The Catastrophic History of You And Me

by Jess Rothenberg

  I felt my anger beginning to slip away.

  He misses me.

  Brie, don’t do that.

  But what if he does?

  What would it change?

  Maybe he’s sorry.

  He SHOULD be sorry.

  I opened my mouth, but nothing came out. I could smell his cologne. Just the slightest hint.

  God that smells good.

  I wanted him to hold me. To tell me everything would be okay. That this was all a bad dream and we could be together again. Maybe even forever.

  You’re not focusing.

  I can’t do this.

  He doesn’t love you.

  Shut up, Patrick.

  I reached out, the tips of my fingers just inches from Jacob’s jacket, baby bolts of lightning running across them. The hair on my arms and on the back of my neck stood up, charged with electricity.

  Milo and Will reached him before I could.

  “Hey man,” said Milo. “What’s up? We’ve been waiting for over an hour.”

  “I texted you a bunch,” said Will. “You okay? You don’t look so good.”

  Jacob shook his head. “I—I needed space. Wasn’t in the mood for a party. I didn’t want Maya to have this thing. I told her to cancel it.”

  Will and Milo exchanged concerned glances. “It’s cool, it’s cool,” said Will. “Everyone’s having a good time.”

  Jacob nodded, his eyes still locked on the floor.

  Poor Jacob. He’s all alone. Nobody understands what he’s going through. Nobody but me.

  “You were with her tonight, huh?” said Milo.

  I froze at the word.

  Her?

  I spun to face Patrick, in case I hadn’t actually heard Milo right. “What’s he talking about?”

  Patrick just shook his head and backed away. “Don’t ask me.”

  I turned back to the three boys.

  “She still pretty upset?” Will said, his voice low.

  “Yeah.” Jacob nodded. “She won’t stop crying.”

  I felt as if a lethal dose of poison had been injected into my bloodstream and was slowly starting to work its way into my chest cavity.

  “She? Who is she?” I glared at Jacob. “Who the hell are you talking about?” If my eyes could have vaporized someone where they stood, he would’ve been a pile of ashes on the floor. I still didn’t understand why he’d broken up with me out of nowhere. Could there have been someone else all along? Another girl? A girl he’d chosen over me?

  Suddenly, a blinding wall of flame and smoke and molten hot lava shot up from the living room floor, forcing me backward.

  Brie! Be careful!

  I have to know. I have to know who she is.

  You need to focus.

  No. Do NOT even speak to me. I need to hear him. I need to hear him say it.

  “Really sucks, man,” said Milo, shaking his head. “But I guess it’s good you guys can, you know, be there for each other.”

  Each other?!

  Here I’d been practically ready to forgive him. Ready to do whatever it took to come crawling back through time and space and a whole other realm of existence so we could be together again. But this? This was too much. A scorching ache began to bubble back up inside of me, pain searing through my chest.

  Patrick was in my head: Focus it. Use it.

  Screw you.

  Good. Yes. Channel!

  “Yeah,” said Jacob, running his hands through his hair. “She’s okay. This whole thing’s been pretty hard for her.”

  How DARE you. Hard for HER? Aren’t you forgetting someone?

  My fists were clenched. Smoke was radiating off my skin. I was on fire.

  Do it. Do it right now.

  I pushed through Will and Milo.

  “Whoa,” said Will, stumbling back. “Dude, did you feel that?”

  “Shit, that was weird,” said Milo. His face went pale.

  I was three inches from Jacob’s face. His eyes were confused. He was looking right through me, but there was something there. Some hint, no matter how small, of recognition. That was all I needed.

  You’ve got him.

  “Brie?” whispered Jacob, just loud enough for me to hear him. I could feel the uneasy rhythm of his heartbeat. Panicked. Pulsing. Alive.

  Must be nice.

  I leaned even closer, closing the gap between us. Orange and blue flames flickered across my skin. His eyes widened. Then, as light as a feather, I brushed my lips against his cheek. Just barely.

  “Yes, it’s me,” I whispered.

