“I know, and I appreciate that.” Chewie refused to walk, forcing me to carry him to the grass to do his business. “Everything just sucks. There are no good decisions, everyone’s messed up, and no matter what I do, I risk hurting someone. I thought it was supposed to get better. When does it get better?”
Mama followed Guster around with a plastic poop bag, waiting for him to go. “There’s no light at the end of the tunnel.”
“That doesn’t give me the warm fuzzies.”
“It’s not supposed to. But that’s life. One long tunnel. There are lights along the way. Sometimes they feel spread farther apart than others, but they’re there. And when you find one, it’s okay to stand under it for a while to catch your breath before marching back into the dark.”
“So it never gets better, then?”
“Not the way you think. But walking through a stretch of dark doesn’t mean you can’t be happy. And if you’re lucky, you’ll bump into someone willing to walk through the darkness with you.”
“Like Fadil.”
“And you,” she said. “And Sofie and Conor.”
“What about Sean?”
Mama glanced at her feet. “Sometimes we walk with people. Other times we carry them.”
“Only because he’s usually too drunk to stand on his own,” I said. “You should leave him behind to find his own way.”
“Do you remember the first time you met Sean?”
“Not really. He sort of blew into our lives and became permanent without me noticing.”
Guster finally dropped a load. Mama scooped it up in the bag, tied it off, and tossed it on the ground. “I’d been dating him for a few weeks, and he’d been begging to meet you, but I didn’t want to introduce him to you until I was sure he was going to stick around for a while. Then the fair came to town and he bought us all tickets. You were so excited when I told you, you demanded to dress yourself in a special outfit of your own choosing.”
“I did no such thing.”
“You most certainly did.” Mama’s eyes grew unfocused like she was reliving that memory. “You wore a black tutu, a striped shirt, pink leggings, little high heels that you abandoned after ten minutes of walking in them, and you even convinced me to let you put on hideous red lipstick. You looked like you’d been dressed by a circus clown.”
I was horrified, but Mama was laughing, and that made me smile. “I’m glad my terrible fashion sense was so amusing to you.”
“Some things never change.”
“Hey!”
“Anyway,” Mama said. “Sean picked us up and we went to the fair, but when we got to the merry-go-round, you started to cry and cry. You said the animals were saying mean things about your clothes, and you refused to go near the ride.”
“Really?” I didn’t think the voices had started being rude and demanding until after I’d healed Freddie.
My mother nodded. “So Sean picked you up and told you that it didn’t matter what the animals said because you were the most beautiful princess in the world. Then he got on a proud white stallion with you and held you as you both spun around and around. You made him ride with you at least five times.”
“What happened to that guy?” I asked.
“He’s still in there,” Mama said. “And I keep hoping if I carry him long enough, the man I married will learn to walk on his own again.”
“You shouldn’t have to carry him at all,” I said. “And I hate that he makes everything so much harder for you.”
Mama crossed to where I was standing with Chewie, draped her arm over my shoulder, and hugged me to her. “It’s not hard, Elena. It’s life.”
Her phone rang, and I led the dogs back to their kennels while she took the call. When I returned she said, “Speaking of life. Kelly’s sick, so my day off is officially over.”
Talking with Mama hadn’t exactly made me feel better, and it hadn’t helped me decide what I was going to do about Justina’s brother or the voices or the end of the world, but she’d bet her entire future based on her belief in me, so I owed it to her to try to believe in myself.
TWENTY-SIX
IF I HADN’T needed a ride to school, I would have let Fadil stew. Dragged it out and allowed his guilt over lying to me about the party eat at him until he finally crawled to me to apologize. I’m not necessarily proud of the impulse, and I’m actually glad that I needed a ride so that my less-than-better nature didn’t have a chance to assert itself.
Fadil frowned when I got into the car and handed him his phone. “How did you—”
“Let’s go,” I said. “I don’t want to be late for first period.”
