The Possible

by Tara Altebrando

  “I’ve always been fascinated by telekinesis,” Ms. Fatone said. “And even more fascinated with our collective fascination with telekinesis. Why do we continue to tell stories about these kinds of powers? What does that say about us? Why can we not seem to embrace the possibility that it is a real phenomenon? Why are people who believe considered oddballs and weirdos and outcasts?”

  This season, to answer those questions, Fatone is dipping into the story of the so-called Telekinetic Teen who became famous in the 1990s and is now serving a life sentence for murder at a prison in Pennsylvania.

  Fatone said, in a recent phone interview, “I’m not interested in making the same show twice. I want to push the envelope of what I’m doing on The Possible. I want to tackle stories that fascinate me. It might not be for everyone. Not everyone who loved the first season is going to stay on board. But I’m doing what interests me.”

  A source at the station that hosts and partially funds The Possible, who chose to remain anonymous, said: “There’s a lot of in-house skepticism. Can she pull this off?”

  Listeners can decide for themselves when The Possible returns next week.

  •••

  Could she pull this off?

  Could I?

  •••

  I was too lazy to type. I called Aiden after I threw clothes on.

  “What’s up?”

  “Nothing much,” I said. “Hadn’t seen it. I don’t know how it can start next week when she’s still interviewing people.”

  “She did the same thing last time around and it worked okay.”

  “What do you mean? You listened?”

  “Over the last couple of days, yeah. Things only got interesting after the podcast started airing. People were crawling out of the woodwork to tell their side of the story or point to evidence or whatever.”

  “Seriously?” I said. “Who do you think is going to crawl out in this case?”

  He said, “You’d know better than me.”

  •••

  I sat down at my desk with the prison form. Thunder shook some faraway clouds and I pictured the approaching storm darkening the skies and swirling, sending birds flying and blowing leaves and litter. I wondered where the lightning bolt had grounded out, whether the same storm had passed over Crystal’s prison, and what the world looked like through small windows.

  I picked up a pen and went to fill out the form, but then my dad poked his head into my room, “You okay, hon?” and I couldn’t do it. I shoved it back into my bag. Thunder again. The lights flickered.

  “Just tired,” I said.

  THE STORM HAD IMPALED THE front lawn with a few large tree branches; clusters of fallen wet green leaves looked glued to the front path and sidewalk. I watched out my window for a moment as my father did some storm cleanup. The sky was blue and clear for my first official lifeguarding shift.

  I got ready for work with a spring in my step because today I’d get to see Bennett and fast-track our destiny.

  I didn’t have to have a dopey book club anymore; I could tell him about the podcast interview and the clips Liana had sent me. For once, I had something interesting to say. It was bad that he’d bought prom tickets, but Princess Bubblegum was probably now in possession of them, so when they broke up, he and I would have to get new ones. No big deal.

  •••

  My daydreaming about how things would go hadn’t accounted for the possibility that Bennett would show up with Princess Bubblegum.

  My mood took a downturn when they clicked their way through the entryway turnstiles that morning. They settled into a few loungers next to his parents, under an umbrella on a grassy area by the shuffleboard courts. When Princess Bubblegum took off her cover-up, even I couldn’t help but be in awe. Without all that Monster High paraphernalia, she was drop-dead gorgeous, which of course made me want her to drop dead. She handed Bennett a bottle of sunscreen and held her hair up as he rubbed it onto her back, and I had to look away.

  I was keeping a close eye on a bunch of boys—including the Miller twins, who lived up the block from me and were already little jerks even though they were only maybe eight. They were playing Marco Polo and annoying everyone or maybe just me. It would probably be easy to ignore your crush and his evil girlfriend if there were actually lives at stake. But lifeguarding is hardly that exciting; nothing ever happens. I was too bored to twirl my whistle.

