer. Can I ask you something?” I say and lean in, making sure to display my friendship bracelet on the table. When Suzy nods enthusiastically, I say, “What did you really think of Katelyn?”

  Suzy sits back in her seat, her eyes on her drink. “Why do you ask?”

  “I’m just curious, I guess.”

  Suzy eyes fill with water, like she might cry. I want to take the question back.

  “Some days, I’m so mad that she’s dead.” Suzy sets her drink on the table. “That she left me.”

  “But it was an accident,” I say, repeating Officer Hubert’s words. And I swear it was.

  Suzy nods slowly, her lips in a tight frown. “Right.”

  I sit back in my seat, having officially killed the mood. “Do you want to hear about the summer Ninny and I lived out of the back of her van and followed Rusted Root around the country?”

  That perks Suzy up. Her cheeks brighten almost instantly. She leans in across the table, but stops halfway. “Oh, my God,” she says and kicks me under the table.

  “Ouch.” I grab my shin.

  “Sorry,” Suzy whispers.

  “What is it?” I look over my shoulder. There, standing at the counter ordering, is Ben. As if he can sense us staring, he looks in our direction. Suzy waves her arm like a madwoman, motioning for him to come over.

  “What are you doing here?” Suzy asks, when Ben gets to our table.

  “Getting coffee.” Ben lifts his drink. “What are you doing here?” He says in the same tone.

  “Aspen took me shopping for a new tie-dye. Do you want to sit down?” Suzy pulls out the chair between us. Ben doesn’t move. “We don’t bite.”

  “I wouldn’t exactly say that,” I mumble to myself. I slump lower in my chair.

  Ben looks around the coffee shop and then takes the seat.

  Suzy get her shirt out of the bag and lays it on the table. “So, what do you think? This lady at the shop—her name’s Leona—she’s so rad—says my color is blue, but not a baby blue, ocean blue.”

  “It’s cool. I hear tie-dye is all the rage.” Ben sits back and sips his coffee. Then he turns to me. Our eyes meet, and the need to know what socks he’s wearing is back. “What did you get?”

  “Nothing,” I say.

  “Leona says Aspen has two colors. Yellow and grey, but not a light grey, a stormy grey.” Suzy leans her elbows on the table.

  “Two colors? Are you that special?”

  “More like that weird,” I say.

  “I prefer the word ‘unique,’” Ben smiles.

  Suzy eyes us and then says, “I need to go to the bathroom. Aspen, will you come with me?”

  “What?”

  Suzy comes around to my side of the table and yanks me up by the arm. “Come on. It’s not like we’ve never peed together before.” She pats Ben on the shoulder. “Don’t leave before we get back.”

  Ben sits back in his seat, coffee in hand, and settles into a comfortable position. Suzy drags me across the Unseen Bean and into the bathroom. Once we’re safely inside, she goes up to the sink and turns on the water.

  “I thought you had to pee,” I say.

  Suzy doesn’t wash her hands, but rests her butt up against the sink. “Enough is enough.”

  “Of what?”

  “You and Ben. I want you to get out there and finally admit you like him.” I fumble over what to say to Suzy. “He makes you happy. I can see it.”

  “So what?”

  Suzy huffs and turns toward the sink. She runs her hands under the water and grabs a paper towel.

  “You know what I’m really mad at Katelyn for? I’m mad at her for not living. Happiness isn’t a given in life. And when you’re happy, you should hold onto it.” Suzy’s hands twist tight around the paper towel.

  “So Katelyn wasn’t happy?”

  Suzy doesn’t answer. She tosses the towel into the garbage can. “Just get out there and make it happen.” She sounds like a coach giving a pep talk, and I laugh in spite of myself.

  When we get back to the table, Suzy doesn’t sit down. Instead, she grabs her shopping bag and says, “I forgot I have this thing. Ben, you don’t mind taking Aspen home, right?”

  He glances at me, confused. “Sure.”

  “Thanks.” Suzy gives me a quick hug and a wink. Then she leaves, swinging her bag behind her.

  I sit back in my seat and stare at the almost empty coffee cup in front of me.

  “How was the bathroom?” he asks.

  “Informative.”

  Ben raises his eyebrows. “Do tell.”

  “What happens in the ladies’ room stays in the ladies’ room.”

  Ben laughs and pulls out a colorful hacky sack from his pocket. He tosses it into the air and catches it on the backside of his palm.

  “You don’t have to take me home. I can walk,” I say.

  “No. I want to,” he says quickly. And then Ben looks around the coffee shop. “You want to get out of here?”

  A few leftover fallen leaves scatter the street as cars drive past us on the road. Snow will be here soon. Maybe even tomorrow.

  Zipping up my fleece jacket, I hug my chest for warmth. Ben doesn’t move, just throws the hacky sack into the air again.

  “You want to play?” he asks.

  “Are you sure? I’m pretty damn good. I’d hate to beat you.”

  “You realize I play varsity soccer. And I’m going to college on a soccer scholarship.”

  “You realize I was raised by Ninny. I’ve had more drum circles in my backyard than Red Rocks.”

  “You asked for it.” Ben smiles.

