by Halli Gomez
“What?”
“It’s not that I don’t want you to. Really. I’ve got this fantasy thing going on in my head about us being together forever,” I said. “But it would make things so much worse for you. He’d never let you out of his sight.”
She scowled. “How much?”
“It’s really expensive. Like five hundred dollars.”
“Well, what else? A train? A bus? I know you have the prices. Probably in a nice little spreadsheet on your phone.”
I cringed. It was true, but I didn’t expect her of all people to throw it in my face.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that,” she said.
Like what? You didn’t mean to make fun of my OCD?
“Don’t you want me to go?” she asked.
Her hair fell over the side of her face. Did I ever tell her what that did to me? I picked up my phone and opened it to the notes section. I had info on every possible route to Schenectady. I read them to her with the prices.
“You’re not kidding! Do you have enough for a bus ticket?”
“Almost. But since my dad won’t let me work right now, it’s going to take a little longer.”
I had to get away and think before she announced she had hundreds of dollars stashed in her bedroom and would be ready to go at midnight. I scanned the park. “Um, I have to go to the bathroom.”
I needed to give her a reason why she couldn’t go with me, besides her dad, because she was so mad at him she wouldn’t care. I stepped away from the playground, down a tree-lined path, and headed toward the bushes. I collapsed on the ground and dropped my head in my hands. Wasn’t this what I wanted? A girlfriend who loved me so much she’d follow me anywhere? Okay, it wasn’t what I had originally asked for, but who knew this would be so much better than one kiss? Who would have even thought it was possible? Or that I’d be the one to leave?
My hands squeezed tight and pulled my hair. It felt good. I did it again. Harder. Repeat. Harder. I hoped it would stimulate my brain. It didn’t. I stood up as clueless as before, but now with a few strands of hair wrapped in my fingers, and walked back to the table.
Khory stared at my phone. In the glow of the lamppost, I saw her eyebrows scrunched together. Didn’t she understand the prices? How could she not? With my OCD, if I wrote something, everyone understood it.
She glanced up at me, and I realized she wasn’t confused. She wasn’t reading the travel list.
We stared at each other for a very long second. I would have sworn that time froze, but it didn’t because I was counting. As soon as I reached ten, I lunged toward the phone, but she pulled it out of my reach. I fell against the table.
“What’s your List of Ten?” she asked barely above a whisper.
“It’s not what you think,” I said. “Can I please have my phone?”
I leaned toward her and reached out. She got up and paced the picnic area. For a second I considered grabbing her, but the phone didn’t matter anymore. She knew what the list said and what it meant.
“I can’t believe I helped you do these things and all this time you were planning this. The whole zero-gravity thing. And I kissed you. I was your first, right?”
I nodded. Tears ran down her face. She tried to swipe them away with her fingers, but there were too many.
“Can I explain?”
She shook her head. “So now that I was dumb enough to help you with your plan, you’re almost there. Were you even going to come back and say goodbye, or just kill yourself there?”
My stomach tumbled. “I’m not going to do it. Things are different now.” I would’ve said anything to get her to stop crying, even a lie. I took a step toward her. She tensed and pressed herself against the fence.
“How could you even consider it? We have things to do.”
“Listen, I still wanted to kiss you and talk about Tourette in front of people. And there are things I need to work out with my mom. But you’re right, life is a gift, so my list turned into one like yours.”
“You lied to me. We shared our secrets. I told you my biggest fears, and you just lied to me.”
“Okay, I didn’t share everything, but you can see why, right?”
She shook her head.
“Fine. You have this big dream about the future. I’m happy for you. But don’t stand there and judge me when you have no idea what my life was like.”
My neck twitched. I counted to ten. I wanted to scream. Throw something.
“I’m in pain every day,” I said. “The only time it goes away is when I’m so drugged up I can’t function. Or stoned, which isn’t much better because I can’t live my life like that. I’m tired of the fear and ridicule in people’s eyes when they see me. Am I a freak or a psycho that needs to be wrestled to the ground?”
Khory stared at the ground. Reality is hard to look in the eyes.
I squeezed my hands and dug my nails into my palms. “I hurt Jude. Did I tell you? I squeezed his hand so hard he cried. I could have broken his fingers because I couldn’t control the tics. I cut myself with a knife. And scissors. Not because I wanted to die, but because it was more painful to fight the urge.”
She looked up, her eyes wide.
“I thought life would be so much easier for everyone,” I said.
I collapsed on the bench. Even as I tried to make her understand and convince her I changed my mind, I still felt the same. Yeah, I’d met the most amazing girl in the world and had real friends who overlooked everything, even if their parents didn’t, but the reality was, they wouldn’t be around forever. They’d go to different colleges or move to different cities. Find different friends. The only things that would stay were the pain, loneliness, and embarrassment.
“I’m not going to tell you I understand what you feel, but everyone has pain. Some that will never go away,” she said.
Her eyes were dark except for the sparkle of tears.
“I want to be brave like you. And I’m working on it,” I said. “Maybe someone knows about a new medication I haven’t tried. Maybe I’ll ask Rainn’s mom about some herbal or mystical concoction. If she’ll talk to me.”