  Across the pool, Aiden was having way more fun than I was—smiling dumbly at the water and totally rocking the whistle twirl. I wished that we had some kind of secret sign language and could communicate, chair to chair. I’d tell him to stop looking like such a dork; he’d tell me to shut up. A few girls from school visited him at his chair—no doubt prom date–hunting and thinking him an easy mark. I shook my head. He’d already bought tickets, the dope.

  The Miller boys were playing chicken, one on the other’s shoulders, wrestling another set of boys.

  I stood, blew my whistle.

  “Down!” I shouted. “Now! Do it again and you’re out!”

  A guy behind me said, “Wow.”

  I turned and looked down and saw Bennett, who smiled. “Hard-ass.”

  I smiled back.

  He was totally flirting.

  Princess Bubblegum was about to be dethroned.

  •••

  I was in the lifeguard supply closet on my break a while later, looking for an extra flotation device to hang on the deep-end chair—my boss, Mr. Griffin, asked me to—and I was annoyed about it. My break was overdue, and I’d seen Princess Bubblegum walking off toward the snack truck and planned to follow; maybe I’d catch her breaking some club rule that she didn’t know about and get her kicked out.

  A long car horn and raised voices drew me to the window that looked out at the parking lot. A crowd was gathering. A girl screamed, “OW!!” and someone else said, “Don’t move.”

  Another voice rose up: “Call an ambulance.”

  By the time I reached the parking lot, Aiden was on his phone. “Yes, she’s breathing and talking, but she’s in a lot of pain.”

  Chiara was leaning on my car in a shady corner of the lot. Across the parking lot Princess Bubblegum lay on the pavement.

  I walked over to Chiara. “What happened?”

  “She was going to get something out of their car. Tree branch fell on her.”

  “Yikes,” I said.

  “Where were you?”

  “Supply closet.”

  “So you just got here?”

  “Yes.”

  She looked over toward the scene, where someone was dragging a huge branch to the side of the lot.

  “Is she badly hurt?” I asked, and wanted to leave, except that leaving might look bad.

  Aiden came over. “She’s lucky it didn’t hit her on the head.”

  “Indeed she is,” Chiara said in a funny tone.

  “That was some crazy storm last night,” I said.

  “Yes, it was,” Chiara said.

  “Why are you talking like that?”

  “Like what?”

  “Should somebody go get Bennett?” I asked as the ambulance arrived. “It doesn’t look like he’s even around.”

  “I’ll go,” Aiden said.

  I thought to protest but didn’t.

  My mother appeared, holding her sun hat. “What happened?”

  •••

  “I’ve been thinking about you,” Chiara said later, when we were in lounge chairs by the shuffleboard courts, our shifts done, the sun beginning to set, the club about to close for the night.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “But I don’t feel that way about you.”

  “Shut up,” she said. “I can’t stop thinking about your no-hitter. And, like, sports in general. You and sports, I mean.”

  “And?”

  “I don’t know. That last pitch especially seemed . . . crazy. And you’re also annoyingly good at soccer and even at mini golf and darts and stuff. And then I was thinking about Disne
y.”

  For Chiara’s sixteenth birthday, I went with her family to Disney World. They’d had T-shirts made, and we all had different Minnie ears (mine à la Maleficent) and also animal hats for a day at the Animal Kingdom. Chiara’s family never did anything halfway.

  “And . . . ?”

  “We were on the Kali River Rapids ride,” she said. “And we went past this one water fountain thing and everyone got a little wet but you didn’t. And then you said something like ‘I’m going to be pissed if I don’t get at least a little bit wet.’ And literally like five seconds later, we take this drop and the whole raft spins impossibly fast and you were at the bottom when we hit and that wave . . .”

  “I remember.” My stomach churned, now understanding why she was telling this story.

  The wave had risen impossibly high and crashed right onto my head, soaking me down to my underwear.

  “I just think . . . ,” she said.

  “Stuff like that happens all the time,” I said, not wanting her to finish her sentence. “It was a coincidence. It was going to happen whether I said that or not.”

