by Cat Patrick
“I’ll help you however I can,” he replies, even though I think he knows I was talking to myself, too.
Luke grabs my hand over the center compartment and squeezes it gently. The lot is nearly full now.
“We should go in,” he says, sounding disappointed.
“Guess so.”
He turns the key and the van is silent. I unbuckle my belt and yank my backpack off the floor in front of my feet. Opening the door, I feel a frigid blast of wind that’s in stark contrast to the warmth of the van. I hop out, slam the door, and shiver my way to the front of the car to meet Luke. He looks unfazed.
“Aren’t you cold?” I ask.
“Not really,” he replies with a shrug. “This is no match for the Charles,” he adds, confusing me.
Luke grabs my hand and we walk quickly toward the building. His fingers are calloused, and I wonder if it’s from playing guitar.
Halfway through the lot, a car is pulling into one of the few vacant spots. It is a blue four-door sedan that someone’s mother might drive. Then I realize that Brad from math is driving it. I wave. He glares at me in return.
What I did to Brad to provoke such disdain, I have no idea. But right now, walking hand in hand with my perfect boyfriend on a sunny, crisp February morning, I don’t care about Brad from math.
I don’t care about anything at all, except Luke.
“Are you sure I can’t switch partners?” Jamie asks Ms. Garcia, none too discreetly. A few of our classmates are staring at me to gauge my reaction.
“Ms. Connor, as I’ve told you now a half-dozen times, the partner you chose at the beginning of the year is the partner you will have until the end. I don’t want to hear another word about it.”
Ms. Garcia turns her back on Jamie and starts writing today’s class agenda on the whiteboard. Jamie rolls her eyes and trudges back to her desk, which she picks up and plunks down with a loud bang so that it’s facing mine.
“Whatever,” she mutters as she flops into her seat.
“Hi, J,” I say quietly.
“Don’t talk to me,” she snaps.
“I have to: we have an assignment.”
“Then only talk to me in Spanish,” she commands.
“Hola, Jamie,” I say as a joke. She doesn’t laugh, opting to roll her eyes again instead. I decide to try a new tack, courtesy of this morning’s note.
“I need your help,” I say quietly.
“Ask your precious Luke for help,” Jamie says loudly, without looking up from our assignment.
“I want to track down my dad.”
Jamie flinches a little. Her face softens. Still, her response is bitter: “Google him.”
“I tried,” I say, without knowing whether I have already.
“You’re so transparent,” Jamie says, still not looking at me. Not sure what she means, I keep quiet. She sighs, and glares right into my eyes. “You’re trying to be all casual, but what you really want is for me to look in my mom’s files, right?” she asks, acting put out. And yet, there’s a slight softness to her tone; I know I’ve got her. I can’t pinpoint why, but Jamie will always agree to help me. Maybe she figures I’m lost without her. In many ways, I am.
Still, I have no idea what files she’s talking about.
“Is that what you’re getting at? You want me to look up your dad’s information in my mom’s legal files?”
The word legal makes it click. Jamie’s mom will be a divorce lawyer for many years; she probably handled my parents’ split. Letting Jamie assume this was my plan all along, I agree.
“You’ve got me,” I say, looking as sheepish as possible without actually feeling that way. “Listen, Jamie, I know you’re mad at me and that’s fine, but this is important. I don’t remember my father at all. You know that. But I want to, and I really need your help. Will you help me?”
Sure, I started the conversation to get Jamie to talk to me, but ultimately, I do want to find my dad. This is the best of both worlds.
“Maybe,” Jamie says with a shrug, before refocusing on our assignment.
“Thanks,” I whisper across the table island at her.
She ignores me completely for the rest of the class.
21
It’s nearly bedtime, and my mom is still out showing houses. Despite being angry with her about what she’s been hiding from me, I feel sorry for her for having to be out so late.
Pajama-clad, face washed, and teeth brushed, I retrieve the envelope from my desk drawer. The metal clasp is worn from being opened and closed many times.
I know I found the items inside three and a half months ago. I know I haven’t done much with the information.
Emptying the photos and cards onto my bedspread, I slowly, meticulously look through them. Vacation photos, shots in the backyard, holidays. We seem happy.
Looking at my father’s face, I can’t help but recall the one memory I have of him from the future. The one that plagues me.
I don’t know how I got there. I’m just there, among dozens of mourners experiencing various states of grief.
The brick wall of a man holds back his tears, the younger man with the eighties hairstyle weeps freely. Wet from the rain, stricken with grief, my grandmother crumbles. Beside me, my mother sobs, looking young… vulnerable. A woman in a low-cut dress tries to keep her composure, probably for the sake of the small boy in front of her. Footsteps crowd the muddy path like bread crumbs leading to sadness. Even the stone statue to my left cries for the unknown guest of honor.
I grab my notebook and read back about how I used to think it was my father’s funeral. I scoff at myself now, remembering my father arriving late, standing near the back—far from both my mother and his own—and fighting back emotion as the priest I can’t hear delivers his message.
I remember willing myself to look away, and seeing the caretaker in the distance, watching us. Watching me.
