“I want to lie on the couch,” I say. I would lie on the couch forever if I could, sink into it until I drown in soft animal hide. I have no more energy. I’m moving in slow motion. And I don’t want to go out again. I don’t want to worry where I’ll be when Devin comes back. What will she do next?
“Grab onto them,” my mother says again. “The people who reach out to you. This boy. Gina and Lizzy. They’re giving you another chance.” She raises an eyebrow and mumbles. “They’d still be your friends if it weren’t for Devin.”
My head throbs, pushing at the back of my eyes. Even dead, Devin can’t escape my mother’s accusing finger. If my mother only knew what I’d done, she might point her finger at me for a change, poking a hole into my forehead so everyone would know. A scarlet fingerprint. “Let it go, Mom,” I say. I roll over onto my side. “Devin’s dead, okay? We’re not going to be hanging out anymore.”
My mother stiffens and sits up straight. “That’s not what I meant,” she says, her lips curving into a frown. “What happened to Devin is tragic, devastating. Of course it is. And when I think about if it had been you…” She closes her eyes and shivers. “It’s too much. Too, too much.”
It could never have been me. It was always going to be Devin. Always.
A horn honks outside. My mother jumps up and rushes to the door. “They’re here,” she says, coming back over to the couch. You’d think she was the one going to the mall. She runs her hand through my hair, and her nails gently scratch at my scalp. “This will be good for you,” she says. “I promise.”
I have no choice but to go with them. When my mother gets an idea in her head, she clamps down with iron jaws and doesn’t let go. My face-in-the-couch-cushion solace is no more.
“Whatever.” I slowly lift myself off of the couch. It’s an effort.
“Come on, Cass,” she says heading out of the living room. “Get your things. I’m going outside to say hello to Gina’s mom.” The screen door slams behind her.
I grab my bag, push open the screen door, and walk slowly down the small hill in front of my house. It’s spotted with patches of daffodils that match the yellow paint on the house. Devin loved those daffodils, but my mother never let me cut any for her. “It’ll ruin the line,” she always said, but it felt like she just didn’t want to give any to Devin.
My mother leans over the sedan parked in our driveway, talking with Mrs. Vincenti. From the back my mother looks like she could be in high school, with her narrow waist, small, heart-shaped butt, and trendy jeans. I tug on the drawstrings of my cargo pants and toss my bag over my shoulder. Clearly I never swam in her half of the gene pool.
“I know it’s just terrible,” my mother says before she notices me. “I’m so glad the girls asked her to go. She really needs this. I practically had to peel her off the living-room couch.” Her voice drops to a whisper. “Won’t even play her guitar. She’s completely—” She sees me and offers a wide smile. “There’s my girl!”
I wave at Mrs. Vincenti, who waves back, her smile less certain than my mother’s. She has Gina’s puppy-dog eyes, brown and longing. Gina and Lizzy are in the backseat. I open the door, and they shift to make room for me.
“Hey, Cass,” says Gina. She reaches over and gives me a quick hug.
“Hi,” I say. I chew on my lip. It tastes like vanilla lip balm.
“We’re glad you decided to come with us,” says Lizzy, pushing her hair behind her ears.
I can see from Lizzy’s puckered face that she knows I don’t want to be here. I feel bad. I know I should be grateful that they’re trying to take me back. I like Gina and Lizzy; I always did. But going to the mall with them, going shopping—it feels wrong. One more thing that feels completely wrong.
“It must be really hard for you right now,” Gina says. She puts her hand on my shoulder. Her pink nail polish is chipped, and her nails look painfully short. I’d forgotten we were nail-biting partners. She stares at me. “How are you doing, Cass?”
It’s funny how Devin’s the one who’s dead, but I’m the one everyone’s concerned about. Okay, true, no one can ask her, “Devin are you angry that you’re dead?” Or, “Are you pissed off that you only had fifteen years on earth?” It seems weird to me, though, that hardly anyone talks about Devin’s loss, only mine. They think I’m a victim, too.
I shrug. “The same, I guess.”
Gina and Lizzy nod as though they understand. But they have no idea. I let them think what they want.