  “But,” she said, “how do you know?”

  “Because, I just . . .” I inhaled, exhaled. “Don’t you think I’d know?”

  •••

  What if you had a secret so dark that no one who knew you would ever believe you? What if there was maybe only one other person in the whole world who might?

  •••

  I drove Chiara home, then drove a block, parked, got the paperwork out of my bag, and took out a pen.

  •••

  FROM THE DESK OF WARDEN JASON LARSON STATE PRISON #56-56D

  APPLICATION FOR VISITATION APPROVAL

  INMATE: Crystal Bryar

  •••

  I hopped out at a red light after a few more blocks and slid the envelope into a mailbox. When I got back into the car, I had a text from a number I didn’t recognize.

  •••

  •••

  Was it Bennett? I couldn’t be sure.

  •••

  •••

  What if . . . one summer, when I had a job as a candy striper at that very same hospital, I was assigned to the stroke victims’ wing? What if I spent days pouring water for people who couldn’t do it themselves, helping them drink, if possible? Moving things around their rooms for them if they asked.

  What if sometimes I couldn’t understand what they wanted and had to find a nurse to help translate garbled moans? What if it was the worst summer of my life because I hated going there, hated being confronted with . . . that? With bedpans and useless limbs and gaping mouths and drool. With lazy eyes and sunken features and feeding tubes.

  What if one day, when I called for a nurse to help me figure out why a patient was agitated and bucking in her bed, they didn’t come? What if I wished the woman would slip away peacefully because all that beeping was probably driving her crazy, too? What if, a few minutes later, she was gone?

  •••

  I drove toward the hospital, gripping the steering wheel too tightly. Had I wished Princess Bubblegum some unspecified harm?

  Probably. My hands were sweating.

  But I could hardly bend tree branches to my will.

  Could I?

  And even if I could? Had she figured it out? And, if so, how? And what was she going to do about it? Who was she going to tell?

  I probably had it all wrong. Probably she just knew I was after her boyfriend and was going to tell me to back off. That, I could handle.

  I remembered my way around and found room 310 easily.

  “You okay?” I asked, wondering whether there would be a bed for me if I needed it. Whether you could be hospitalized for nerves and nausea. Whether my pulse would betray me.

  “Concussion,” she said. “A fractured rib. I can probably go home tomorrow.”

  “Well, I guess that’s good. I mean, it could have been worse, right?” The room was small, and dirty white. With pink curtains and a bad seascape on the wall behind her. It smelled of pea soup and rubbing alcohol.

  She smoothed the blanket by her stomach. “Is that what you wanted? For it to be worse?”

  “What are you talking about? No, of course not.”

  “People are saying things,” she said. “About you. Your mother. Birth mother. Whatever.”

  “What are people saying?” I slid into the guest chair. It was pink and cold.

  “Just that you’re like too good at pitching and stuff. And how your mom has these powers. And I don’t know, it’s not possible, right? I mean. You didn’t do this to me, did you?”

  “Of course not!” I said, panic beeping at me like a silent machine in my heart. “Did someone say that?”

  “Maybe.”

  It was one thing for me to wonder, but for people to actually be talking about wondering themselves . . . “Who?”

  “People.”

  “Like who?”

  “I don’t know, Kaylee. People.”

  I made a quick calculation and decided I had to act like the accusations were insane; because maybe it would stop rumors from spinning out of control. “If I could control things with my mind,” I said, “do you think I’d be able to sit through chem lab without pinging Mr. Lister on the head with a dead frog or making the marker write ‘You’re boring’ on the whiteboard? I’d go totally Matilda if I had powers like that. There’d be chaos!”

  She smiled. “So you weren’t trying to kill me.”

  “Of course not!” My voice rose.

  She sighed. “It’d be cool, though, wouldn’t it? To be able to do stuff like that?”

  Before I could say anything she said, “He’s not that great, you know.”

