The Chaos of Standing Still

by Jessica Brody

  But then I flash back on the conversation I overheard just a minute ago.

  “I’m telling you, I didn’t say a word to anyone! I swear. I have no idea how they found out!”

  I glance up at Xander, who’s still crouched in the corner, scowling into his phone.

  Is that what he was talking about? The expulsion?

  Does that mean it’s possible he’s not on the phone with a girlfriend?

  Xander lets out a frustrated sigh as he listens to the voice on the other end of the call and casts his eyes to the ceiling. On their way back down they land right on me, and I feel a strange sensation trickle through me.

  His entire demeanor shifts. He stands up a little straighter. His scowl fades.

  “Look,” he snaps to the person on the other end of the call. “I gotta go. I’m sorry, Claire, but I can’t help you.” Then he jabs at the screen and returns his phone to the pocket of his bag strap.

  “Hey,” he says, walking over with a smile that I think is supposed to look casual but ends up just looking painful.

  “What was that about?” I ask, even though I know it’s not my place. It’s not any of my business. If I’m going to attack him for asking me about my text message, I certainly can’t expect him to answer questions about his phone call.

  Xander glances back at the corner he was just huddled in, as if he already forgot where he was. “Oh, that?” he says, his pitch slightly higher than normal. “Just more people trying to blame me for things I didn’t do.”

  He looks pointedly at me with a look of accusation.

  I open my mouth to . . .

  To what?

  Apologize?

  Protest?

  Yell again?

  I’ll never know, because Xander chuckles and adds, “I’m kidding. Chillax. Who’s this?” He nods at Troy.

  Troy doesn’t even bother introducing himself. He swipes the phone out of my hand and chirps, “I’ll take that, thank you very much.” Then he immediately goes to work, resuming his conspiracy search.

  “That’s Troy,” I explain. “I’m sort of kind of responsible for him.”

  “Sort of kind of not,” Troy argues without looking up.

  Xander glances between us, clearly wondering what he missed in the time he’s been gone. He gives his head a little shake. “Okay, so what’s the plan?”

  I glance over the railing at Siri, who is back on the ground floor, chatting up some guy. I assume he’s another airport employee she’s recruiting. “Siri has taken my phone hostage until I agree to go to some stupid New Year’s party she’s planning.”

  “A party?” Xander asks, his face brightening. “Cool.”

  “No. Not cool. I need to get my phone back. I need to—”

  “You need to what?” he interrupts, and I notice the subtle edge to his voice. “You need to go home? You need to call a cab? Ryn, you’re stuck here. We both are. So why don’t you relax and just let go for a minute?”

  His words ignite a flare of irritation inside of me. He doesn’t know me. He doesn’t know anything about me. Who is he to tell me to relax?

  “C’mon,” he coaxes, his voice lightening again to that playful, easy cadence. “I’m willing to bet all the money I have in my wallet that you’ve never been to a party before.”

  He draws his wallet out of his back pocket and holds it up as proof that he’s serious about the wager.

  I think back to the last party I went to. That horrible night at Poker Guy’s house.

  I cross my arms. “I’ll have you know that I’ve been to lots of parties.”

  “Fine,” Xander allows, his mouth twitching with the hint of a smile. “Then I’m willing to bet all the money I have in this wallet that you’ve never been to a party you’ve actually enjoyed.”

  I expect to hear Lottie’s buoyant voice telling me once again how easily pegged I am, but she stays silent. I think she might be on strike. For what, I don’t know. But I have my theories and most of them revolve around that flight attendant. But I can’t deal with that now.

  “You can’t change the bet,” I retort. “The stakes have already been set and you lost.”

  The smile breaks free, overthrowing his scowl once and for all. “Fair enough,” he says, and opens his wallet, pulling out two wrinkled and worn dollar bills. “There you are. All the money in my wallet.”

  I can’t help but laugh.

  “Hey! Mopey Girl!” I hear Siri’s voice and glance over to see her running back up the escalator. She’s waving my phone in the air, and I feel my dread lift. Thank God. She’s giving it back. Finally.

  I practically skip over to meet her. “Your phone’s ringing,” she announces when I get there. “It’s your mom. I’ll let you talk to your mom because moms are important, but then the phone goes right back in my pocket.”

  This is my chance, I immediately think. I could do it. Take the phone and run in the other direction. Get as far away from these people as possible.