He’s standing in front of a toolshed disguised as a mausoleum and he smiles. It’s not an all-out smile; it’s the one you use when you want to make someone feel better and smiling is all you can do.
It makes me want to run over and kick him, but I don’t. Instead, I stare back until he tosses his cigarette to the ground and saunters inside the shed.
The funeral is over and my father is gone.
Grandma is gone.
Everyone is gone.
And still, even as I turn to follow my mother, I can’t see the grave. Try as I might, I can’t look down. Somewhere deep inside, I won’t let myself remember who is in the hole in the ground.
My thoughts turn to Luke. Is it him?
It can’t be him.
Why would my father return after years of absence to attend a funeral for my boyfriend? And my grandmother? It doesn’t fit.
It’s not Luke.
And yet, when I flip through my spiral-bound substitute for a proper memory again, one truth becomes clear: the darkest memory showed up when he did.
Exhausted from the day and the weight of what’s coming, I gather the photos and cards before me into a neat stack and ease them back inside the manila envelope. I fold down the clasp to hold it shut, replace it inside the desk drawer, and set my notes on my nightstand.
After scooting under the covers, I reread the note I left myself, just to make sure everything’s there. I add a few details about the memory, and a question: How is Luke involved?
The garage door begins to open; my mom is home. Instead of waiting to say good night, I put the note on my nightstand, click off the lamp, and roll to my side, facing the wall.
Two questions volley back and forth in my mind:
Why can’t I remember Luke?
Whose funeral is it?
I’m watching the tennis match with my eyes closed when my mom eeks open my door and whispers, barely audibly, “Good night, sweet London.”
Her words are like a sleeping pill; they instantly relax me.
Soon, the tennis match is over.
It’s love�
�love.
No resolution.
22
Walking alone from the locker room to the gymnasium, I am lamenting the fact that it’s Thursday. Thursdays are odd-block days: ninety minutes each of my least favorite classes.
No Luke to enjoy.
Then again, no Jamie, either.
I am pondering what to do about Jamie as I lean into the bar across the middle of the massive gym door and set foot onto the gleaming court. It’s loud and alive with squeaking sneakers and shouts and pants, and the sensory overload distracts me to the point that I don’t see it coming.
Before I have time to jump, duck, or even flinch, my thoughts are obliterated by the weight of a massive rubber ball slamming into the right side of my face. The momentum knocks me sideways and then off balance. I trip over my own feet and fall, without even a smidgen of grace, to the ground.
A loud, embarrassing “oof” comes out of my mouth as my hip hits the floor first, followed by my ribs, and then my head. My right ear rings and my cheek tingles and burns at the same time; hand to cheek, I realize that the rubber ball left a pattern on my skin.
I brush the hair that I haven’t had the chance to pull back into a ponytail from my face, then blink once to clear the water from my eyes. With one good ear and only partial vision, I experience the fallout.
Everyone in first-period PE is laughing at me. Some try to hide it; others are actually pointing in my direction. Jerks. I struggle to get back on my feet, but my senses are still off, and it’s a lot more difficult than it should be. I feel a little drunk, and, yes, I know what that feels like. I remember it.
Once I finally make it to my feet and the crowd begins to scatter, my eyes catch Page Thomas’s. There’s a nasty smirk on her face as she quickly looks away. Before I have too much time to dwell on it, a shrill whistle blows. Ms. Martinez commands the room, and I grudgingly join one of two teams.
For the rest of the period, I try to defend myself as best I can through an excruciating “game” that should be banned from high school and general play forever.
It is nothing but pain and humiliation.
It should be avoided at all costs.
It is the reason this morning’s note warned: stay alert first period.
It is hell on earth.
It is dodgeball.
Hours later, during Ms. Harris’s lecture on the hippocampus in Human Anatomy, Ryan Greene keeps glancing at me from across the aisle. My face and ego still sting from this morning, but I’m smiling and I can’t stop. It hurts my cheeks, and Ryan is gawking—probably because the hippocampus isn’t that exciting—but I don’t care.
I saw Luke before class.
“Something funny, London?” Ms. Harris interrupts. She’s stopped writing midsentence and is holding the blue dry-erase marker in midair. One of her perfectly curvy hips is popped to the side, and a manicured hand rests there, waiting.
She looks a little like one of the cheerleaders did earlier today. That’s concerning, seeing as how Ms. Harris is a teacher and all. Shouldn’t she reserve judgment?
Though I’m fairly certain that the majority of them are as bored by the anatomy of the brain as I am, the students in my line of sight now look annoyed at the interruption. More likely, they’re just annoyed Ms. Harris turned around.
“London? Is there a joke?” she asks again when I don’t speak. She tosses her dyed red hair and I wonder if she’s jealous that mine is real.
“No, Ms. Harris,” I say quietly. I try to think of something depressing, but the smile hangs on.
Ms. Harris stares at me, unblinking, for what feels like days. When she seems convinced that I’m either a bad seed or insane, she sighs and turns back to the whiteboard.
The rest of the students right themselves on their stools, and I relax, too. I take a deep breath of stale science-wing air and loosen my grip on the metal table.
My happy moment ruined, I focus on what Ms. Harris is saying, most of it completely snore-inducing. But then, she says something that grabs my interest.