  He. Who. Oh.

  I couldn’t think of what to say. Of course she felt that way. She wasn’t meant to be with him the way I was.

  “Anyway, as far as I’m concerned, he’s all yours.” She pulled her blanket up and shifted and winced. “I should rest.”

  •••

  I took the long way home, with the windows down, radio blaring, a grin on my face. I wanted to shout out something joyous but couldn’t think of the right words.

  Princess Bubblegum was out of the picture. She’d even given me her blessing. There was nothing stopping me from being with Bennett anymore.

  The air around me felt clean and light. I blew on some dust on the dashboard and the particles puffed up and swirled. I sneezed.

  •••

  I had e-mail when I got home; a Paperless Post invitation from FPR. I clicked through.

  •••

  JOIN US FOR A

  SPOON-BENDING PARTY

  TO CELEBRATE THE LAUNCH OF

  SEASON TWO OF THE POSSIBLE

  ROSEWOOD CLUB

  FRIDAY, JUNE 2 AT 7PM

  RSVP to thepossiblepodcast@gmail.com

  •••

  In the kitchen that night, I took a teaspoon in my hand. Balanced it on my index finger, and raised it and lowered it, bouncing my hand, as if the spoon absolutely could and totally would just drip over my finger. When I heard footsteps upstairs, I slid it back into the utensil tray, closed the drawer.

  IN THE MORNING, I WATCHED from my lifeguard chair as my parents helped to get my grandmother settled in a lounge chair shaded by an umbrella annoyingly close to my station. She wore long pants, a long-sleeved shirt, a scarf, and a hat. She looked eccentric, like some batty old lady in a movie. Her sunglasses covered half her face, and I thought how it couldn’t have always been like that, that she must be shrinking. I waved at her, but she didn’t see or at least she didn’t wave back.

  My mother’s voice carried. “The idea is to move in so that you keep some independence. But for it to work you have to actually move before you need to move.”

  My father said, “Capisce?”

  “Don’t capisce me,” my grandmother said. “Only your father was allowed to do that.” And he died ten years ago.

  “Fine,” my mothe
r said. “Have it your way.”

  •••

  The pool was crowded—you could tell from the dwindling stacks of lounge chairs and grassy spots—due to the Memorial Day barbecues and face painting and bonfires, but it was pretty mellow for me, with all the annoying stuff happening over by Aiden. So I sat back and relaxed.

  Today, I totally felt like twirling my whistle.

  Bennett Laurie was there by himself.

  Parked where he had a nice clear view of yours truly. And if the breakup hadn’t already happened—maybe she’d texted him from her hospital bed—it was coming.

  We weren’t allowed to have phones on the chair with us and it made me sort of twitchy but was also sort of freeing. I had time to notice things. Like how my toes felt warm because the shade of my umbrella didn’t quite cover them. And how the air smelled like chlorine and pollen. And how the birds never shut up—some incessant high-pitched chirping and an occasional loud squawk like a siren.

  Aiden’s fangirls were out in full swing. They’d positioned themselves in chairs behind him, and he was occasionally turning to say something to them and smiling. His teeth were so very white compared to his black, shiny sunglasses; I knew if I were closer I’d see myself reflected in mirrored lenses, warped and small.

  •••

  I went to visit Chiara in the snack trailer on my break. She handed me a small pile of french fries in a rectangular cardboard box as I stood by the window.

  “Did you hear?” she said.

  “Did I hear what?”

  “I swear, with you in that damn lifeguard chair phoneless it’s like you’re in Timbuktu or something. I don’t know how you stand it.” She looked around as if to make sure no one was listening. “Aubrey broke up with Bennett.”

  I widened my eyes, afraid that if I said something—anything—my surprise or lack of surprise would be obvious in my voice.

  Chiara said, “Apparently her little accident caused a fight because he didn’t run to her bedside as quickly as she wanted or something.”

  “Fascinating.” I nodded.