  Focus. Patrick was still with me. I could feel his eyes burning into me.

  “Jacob, dude, seriously—are you okay?” Milo was shaken. The rest of the party had caught on that some weird stuff was going down. Someone turned the music off.

  Jacob was standing in the middle of the room like he’d seen a ghost. I don’t know about seen one, but he’d definitely heard one.

  I watched his eyes dart back and forth across the room. His palms were sweating and I could tell he was spooked.

  Big-time.

  But I wasn’t done with him yet. I still had something I needed to get off my chest.

  “It’s your fault,” I whispered into his ear, a touch louder this time.

  In an instant, all the blood drained from his face. “Whoever’s doing this, it’s not funny!” he cried. The entire room went still. All eyes were on him.

  “Chill, man, it’s cool,” said Milo, trying to settle him down. He grabbed Jacob by the arm. “Come on, let’s get you some air.”

  Do it. You’ve got him. Do it now.

  I held my ground and leaned in even closer. Slowly, I wrapped my arms around his waist. Felt his entire body tense at my touch.

  Then I whispered three perfect words right into his ear. Three words I’d locked away ever since that night.

  “You killed me.”

  He started screaming.

  And he didn’t stop until the entire party had cleared out.

  CHAPTER 14

  nothing compares 2 u

  Patrick and I walked slowly down the road, side by side in the moonlight, the air a mix of chilly ocean and eucalyptus forest. We didn’t have a destination in mind. All I knew was we were heading north, away from Jacob’s house, toward the city. We walked for a long while without speaking.

  “That was impressive,” he said after a while, finally break-ing the silence. “I wasn’t sure you had it in you, Cheese Puff.”

  I forced a smile. “I was pretty awesome, if I do say so myself.”

  Still, I couldn’t shake the feeling that things hadn’t turned out like they were supposed to. On one hand, I knew I should’ve felt really good about scaring the hell out of Jacob. And I knew I should’ve felt some sense of relief, or finality. After all, I’d just made him look like a total freak in front of most of our junior class and a bunch of his sister’s friends from Stanford.

  None of it had made a difference. I was still stuck in this stupid place, and I still wasn’t any closer to getting home. I guess part of me had been hoping Jacob might have had a change of heart. Hoping that maybe he’d realized just how badly he’d messed up. How completely idiotic he had been to throw away someone as good as me.

  But he hadn’t.

  Instead, all he had been thinking about was her. Another girl. Someone prettier, funnier, sillier, and who was I kidding, probably more boob-tastic than I’d ever be. Someone who “got him” in a way I never would. Someone who, I couldn’t help wishing, would break his heart just as much as he had broken mine.

  “Love sucks, huh?” said Patrick.

  I nodded. “Yeah. It does.”

  He put his arm around my shoulder. “It’ll go away. This feeling, I mean. You’ll forget all about him before you know it.”

  I stopped walking. “What if I don’t want to forget?”

  I sank down to my knees. I’d been so stupid to believe that he had loved me. I’d been so wrong to think that showing up at his siste
r’s Halloween party would change what had happened between us. That it would prove anything. There was nothing I could have done differently. Nothing I could change. The letters in my headstone were not temporary. They had been carved to last a lifetime. They had been carved to last forever.

  AUBRIE ELIZABETH EAGAN

  FRIEND. DAUGHTER. ANGEL.

  FOREVER IN OUR HEARTS.

  NOVEMBER 1, 1994—OCTOBER 4, 2010

  I felt it then. I knew it for real. I wasn’t coming back. I’d been living in a fantasy world full of promises that someday, somehow, I’d return to my old life. A life that would be waiting for me with open arms. Full of hope and laughter and love and second chances. But the truth had finally caught up with me, just like Patrick said it would. And it wasn’t fair.

  Patrick sat down next to me. I watched him reach into his faded jeans pocket and pull out the crumpled-up napkin—the one from Slice—where he’d written down a list of words. He bit the cap off his pen and unfolded the napkin. Then, without meeting my eyes, he carefully crossed the first word off the list.

