Tragedy Girl

by Christine Hurley Deriso

  “Aaaahh. Clever.”

  “Before we get started,” Mr. B/Loring begins in a monotone, “we’d like to welcome a new student to our class. Uh, Annie … ?”

  “It’s Anne,” I say softly. “Anne Welch.”

  He responds with an awkwardly prolonged pity smile. Damn. He’s at least the fourth teacher today to give me a pity smile. Not even three hundred and fifty miles is far away enough to escape them.

  “Well.” He tilts his head, his eyes oozing sympathy. “Welcome, Anne.”

  “Well. Thanks.”

  The class chuckles lightly. Uh-oh. Was that a smartass response? The last thing I want to do is draw attention to myself. Hollis Island High is just a brief way station en route to college. Now, that’ll be a true fresh start. This is a year I’m simply trying to endure.

  “I certainly hope you’ll find this class enjoyable,” he says improbably, because truly, what are the odds.

  But I just smile and nod.

  Low profile, E, I remind myself, fingering the wedding rings that dangle under my shirt from a chain around my neck, my only 24-7 connection to my parents. Low profile.

  “So!”

  Another oh-so-nuanced conversation starter from Aunt Meg. She spoons some mashed potatoes onto her plate and passes me the bowl.

  “How was your first day of school?” she asks.

  “Okay,” I respond, spooning my portion and passing the bowl along to Uncle Mark. “I take it the word’s out to all my teachers about Mom and Dad?”

  Aunt Meg feigns confusion. “What do you—”

  “We talked to the counselor,” Uncle Mark says quietly. “We had to explain your circumstances … us being your guardians, why you’ve switched schools your senior year … ”

  “Plus, honey, we wanted to make sure they were aware of your special needs,” Aunt Meg says, her eyebrows an inverted V.

  I stiffen. “Special needs?”

  “Just … that you’ve been through a lot, and that the administration should be attuned to any … ”

  “We know you’re fine, Annie,” says Uncle Mark, who calls me that sometimes on purpose and not because he’s mispronouncing my name. “We just needed to give a little information about your background. I’m sure the curiosity factor will die down in the next couple of days.”

  “Oh, you know what?” Aunt Meg says in her sing-song voice. “I found a list of extracurriculars on the school website. Plus, volunteer opportunities!”

  My fork lands with a dull thud into my mashed potatoes. “Thanks, Aunt Meg, but I don’t know if I want to get involved in—”

  “Staying busy is key,” she says, a stern edge creeping into her perky tone.

  “Meg, Annie needs to take things at her own pace.” Uncle Mark’s voice is kind but firm.

  “Busy!” she repeats, her pitch higher than ever. “That’s the key! Plus, she’s got her college applications to think about.” She flashes me a quick smile.

  I bite my lip, my heart sinking with the reminder that I’ll go the whole year—maybe longer—without being able to have a genuine or spontaneous conversation with the people my school knows as my “guardians.”

  “Oops. Forgot the rolls,” Aunt Meg says, then pushes her chair away from the table and scurries into the kitchen.

  Uncle Mark clears his throat, and when I glance at him, he winks at me.

  “She’ll calm down soon, I promise,” he says.

  I wave a hand through the air. “Aunt Meg is great,” I say, furrowing my brow for emphasis.

  “I know she tries too hard,” Uncle Mark responds, “especially when she’s stressed. But she means well.”

  My heart sinks. “I’m so sorry I brought stress into your life.”

  Uncle Mark leans closer. “Honey, no. No. That’s not what I meant. She’s just in hyper-management mode right now, what with getting you enrolled in school and everything. She wants the best for you; we both do. It’s just … like I said … she tries a little too hard.”

  He squeezes my hand as Aunt Meg walks back into the dining room with a bowl full of hot rolls. “Might want to wait a couple of minutes for them to cool down,” she says, rejoining us at the table.