After Fadil plugged his phone into the charger in his car, we took off. He stopped at a Dunkin’ Donuts and bought me an OJ and a bagel. Bribery wasn’t going to make me forgive him, but I couldn’t say no to carbs and juice.
“Can I explain?” he asked.
“What’s to explain?” I said between bagel bites. “You wanted to hook up with Naomi; you didn’t want me around. Easy enough to understand.”
“It’s more than that, though. Naomi and her friends aren’t so bad, but you act like they’re monsters.”
“Maybe because they call me names and treat me like a freak?”
“I know, but I thought if I could tell them how great you really are, they’d see you the way I do.”
I wiped the crumbs off my hands onto the floor, but only because I knew it would drive Fadil crazy. “Don’t pretend you lied and went to that party for my benefit. The only person’s interest you were serving was Little Fadil’s.”
“Not true.”
“Totally true.”
“Fine,” he said. “So what if I was? Is it so horrible that I wanted to get to know a girl I like without worrying someone was going to hurt your feelings?”
“Do you really think I’m that fragile? Christ! Do you even know me at all?”
“Of course I do, which is exactly why I didn’t invite you.”
“Look, Fadil. I don’t care if you hook up with Naomi or date her or screw and make a million adorable baby Fadils. And I’m sure that under the layers of wealth and privilege and expensive foundation, those girls she hangs out with aren’t venomous harpies, but please don’t lie to me.”
I thought I’d slammed the door on our argument, that Fadil was going to tell me he understood and was sorry for lying, but he banged his hand on the steering wheel.
“I didn’t lie to protect you,” he said. “I lied so that you wouldn’t act like I’m a horrible person for being into a girl whose friends are mean to you.”
“Don’t I have a right to?”
“No!” he said. “I didn’t see you dumping Javi for calling me Abdul all the time.”
“I didn’t—”
“You ignored the way he treated me and only broke up with him when he annoyed you.”
“But Javi thinks you’re nerdy cool.”
“That doesn’t mean I like him,” Fadil said, “or being called shitty racist names.”
I tried to recall Javi calling Fadil Abdul, but it didn’t matter if I remembered it; Fadil obviously did, and it had hurt him.
“At least when Tori called you Mary at the party, I spoke up for you and told her it was rude and that you had a name. Something you never did for me.”
“Fadil, I’m sorry.”
We pulled into a space and Fadil parked the car. “I don’t want you to be sorry,” he said. “Everyone’s shitty in their own way. You dated a boy who called me names and now you like a girl who didn’t even know your name until you saved her life. I like a girl whose friends can be mean and petty, and I hate that they are, and I will always stand up to them for you, but none of it changes that you’re my best friend, so stop acting like it does.”
Here I’d expected to have Fadil groveling for forgiveness by the end of the ride to school, but I was the one feeling ashamed, and I deserved it. “I’m sorry I never called Javi out on the things he said to you.”
&nb
sp; “And I’m sorry I lied,” Fadil said.
We’d apologized to each other and I thought that was the end of it, but I still felt awkward. I’d been blindsided by the things Fadil had said, and it made me think of what Javi had said to me on our nondate. “Javi thought I’d be pissed about you dating Naomi because I keep you around as my safety boyfriend. Isn’t that stupid?”
Fadil shook his head. “Not really.”
“You know I would never—”
“I know,” he said. “Not intentionally, anyway.” He turned in his seat to face me. “It’s just, you act like I should sit on a shelf waiting for you to need me—like I don’t have a life of my own—but it’s not fair. I love you, Elena, and I will always be there for you when you need me, but I can’t always be around when you want me.”
I’d had no idea Fadil felt like I’d been taking advantage of our friendship. “I want you to be happy,” I said. “I want you to do whatever it is that makes you happy, even if it doesn’t include me.”
“I know.”
“And I’m totally cool with you and Naomi. Honestly.”
“I know that too.”
“Can we be friends again?”
He nodded. “Obviously.”
“Good.”
