The Catastrophic History of You And Me

by Jess Rothenberg

  I felt the wind against my face and neck as he lifted me into his arms.

  My eyes were locked on the spot, just three or four feet away, where Sadie and Jacob’s footprints had started to blur together in the sand.

  I can’t breathe.

  “You can.” Patrick brushed his lips lightly against my forehead. “You have to.” Then, in one swift movement, his feet left the ground, and I felt the earth begin to fall away beneath us.

  Aubrie, open your eyes.

  I took a deep breath and opened them. Then I laid my head against Patrick’s chest and watched as my old, familiar, perfect world slowly went up in flames.

  CHAPTER 21

  1, 2, 3, 4, tell me that you love me more

  In my slice of heaven, all of the days smelled the same. My hours were made out of roasted eggplant and portobello mushroom and fizzy, bubbly Sprite and Wendy’s Frostys (my own personal request). My minutes were made out of checkered linoleum floors, stained and scratched from where chairs had been scraped over them decade after decade. My seconds buzzed like static on that old tiny TV with terrible reception—the one I’d seen Patrick stare at for hours on end without blinking. Ceiling fans whirred and spun lazily above my head, reminding me of all the summer vacations and pool parties and ice-cold lemonades I’d never get to enjoy again with my best friends.

  Not that I cared.

  Best friends are overrated.

  Sure, there were plenty of things to distract me from thinking about my new discovery. I taught myself how to tear snowflake patterns into paper napkins. I learned how to throw a football and put on really heavy eyeliner, thanks to my new friends Quarterback Dude and Lady Gothga. Crossword Lady even took me under her wing and helped me finish my very first crossword puzzle.

  The truth was, in my slice of heaven, there was always plenty of pizza to eat. Always plenty of waves to surf. Always plenty of time to kill. But the sort of sucky thing is, time doesn’t necessarily heal all wounds.

  Sometimes, it just makes the wounds worse.

  “Wanna go for a walk or something?” Patrick was fidgety. Bored.

  “Nope.”

  “Maybe a swim?”

  “Negatory.”

  “Pony ride?”

  “No, thanks.”

  “Wanna make out?”

  I looked up from my book. “Excuse me?”

  Patrick grinned. “Thought that might get your attention.”

  “You’re a lunatic.”

  “Aw,” he gushed, “that is so sweet.” He glanced over at Nintendo Boy and Bojangles. “See? She likes me. You two are my witnesses.”

  “I’m pretty sure she hates you,” the boy replied in a monotone voice, his thumbs flying across the keypad.

  Patrick huffed and looked back at me. “Kids. What do they know?”

  I ignored him and sped through the last paragraph. Slapped the D&G shut and pushed it toward him across the booth table. “There. Finished.”

  “So?” he said. “What did you learn today, Grasshopper?”

  “You mean besides the fact that you smell like pepperoni?”

  “Very funny.”

  “Don’t mention it.”

  “What else did you learn?”

  “That your m—”

  “Do not say that my mother smells like pepperoni.”

  I made a face. “Well, she does.”

  He sighed and pointed at my necklace. “I like that, by the way. Been meaning to tell you.”

  I reached up, twisting the delicate gold chain back and forth between my fingers.

  He watched me quietly. “Where’d you get it?”

  I didn’t answer.

  “Sore subject?”

  “I want to go to the bridge,” I blurted out.

  “Excuse me?” He sat back, looking shocked. “And what would the point of that be, exactly?”

  I shrugged. “I just think I’m ready.”

  He smacked his hand on his forehead and shook his head.

  “What?”

  “I was just wondering,” he said with an extra dose of sarcasm, “do you ENJOY pain and suffering?”

  I glared back.

  “Well? Do you?”

  “No,” I mumbled.

  He arched his eyebrow. “That’s funny. Because I think you do. I think you love it.”

  “Well, I think you’re an idiot.”

  “Am I?”

  “Yes,” I said. “A big one.”

  “Idiot or not, you’re not going. You’re not ready.”

  “Oh no?” I shot back. “Who made you the authority?”

