Then, he pulled up a desk chair from the corner and sat in front of her.
Cat wasn’t sure where to begin.
The beginning is always a good place to start, right?
Luke listened as she described Landon, their first meeting, the shenanigans they used to get into. He laughed as she recounted dropping Landon’s Pomeranian down the laundry chute. He held her hand as she told him about suspecting Landon’s involvement in drugs, and when she found out it was true. By the time she got to the part where Landon died, Luke felt that he had somehow known him, too. Cat spoke with such love and admiration for him. It was easy to see why her life had been turned upside down by his death.
He held Cat as she cried and found that his own eyes were moist with tears. A first.
Luke pulled away from her saying, “Cat, no one blames you. You have to forgive yourself if you’re going to heal.”
He thought he sounded a bit like a bad Oprah episode, but he knew he was saying the truth.
Cat shook her head.
“Stop it, Cat,” he looked into her eyes. “You can’t keep doing this to yourself! You came here to move past this, right?”
“Oh, Luke,” Cat wiped her eyes with the sweatshirt Luke had given her in the truck, “if only that were true.”
“What do you mean?”
“You think I came here to get over Landon’s death? That I’m blaming myself?”
“Yeah?” Luke was uncertain of what she was saying.
“Luke, I came here because of what happened after Landon’s death. Maybe I do blame myself, but that’s because she blames me, she told me so herself!” Cat began to sob.
“Who?” Luke wrapped his arms around her.
“His mother. Landon’s mother told me that I am the reason her son is dead,” Cat stopped crying and looked at Luke with a face that had gone numb.
“Tell me, Cat,” Luke urged. He didn’t want to lose her again.
“Alright,” and with a sigh of defeat, Cat allowed herself to remember everything she had been carefully locking away in her mind — every sorrowful and sordid detail.
Chapter Eleven
Cat sat in her hospital bed. She was still shaking uncontrollably. She had grown more aware in the last hour and scenes of what had happened were flashing in her mind. Only pieces though, she had been in and out of consciousness since they had found Landon’s body sprawled out in the garden where he had leapt to his death.
She remembered screaming, and then she remembered Samuel carrying her down the stairs. Her legs had been shaking so that she found it impossible to walk. When the ambulance had placed Landon’s body on the gurney with a sheet over it and brought it through the house, Cat had clung to it. It took several grown men to pry her off, and that was when she had hyperventilated and had to be put in an ambulance herself. After that point, she didn’t recall much of anything, until just now.
She examined the crisp white linens on which she lay. The beep-beep of the nearby machine told her she was hooked up to a heart monitor. She looked down at the hospital bracelet around her wrist. Lenox Hill Hospital.
Did they bring Landon to the same hospital? Cat closed her eyes. Some floors beneath her, Landon could be lying in a morgue, in one of those fridges they keep bodies in. She puked. She managed to turn slightly, so it ran down the side of the hospital bed and onto the floor.
She hadn’t seen his body, except from where she stood five floors above it looking down. No one would let her go outside. It was probably best. She wanted to always remember him as she knew him, not like that.
Cat heard footsteps and voices coming down the hall. It was her mother and someone else, a nurse maybe?
“Oh, my baby,” Cat’s mother came running to her side.
Cat stared blankly at her, not speaking.
“My sweet daughter. I am so sorry,” her mother was sitting beside her on the bed and rocking her back and forth.
Cat stared absently at the woman in the nurse’s uniform as she went about checking her blood pressure and calling for an orderly to clean up her vomit.
Her mother’s tears were wet against Cat’s face and dampened her hair.
“Is she okay?” her mother directed the question at the nurse.
“She’s still in shock. It would be best to keep her here overnight. But the doctor has cleared her to go if you want her to,” she said. The nurse’s tone was very much business as usual.
“No, no. She should stay. If she hyperventilated or something … it’s better that she’s here,” Cat’s mom smoothed her daughter’s hair and patted her head.
Cat looked her mom in the eyes for the first time since she entered the room.
“Do they know yet?” Cat’s voice was barely audible.
“Does who know, sweetie?” her mom leaned in.
“His parents. Do they know?” Cat watched as her mother’s eyes filled with tears.
That was her answer.
“I want to see them,” she began to get out of bed.
“No, sweetie. Now is not the time,” her mother pushed her back down with more force than Cat expected.
“Why?” Cat’s voice broke.
“Because they are in shock, too,” her mother hugged her. “I think you will both need time before you see each other. It’s best.”
Cat closed her eyes and retreated from reality into a deep, dreamless sleep. When she woke, the nightmare would be over. She was sure of it. It would be gone and Landon would be alive. Everything would be okay.
The next few days passed in a blur, but Cat never cried. She hadn’t cried since that night when they had taken his body out of the garden. Maybe, she thought, she had cried all of her tears then. She didn’t take any calls. She turned her cell off when it kept beeping that she had 54 unread texts. She just sat in her room, in her bed, or on her window seat staring into nothing. Praying that any minute she would wake up to find it had all been a very bad dream.
There was a knock at her door. She turned her head in that direction, but she couldn’t bring herself to say, “Come in.” She didn’t have the energy.