He shut off the car. “Now that that’s settled, how in the world did you get my phone?”
TWENTY-SEVEN
FADIL THREW ME curious side-eye when Freddie joined us at lunch on Monday. She didn’t bring any food with her; she simply took a seat across from me and acted like it was totally normal and we sat together every day. Which isn’t to say I wasn’t simultaneously freaking out and dancing inside that she’d decided to grace us with her presence, but I was definitely confused.
“Word is you’re going to heal a bunch of people after school,” she said.
I’d done my best to push Justina Smith and her little brother out of my mind. It wouldn’t have been a big deal if using my ability to heal others didn’t come with such huge consequences, but it did and I couldn’t ignore them.
“What?” Fadil said with his mouth full.
Freddie shrugged. “Elena? Going all Miracle Girl on the football field after last period?”
“I said I might heal Ben Smith. And I still haven’t decided.”
“Yeah, that’s not what I heard at all.”
Fadil might have been worried, but it didn’t stop him from stuffing his face. “If you do it, you know I’ve got your back.”
“Thanks,” I said, though if Homeland Security agents decided I was a threat, I doubted there was anything Fadil could do.
“Uh, I don’t,” Freddie said. “How many people did you say have disappeared in your magic sky lights?”
I did the math in my head. “Around eighty, I think.”
“That’s not nearly enough,” Fadil said.
“Are you serious?” she asked. “Is he serious?”
“Usually not,” I said. “But this time he is.”
Freddie stared at Fadil and me like we had eight heads between us, each speaking a different language. “How are you pretending this isn’t a big deal?”
Fadil ate the last of his sandwich and swept the crumbs off the table. “No one’s saying it’s not, but Elena’s part of a bigger plan. She can’t ignore that.”
“Sure she can.”
The way Freddie was eyeballing Fadil, I worried she was going to punch him if I didn’t intervene. “Can we talk about anything else?” I asked. “I haven’t made up my mind what I’m going to do, and arguing about it isn’t helping.”
Fadil pushed his chair back and stood. “I have to run anyway.” He caught my eye. “Think about what Deputy Akers said, okay?”
“I will.”
“What was that about?” Freddie asked when Fadil was gone.
“Afternoon prayers,” I said.
“Not him leaving, the thing about the deputy.”
“Oh, that.” I’d been serious about not wanting to talk about it anymore, but Freddie was part of it, so I figured she deserved to know. I explained what Akers had told me about the case and the Homeland Security agents and healing her sister.
Freddie was shaking her head as I finished. “If a cop’s telling you it’s a bad idea, don’t you think you ought to listen?”
I didn’t expect I’d ever be eating lunch with Freddie, wishing the bell would ring so I could escape, but I was tired of talking about healing and miracles and the end of the world. “You never told me why you were hiding in the closet at Tori’s party.”
My abrupt subject change must’ve caught Freddie off guard, because she sputtered and looked everywhere but at me. “I wasn’t in the mood to party.”
“Then why’d you go in the first place?”
“My favorite movie when I was a kid was The Little Mermaid. I loved that shit and I would sit and watch it, like, five times a day.”
“Okay?” I said.
“I thought it would be so cool to live underwater and then fall in love with a prince and live happily ever after.”
“Sure,” I said. “Who wouldn’t want to be a mermaid, though don’t you think it’s a little disgusting, them swimming around and breathing the same water they go to the bathroom in?”
Freddie grimaced. “Gross.”
“Seriously though.”
“You have issues,” Freddie said. “But anyway, I watched the movie a few months ago, expecting to love it as much as I’d loved it when I was little.”
“Let me guess: You hated it.”
Freddie’s eyes widened. “Like, what kind of fuckery are we teaching kids? If you want someone to love you then all you need to do is change every fucking thing about yourself? What a crock of shit!”
“You’re not wrong,” I said, “but what does that have to do with the party?”