  We find an open space under a bare tree on the outdoor pedestrian mall of Pearl Street. Only a few people walk around us, clasping their shopping bags. Down the block a four-piece string band plays average bluegrass music, a hat placed before them for donations.

  Ben kicks the hacky sack in my direction. I catch it with my knee, bouncing it high and then volleying it back to him.

  “So you have a soccer scholarship?” I ask.

  “To University of Colorado.”

  “You’re staying in Boulder?” I pause for a second, surprised, and snap out of it when the hacky sack flies towards my face. I duck the moment before it would have hit me in the nose. Ben laughs loudly and then clasps his hand over his mouth.

  “Shit. Sorry.”

  I snatch the hacky sack off the ground. Then I kick it high in the air with my heel.

  “Why University of Colorado?” I ask.

  “There’s no way my dad can afford college without the scholarship. I don’t really have a choice.” Ben volleys the ball with both knees, his eyes focused. He kicks it high and catches it with his head.

  “Impressive.” I clap. He bows, catching the hacky sac
k as it rolls off. “Do you wish you had a choice?”

  “Sometimes. But I’m glad I can be here for Sam, since my mom isn’t.”

  “Do you miss her?”

  Ben rolls the hacky sack around in his hand. I bite my bottom lip, worried I shouldn’t have asked that question. It takes him a second, but then he nods. “What about you? No dad?”

  “You know Ninny. There’s a list of potential people. It gets longer the older I get.”

  He makes a fake shocked face. “I can’t believe Ninny studied with that many people in high school.” Ben kicks the hacky sack in my direction. I knock it with the outer edge of my foot, sending it over my shoulder, where I catch it on the opposite knee.

  “Most people study with someone in high school. It’s just that no one talks about it.” I pause. “Unless you’re Ninny.”

  “So you’ve . . . studied with someone?” Ben asks.

  I volley the ball back to Ben. “Maybe.” He misses the hacky sack and I giggle. “You?”

  Ben picks it up off the ground and takes a seat under the tree. I move to sit next to him. “Maybe.” Ben rolls the ball around in his hand. “Don’t ever tell me the guy’s name, okay?” Ben’s voice sounds serious and anxious. “It’s only one guy, right?”

  “Only one guy,” I say. “And he doesn’t live here.”

  “Thank God.” Ben pushes out a long breath.

  “And you? Only one girl?” Ben nods slowly, both of us acknowledging who we’re talking about. “Were you in love with Katelyn?” I ask.

  “I don’t know,” he says, picking up a leaf and spinning it around in his hand. “Some days, I thought I was.” The terrible side of me is glad he just used past tense. “What about you? Were you in love?”

  “God, no. I just wanted to do it.”

  A deep laugh bursts from Ben. The sound makes me smile. “How come this is so easy?” he asks.

  “Are you calling me easy?” I nudge him in the shoulder.

  “I’m not sure if you’re easy. I’ll have to find out.” He leans into me.

  I smile, but as soon as it’s there, it falls away. “It is kind of messed up,” I say, unable to meet Ben’s eyes. “That this is easy.”

  “But everything seems so hard most of the time. I’m just so tired of it.”

  And I think I might be tired too. Exhausted, really. “Did you just say easy and hard in the same conversation?”

  “I’m a teenage boy. What do you want from me?” Ben nudges me again.

  We sit quietly for a while, Ben playing with his leaf, me reveling in how good it feels to have my kidney back. And then Ben says, “So what about you? College.”

  I shake my head. “The future is too unexpected and unintentional for me to make any decisions at this point.”

  “Fair enough.” Ben pulls his knees up to his chest. The wind on Pearl Street makes pieces of the trash dance in the air, spinning around one another.

  “How did you get those?” I say, and point to the two scars on his face.

  “This one,” Ben touches the one on his cheek, “I fell out of a tree and caught a branch with my face.”

  “Gross.”

  “And this one,” Ben touches the one over his eyebrow, “I got kicked in the head with a soccer cleat.”

  “I bet that hurt.”

  “What about you? Any hidden scars?”

  I pull my jeans up to my knee. A thick scar lines the center of my kneecap. “Kim and I snuck into her neighbor’s hot tub and they caught us. My knee got cut on the fence running away.” Ben laughs, skimming the length of the scar with his finger. My leg feels like it’s covered in shivers. Embarrassed, I roll down my pants and point to my forehead. “And you know how I got this.”

  Ben’s eyes travel from my knee to my face. They land on my scar and stay there.

  “It’ll never go away, will it?” Ben asks. By the sad tone of his voice, I get the feeling that Ben isn’t talking about my scar.

  “I don’t think so,” I say.

  Ben stands up, wiping dirt from the back of his pants. “I better get you home.” And then he holds out his hand to me, to lift me off the ground. We walk over to a parking lot behind the Unseen Bean, where he points to a tow truck. “That’s me.”

  “Side job?”

  Ben laughs. “Loan from my dad.”

  “Your dad’s a tow truck driver?”

  “Technically, he manages a towing company.” Ben runs his hands through his hair. “Un-technically, he’s a tow truck driver.”

  “Un-technically isn’t a word.”