There was another knock. She turned her head back to the window. She didn’t care who it was; if they really needed her, they would come in anyways.
The door creaked open. Lili poked her head through. Her eyes were red from crying. She wore a black dress and a black hat with a veil that had belonged to their dad’s mother in the 1940’s. Always fashionable, even in mourning. Landon had been like a big brother to Lili. She was taking it very hard; not nearly as bad as Cat, though.
“Are you ready, Cat?” Lili asked, though it was clear that Cat was not ready for anything.
Still in her pajamas, hair unwashed, Cat looked down at herself.
“Ready?” clearly, she was missing something.
“The funeral,” Lili said gently. “Mom said she has come up two or three times to remind you to get ready.”
“Oh,” Cat was feeling nauseous again. They couldn’t bury Landon. They just couldn’t. Because then it would mean he was really dead. And if he was really dead, Cat feared she might die, too.
“I can help you get ready,” Lili stepped into the room.
“Okay,” Cat nodded, and turned her head to stare out the window. It was a beautiful spring day. How cruel.
With no time to shower, Lili washed Cat’s face with a washcloth. Combed through her hair, pulled it back with a thin black headband, and then into a bun. She carefully applied Cat’s makeup, substituting water proof mascara for Cat’s usual Bad Gal Lash.
When Lili came out of the closet bearing her typical black “funeral” dress, Cat spoke up, “No, not that one.”
Lili put it back, “You can’t wear your pjs, Catie.”
“My green dress. The one I got at Intermix last month. Landon was with me then. He liked it. Green was his favori
te color.”
“I think he would like that,” Lili nodded, and then finished helping her sister get dressed.
They arrived at the funeral a little early, but it was already crowded. People came to hug Cat and give their condolences. She nodded and accepted them. She didn’t know what else to do. She still hadn’t seen or spoken to his parents, and it had been five days since his death.
She wanted to see his mother. They had always been close. She was the only other person Cat could think of that would be feeling as awful as she did.
An enormous arrangement of white roses sat upon the casket. The sermon was lovely, as funeral sermons go. But the entire time, Cat didn’t believe she was actually at Landon’s funeral. Her Landon. He was only seventeen, he couldn’t be dead. People don’t die when they’re seventeen, it has to be against the law of nature or something. It wasn’t until after the funeral, when his mother and father were leading the processional out of the church and Cat caught his mother’s eye that she knew it — he was really gone. She swallowed back the tears and the terror of this realization and walked out to their car.
A long line of black town cars, all with headlights on, crossed into Brooklyn. Cat felt like an iron hand was wrapped tightly around her throat, making it difficult to breathe. Her sister was holding her hand on one side and her mother on the other when their car pulled onto Bushwick Avenue. When they entered Evergreen Cemetery, she started taking deep breaths to keep from passing out.
The car finally came to a stop along with all the others in the shade of a large oak. It was a beautiful place to be laid to rest. How ironic, Cat thought, that so much time and attention had been paid to creating a park-like landscape for those who couldn’t enjoy it. Maybe it isn’t for them, Cat thought, maybe it is for the ones who loved them. However, she didn’t feel any better about Landon’s death because he was buried by a flowering dogwood tree.
Holding tightly to her mother’s and sister’s hands, she willed her feet to move until she reached the large hole in the ground. The hole where Landon would rest from this day forward. Cat felt a lump rising in her throat. She swallowed it down.
The preacher said a few words, the casket was lowered, it was over so quickly. Cat clenched her fists and squeezed her eyes tight when they started to fill the hole in with dirt. She couldn’t watch this. Landon had never liked the dark. When they were little, he would always make her keep the night-light on during their sleepovers. She didn’t want him to be down there in the dark, all alone. She wanted to dive in there with him and shout, ‘Let me stay here, too! If Landon is down here, I need to be with him!’ He needed her. Tears started to form in her eyes. He needed her. He had needed her that night and she was on the patio with Matt Darlington. Damn her! He had needed her and she had abandoned him. If she had been there, Landon would still be alive. It was her fault. Everything was her fault.
When she opened her eyes most of the crowd had cleared away. Many were already in their cars or half way there. Her family was milling over to the side, exchanging regards with others Cat didn’t bother to look at. Directly across from Cat, on the other side of the grave, stood Landon’s mom. When Cat opened her eyes, she saw Mrs. Jennings staring at her. Not a sad stare or an understanding stare, but a look that told Cat she wished it was her in that grave instead of her only child.
With some speed, Mrs. Jennings came around the grave until she was face to face with Cat.
“Mrs. Jennings,” Cat began. She had rehearsed, over and over the last few days, what she would say to Landon’s mother and father when she had the chance.
“How could you?” Landon’s mother spat at her.
“I — I — I’m so terribly sorry,” Cat’s eyes swam with tears. “He was my best friend.”
“Is that how you treat your best friend?” her voice was shrieking now, drawing attention from all those left to hear. “You killed him! You deserted him and you killed him!”
Cat didn’t know what to say. There were no words. Silent tears poured from her eyes. Her shoulders heaved as she accepted whatever abuse that his mother wanted to heap onto her.