  I smile weakly and pick at my food. Of course I’ve brought stress into their lives, like it wasn’t stressful enough for Uncle Mark to lose his brother and sister-in-law. He and Aunt Meg have been happily childless throughout their twenty-something-year marriage, touring Europe, going on cruises, joining tennis leagues, or redecorating their house whenever they felt like it. Now, they’re arranging discreet meetings with high school counselors, enumerating my “special needs,” and ensuring that all my credits have transferred. I feel a thud in my stomach as I contemplate that moving here was perhaps the stupidest, most selfish decision I’ve ever made. I barely know a soul on this island, and though my crash course with grief has made it easy to replace my once-active lifestyle with hours on end of burrowing my nose in a book, I can’t deny that my first day of school left me achingly lonely.

  “Honey, speaking of your special needs … ” Aunt Meg says, willfully avoiding Uncle Mark’s disapproving scowl. “I think … I think it might be a good idea for you to see a therapist.”

  Ah. The talk-about-her-parents-constantly therapist?

  Uncle Mark’s eyes are shooting daggers at her, but Aunt Meg is still ignoring him. “I’ve called around for some references, and this psychologist named Virginia Sennett comes highly recommended. She specializes in working with young—”

  “Meg, you should have discussed this with me,” Uncle Mark says in a clipped tone, and I wonder if I’ll soon be able to add divorce to the ways I’ve transformed their lives.

  Aunt Meg bristles and tells him under her breath, “You know very well we talked about—”

  “You know what?” I blurt. “I think that sounds like a good idea.”

  Their eyes widen.

  “I think it’ll help, and I really appreciate all the trouble you’ve gone to,” I say.

  Long pause.

  “You’re sure?” Uncle Mark asks, and I nod briskly.

  Yes, I’ll see a therapist. Anything to dissipate the tension in the room. Anything to loosen the knot in my stomach. Anything to make Aunt Meg smile, and yes, she’s smiling now. Anything to assuage my guilt, to be less of a burden, to hasten this journey through Hollis Island hell.

  Anything to help me choke down this meat loaf so I can excuse myself from the table at the earliest possible opportunity.

  I put a bite in my mouth and swallow it whole.

  Three

  “Sorry.”

  I glance at the guy with dark hair and deep blue eyes who has just accidentally knocked my shoulder with his locker door. I smile. “No problem.”

  “The door always sticks,” he says, explaining why he opened it harder than he intended to.

  “Yeah, I’m guessing these lockers date back to, I dunno …

  maybe the sixth century?”

  He smiles. “Nah, you’re off by a few million years. We’re talking caveman technology here.”

  I wrinkle my nose. “I think you just insulted cavemen.”

  We rifle around in our lockers for a moment, then he says, “I’m Blake.”

  I nod. “Anne.”

  He extends a hand just as I’m grabbing my first-period English Lit book from my locker, and I fumble, tucking it hastily under my arm so I can shake.

  “Hi,” I say.

  Blake takes my hand, laughing lightly at my awkwardness.

  “Not so good at multitasking,” I tell him sheepishly.

  A guy with fine, shoulder-length blond hair rushes up to Blake and stops just short of chest-butting him, forcing me to jump back.

  “Dude,” Blake mutters irritably.

  “My notes,” the other guy snaps. “I need my no
tes.”

  “Fine.” Blake opens a notebook, grabs two sheets of paper, and hands it to the guy, who snatches it—snap!—from his fingertips and rushes down the hall.

  “Already borrowing notes on the second day of school?” I ask with a raised eyebrow as I close my locker door.

  But instead of getting the wise-guy response I expect, Blake’s eyes fall. “I had kind of a meltdown in Spanish class yesterday and had to go to the nurse’s office. I promise, I usually take my own notes.”

  I push my book tighter against my chest as people rustle past us on their way to their first-period classes. “What was wrong?” I ask. Then the lightbulb goes off over my head. This is the guy Melanie was telling me about yesterday … the guy whose girlfriend died over the summer.

  “Just … kind of a panic attack,” he explains, still averting his eyes. “It wasn’t as dramatic as it sounds; I just felt really claustrophobic all of a sudden and needed some air. I was okay after lying down a few minutes.”

  I nod. “I know the feeling. Your friend didn’t seem very sympathetic.”