  “Me,” he said, leaning forward. “I made me the authority. Ever since you decided to throw all logic and reason right out the window.”

  “I just want to—”

  “What?” he cut me off. “You just want to what? See them together again? See them happier without you? Think you can handle that?” He leaned back. “’Cause I don’t.”

  “I don’t remember asking for your opinion,” I snapped.

  “Well, I don’t remember you asking me when you decided to mope around for months and months. Because that’s been really fun for me.”

  Months and months.

  He was right. Time was passing all around us. A shabby little plastic Christmas tree still sat in the corner window of Slice, even though Christmas had come and gone. I’d been dead long enough now that people back home were probably starting to forget. I could see younger kids coming up through the grades finding my picture in the PCH yearbook. Imagined them thinking that I looked a little bit dated. Expired. Like the pink skinny jeans I bought and was obsessed with in eighth grade, but which I wouldn’t be caught dead in now.

  Ugh.

  “Oh right,” I chimed back in. “Forgive me for ruining all your fun. Because you obviously have so much going on in your busy schedule.”

  He threw up his hands. “What? Do you want to tie the poor kids to the railroad tracks? Drown them in the sea? Throw them in an abandoned ditch?”

  I gave him a big smile. “Glad we’re finally speaking the same language.”

  “Come on,” he groaned. “I know you’re all scorned and brokenhearted and stuff, but don’t you think maybe it’s time to let it go? Live and let live or something?”

  “Let it go?” I asked. “How can you even say that? You know what they did to me.” I shook my head, disgusted. “I don’t care what you say, but I am not going to let them get away with it. They don’t deserve to get away with it.”

  “Listen up, Little Miss Fatal Attraction.” Patrick gave me a stern look. “I’m all for a little payback, but you’ve had your fun. What’s done is done. You’re going to need to accept it sooner or later, and I’m not going to continue encouraging your stalkerish ways and raging hormones in the meantime.” He nodded at the book. “You haven’t learned anything, have you?”

  “Oh,” I said, “on the contrary. I’ve learned a lot. I just read that Basic Object Interaction is less about controlling the thing than it is about controlling yourself. And any object found and collected on earth becomes the ‘soul’ property of its finder. So there.”

  It was a pretty cool rule, actually. Probably could’ve explained a bunch of the world’s missing socks and stolen diamonds.

  “How astute,” Patrick said.

  “Also, I learned you should never zoom on an empty stomach.” I grabbed my Frosty and took a giant slurp, super-loud and obnoxious. “So now that we’ve taken care of that—”

  “Now nothing,” he said. “But for the last time, you are still not going back.”

  “For the last time, YOU are not the boss of me.”

  “Says who?”

  “Said you. I make the rules, remember? I’m ready when I say I’m ready. If you don’t want to come with me, that’s fine. Because I don’t need you.” I took another long, slow sip, stinging my tongue with icy, chocolatey sweetness. “I don’t need anybody.”

  “Wow.” Patrick shook his head. “That’s pretty heartless
, Cheeto.”

  “Ironic, doncha think?”

  “Oh, what the hell,” Patrick said. He grabbed the Frosty out of my hand, threw it back, and slurped down the very last drop.

  “There’s no place like home.”

  CHAPTER 22

  every time I see you falling, I get down on my knees and pray

  They say that when you fall from somewhere super-high—like a plane or a skyscraper or a bridge, for example—you don’t really have time to panic. That you can’t actually process what’s happening while you’re falling and, by the time you finally land (yikes), you’re basically already dead from the shock of the fall.

  Well, guess what, boys and girls. They are lying.

  Big-time.

  This time as I fell, the seconds seemed to slow down. I knew the wind was screaming all around me, but I couldn’t hear it. I knew my limbs were buckling through empty space, but I couldn’t stop flailing for something to grab on to. I knew the dark water was rushing up toward me like a parking lot, but couldn’t bear to look. In my entire life, there had never been anything so terrifying.

  Pretend it’s a game, I heard Patrick whisper. And it will be.

  A GAME? Are you NUTS?!!