  “Well, it should be.”

  “Kind of like Beta Particle should be a band.”

  “Exactly,” Ben says. He stops at the driver’s side door and turns to face me. “My dad’s the one who called me that night.”

  “What?”

  “He was working the night of the . . . ”

  I freeze, everything inside of me turning cold.

  “Did he see . . . ” I don’t finish the question before Ben nods. I stare at the back of the truck, at the crane and the hook and the levers that must have lifted Katelyn’s broken car from the ground. I almost trip over my own feet as I stumble backwards. “You know what, Shakedown Street’s just around the corner. I’ll catch a ride with Ninny.”

  “I can take you.” Ben reaches for my hand, but I pull away.

  “It’s okay. Really.”

  I speed across the parking lot, my breath coming faster and faster. At the corner, I duck into the alley. I brace myself against the wall, but my knees buckle and I slump to the ground. Footsteps sound on the pavement.

  “I told you, Ben. Ninny can drive me.” But when I look up it isn’t Ben in the alley with me. Katelyn stands in the shadows. The darkness casts an odd mark on her face. And the smell is back. I cradle my head in my hands. It’s starting to hurt.

  I sit nestled against the wall until it’s completely dark out.

  When I creep out from behind the building, I check the parking lot for Ben. The tow truck is gone. All that’s left are leaves and pieces of trash, dancing in the late fall wind.

  CHAPTER 15

  Ninny is upside down on a yoga mat when I walk in the door. Fresh incense burns in the kitchen and Bob Dylan plays over the stereo. The lights are dimmed, and candles flicker over the unlit fireplace.

  “What are you doing?” I whisper, afraid I’ll mess up whatever aura-cleansing, Zen-yoga thing Ninny’s trying this week.

  “Feeling the earth beneath my feet.”

  I bend down to look at Ninny’s face, all bright red and sweaty. “But your feet are up in the air.”

  She comes down from her pose. “Come here, Aspen-tree.” Ninny pulls me down beside her. It must be the yoga mat, because I sit up straighter. I even cross my legs. “Now close your eyes,” she whispers.

  “Why do I need to close my eyes?” I ask in a hushed voice.

  “Just do it.” Ninny puts my hands in a prayer position right in front of my heart. “Let the earth hold you.”

  I peek out of one eye. “But the floor is holding me.”

  “Semantics.”

  “You know that word?”

  Ninny knocks my arm. “Deep breath in and out.”

  “Are you going to make me say om?”

  “Just feel the energy.”

  “What energy?”

  “Your energy.”

  I shift my butt on the hard ground, trying to get comfortable. It’s better to do what Ninny says. When she gets determined, she’ll just beg you until you say yes. I follow her breathing, sucking deep breaths in and out through my nose.

  The longer I sit there, the more tired I get, and the more my stomach growls. When Ninny seems consumed in meditation, I tiptoe into the kitchen and grab a container of leftover macaroni and cheese and pop it in the microwave. Then I plop myself down on the couch.

  Ninny takes a deep breath, pushing everything out of her lungs, and opens her eyes. “You could at least try, Aspen-tree,” she says, getting
off the mat to pour a glass of wine. I watch her, noting that she barely looks old enough to drink legally. Not a single wrinkle marks her face.

  “What were your parents like?” I ask, poking my food with a fork.

  She peers around from the kitchen. “Why?”

  “I don’t know. Just wondering.”

  “Who cares what they were like?”

  “I care.”

  “Well, they don’t deserve your care.”

  “Don’t you ever wonder if they’ve changed?”

  “They haven’t.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “I don’t want to talk about this anymore,” Ninny snaps. I stab at my macaroni and cheese. She comes to sit next to me and pets my hair. “It’s in the past, baby. There’s no use looking back.”

  I put my empty container on the coffee table and settle in next to Ninny. “I went to the Crystal Dragon today.”

  Ninny cups her wine glass in her hand. “I miss their black-light room every day.”

  Pulling the blanket off the back of the couch, I lay it over the two of us. “Where does your energy go when you die, Mom?” I ask.

  “I don’t know, baby.”

  “Mr. Salmon says that energy can’t be created or destroyed, so it must go somewhere.”

  Ninny takes another sip of wine, tipping her head back against the cushion. “Well, Mr. Bob Dylan said the answer is blowing in the wind.”

  I close my eyes and listen to the music, to the song playing over and over. Uncle Bob Dylan might be right. Maybe the only thing left after we die is the air we breathed when we were alive, carried in the wind.

  “Bob Dylan is a genius,” I say.

  “That’s my girl.”

  I smile and stuff my face into her shirt, breathing in her earthy scent. We fall asleep together until morning, Bob Dylan playing on repeat. It’s the first night I’ve slept straight through in months.

  “Cass and I have a very important question for you,” Kim leans on the counter at Shakedown Street, her round sunglasses still on her face.

  “Is it true that if a girl jumps up and down after sex, she can’t get pregnant?” Cass asks.

  “No!” Ninny’s voice booms from the back room.

  I throw a strawberry at Cass’s head. He dodges it a second before it smacks him right between the eyes. “What? I’m just trying to be safe.”