Playlist for the Dead

by Michelle Falkoff

  “I know you don’t really want that pizza, am I right?” she asked.

  I looked down at it. The cheese was an abnormal yellow, as if someone had drawn it with a Magic Marker. “Not really,” I admitted. “But it was the lesser of several evils.”

  “You haven’t considered everything,” she said. “Come on, you look like you need to get out of here.”

  She was right, but I’d never skipped school before. Kids in the college-prep classes I was taking never skipped school. And for all my online bravado I’d never done anything anyone would really consider bad, or at least I didn’t think I had. But things were different now. Missing a few classes wouldn’t kill me. “Where are we going?” I asked.

  “I’ve got a plan. We just need to very, very casually wander out back.” She pointed to the doors that led straight out to the soccer field. There was usually a teacher stationed in front of them, but I didn’t see one now. “Mr. Cartwright’s out and they didn’t get a sub. He’s the lunch monitor today. There’ll never be an easier time for us to ditch. Let’s go!”

  “As long as you’ve got a plan,” I said, but really, I didn’t care. I’d have followed her anywhere, plan or not. I stayed right behind her as she walked—no, strolled—right out the back doors of the cafeteria, like it was no thing, even though she was carrying the enormous overstuffed bronze backpack she’d had at the party.

  Astrid started laughing as soon as we made it outside. “You were perfect!” she said. “Didn’t look back once. I was worried you’d go all Orpheus on me and turn around.”

  “Orpheus?”

  “It’s a Greek myth, where this guy’s wife ended up in Hell and he could only have her back if he didn’t look behind him as they left the underworld.”

  “I never read that one. But it sounds like the story of Lot’s wife.”

  “What’s that?” she asked.

  “It’s from the Bible,” I said. “I learned about it in Hebrew school. God let Lot and his family leave Sodom and Gomorrah before he destroyed them, as long as they didn’t look back. But his wife turned around and got turned into a pillar of salt. Sounds almost like the same thing.”

  “It’s funny how much overlap there is between all the different kinds of myths and religions,” she said. “I love all of it. I was obsessed with Clash of the Titans as a kid. I watched it whenever it came on cable. It really got me into Greek mythology.”

  “I love that movie!” I said. “The original, not the remake. I tried to get Hayden to watch it—I thought since we were both so into fantasy that he’d love it too. But he thought the Claymation was cheesy.”

  “It was,” she said. “That’s what made it so great!”

  “I know,” I said, though I felt guilty, almost as if I was choosing Astrid over Hayden. Though I reminded myself that I didn’t really have a choice, not anymore.

  The sky was bright blue and full of puffy clouds, not the kind that made me worry about rain but the pretty ones, the ones that seemed like they really could be made out of cotton. The brightness of the sun made it easy to see the path we were following, but occasionally there were low branches and weeds blocking us; Astrid would kick them out of the way so they didn’t trip me up. She seemed to know where she was going, which was great, because I was completely lost. And I was starting to get hungry—I almost wished I’d eaten that radioactive-looking pizza. “Are we almost there?”

  “Almost.”

  After we’d walked through the woods for about five more minutes I could see a field in front of us. It was a vast open space, with nothing but fields of corn and soybean as far ahead as I could see. In the middle of the field was a strange building that looked kind of like a barn. But not any barn I’d seen before—it wasn’t round, exactly, but it wasn’t square, either. Its wood was gray and faded; it didn’t look like it had ever been painted before. “Is that it?” I asked.

  She nodded.

  “What is it?”

  “An octagonal barn,” she said. “It’s one of the few left in Iowa. It’s really old, and very cool.”

  Okay, that explained the shape. “What’s so cool about it?”

  “I’ll show you.” She grabbed my hand; her grip was firm, though her fingers felt almost delicate intertwined with mine. I hoped my palms weren’t all gross and damp. We started running together, across the field toward the barn. I could barely keep up with her, giant backpack and all; I was excited that we were holding hands, so it took me a minute to realize that if I didn’t speed up I was going to wipe out, and that would be totally embarrassing. I wondered what Eric would think if he saw us and then put the idea out of my head.

  We stopped running just before the barn. It was warm for October; I was a little sweaty, and the air smelled faintly of cinnamon, a smell I normally associated with spring—I think Mom had said it was from some native plant. The doors to the barn were enormous slabs of wood, with X-shaped planks across them. A latch held them together but Astrid just walked up and opened it; it wasn’t even locked. She slid the doors apart and I could see the sunlight shining on the knotted wood floor. The barn was basically one big room that smelled like sawdust, with a rickety-looking staircase leading to a loft perched just under a very high ceiling. “You’re not afraid of heights, are you?” Astrid asked, then led me upstairs.

  Normally I wasn’t, but the stairs were really narrow and creaked as we climbed them, and the floor of the loft didn’t feel all that sturdy. I tried not to think of the prospect of it caving in and pitching us both to the ground, which I normally would, but somehow today I knew it wouldn’t happen. There was something about what was happening that felt so perfect that I felt almost certain that nothing could screw it up.