  “Eat air, Cheeto!” Patrick yelled. He zoomed right in front of me, cutting me off.

  “Hey!” I yelled. “Watch it!”

  All of a sudden I felt an old familiar sensation work its way under my skin and into my veins. My old competitive streak kicked into automatic.

  Oh no you don’t. You are going down, Dead Boy.

  I threw my arms straight out in front of me and shot forward, spinning past orange suspension cables and giant steel beams with rivets as big as my head.

  “And another thing!” I cried, gaining on him. “Don’t call me Cheeto!”

  The ocean continued to rush up, closer and closer.

  Three hundred feet.

  One hundred.

  “Wahoooo!” Patrick howled. “I feel the need, Cheeseburger! I feel the need for speed!”

  Seventy-five.

  “Here we go!” He pulled his knees into his chest and tucked his chin way down. “Cannonballlllll!”

  He was totally out of his mind. We were falling way too hard and way too fast. I knew from diving that if I didn’t hit the water at just the right angle, things were going to be ugly. I tried to make my body as straight and vertical as I possibly could. Head down, arms together, toes pointed toward the moon.

  Ten feet.

  I squeezed my eyes shut and braced myself for crash-down.

  One foot.

  For the briefest moment, all I could hear was the sound of my beating heart—or the memory of it. Then suddenly I was hurtling through a giant wormhole, a vortex made of planets and stars and the ageless Pacific, spinning headfirst into the black, starless night. An intergalactic washing machine set on turbo blast.

  But as I let myself go—as I gave myself up to the all-consuming dark—a single, smoldering, furious thought ignited in my brain.

  Jacob.

  If I couldn’t have him, nobody could.

  “Hey Cheeto, you alive? Well, not alive-alive. You know what I mean.”

  I clutched my stomach and groaned. “Why must you always be talking?” My entire body felt limp. My hair was soaked and matted and my arms and legs were twisted up and made of jelly. I tried to open my eyes, but the glare was still too bright.

  “How’s it feel to be the rotten egg?” Patrick teased. “I’d say you had nice form, overall, but your jackknife really had nothing on my cannonball. Next time, you might want to try being a little more creative.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind.” I reached up and wiped a giant piece of seaweed from my face. Peeked my eyes open and realized we had washed up on the beach at Crissy Fields, right on the edge of the Presidio.

  “Well, that’s interesting,” said Patrick.

  “What is?”

  “I had no idea this was a nude beach. California’s really come a long way since my day.”

  “What are you talking about? It’s not a nude beach.”

  But suddenly I felt the slightest draft of breeze dance across my left butt cheek.

  Oh my GOD, I’m NAKED.

  “Where are my clothes?” I cried, trying desperately to cover up. “Turn around, Patrick!”

  “Don’t worry.” He covered his eyes. “I didn’t see anything.”

  I reached up to touch my neck, and breathed a giant sigh of relief when I realized my charm necklace was still right where it was supposed to be, thank goodness. But then a fiddler crab crawled out from underneath my armpit, causing me to shriek and then jump about a foot in the air.

  “See? I said you weren’t ready to come back,” he said. “We just got here and you’re already freaking out.” He sighed. “Women.”

  It took me a few seconds of scanning the beach, but I finally spotted my dress, soggy and crumpled against a stray piece of driftwood, just a few yards from where I’d washed up on shore. I stole a glance at Patrick. “Stay exactly where you are, my friend, or suffer the consequences. Do you hear me?”

  “Sorry?”

  “I said, do you hear me?”

  “What was that?”

  “Are you deaf or something? I asked you if you could hear me!”

  He cracked a sly grin. “Yes, Cheeto, I heard you. You’ve really got to lighten up.”

  I sprang to my feet and tiptoed across the sand, doing my absolute best to cover my boobs. Not that there was a whole lot of boob to cover, but still. I peeled my waterlogged dress off the sandy, seaweedy beach, and shook it out. After a lot of pulling and tugging, I finally managed to get the thing back on over my head. The only problem was, the dress had shrunk.