“The way I felt watching that movie is the way I’ve felt about my entire life since Starbucks. I’m seeing all the things I used to love with these new eyes, and I hate it.” She chewed on her thumbnail. I hadn’t noticed before that she bit her nails, most of them down to the quick. “I was sitting on the couch listening to Tori and Corinne argue about prom and I flipped out. Who gives a shit about prom? It’s one night in our lives. A blip. If you hadn’t been working the day David Combs shot me, I wouldn’t have been around to worry. But you were, and I am, and I still don’t give a shit about it.”
Nothing existed outside of me and Freddie and our lunch table. Not the other kids eating, not the school, nothing. We were suspended in a moment, just the two of us. “You’re not . . . ? Should I be worried? Should I tell someone?”
Freddie snorted derisively. “Tell them what? That I’m having an existential crisis?”
“You said you were happy you’d been shot. You told me if it happened again not to heal you.”
“I’m not suicidal,” Freddie said.
“This is serious.”
“You don’t have to tell me how serious suicide is,” she snapped. “I know.”
The force of her words caused me to flinch. “Okay,” I said. “But if you need to talk, you can always call me, no matter what closet you’re calling from.”
Freddie opened her mouth, shut it, and looked down at the table. “I promise I’m not suicidal,” she said. “It’s just that my life doesn’t make sense anymore. You healed me and part of me feels like I have to prove I was worth saving.”
“You were,” I said. “You are.”
“How would you know?”
“Because either we’re all worth saving or none of us are.”
“And yet you pick and choose who lives and who dies.”
“I didn’t ask for this,” I said.
“Like that matters.”
The bell rang, and now that it had, I found I didn’t want to leave. Freddie stood and slung her bag over her shoulder.
“Freddie?” I said. “What if I make the wrong choice? What if the voices are right and the world is literally ending and I screw everything up?”
Freddie shrugged. “Then we all die. No big deal.”
“Right. No big deal.”
“Exactly,” Freddie said. “I’ve already died once. I can do it again.”
TWENTY-EIGHT
JAVI CAUGHT UP to me in the hall after Mrs. Czukas’s class. “When’re we going out again, Elena?”
“When you get an A in algebra and hell freezes over.” Javi was flashing me his best smile. “I told you it was a one-time thing.”
“Come on,” he said. “Admit you had a good time.”
“I didn’t have a terrible time.”
“See?”
“You know that’s not the same thing, right? I also don’t have a terrible time at the gynecologist, but that doesn’t mean I do somersaults every time I have to go back.”
Javi’s grin grew impossibly bigger. “But you do go back.”
“What do you want? I’m going to be late to my next class.”
“I’ll walk you,” he said.
I didn’t particularly want to walk with Javi, but letting him tag along was easier than arguing.
“Is it true that you’re going to heal some kids on the football field after lunch?”
“Who told you that?”
“I heard it around.”
I’d kind of been hoping Freddie had been exaggerating, but if Javi had heard the rumor then it had spread further than I’d thought.
“Whatever,” I said.
Javi held the door out of the building open for me. I turned my face toward the sun to soak it in as we crossed the quad. “You get any sleep last night?” he asked. “You look tired.”
I shook my head. “Sofie wouldn’t go to bed until I’d read her the next Harry Potter chapter, but I kept putting it off because we’re getting to the part where Cedric’s going to die.”
“Too scary for her?”
“For me,” I said. “I hate that part. Up till then everyone who gets hurt winds up fine. Hermione survives her encounter with the basilisk, Ron and Harry escape the creepy spiders, Ginny is returned unscathed from her encounter with Tom Riddle. There’s no actual loss. And then Voldemort kills Cedric Diggory and suddenly everything becomes real. We have to face the possibility that we won’t all live long enough to lose our hair or become those crotchety old folks who yell at dumb kids like us. Good people die and bad people don’t always get what they deserve. Death stops being this abstract concept that happens to other people and becomes something that could happen to the people we love. Or even to us.”
The Apocalypse of Elena Mendoza Page 14