“I — I’m so, so sorry,” Cat repeated. But, before she got the last word out, she was knocked sideways by the force of Mrs. Jennings full hand slap.
Cat remained on the ground as people came rushing forward. Mr. Jennings tried to take his ex-wife to the car.
Cat’s mother, father, and sister ran to help her up. Cat felt humiliated, guilty, and ashamed. She looked into Landon’s grave with a longing to join him.
“I blame you! I blame you!” Mrs. Jennings shouted until she was tucked safely in her vehicle, but even then, her muffled cries carried to Cat.
“So do I,” Cat muttered as she looked down where dirt was beginning to fill in the grave. “So do I.”
Chapter Twelve
Cat examined the left side of her face in the mirror. A very clear reddish-purple handprint was visible, even through the three layers of foundation she had carefully applied. It served as a visible reminder of the slap she had received three days ago in the graveyard.
She stepped back to look at herself. Her uniform was neatly pressed, her hair was tidy; she looked completely different than she had the previous week, staying in pajamas all day and even neglecting to shower. But on the inside, she felt the same. The bruise on her face was nothing compared to the pain that had been inflicted within.
After the scene at the graveyard, both of her parents had words with Mr. and Mrs. Jennings. Mr. Jennings was very apologetic of his ex-wife’s behavior. Mrs. Jennings remained resolute in her belief that Cat was to blame for Landon’s death. The thought of that wounded Cat to the very core of her being. The last thing she wanted to do was to get out of bed and get ready for school. However, according to her parents, she had no choice. Spence had excused her absences for one week, but any longer would hurt her perfect G.P.A.; and the school year was coming to a close.
Cat couldn’t care less about her G.P.A. It’s funny how it can take a tragedy to put life into perspective. According to Lili, Meghan had stopped by three times to see if Cat wanted to join her in what she called retail therapy. Somehow, Cat didn’t think the Alexander McQueen sample sale would make her feel any better.
There was a soft knock at the door. Accustomed now to Cat’s silent response, her dad peeked his head in the room.
“I’m heading to an early meeting,” he informed her. “I thought I could give you a ride over to Spence.”
“That’s not really in your direction,” Cat responded.
“That’s alright,” her father insisted. “I can just have the driver take the FDR all the way downtown.”
Cat knew that this would most likely make him late for work. Her father hated being late. This was his way of showing how much he cared.
“That’s sweet Dad,” Cat smiled at him and turned away to grab her bag, “But, I already told Meghan she could pick me up.”
It was a lie. However, since he couldn’t see her face when she spoke the words, he might just buy it.
“Alright,” her father began to close her door. “Call if you need anything today.”
“I will,” Cat forced a thank you smile in his direction as the door closed.
When she heard his driver leave, she walked solemnly downstairs. Her mother heard her footsteps and came around the corner to see her off.
“Is Meghan’s car here?” her mother looked at her with uncertainty. “Your father said she’s picking you up. When did you talk to her?”
Damn, Cat thought.
When Meghan had come calling last night, Cat had asked her Mom to take a message. She had said she wasn’t ready to face people yet.
“I called her this morning,” Cat lied. “I decided I needed some support for the first day back and she wanted to give me a ride.”
Her mom paused for a moment. Cat knew she was trying to apprais
e whether or not her daughter was being honest. Cat was not in the habit of lying to her parents. They always took her word on things; she had never given them any reason to think otherwise.
Her mother’s face broke into a wide smile, “I’m so glad, honey. I think having support from friends is important to healing.”
She hugged her daughter and looked out the window, “But, where is she? Meghan should be here by now, then.”
“Ummm, I told her I would walk down to her place,” Cat headed for the door. “I’m actually supposed to be there right now. She’s probably wondering where I am.”
“Do you want me to walk with you?” her mother hurried after her.
“No,” Cat forced another grateful semi-smile, “I think I’ll be okay. Really.”
“Alright,” her mother hugged her again, “I’ll be thinking of you today.”
Cat nodded.
She wished there wasn’t a reason for everyone to be thinking of her. She wished Landon was here. She wished this morning, like all of the past mornings, that they were eating breakfast at Eli’s and she was scolding him for making her late.
She set off to the end of the block and then turned right to walk in the direction of Meghan’s townhouse, which was two blocks down, just in case her mother was watching.
After going two blocks, she leaned against the side of the building. Decision time. Was she going to school?
She heaved a sigh and crossed the street to begin her walk through the park. It was a beautiful May day. Only five weeks of school left. Finals were being held over the next two weeks and then the last three weeks would be spent preparing and presenting their portfolios to show the evidence of learning that had occurred their junior year.
She reached Fifth Avenue quickly. She didn’t even remember walking there; she had been so deep in thought.
Staring to her right she saw The Met. If only it wasn’t Monday, she would slip inside and lose herself for a few hours in art. It was one of her favorite hobbies — a pastime inherited from her mother. Before her mother had kids, she had worked at Sotheby’s and was an Art History major in college. Cat was not an artist herself, but it was something for which she had always had an appreciation.
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