  A lot.

  “You look . . . good,” Patrick said, once I’d allowed him to open his eyes.

  I scowled.

  “Not that you don’t always. Look good, I mean. Um. Because you do.”

  I felt myself blush as I pulled my dress down over my butt, which I couldn’t help being grateful hadn’t expanded with all the pizza slices and Frostys I’d gotten used to. Patrick might have been annoying, but he was still a guy. And, I couldn’t lie, a pretty cute one at that. I’d become used to him teasing me all the time, but this was the first time he’d ever really mentioned my looks before.

  Not to mention seen me naked.

  Kill myself.

  “Can you, um, zip me?” I grunted, swiping at the back of my dress.

  “Yes.” He nodded. “Yes, I can definitely do that.” He made his way over and I felt his fingers graze my neck as he gently lifted my hair.

  Suddenly, the air tasted like smoke. And my skin was on fire.

  “Don’t get any ideas,” I warned him.

  “Nothing I haven’t seen before,” he said matter-of-factly. “I did have three sisters, after all.”

  Three sisters?

  For the briefest moment, I could almost see them. Two older, both with honey-colored hair, and one younger, a blonde. Their names floated into my head.

  Julia, Kate, and Alex.

  But how could I know that?

  “I think I’ve just . . . about . . . got it.” With one final tug, he’d done it. Patrick stepped out from behind me, looking pleased with himself. “Your wish is my command.”

  I tried to think of a reasonably cool response but felt my cheeks flush an even brighter shade of red.

  Brie, don’t be dumb. Say something. Say anything.

  “You all right?” he asked. “You seem sorta weird.”

  “I’m fine,” I blurted out. “Just dizzy. From the fall.”

  The sun slipped behind a cloud, casting a long shadow across his face. I shivered a little and looked up. The fog would be rolling in soon. “We should get going.”

  He paused. “Okay, Cheese Puff, you lead the way.”

  I reached out slowly and took his hand, visualizing our exact destination, like it had said to do in the D&G. “Here goes nothing.” I
focused on the place and on the exact spot I wanted us to land. Wished I’d had another slice of pizza before takeoff.

  But then the winds picked up and the sun disappeared and I felt the world spin out from underneath my feet, until, BOOM! we slammed down onto a grassy field, collapsing in a heap.

  “Nice,” grunted Patrick. “You’re a real natural. Now can you please get off?”

  “Sorry.” I rolled off of him and tried to get my bearings. Breathed deeply and scanned the field, taking in a giant lungful of earth and grass and sky. “We’re back.” I smiled. “We made it.”

  The journey had been a little on the rocky side, but all that mattered was that I’d successfully zoomed us back to Half Moon. I felt incredible. Totally free, and totally in control.

  Best. Zoom. Ever.

  “Not to brag,” I said, “but I’m getting pretty good at this.”

  Patrick was too busy checking out our surroundings to answer me. I didn’t blame him. The California coastline was just beginning to wake up from its winter nap. The hills had started to sprout flowers, and their petals sparkled in the sunlight. Pansies, poppies, star lilies, fiddlenecks, and rambling patches of blue and gold forget-me-nots.

  Ha. I can think of two people in particular who could use a giant bouquet of THOSE delivered to their doorsteps.

  The trees even seemed to stand a little taller somehow, reaching and stretching their sleepy limbs toward the light. The air was sweet and full of spring.

  Spring.

  And now there was officially nothing standing in my way. That is, except rows and rows of white granite headstones.

  “Destination reached,” I said, suddenly feeling very much home. I mean, not that I should have been surprised.

  We had landed at the cemetery.

  CHAPTER 23

  hey, hey, you, you, I don’t like your girlfriend

  I walked up to my grave and sank down to my knees. There was my name, carved into powdery white stone.

  “Doesn’t seem real,” I murmured.

  “Funny thing is,” Patrick said, “I’m not sure it ever will.”

  Scratching. Screaming. Suffocating.

  I felt the slightest tingling in my eyes. “Don’t cry,” I scolded myself. “Do not cry.”