That brought a tiny hint of a smile to her face. I’d take any little bit I could get.
“So what happens when you see your mom? When number nine is done?”
“I get answers to questions that have haunted me for six years. And then I come home to you.”
“And what about number ten?”
“I told you, things changed.” I got up and moved to her. I wrapped my arms around her. She hugged me back.
“Please believe me. What can I do to prove it?” I glanced away. I couldn’t look her in the eyes. “Please don’t tell anyone. Not our friends, my dad, or your parents. It’s done. No one needs to know but us.”
She dropped her arms and pushed me away. She studied me. “You promise things have changed?”
“Yes, I promise.” I was surprised at how smoothly the words rolled out of my mouth. But that was the definition of desperation. It made a person lie to anyone, even to the one they loved the most.
. . . . . . . . . .
My neck twitched in triple time during the twelve-minute bike ride home. I didn’t realize it could go that fast. A stabbing pain made itself at home in my left shoulder blade. Then something popped.
I dumped my bike in the bushes, crawled back through my window, and went straight to the bathroom. I accidentally caught sight of myself in the mirror. My head was bent toward my left shoulder. I tried to straighten it, but the pain went from seventy to one hundred.
I got in the shower and let the water pound it.
The hot water usually loosened my muscles, but tonight it had a lot to work through. I was almost at scalding before the pain went from one hundred to ninety-five. Then ninety. And all the way down to fifty, where it hung out for a while. I washed myself and let the rhythmic sound of pounding water calm my brain.
When the pain was down to twenty, my head was now sort of in the u
pright position. I got dressed, took my medicine, and went to my room.
Dad sat on my bed, hands in his lap.
“Shit!” I screamed.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you,” Dad said.
“Why are you in my room?”
Was he going to subject me to weekly drug tests? Did he search my room when I was in the shower? I glanced around for anything that could be used against me. I tried not to focus on my mattress and the scissors waiting for me.
“The Prices called,” he said.
I leaned against the wall and crossed my arms.
“I know you and Khory snuck out, and we will deal with that later, but first tell me about the note. The one that said you were going to kill yourself.”
So much for true love. My neck twitched. The pain rate of twenty was going back up.
“Is it true?” Dad asked.
I wasn’t in the mood for this conversation again tonight. The talk with Khory left me emotionally and physically exhausted.
“It was,” I said.
“Was? Not anymore?”
I shook my head. I had the right to remain silent.
He stared at me. Studied me. Like he was trying to read my mind.
“What changed your mind?”
If this was an interrogation technique, it was pretty damn effective. My tics ramped up. I tried hard to calm myself, but I couldn’t clear my mind enough to picture anything.
“My life got better. I have a girlfriend and friends. At least I did until recently.” Having one friend was good, but add a girlfriend, more friends, and BAM! Instant social life. I could play the psychology-interrogation game, too.
“Let me ask you something: does any of this have to do with the driving stunt?”
I wish I knew what Khory told her parents. A note was one thing. A list with details was another. But I’d been lying for so long, what was one more?
“No,” I said. “That driving stunt was the only way I’d ever get to drive.”
“We could have talked about it. Found some way that was safe.”
“So all those times I asked, and brought home papers from school, you never thought those were good times to talk?”
Dad sighed and frowned. “I was worried. Not about you, you’re responsible. It’s the Tourette.”
“I am the Tourette!” I put my hand over my face. “Never mind.”
“No, let’s talk. Like we did in New York. I’d hoped after that you would have come to me with these feelings.”
“After one talk we’re supposed to be best friends? If I didn’t tell Khory, did you really think I’d tell you?”
Dad put his head in his hand. “I’m changing my schedule so I’ll be home before Terri leaves. That way you won’t have to worry about watching Jude.”
What? Suddenly I’d gone from being the babysitter to having one. I pressed my lips together and put my hands behind my back. They squeezed and opened. Squeezed and opened. Repeat. Of course I couldn’t hide the neck twitch, and now the pain was down the right side of my neck, too.
“I want you to focus on yourself right now. Being a teenager is hard enough without the added pressure you have,” Dad said. “I also think talking to someone again might help.”
Did he have a suicide checklist or something?
1. Don’t leave the kid alone
2. See a psychiatrist
I refused to go back to Hardly Qualified. I scrunched my nose and sighed.
“If you don’t want to see the same person, we can find you someone else. We can talk about that later.”
I slumped against the wall. Dad got off the bed, came over to me, and put his hands on my shoulders. There were tears in his eyes.
I twisted away from him.
His hands dropped, and he stood there for a minute. My neck twitched. My face scrunched.
“Don’t stare at me!” I yelled.
“I—” he started. Then he turned and shuffled out.
All I wanted was to be free, but now I was more trapped than before.
My phone vibrated. There were seven texts and three voicemails from Khory. At least she had the decency to make it an even ten. Did she do that because she understood me, or was it just a coincidence and she really had no idea how my brain worked? But how could she when I didn’t get it myself?
I scanned the texts. They were all pretty much the same. “I’m sorry, I feel guilty, I love you.” Her first voicemail gave the details.