  Blake’s eyebrows knit together. “Oh, you mean Jamie? Nah, he didn’t mean anything by that.”

  “Well. Nice to meet you.”

  He nods, his eyes still doleful.

  I take a few steps down the hall, then suddenly pivot and face him again. “Hey, Blake?”

  He glances up.

  “Feel better … okay?”

  He gives me a thumbs-up sign as his deep-set eyes turn warm.

  Warm … but so incredibly sad.

  “So, that guy you were mentioning yesterday—how did you say his girlfriend died?”

  Melanie forks a piece of lettuce and pops it in her mouth. “Drowned. In the ocean.”

  Her friend, Lauren, leans closer into our lunch table. “You know Blake?” she asks me.

  I shake my head. “Not really. I met him at my locker this morning, and Melanie mentioned yesterday that his girlfriend died over the summer.”

  “Natalie informed Anne yesterday that Blake is off limits,” Melanie tells Lauren conspiratorially, and they share a knowing smile.

  “Natalie’s like a narc,” Lauren says to me. “Only instead of sniffing out druggies, she sniffs out hot new girls so she can put them on notice: no sucking up her oxygen! She’s got dibs on all the studs, even though none of them give her the time of day.”

  The girls study my reaction, then grin. “You’re blushing!” Melanie tells me, and I squeeze my eyes shut and shake my head.

  “Sorry; you’re the hot new girl whether you like it or not,” Lauren says. “The word is out. I’ve even heard some numbers bandied about. I think the consensus is you’re a solid eleven. And this is on a ten-point scale, mind you.”

  I cringe. “Please.”

  “You truly can’t handle attention,” Melanie says.

  “Change of subject?” I plead, and the girls laugh good-naturedly at my mortification. Why, oh why, did I bring up Blake in the first place? That’s what started all this, which probably made me look like some kind of boy-crazy twit. I just can’t get his sad eyes off my mind …

  “Okay, new subject,” Melanie says. “Why did you move here? Somebody’s job? What do your parents do?”

  I smile wanly. “Not much. They’re dead.”

  The girls gasp.

  “Dead?” Lauren says. “Both of them?”

  I nod. “They died in a car crash last spring. I moved here to live with my aunt and uncle.”

  “Oh god,” Melanie says. “How do you … what do you … ?”

  I’m used to this kind of shocked-speechless response, but I know what she means: How do you go on without your parents? What steps are involved in moving on with your life when your foundation has been ripped from underneath you? I offer the answer I’ve learned from experience: “You remind yourself to breathe,” I say.

  And I mean it. When I have absolutely no idea how to go on, I talk myself through the process of inhaling, then exhaling. Somehow, one breath leads to another, and another, then another … Inhale, exhale, repeat. If Melanie is looking for any cosmic wisdom or helpful platitudes, she won’t learn them from me. I don’t know how to make sense from nonsense, or order from chaos, or happiness from misery. I haven’t learned any of those lessons yet, and I kind of doubt I ever will. I’ve just learned to remind myself to breathe.

  “I’m so sorry … ” Lauren says in barely a whisper.

  “Thanks. But I’m okay. Truly.”

  An awkward moment hangs in the air, and then Melanie says, “No wonder you and Blake connected.”

  Connected? Did my offhand comment earlier insinuate that we connected? Did we connect? I feel excruciatingly transparent.

  “Hey, he’s a really nice guy,” Melanie adds, seeming to intuit my self-consciousness. “In fact, I heard he was going to the bonfire Friday night, that he’s finally ready to start getting out again. We should go. I’ve got a semi-major crush on his best friend. Speaking of whom … ”

  Our eyes follow Melanie’s as Blake walks into the cafeteria with the guy who demanded his notes back when I met him at our lockers.

  “That’s his best friend?” I ask.

  “Mmmmmm,” Melanie replies, her eyes still on the two of them. “Jamie Stuart.”

  “He didn’t seem very friendly this morning,” I say.

  Melanie glances at me. “What do you mean?”

