“I want you to go home tonight and imagine if someone else, say Sheila or this boy you like, or me, had been driving the car when it hit Coach Mitchell. I want you to think about what you would say to that person.”
“That won’t help.”
I pick up my backpack, and as I walk out the door, Ms. Ellen says, “I’m serious about it, Jess. Think about it.”
But that’s stupid because no one else was driving that car.
— — —
In chemistry, I have a new lab partner. Jennifer is a quiet girl I’ve never really noticed before. She gives me a half-smile and scoots her stool over to make room for me at her counter. She says, “Sheila asked Mr. Farenz to switch partners.” Then she smiles and whispers, “But I’m glad because Mitch has the worst BO.” I glance over to where Mitch sits in my old seat at the bench he now shares with Sheila, who isn’t there yet.
I pull out my chemistry notebook and open to a clean page. Mr. Farenz calls roll. Sheila comes in late and doesn’t acknowledge me.
“Ms. Richards, I hope we aren’t keeping you from something more important,” says Mr. Farenz.
“Of course not, Mr. F. I love chemistry,” purrs Sheila as she takes her seat next to Mitch. When the class ends, Sheila glides out the door without a backward glance.
The next class is American History. Several soccer players in the class are friends with Casey. I take my regular seat behind Erik and Jay.
When I sit down, Jay turns to me and says, “We missed you. There’s been nobody to copy off of.” He grins and turns back around as the teacher begins her lecture.
The rest of the week goes by much the same. I go through the motions of being a high school student. A few people talk to me, but it’s always awkward. I tell Ms. Ellen about it at lunch.
“They’re figuring out you’re not made of glass,” says Ms. Ellen.
“It’s funny, though, because most of the people who speak to me now are people I’ve never talked to before.”
“Maybe you’re more approachable now,” she suggests.
“Why?”
“They know you’re human. You’ve been through something terrible. You’re hurting. It makes you human. You’re not just one of the in-crowd.”
I roll my eyes. Sheila would be glad to know even the guidance counselor she’s never met considers us the ‘in-crowd’.
25
LIZ
Jess goes to Jake’s the weekend after we get back from Arizona. I think we have both had enough of each other. She said she made a friend out there. I am not sure whether that is a good thing, but I know she could use some friends, so I drive her out after work on Friday.
Early Saturday morning, before it is even light, I wake up with the feeling that someone is in the house. A chilly breeze blows across my face like a door or window is open. I lay still and listen to the silent house. I think about the people who painted my sidewalk last weekend. Would they also break into my house? I sit up, slowly. A car door slams next door, and I hear the muffled sound of Van Halen from my neighbor’s car stereo.
I creep carefully to the closet and pick up Jake’s baseball bat he never took with him when he moved out. He told me I might need it someday. I inch to the bedroom door, my arms shaking but the bat in the ready position, not that I have ever hit a softball, let alone a person. All I can hear is my heart galloping. I creep into the living room in search of my phone, charging on the counter. Nothing looks out of place. The silence is eerie.
I growl, “Who’s there? I’m calling the police!” The quiet screams back at me. As I make for the front door, I notice the slider is slightly ajar, only a sliver near the bottom, but not locked as it should be. It looks like someone yanked it closed in a hurry, the way Jess does sometimes. I have asked Jake to look at it a million times.
I can’t decide if I should put the bat down and call 911 or run out of the house. What if I am just being paranoid? I can’t hear anything except leaves blowing across the cement pad out back. The nice thing about an open layout house is I can see the entire space except for Jess’ room and the bathroom. I take a tentative step towards her room. Her door is ajar; I flick it open with the baseball bat. It rattles against the wall and causes Jess’ computer to light up. I scream.
And then I realize there is no one here.
There is no one in my house except me—a crazy, paranoid woman with a baseball bat. I set the bat down and turn on the lights. There is no point in going back to bed now. I have never been a nervous person, but lately, everything makes me jump. Every person looks suspect. I am wary and I no longer meet a stranger’s eye or offer a smile on the sidewalk. That is what this is doing to me.
I wrench the sliding door shut and lock it. I lay the board on the track that Jake gave us to use until he fixes it. I sit down on the couch and let myself cry. Not just cry, but sob, releasing the pent up pain I have held at arm’s length to protect my daughter. As my grief fills the empty house, I see this from the town’s point of view. Whatever happened in that car, it is clear Jess was careless. And her carelessness cost Coach Mitchell his life. She never intended to take it; she never even knew it was in her power. We all assume that what we say and do and think means nothing to anyone but ourselves, when in reality it can alter lifetimes, change history, even snuff out a soul unknowingly. Our lives intertwine in invisible and impossible ways. We take that for granted, or maybe we don’t believe it until we have no choice. Everything we do matters to someone.
I let myself cry for Coach Mitchell, for Helen Mitchell, for their children, for my community, instead of just for my daughter. I understand the anger. None of this is fair or right. None of it. But I can’t make it right. And neither can Jess. And neither can the court.