  Astrid dropped her backpack and opened it up. I’d assumed it was full of books, since it looked so heavy, but she pulled out a patchwork quilt and laid it on the ground, then motioned for me to sit. “This is more comfortable than just the floor,” she said.

  “No kidding.” I was impressed that she’d come prepared. She’d really put a lot of thought into this. “Does no one ever use this place?”

  “I think sometimes people rent it out for parties, but no one uses it as a barn anymore,” she said. “It’s kind of sad. When I was a kid, there were people my dad knew living in the farmhouse down the road, and we’d go over there and play with the animals. Me and my dad would come up here and look out the window at all the fields. Now I come here when I need to be alone, which has been a lot lately.” She pointed, and I could see how sitting up here and gazing out at that expanse could be soothing, if you were sitting here with someone you liked, which I was. “We even carved our names into the wall—see? Still here.”

  She pointed. Alison and Richard were here.

  “Alison?” I asked.

  She nodded. “That’s one of the reasons I brought you here. I wanted to explain.”

  I was glad I hadn’t had to ask.

  “Alison’s my real name,” she said. “Or it used to be. My dad died last fall, at the beginning of sophomore year.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, though it felt inadequate. I thought about the Elvis Costello song on the playlist. I hadn’t given much thought to what it might have been doing there; now I wondered whether it meant that Hayden had known all along.

  “Thanks,” she said. “I know you of all people know that there’s not much else you can really say. But I wasn’t telling you so you’d feel sorry for me. I just wanted you to understand—he died really suddenly, in a car accident, and everything changed. I felt the loneliest I ever felt, and even though I had all these friends, and a boyfriend I’d been crazy about, it didn’t matter—it was like they were all strangers to me. I knew I’d never be the same person again, and it seemed really important to me that everyone else understood that, too. So I started calling myself Astrid, and I changed my hair and started dressing how I’d always really wanted to dress and acting how I’d really wanted to act and hanging out with who I really wanted to hang out wit
h, because I realized that everything I’d been doing up to that point was bullshit. My old friends kind of freaked out, especially when I quit cheerleading.”

  “Wait—you were a cheerleader?” I couldn’t picture it. Then I looked at her more closely, tried to imagine her hair a different color, her wearing one of those stupid outfits with the short skirt and sneakers with pom-pom socks, and all of a sudden I realized I had seen her around at school before she’d changed, surrounded by all her old friends. “Right. I see it now.”

  “Too bad,” she said, and laughed. “I was kind of enjoying the fact that you seemed to be the last person who knew. Yep, I was a cheerleader, and I hung out with all of those guys, until the proverbial shit hit the fan. But let’s not talk about that now. Let’s have lunch and not talk about anything that makes us sad. We’ve got plenty of time for that.”

  “Sounds good,” I said, and it really did. I liked the idea that she was assuming we’d have more conversations, that we would eventually be able to talk about everything. And it made me feel better about not asking all the questions I had, even though I was getting more and more curious about her relationship with Hayden. Had he actually known her real name?

  But right now, I was happy to focus on the food she was digging out of that backpack. Packets of sandwiches, apples, a huge bar of chocolate, and a bottle of water. She really had planned ahead, and the thought of it made me nervous and happy at the same time. So much so that I worried if I’d be able to eat, but as soon as I unwrapped a turkey and avocado sandwich, I knew I’d be fine.

  “Slow down there, buddy,” she said. “We’ve got all day. Here, have a drink.” She opened the bottle of water and handed it to me. I supposed we were sharing it, which seemed kind of intimate, in a good way.

  “I can’t believe you did all of this.” I didn’t say “for me,” but that was really what I meant.

  “I’ve been wanting to get to know you for a while,” she said, sounding almost shy, which wasn’t like her. “I wanted us to have a memorable afternoon, away from school and all the stuff that makes things hard.”

  I knew exactly what she meant, though it made me kind of sad to think about the ways in which things were hard for her. From the way she said it I could tell there were more hard things than what she’d already told me, but now wasn’t the time to ask. “It’s definitely memorable,” I said. I wished I could think of the words to say it better, but being around her like this made me nervous, in a good way. I felt like I was hyperaware of every single thing about myself, and her—the way her sea-creature hair streaks somehow matched the vintage Celtics T-shirt I was wearing, as if we’d coordinated our outfits; the way a streak of sunlight coming through the window lit the spot on the floor where both of us were leaning on our hands, making her nail polish glitter and turning the hairs on my arm almost blond. I could hear that song playing in the back of my head.

  Alison, my aim is true.

  It was the only lyric that really fit. But Hayden couldn’t have predicted this.

  We spent the afternoon working through the picnic she’d made. We talked a lot about our families; Astrid was an only child and was jealous that I had a sister, and nothing I said about pinching and tattling and practicing makeup on me would change her mind. “Come on, you’re telling me that she introduced you to all the music you love and you’re still mad about a little lipstick?”

  “You can’t ever tell anyone about that!” I said. “That’s the kind of stuff you’re supposed to do with your mom, but ours has to work all the time.” I told her about my dad the d-bag, but I didn’t get into too much detail—I didn’t want her to think about hers again.