  Denial

  I tried so hard to fight the tears, but they came anyway. “Why me?” I screamed up to the sky. “WHY? What the hell did I do to deserve this? To deserve any of this?!” I collapsed against him, sobbing. Hot, angry tears pouring out of me and into the sandy, soggy ground.

  “It’s okay,” said Patrick, his voice soft and serious. For once. “I’m right here.”

  He let me cry into his lap for I don’t know how long, right below a giant redwood tree on the edge of Highway 1. He stroked my hair. Told me everything would be okay. The stars were all out, twinkling and shining, and the ground had grown damp beneath us. I felt him lean back and slowly unzip his jacket. He placed it over me, and I snuggled in even closer. I was so angry and upset I could hardly keep my eyes open, like a little kid after a temper tantrum.

  “I bet,” I whispered, “once upon a time, you made someone really, really happy.”

  If Patrick answered me, I didn’t hear him.

  I had already fallen into a dark, distant, stormy sleep.

  PART 3

  anger

  CHAPTER 15

  you ain’t nothing but a hound dog

  I’ve never really been one of those people who remembers her dreams. I’ve literally tried everything—journals, tape recorders, getting the girls to tell me if I ever talked in my sleep—but zilch, nada, nothing. With the creepy exception of my recurring motorcycle nightmare, nothing ever really seemed to stick.

  But not this time.

  For some strange reason, on this particular night, something told me this was a dream I was going to remember. And when I finally came to the following morning, still curled up in Patrick’s lap, guess what?

  It was.

  I dreamed about Hamloaf.

  Or, specifically, I dreamed about the time Hamloaf ate my favorite stuffed animal—a bunny I had named Mrs. Fluff. I’d screamed my head off when I had climbed into bed that night to find my beloved Mrs. Fluff missing from her usual spot under the covers. Her fuzzy pink nose. Her soft pink ears. The floppiest ever.

  Vanished, without a trace.

  At first, Mom and Dad said I must have left her somewhere. Over at Sadie’s house. In the laundry room. Under my bed. I denied all their accusations. Because I knew the truth. Mrs. Fluff wasn’t missing . . . Mrs. Fluff had been kidnapped.

  Chaos morphed into pandemonium when Dad noticed a strange trail of slobbery cotton leading from the upstairs hallway, down the stairs, into the living room, and right out of Hamloaf’s doggy door. Yes. It’s true. The dog ate my bunny. He ate her pink nose, worn from where I’d kissed it a thousand times. He ate her floppy pink ears. He even ate her beautiful blue glass eyes. (One of which showed up a few days later, it should be noted, a little less blue and a little less shiny.)

  “Everything,” I whispered, still only half-awake. “I remember everything.”

  I remembered Mrs. Fluff. I remembered Hamloaf’s swollen belly as he lay stretched in the starlight, all passed out and full of bunny. I remembered being angrier than I’d ever been in my young, short life, and the remorseful look in his sweet, brown, hound-doggy eyes when he saw me crying. I remembered the way he’d pressed his soft, black, whiskery nose to my face to say he was sorry.

  And then, for some reason, I remembered the way Mom had held me in her arms that night, telling me that Hamloaf was only a puppy. And that he hadn’t meant it. I remembered the smell of her hair and the warmth of her terry cloth robe. I remembered the way she’d made me feel better in that special Mom-Way nobody else on earth could ever do.

  But this was more than memory. This was longing. Unexpected, overwhelming longing. This was holding hands when I was little, and the two of us being silly in our pajamas on Saturday mornings. This was us hurting each other because we could and being best friends and growing apart and the anger and resentment over what neither of us had fought hard enough to hold on to because—in the end—kids have to grow up someday. These were feelings I had locked away and buried in a time capsule, sealed off in a safe, secret place deep inside where nobody would ever find it. A place that somehow, over time, I had forgotten.

  I missed my family. I missed my mom.

  I opened my eyes, swollen from crying, and looked up at Patrick.

  “Angel?” he said.