Mrs. Vincenti starts the engine and backs out of my driveway. My mother waves dramatically, a large smile plastered across her face. Her waving makes me feel as though I’m off to sea in one of those old-fashioned newsreels. I raise my hand, but I don’t smile back. She looks disappointed but manages to smile through it.
We get to the mall a few minutes later. The parking lot is filled with cars and Sunday shoppers. An old woman with a walker is being led by a home health-care aide, a busy mom tugs along small noisy children, and a couple holding hands strolls slowly through the busy parking lot. Everything is the same. Devin is dead, but everything is still the same. Everyone else is still connected.
“Should I drop you girls off by the Shoe Stop?” asks Mrs. Vincenti.
“That’s good, Mom, thanks,” says Gina. She turns to Lizzy and me. “I need a pair of ballet flats for school.”
“Yeah, and I’m always good for a new pair of sneakers.” Lizzy lifts her leg and wiggles her foot inside a pink, green, and blue high-top. She and Gina look at each other and laugh.
I’m not in on the joke, but I smile because I’m supposed to. I guess that Lizzy must have a sneaker fetish or something like that, but I’m not sure. It’s one of those best-friend jokes. The kind no one thinks is funny except your best friend. The kind of joke I can’t tell anymore.
“All right, here we are.” Mrs. Vincenti doubleparks in front of the store. “Have a good time,” she says.
“Thanks for the ride,” I mumble, awkwardly.
“See you, Mrs. Vincenti,” says Lizzy, hopping out the car door on the other side.
“Bye, Mom,” says Gina.
I’m about to get out of the car when Gina rests her hand on my leg. She looks at me closely, examines me, I think, and it seems as though she’s about to speak. I wait for her words, my own words creeping up through my throat, ready to jump, maybe, take the plunge, fall where they may—depending upon what she says.
Gina doesn’t speak. Instead she squeezes my knee. It’s a friendly gesture, a loving one, even, and unexpected. Or, I think, maybe she knows. My joints stiffen. Maybe somehow Gina knows. Blood rushes through me, and my body heats up. Gina’s hand is still on my knee, still there waiting. What is she doing? What does she want?
And then I remember, and then I realize. My throat clamps shut, and I suck in a sliver of air. Gina’s hand on my knee reminds me of when Devin did the same thing to me that day. In her dad’s car, when we last went to the mall. My knee throbs, and my heart screams. I yank my leg away.
“Cass?” Gina says. I grab my bag and run out of the car. Sweat soaks my forehead. I don’t look back.
Before
MARCUS AND I WERE SITTING on a hard, plastic mall bench. It was near the movie theater, so we had a good view of the entrance in case Devin and Chad came out, flushed and red-faced and full of lame excuses.
“So, come here often?” Marcus said.
“Yeah,” I said. “Probably too much. I was just here last weekend—” I stopped, surprised to see Marcus was smiling.
“What?” I said.
“Nothing,” he said. “I was kidding. You know, ‘Come here often?’ It’s a line,” he said. “A cheesy one, I’ll admit.”
“Oh,” I said. Marcus was actually kind of funny, which made him not a complete ass, as I’d previously suspected. But the adventure had just begun.
“It’s okay,” he said. “You don’t have to laugh or anything.”
“I’m not,” I said, but now I kind of was laug
hing. Inside only.
“Yeah, I know.” He was smiling, and he had a nice smile. I liked the way his top two front teeth slightly crisscrossed over each other.
“You like video games?” he said.
“Video games?” I made a face. “Uh, no.” Then I smiled, a little. I even felt brave. “Your first line was better.”
He closed his eyes and brought his arms up to his chest. “Ow, that hurt.” He leaned forward again, still smiling. “Didn’t think you were a gamer girl. Most girls aren’t.”
I shook my head, sighed, and tried not to smile. “How many girls have you asked about the video games?” I said. Brave was one thing, but I was pushing it now. I wanted to reach back into the air and grab back my words. But they’d left my sphere of gravity and floated into his. Point of no return.
“All of them,” he said. He leaned forward and clasped his hands in front of him.
“How many is that?” I asked. “Girls, I mean.”