  “Yeah, I used to do that kind of girly stuff with my mom,” she said. “It’s funny—we got along really well when my dad was alive, but now that he’s gone, everything’s completely different. She wasn’t crazy about the new look, and now she’s starting to think about meeting people and it’s totally freaking me out. I mean, she’s acting like we’re friends, not like she’s my parent, you know? I don’t want to go shopping with her for date-night outfits.”

  “I get it,” I said. “But don’t you think it’s better than her just assuming she’s going to stay alone? My mom’s been divorced for like eight years now, and I don’t remember her going on a single date. She’s just so stressed out working all the time I think she figures there’s no point, but it’s kind of sad. And your mom was married for way longer than mine, and nothing went wrong—maybe she just wants to remember what it was like to be with someone she loved.”

  “You’re a much nicer person than I am,” Astrid said. “Hayden always said that.” She stopped and frowned. “Wait, we said we weren’t going to talk about sad things, and here we are, talking about my problems with my mom, and now I’m bringing up Hayden. I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be,” I said, but I didn’t pick up the thread, and we sat quietly for a while. I loved being on the picnic with her, in a place that was special to her, and there was this moment when we’d finally eaten the last of the chocolate and were sharing the rest of the water when her face was so close to mine that I’d hardly have to move to kiss her. And it felt like maybe she was thinking the same thing, and maybe she even wanted me to. But another topic we hadn’t covered was Eric; I wasn’t sure if he was the boyfriend she’d talked about being so crazy about or the next guy on the list, but either way, I didn’t want to be someone who moved in on someone else’s girlfriend. If Astrid and I were going to get together, it had to start the right way, which meant she’d have to break up with him. But I was too nervous to ask her, and it wasn’t just the nervousness of being around her; I was afraid of what she’d say.

  We stayed in the barn until the sunlight moved away from the window. It wasn’t yet starting to get dark, but the sun was definitely moving, and the sky was starting to fill with streaks of pink and orange. “We should head back,” Astrid said, but it took a few minutes before either of us could bring ourselves to move.

  I didn’t want the day to end.

  But eventually we cleaned up the trash from our picnic and folded the quilt together so it fit in her backpack. It felt almost like we were playing house. “Can I carry that for you?” I asked, trying to be, I don’t know, gentlemanly or something.

  She laughed, that great Astrid laugh. “I’ve got it,” she said. “You just concentrate on keeping your balance in the woods.”

  She had a good point. With the sun starting to set it was getting harder to see the path, so I focused on not falling down. I tried to think of a way to ask her about Eric but I didn’t want to ruin things.

  “Why so quiet?” she asked, as we skirted a bunch of trees. Pine, maybe, from the smell. And the needles.

  I didn’t want to tell her what was really on my mind, so I had to think fast. “Hayden’s mom brought me a bunch of his stuff this weekend,” I said. “She even gave me his computer, but I can’t get into it because it’s password protected.” I felt guilty using Hayden as a shield to keep from talking about Eric, but it’s true that the computer was on my mind, along with a million other things.

  Astrid turned around and narrowed her eyes at me.

  “What? Do you think it’s morbid and creepy that I want to look at his computer?” I asked, worried even as I said it that it might be true.

  “Not at all. She gave it to you, so she wants you to be able to use it. You’re curious about what’s on there, right?”

  “Of course.” We’d finally made it out of the woods, and the two late buses heading east and west were lined up in front of the school. “This one’s me.” I pointed to the west bus.

  “I’m east,” she said. Well, that answered that question. I’d spent the day hanging out with a cheerleader from the rich side of town. Never would have seen that one coming.

  “I guess I’ll see you later, then,” I said. “Thanks for the picnic.”

  “No problem,” she said, and then paused. “Hey, Sam?”

  “What?”
<
br />   “That password? Try ‘Athena,’” she said, and then got on the bus.

  UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

  HarperCollins Publishers

  ..................................................................

  USER NAME: HAYDENSTEVENS

  PASSWORD: ATHENA

  And I was in. Simple as that. Or not so simple, really; I had a million questions. Who, or what, was Athena? Why was it important enough to be Hayden’s password? And how did Astrid know? Not to mention the still-open question of what really happened to Jason and Trevor—my brain felt like a whirling blob of confusion. It was all too much. I had to focus on one thing at a time, and right now, I was focused on Hayden’s computer.

  I’d always been a little bit of a snoop. I’d found the hiding place for Hanukkah presents every year until I was ten, when Mom finally sat me down and said, “You know you’re just ruining it for yourself, right?” Yup. I was just starting to get how much the surprise of the gift was part of the fun, sometimes even more so than the present itself. But even though I stopped looking for Hanukkah presents, I didn’t stop looking through Rachel’s stuff trying to find a journal (not a chance; she wasn’t much of a writer, and even if she were, she’d be great at hiding it), or even through cabinets trying to find Mom’s stash of Oreos (she thought if she hid them she wouldn’t have to share, but she was wrong). And I considered myself the king of Internet stalking; the few times Hayden or I found a girl we liked I’d practically put together a dossier on her, though neither of us had ever had the guts to use it. At least as far as I knew.