“I know you said you weren’t going to do it anymore, and it’s not that I don’t believe you, but I couldn’t stop thinking about it. And if something changed your mind and you did it and I didn’t say anything . . .” By that point she was crying.
Maybe she really did get me, because a part of her knew I was lying. And maybe I would have done the same thing. Especially if I already knew what losing someone felt like. But I wasn’t her. I was the one who had to live with myself, and I couldn’t do that anymore.
MARCH 29
I yanked the schoolbooks out of my backpack and shoved in clothes, medicine, a toothbrush, and deodorant. Then I pulled my blanket to the pillow and turned off my light. Dad said a lot tonight; I’d hoped he was as emotionally done as I was and wouldn’t want to talk anymore. I needed at least an eight-hour head start.
I opened my window, climbed out, and got my bike from the bushes. I needed help. Actually, I needed money. The problem was, you couldn’t just ask anyone. Money was so damn hard to come by, especially for teenagers, and everyone wanted to keep it for themselves for crap like ten-dollar coffees. I had to find someone close to me, like a family member or a really good friend.
Family was clearly out, and since Khory would never give it to me because she knew I was full of shit, Jay now had the distinction of being my closest friend. Lucky him.
I’d never been to his house, but I knew where it was. He lived three houses down from Khory. I slowed down as I got near her house. Her bedroom light was on. Was she lying on her bed or taking the pictures of us off her bulletin board? I knew she loved me, but I wouldn’t blame her if she wanted to break up. This was a problem as far from simple as Pluto was from Earth. Simple would have been you kissed my best friend. This one was way too complex for me to understand.
I sped up and stopped at Jay’s. Even in the dark it was clear his parents weren’t as obsessed about gardening as Mr. Price. Other than that, the house was the same, two stories, brick, with two trees in the front yard.
I leaned my bike against one, ran to the door, and dried my hands on my jeans. His parents’ first impression of me sucked since I almost got their son arrested, but I was desperate. I took a deep breath, knocked on the door, then paced the porch.
My neck twitched. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven—
The door opened. “Can I help you?”
I spun around and faced Jay’s mom. She glared at me and put her hands on her hips. Eight, nine, ten.
“Mrs. Davidson, I’m really sorry to bother you, but it’s an emergency.” I went for a manners-and-desperation combo. The best tactic for a sweaty kid full of adrenaline and twitching up a storm.
“It’s late and he’s grounded,” she said.
Good thing it wasn’t a life-or-death kind of emergency. But then I probably wouldn’t be knocking on his door.
“I know. And I’m sorry, but it will only take a second. It’s very important.”
She inspected me. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. My neck twitched, and my hands squeezed together. Sweat dripped down my chest. Her eyes wouldn’t leave me. I stood there and took it. I had no choice.
“Wait here. I’ll get him.” She closed the door and left me there.
I waited, counted to ten four times, and prayed she wasn’t calling the police.
The door opened again. “Sorry, my mom’s a little cranky. Come in,” Jay said.
“It’s okay, she’s allowed to be. Look, I need a favor. I need to borrow some money. I’ll pay you b
ack. I promise.” I shifted my feet.
Jay inspected me the same way she did. Genetics always amazed me.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Yeah. I’m going to see my mom in New York. That’s why I’ve been working. I almost have enough for the bus ticket, but I just need a little more.”
He leaned against the wall. “You didn’t ask your dad?”
“I can’t,” I said. “We got in a fight. Plus, their divorce was really bad. They haven’t spoken in six years.” I looked him in the eyes, pleading. “And before you ask, Khory and I had a fight too, so I can’t ask her.”
I stuffed my hands in my pockets and turned toward the door. “Never mind. I understand. I don’t want to get you into more trouble.”
Jay stood straight. “No, it’s okay. I’ve got money in my room. Come on.”
I let out a big sigh. “Thanks. I really appreciate it. You have no idea.”
I followed him to his room. It was exactly what I expected. Clothes on the floor, an unmade bed, and shelves of model cars. He was the opposite of me in every way.
Jay opened his desk drawer and pulled out sixty dollars. All he had.
“Is this good?” he asked.
“Yeah, perfect. Thanks again. I’ll be back in a couple days, and I’ll pay you back.”
“No problem.”
We walked back down the hallway to the front door.
“What’s the rush?” Jay asked. “Why don’t you wait until you have money for a plane ticket? It’s got to be better than taking a bus.”
“I know. But plane tickets are majorly expensive, and since I’m grounded, my dad won’t let me work.”
“Ha, you’d think work would be a punishment.” He nodded toward my bike. “You riding to the station?”
“Yeah. I have a few things I need to get first, though. Eight hours is a long ride. I need something to keep me busy.”
“Next time you should suck it up and fly.”
“No kidding.”
“I hope things work out with your mom.” Jay patted me on the back. “And Khory.”
“Thanks. Me too.”
I put the money in my pocket, then rode to the bus station. It was farther than I’d ever ridden, but I had to save every penny for the trip. What if Mom wouldn’t see me? I had to stay somewhere. Or go back home.