Later, Kevin calls with a question about Sheila. Her testimony has him the most worried. I answer his questions, but repeatedly suppress yawns. My early morning freak out has rendered me slow and sleepy.
“Did I wake you?” he asks after I yawn through another answer.
“Tough night.”
“Anything I can do?”
I almost say, “Nothing. I’ll be fine.” That is my standard line for seventeen years now whenever anyone asks if they can help. I have always handled everything as if I had something to prove—Jake leaving, holding down a job and juggling childcare, Jess’ tantrums and moods, practices and lessons, birthdays, and braces—all of it. But I am tired. Tired of always being the one to handle everything. I tell Kevin about my early morning fright.
“It’s understandable. You’ve been under a tremendous amount of pressure.”
“I’m not a wimpy person, though. It seems a bit ridiculous.”
“Not at all, considering the circumstances. How about if I come take a look at that sliding door?”
I hesitate. I don’t want to take advantage of him, but there is a part of me that was dreading the weekend alone. I would like to see him. Even if it is only to have him fix my door.
“Sure. That would be great.”
“Be there in an hour,” he says.
— — —
I run the vacuum and wipe the worst spots on the worn kitchen linoleum, gather up dishes abandoned in the living room, and fold the afghan. Kevin’s been here before, but this is different. He is coming here as my friend, not my lawyer.
He shows up at eleven carrying a toolbox.
“I didn’t realize you were a handyman,” I say.
“My dad made sure I grew up knowing my way around a power tool. Every weekend I was with him, he had another project for us to work on.”
I smile thinking of his father.
“I’ll just get to work,” he s
ays, refusing my offer of coffee. He moves furniture out of the way and examines the slider. Then he shakes his head and pulls out a tape measure.
I sip my coffee and admire him in blue jeans. I have never seen him in anything but a suit. He looks more vulnerable in his sweatshirt without the armor of his coat and tie. Younger. Friendlier. I decide I much prefer the casual Kevin. He catches me staring and I am certain he blushes before saying, “I think the best option is to replace the thing. All the weatherproofing is shot, and the track is rusted.”
“Oh,” I say. “Really?” I haven’t got money for a new sliding door.
“I’m going to run to the hardware store and see what they have.”
“Kevin,” I say beginning to protest, but he holds up his hand.
“I don’t want to worry about you. We can figure out the cost of the door later. For now, you need to be safe.”
“You don’t have to do this. I can ask Jake again.”
He pauses at the door. “Do you want to ask Jake?”
Jake’s name hangs there in the air between us, like an intruder.
I shake my head. I know asking Jake will not get me anywhere. He will just remind me to put the stick on the track for security and tell me the old door is fine.
“Then let me do this. I want to do this.”
— — —
So, I let him. It takes Kevin the rest of the day to remove the old door and install a new one. While he works, I go to the grocery store and buy the ingredients to cook a puttanesca sauce with mussels, my specialty. On the way home from the store, I call Kate and tell her what is happening.
“So, let me get this straight. You have decided you like your lawyer after all, so you’re cooking him puttanesca?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t you want to kiss him?”
“What does that have to do with it?”
“Is there any dish that renders your breath more unapproachable than puttanesca?”
My heart sinks. She is right. On the seat beside me, in addition to mussels, tomatoes, and pasta, are cloves of garlic, a bag of onions, plus bottles of capers, anchovies, black olives, and green olives. It is my favorite and possibly best dish, but it is also powerfully pungent.
“I guess I’ve been single too long,” I laugh.
Later, after we are well into our second bottle of red wine, I confess my conversation with Kate to Kevin.
“Does that mean you don’t want to kiss me?”
“No.”
“No, you don’t want to kiss me or no, you do?”
I shake my head and get up to clear our dishes. “Maybe I can loan you a toothbrush,” I tease and hardly recognize myself. But later, when Kevin says goodnight, I do kiss him.
After he has gone, I test out the new slider. It glides open easily, and I step outside and look at the stars. I feel more hopeful tonight than I have felt in a long time. All the time I knew Kevin when his father was at Morningside, I was cynical, skeptical. Not just of Kevin, of all men. I pushed aside his compliments and questions, assuming I knew who he was and what he wanted. Have I always done this? Are Jess and I alone because I always think people want something from me I don’t want to give? I gave everything to Jake—my family, my reputation, my future—and he walked away from it; but he was only one man, and really he was just a boy.
26
JESS
Saturday morning, Dad is up early. He has some colossal job to do. Which is fine with me because yesterday when Mom dropped me off, he told her we would go fishing today. I wasn’t looking forward to an entire day stuck on a boat pretending everything is fine. When he got a call for a tow late last night, I was relieved.
“I’ll be home around eight. I hate to leave you, but I need this job. I could use the money.”
“I’ll be fine,” I tell him, as I follow him out of the trailer to feed the dogs.