  “I want to go home.”

  “You want to talk about why?”

  I shook my head. Stretched and got to my feet. Something felt hard and heavy in my chest, like a block of concrete had settled in there while I was sleeping. But something else had settled in there too. A plan, which I was looking forward to putting into action.

  But first, home.

  “So.” He sounded upbeat, like he was trying to lighten the mood. “I was thinking I’d show you this really cool spot not too far from here—”

  “I want to go home,” I said again. “Now.”

  He gave me a funny look. “A little bossy this morning, aren’t we?”

  “If that’s what you want to call it.”

  He scratched his head. “The thing is . . .”

  “What?” I said. “The thing is what?”

  “It could be a little bit of a problem, is all,” he said.

  “And why would that be?”

  He sighed and dug his hands into his pockets. “Listen up, Homeslice. I know you don’t like to hear it, but things are different now. You can’t just go doing every little thing exactly like you used to do—”

  “Who says?”

  “Seriously?”

  I glared back. “Do I look like I’m joking?”

  “Man,” he said. “Somebody woke up on the wrong side of the highway.”

  “So just zoom us or whatever.” I held out my hand. “I’m ready.”

  He crossed his arms. “Allow me to remind you that I am not your personal chauffer.”

  “That’s funny,” I said. “Because I think that’s exactly what you are.”

  “You’re really something else,” Patrick muttered before grabbing my hand.

  I felt a jolt of electricity shoot through me.

  “Ouch!” I yelped, and jerked my hand away. “Jeez! Electrocute me much?”

  “Aw,” Patrick said. “The sparks are totally flying between us. Groovy.”

  I rubbed my arm, scowling. “Nobody says groovy anymore, dork face.”

  “Look,” he said. “Don’t shoot the messenger. You’ve got every right to be pissed off, but don’t forget.”

  “Don’t forget what?” I snapped.

  He kicked a big rock hard, sending it flying across the road. “Don’t forget I’m all you’ve got now, okay?”

  His words stung, but I couldn’t help marveling at what I’d just seen. Somehow, Patrick had made that rock move. With his foot. He’d made contact with an object that existed in the Real World. Even though he didn’t. I was totally stunned.

  “How’d you do that?”

  “Sorry? Yo
u mean you don’t know everything about being D and G? Well isn’t that a shocker.”

  “Okay, okay,” I groaned. “I get it. I’m sorry.”

  “Say it first.”

  “You’re the only one I’ve got,” I mumbled.

  “I can’t heeear you . . .”

  “You’re the only one I’ve got!” I felt my face flush. “Now will you show me how the hell you did that or what?”

  He smiled. “First things first.” He grabbed my hand, pulling me close. Before I knew what was happening, it was as if we’d taken off on the most barf-tastic roller coaster ride of all time, spinning through the air at speeds so insane I wanted to throw up just thinking about them. My stomach was in my throat, my feet were on fire, and I couldn’t even hear the sound of my own voice against the wind, screaming for it to stop.

  Then, suddenly, it did.

  “Home sweet home,” said Patrick.

  I opened my eyes. Felt my whole body shaking and spasming and generally freaking out as gravity and inertia caught up with the rest me. “D-d-don’t ever d-d-do that again.”

  “I’ll make a note of it, Angel,” Patrick said.

  I didn’t like him calling me Angel. Just like I did not appreciate all the cheese-themed nicknames, or the way he always seemed to get information out of me without ever really telling me anything about himself. But for now, I was willing to let all of it slide.

  Because we were standing in my driveway.

  11 Magellan Avenue.

  The house was drenched in shadows. All the windows closed. All the curtains drawn. As if whoever lived here had moved away years ago. Or simply stopped caring.

  It had only been a few weeks since my death, which wasn’t long at all, especially in the grand scheme of All Eternity. But seeing the way the cool autumn light hit the roof—the muddy, yellow, uncut yard; the dried-up leaves in all of their messy decay; the eerie whisper of the ocean just a few blocks west—it suddenly seemed like so much longer.