“Have you met Chad?” he said.
“Unfortunately.”
“It’s a lot of girls,” he said. “A lot of double dates where I’m left with splinters in my ass from these benches.”
“The benches are plastic,” I said, trying to sound irritated. But my heart might actually have been smiling. I’d met my hard-plastic-bench-warming twin.
“Got me on a technicality,” he said. “I exaggerate sometimes.” He leaned closer. “So, what else do you want to know about me?”
I leaned back. “What makes you think I want to know anything about you?”
“Well, we’re here, aren’t we?” he said. “What else are we going to do?” He sat back up. “Come on, ask me something, anything.”
“Okay,” I said. I thought for a moment. I wasn’t used to making small talk with boys. I wasn’t used to making small talk at all.
“Do you like sports?” I said, and then thought, Could I be any lamer?
Marcus didn’t seem to mind. In fact he was still smiling. He shrugged. “I play the occasional pickup hoops game.” He sat up and pushed at the air, as if he was making a basket. “You know, swish.”
I nodded. “Sounds fun,” I said, although it didn’t. I was terrible at sports, but I pretended to like them because if you didn’t, you got accused of having bad school spirit.
“Not so much,” said Marcus. “But with my height, what else am I going to do?”
My heart dinged again. We both pretended to like sports. Another point for Marcus. No, maybe two— that was a big one.
Marcus leaned back onto the bench. “So, no real calluses from the guitar, huh?”
Was he looking at my hands? I brought them onto my lap and squeezed them together.
He was looking at my hands, and now he was looking at me.
“I use a pick,” I said. “You know, at least with my right hand.” I pressed my left hand against the bench. I wasn’t ready for him to see the calluses I did have.
“Oh, yeah.” He squeezed three fingers together and gave the heavy metal sign. “Like this, right?”
“Something like that,” I said, trying not to let my inside grin take over my entire face. Marcus liked music, too. The point tally was rising, like, Everest high.
“So what else?” he said. “Ask me something else.”
I didn’t want to ask anything too personal, anything that could be taken the wrong way. “How long have you and Chad been friends?” I finally said.
“Forever,” said Marcus. “Day care. Side-by-side cribs or something like that.”
“Really?” I said. “Wow.”
“Yeah, I stole his Binky, and he beat the crap out of me.” He grinned. “Things haven’t changed much since then, minus the Binky.”
“You’re kidding, I hope.”
“Eh.” He shrugged but smiled again.
“He seriously beats you up?”
“Sometimes,” said Marcus. “Not as much as he beats on other people. You know guys like Chad. They throw their weight around to prove a point. Just part of the pecking order. I accept that.”
“I wouldn’t,” I said.
“Really?” He looked at me, right in the eyes. “Okay. How about you and little-miss-headlights?”
“Who?” I said.
“You know, your friend’s headlights are on, but I think she likes it that way.”
It took me a minute to realize he was talking about Devin’s shirt. Well, what was protruding from underneath Devin’s shirt.
I shifted over on the bench. “You’re disgusting.”
He gave me a “Who, me?” grin and shrugged. “Hey, guys notice these things.”
I folded my arms over my own chest and prayed that I wouldn’t get cold. Mine would be more like searchlights.
“Don’t worry,” he said, which I thought made things even worse, because I’d been ridiculously obvious. “Your shirt’s fine.” He looked over at me quickly, then turned his eyes toward the marble floor. “It’s nice.”
I felt warm all over. Was Marcus flirting with me? Not one guy on any of our not-dates had ever hit on me. I didn’t even know what to do with this small revelation, but I liked it.
“Thanks,” I said, looking down at my sneakers.
“So how about it?” he said.
“How about what?” I asked.
“What’s up with you and Devin?” he said. “You don’t seem like you’d be friends.”
“You don’t seem like you’d be friends with Chad, either.”
“We have a symbiotic relationship. He beats the crap out of me, and I let him.”
“That’s not symbiotic.”
“It’s something,” he said.
I suddenly didn’t care that Marcus might have been hitting on me. I didn’t like that he was questioning my friendship with Devin. I didn’t like that he was saying what everyone else probably thought. “I’ve been friends with Devin for a long time,” I said. “Best friends.” Without thinking, I reached for my charm.