“Watch Homeboy; he keeps running off.”
I eye Homeboy; he’s twirling in circles at the sight of his breakfast, completely tangling his line. Willard sits by his bowl patiently.
“Call if you need me. I’m only ten minutes away.”
“I won’t need you.”
“Roger that,” he says and pulls away.
After he’s gone, I spend the morning watching not-cable television, but by the middle of the afternoon, I can’t take it anymore. I clip a leash on Homeboy and let Willard run loose. It’s turned into a nice day and I don’t want to spend it in a smelly trailer. I grab my copy of The Catcher in the Rye and set off to hike along Cache Creek.
After twenty minutes of Homeboy yanking on my arm, I’ve had enough and stop to take a break. I wind his leash around a tree, pick my way down the bank, and climb out on some rocks in the middle of the creek. Willard whines from the shore for a few minutes and then circles out a spot in the leaves to lie down.
Out here in the middle of the creek, with the noise of the water, it’s easier to breathe. I push Jefferson and Mom and Kevin and school and Helen Mitchell off to the side of my mind. I read for a while. I like the way Holden talks. He says whatever pops into his mind. I totally get what he means when he says everybody is fake except for little kids. I wish I could see Sally and Stu. They would treat me like they always have.
I pull off my shoes and socks and dip a toe in the icy water. It’s hard to believe it’s been only a month since the accident. It seems more like years. I can hardly remember who I was back then. Back when all that mattered was Homecoming Court and a letterman jacket and hoping Casey Miller would ask me out. Now that all seems like another lifetime when I was someone different. The sunshine sparkles across the water and slides around me like a warm blanket. A bird screeches from the branches above.
The creek isn’t deep, but there’s a spot closer to the trailer park where I used to go swimming with Dad. It has a branch with a rope over it. I loved to swing out over the water on that rope, but I never let go, never let myself drop in. It made Dad laugh that I would ask him to give me a push, but then scream for him to pull me back safely to the bank. I touch my heel to the freezing water now. I’ve always been such a baby.
The water is clear as glass. I can see right to the rocks on the bottom. The water bugs from summer have gone wherever it is they go in winter. When I was little, Dad and I used to catch crayfish and race them on the rocks. They scuttled into the water like wind-up cars, swimming backward until they disappeared. I set my book next to my shoes on the rock and stand up, starring at the water until I feel dizzy.
I lean towards the water and then the Jess who always does the right thing, who never does anything stupid like jump in an icy creek or text while she’s driving, stops me.
“AGHHHH!” I scream and smack my legs with my fists. “I’m so sick of me!”
Willard lifts his head to watch me. He thumps his tail and whines. I look at him and yell, “Screw it!” and then I leap into the creek.
My feet hit an angled rock on the bottom and go out from under me. The cold water swallows me up and I scramble to my feet. The freezing water takes my breath away. I crawl back on the rocks.
“What the hell are you doing?” yells a familiar voice.
On the shore Willard is dancing in circles, barking beside Fish. “Are you fucking nuts?” he asks.
I am nuts, aren’t I? I am fucking nuts. You can’t drown in three feet of water. I smile weakly at Fish. He shakes his head. I hold my shoes and book against my chest and wade towards him, my entire body shaking with the cold.
I reach the side and Willard jumps all over me.
“You’ll fucking freeze to death. Come up to my place and get a blanket or a coa
t or something.”
I nod because my teeth are chattering so hard I can’t speak. Fish pulls off his sweatshirt and gives it to me. After I put on my shoes and his sweatshirt, Fish grabs my hand and pulls me up the bank. We walk towards his place, but then I remember Homeboy.
“Where is he?”
“I tied him to a tree back there.”
“I’ll come back for him. You need to get dry first.”
I’m too cold to argue, so I follow him to an RV close to the bank. It’s a gooseneck trailer, the kind you tow with a pickup truck. The front is propped up on a stump and most of the windows are covered with plastic.
“Nice place,” I say as Fish opens the door.
“Shit hole is what it is,” he says, and I follow him in.
The inside is dark. Fish kicks a path through the clothes and papers littering the floor. There’s a bed up on the gooseneck part of the trailer and empty beer cans line the window above it.
“You live here by yourself?”
“Ever since my old man threw me out. He lives up the hill in the white trailer. My mom split when I was a kid.”
Dad told me Fish had a tough life, but I had no idea. I let Fish wrap me in a blanket from the bed.
“There’s not much heat in here. I use a propane heater in the winter. I’ll get it going.”
“You don’t have to do that. I can go back to Dad’s.”
He shakes his head. “Not yet. You need to get warm first. How about I build a campfire?”
“That’d be cool,” I say.
Fish starts a fire in a matter of minutes and then sets off to find Homeboy. Willard runs after him. I sit so close to the fire my clothes steam. My body shakes from the cold even as my face burns from the heat of the fire. I rotate myself every few minutes like a human rotisserie shivering in Fish’s smelly blanket.
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