“… possible that we store different types of memories in different parts of our brains.”
Intrigued, I sit up a little straighter. I need to hear what she’ll say next.
She turns and writes “Types of memories” on the whiteboard. Just as she’s underlining her header, the bell rings.
“Class dismissed.”
A little over an hour later, Mom is driving in the opposite direction of home, looking determined.
“Where are we going?”
“Out for a snack,” she says.
“I’m not hungry,” I protest.
“I don’t care,” she says. “You don’t have to eat. But I think we need to spend some time together.”
Uh-oh.
Mom pulls into a diner and parks, and we walk inside and seat ourselves as the sign instructs. Once the waitress has taken our drink orders—diet for Mom, regular for me—Mom strikes up a conversation.
“Good day?” she asks.
“No,” I answer.
“Why not?”
The waitress delivers our drinks, and my mom unwraps our straws and puts them in the glasses. She takes a sip as she waits for me to respond.
“I got hit in the face with a ball in gym,” I answer.
“Are you okay?”
“Yes, I’m fine.”
“Good,” she says. Another sip. “Anything else?”
“Carley Lynch.”
“What did she do this time?” Mom asks.
“She just made some comment about my outfit.”
“I love that outfit.”
“Me, too,” I say.
“You know she’s just jealous of you, London.”
“No, I don’t know, Mom. I don’t remember.”
“Was Jamie there?” my mom asks casually.
“No, of course not,” I mutter.
“Still fighting?”
“Obviously,” I say, rolling my eyes.
A family scoots into the next booth over, and I watch them settle themselves as my mom speaks in a quieter tone. For that I’m grateful.
“There’s no need to get snippy, sweetie. Jamie will come around; she always does. And Carley is jealous because of a boy. Christopher something. They went out for a while and broke up, then you asked him to a dance.”
“I asked a boy to a dance?”
“It was a turnabout dance where the girls ask the boys. Jamie talked you into it. Anyway, you weren’t interested in him after that one date, but Carley’s always held a grudge.”
“I told you all that?”
“We used to talk more,” Mom says, with a hurt look in her eyes. I’m guilty of putting it there. I don’t say anything back.
The waitress returns and asks what we’d like to eat. Mom orders a plate of onion rings for us to share; I love onion rings. The waitress moves to the next table over, and I watch the father order for his family. I’m aware of my envy as he chats with his daughter and son.
“When did Dad leave?” I ask my mom out of the blue. Her eyes grow wide as she swallows the soda she’s just sipped.
“Where did that come from?” she asks. I shrug.
“Is that what’s been bothering you lately? You want to know about your dad?”
“Maybe,” I say.
Mom fidgets in her seat a little and then clears her throat.
“Okay,” she says softly. “I’ve told you this before and I’ll tell you again. Your father and I weren’t meant to be together. We didn’t get along, and he left when you were six. That’s really the end of the story.”
I think back to my notes.
“My memory went crazy when I was six. Do you think Dad leaving us traumatized me?”
“I’ve considered that,” Mom admits, looking incredibly uncomfortable.
“So, what, you just fell out of love with each other?” I ask.
My mom doesn’t meet my gaze when she replies, “Yes.”
“And we never heard from him again?�
��
“No,” she says. The letters at home tell me that she’s lying, but I hide my anger. I press the issue.
“He never tried to talk to me or anything?”
I swear I see a flash of guilt in my mother’s eyes when she answers. “No, honey, I’m sorry, he never did.”
I don’t believe you, I think.
And then our onion rings arrive.
When I get home, I try calling Jamie. She picks up on the third ring.
“You need to stop stalking me,” she says sharply.
“Hi to you, too,” I say.
“Seriously, I got your message earlier. I’ve gotten all of your messages. When I’m ready to talk to you, I’ll call.”
“But, Jamie, don’t you think we should just talk about it?”
“Do you even remember what it is, London?”
“Yes,” I say quietly. My notes are resting on my lap.
“But not really,” Jamie snaps at me. “See, you get to go to sleep and forget everything. I don’t have that luxury.”
“It’s not a luxury,” I protest.
“Whatever, I have to go now.”
“But, J, are we ever going to talk again?”
“I don’t know, London, are we?”
Click.
“What’s wrong?” Luke asks over the phone.
“Nothing,” I lie.
“No, really, what is it? I can hear it in your voice.”
I smile weakly. Why can’t I remember you?
“Bad day,” I reply, shrugging, though he can’t see it.
“What happened?” Luke presses. I decide to let him in a little.
“My mom and I aren’t really getting along, and she made me go and talk about my feelings after school. Then I tried to call Jamie and she basically cut me off and hung up on me. I’m really sick of her drama,” I say bitterly, remembering forward to what I would consider some unnecessarily long arguments in the future. “She’s just so self-absorbed. Everything is about her. It drives me crazy sometimes!”
Luke laughs a little.
“What?” I reply angrily.
“Nothing, I’ve just never heard you mad. It’s cute.”
“It’s not cute!” I playfully shout at him. He laughs harder, and I join in. When we stop, Luke asks, “Seriously, though, what can I do to help?”