  I shrug. “Blake had to leave his Spanish class yesterday to go to the nurse’s office, and Jamie seemed upset about having to lend him his notes. I mean, I just saw them together for a second, but … ”

  “Uh-uh,” Melanie insists, shaking her head briskly. “You definitely misinterpreted. Jamie worships the ground Blake walks on.”

  Lauren nods, her dark hair bouncing lightly on her shoulders. “Blake is like a big brother to him, ultra-protective. Jamie was short and scrawny until last year. Always in Blake’s shadow.”

  “Then he … blossomed,” Melanie says, staring at Jamie as he and Blake collect their trays.

  Lauren gives them another once-over and nods. “Yeah. Who would have guessed they’d both turn out to be tens?” She gives me a mischievous glance. “Not that they’re elevens, like you. I mean, how many people can manage that?”

  I toss my head backward and groan. “Enough, enough!”

  “Definitely plan on the bonfire Friday night,” Melanie tells us. “I just might need to borrow Jamie’s Spanish notes myself.”

  “You have got to be kidding.”

  I glance up from the conveyor belt where I’ve just placed my cafeteria tray and see Natalie facing me, one hand on her hip and a sheet of sleek dark hair falling down her back.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “A bonfire? You honestly think Blake would go to a bonfire?”

  My brow furrows. Why in the world does this girl keep pulling me into conversations that seem to start in the middle?

  “I couldn’t help overhearing,” she finally clarifies. “Do you and your ‘girlfriends’ honestly think Blake and Jamie would be caught dead at a bonfire?”

  “My ‘girlfriends’ and I?” I ask, borrowing her air quotes.

  “Don’t you know that a bonfire is where it happened?”

  “It?”

  Natalie huffs. “The drowning I was trying to tell you about yesterday. If you hadn’t rushed off, you would have heard. Blake and his friends were at a bonfire on the beach when his girlfriend drowned. To death.”

  “Oh.” I’m annoyed enough to want to walk away but intrigued enough to stay put. Natalie seems to sense my conflict, so she picks up the pace.

  “They were having a bonfire on the beach, and Blake’s girlfriend decided to take a quick swim. When Blake and Jamie realized she wasn’t coming back, they rushed out on Jamie’s jet ski to try to find her, but they n
ever did.” She pauses for dramatic effect. “Her body was never found.”

  “Wow,” I say softly. “That’s terrible. Did she not know how to swim?”

  “She could swim, but the surf was really rough that night. We think she got caught in a rip current.”

  I peer at Natalie closer. “So you were there?”

  She rolls her eyes impatiently. “No. But I know practically everybody who was. And, I mean, I was invited, of course. I just had other plans. Thank heaven I didn’t go. Everybody who was there will be traumatized for life.” She shakes her head slowly. “As if Blake hadn’t already been through enough … ”

  Okay, I’ll bite: “What else has he been through?”

  She feigns looking startled by my ignorance. “Uh, duh, cancer,” she says. “Oh, that’s right … you’re new. But everybody around here knows Blake had cancer in middle school. It was awful; he just barely survived. We spent a whole year taking turns making him cards and bringing him cookies—his friends did, I mean. His good friends. Anyway … cancer … then his girlfriend drowns at a bonfire on the beach … ”

  She studies me evenly before cutting to the chase: “So I don’t think you’ll find Blake at a bonfire any time soon.”

  I briefly consider defending myself—who said I was going to a bonfire in the first place?—but I just nod instead. “Got it,” I say. “Well, I’ve got to get to my class. Later.”

  Natalie’s jaw drops slightly, but I’m already on the move.

  I feel her eyes bore into my back as I walk away.

  Four

  I close my bedroom door, bite an apple, and settle in at my computer. I’ve got homework, but first, I do a quick Google search. I don’t know the dead girl’s name, but I have enough information to find what I’m looking for in just a few seconds:

  Officials Halt Search for Possible Drowning Victim

  —By Ted Hardiford, Hollis Island Tribune Reporter—

  Rescuers called off an eleven-hour search Sunday morning for a sixteen-year-old believed to have drowned off Hollis Island.