He leaned in close. His breath wasn’t minty, but there was something fresh, something plain about it that smelled right. “I don’t think she’s such a good friend.”
I leaned away from him. “Really?” I looked at my phone. “You’ve known me for like a minute.”
“Yeah and in that minute you’ve seemed nice. And Devin, well…” He shrugged.
“Well what?” I said.
Marcus moved back and looked down at the floor. He leaned over and rested his head in his hands. “Look, I don’t want to start something, okay?”
“Start what?” I began to make mincemeat out of my lip.
“It’s just, you seem pretty cool.”
A rush of warmth spread up the back of my neck. I waited for the “but.” You seem pretty cool, but… How stupid could I have been? He wasn’t flirting with me! The let’s-just-be-friends speech was about to hit me like a pie to the face. With extra whipped cream for the fat girl.
“What’s your point?” I said, moving over on the bench. Only then did I realize how close we’d been sitting.
He looked up at me. He had nice eyes, dark brown and deep, which was only going to make this hurt more. “Chad’s not the nicest guy.”
“Shocker,” I said. The sarcasm poured out of me. Instant verbal armor.
Marcus wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Here’s the thing.” He looked at me, right at me again and said, “Chad usually asks me along only when the other girl’s an oinker.”
My heart, my stomach, my head, everything inside me curdled. “What?” I said. “What?” I shook my head. “I never even met you.”
“That’s why I’m telling you,” he said. He ran his fingers through his hair. “It’s what Devin—it’s what your best friend—told Chad.”
If I’d been smaller, I would have crawled underneath the hard plastic mall bench and flattened myself against the cool marble floor. If I’d been smaller, I would have done that. But I wasn’t, was I? Just ask Devin. Just ask my best friend.
AFTE
R
“HOW CUTE ARE THESE?” Gina holds up a leopard ballet flat. They’re small and narrow. The kind of shoe that stretches out on anyone who doesn’t have an extra-narrow foot, like Gina. I will never wear ballet flats.
“For a safari?” Lizzy snickers. She turns to me, and I flash an obligatory smile. I’m calmer now. I still don’t want to be here, but I don’t have another way home. There’s no chance my mom would come get me. I’m tired and achy, and I wish more than anything that I were back on the living-room couch.
Gina frowns. “They’re different, at least,” she says, slipping on one flat. “I’m so sick of black.”
Lizzy shrugs. “I never wear black,” she says, “and I’ll never wear a dead animal on my feet.”
“It’s not real leopard.” Gina rolls her eyes, but mostly, I think, for effect.
“Synthetic leopard,” says Lizzy. “What do you think, Cass. Does it really matter?”
I shrug. “I guess it does to the leopard.”
Gina and Lizzy both laugh. Gina’s a giggler, and Lizzy’s always had a loud, barking laugh. Like a coughing seal.
“There’s the Cass I remember,” says Lizzy. “Funny in an understated kind of way.”
I push some hair behind my ear and actually smile a little. “Thanks, I think.”
“You were always funny,” says Gina, stepping into the matching ballet flat. “Remember how the four of us used to laugh? I mean, really crack the hell up.”
“You did the best impression of Mrs. Frye back in eighth grade.” Lizzy snorts. “Devin, is that rude or is that ruuuude?” She laughs again. “I can’t do it justice, Cass—it’s all you.”
Gina laughs. “Devin would get all up in Mrs. Frye’s face. Remember that?”
I nod and smile. “Yeah.” I do remember. I remember it a lot. I wonder if Lizzy and Gina laughed like that after we weren’t friends anymore. I think of their joke in the car about Lizzy’s sneakers, and I decide that they probably do. “Seems like a long time ago,” I say.
“Not that long ago,” says Gina. She rests her hand on my shoulder. Gina’s looking at me again the way she did in the car, as if she can turn me inside out and see what’s really going on. My stomach tightens. I’m scared. Really scared. I have to get away from them before they realize I’m hiding something. Shelves of shoes are closing in around me.
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