  I look at Xander, who’s followed me over here, his eyes pinned intensely on me. I look at Troy, his attention still focused on his Web search. Then, finally, I look at harsh, abrasive, salty Siri who’s holding my beloved phone in her hand.

  I can see my mom’s number flashing on the screen. I still haven’t responded to any of her latest texts about me being stuck here overnight. I can only imagine what that conversation will sound like. A whole lot of talk that results in absolutely nothing.

  A whole lot of words that form sentences but no meaning.

  The same dance of avoidance we’ve been doing for eleven months and thirty-one days.

  “Last chance,” Siri says, brandishing the phone. “Do you want to answer?”

  Ever so subtly, I shake my head and watch the screen change from the incoming caller ID to the pop-up message alerting me of a missed call.

  Siri shrugs, returns the phone to her pocket, and spins on her heels. Xander follows after her and Troy follows after him.

  I guess I’m going to a party.

  I’d been at Poker Guy’s house for more than two hours and there was still no word from Lottie.

  Is she dead in there?

  Did he strangle her and climb out a window?

  Is he already halfway to the Canadian border?

  These were the questions streaming through my mind as I sat on the supple leather couch and played on my phone. I’d already won twenty-seven trivia games with random strangers across the globe and amassed more than ten trophies. The victories were all empty, though. They felt like placeholders for a life that I should have been living. Every time I started a new game, I told myself this one would be the last. After this, I would get up and talk to people. Make conversation. Ask someone about their day, their interests, their life. It’s not hard. Question. Answer. Question. Answer. That’s all a conversation is.

  I promised myself I would be at this party instead of just existing at this party.

  And yet every time I won and the little Play Again? bubble appeared on my screen, I always chose Yes.

  I always chose wrong.

  Occasionally, I would lift my head and watch the various partygoers chitchat and drink and laugh and then rearrange into different group formations and start again. They all made it look so easy to not be me.

  Somewhere around eleven o’clock I finally managed to convince myself that this was just not my crowd. That they were all older and more mature and what would I have in common with them anyway? Probably nothing.

  I gave myself an out, and I didn’t only take it. I leapt on it. I tackled it and wrestled it into submission like a wilderness expert wrestles an unruly crocodile.

  The party began to wind down around midnight. Coats were gathered. Hugs were dished out. Sober friends helped stumbling, drunk friends toward the door.

  I checked the message app on my phone. Still nothing from Lottie.

  I decided to text her.

  Me: Hey. Party’s almost over. Are you ready to leave?

  Minute
s passed before I heard back from her.

  Lottie: You’re still here? I thought you would have left by now.

  Me: I wouldn’t leave you!

  Lottie: I think I’m gonna stay. Why don’t you go home? Pete will give me a ride in the morning. I’ll tell my mom I’m staying the night with you.

  Staying the night?

  I didn’t like it. I didn’t like it at all. Of course, I didn’t mind lying for Lottie. I’d done it countless times. But Poker Guy was bad news. Despite the fact that his friends had proved to be harmless, I could feel it in my bones. Lottie may have been blind to it, but that’s what she had me for. To be her Seeing Eye dog. To guide her around dangerous obstacles. To make sure she didn’t trip and fall.

  Me: I think you should come home with me.

  Another lifetime passed before she responded.

  Lottie: But I’m having fun! I’ll text you tomorrow.

  Frustrated, I stood up, jamming my phone into my pants pocket. How could I help her if she wouldn’t let me? How was I supposed to do my job—keep her safe—if she cut me loose?

  Then a disturbing thought struck me. It felt so obvious that I chastised myself for not realizing it sooner.

  What if that’s not Lottie texting me back?

  What if Poker Guy had her bound and gagged in that room and was texting from her phone? Trying to get rid of me so he could finish whatever sadistic plot he had plotted?

  The thought made me bold.

  I marched down the hallway, knocking firmly on the door that I had seen Lottie disappear behind hours earlier. There was a shuffling on the other side. A repositioning of things.

  “Who is it?” called Poker Guy. He sounded guilty. I felt vindicated.

  “It’s Ryn. I need to talk to Lottie.”

  More movement. A padding of footsteps. The door opened.

  Lottie’s face appeared through the crack. She was purposefully hiding the rest of her body.

  “What’s up, Ryn Ryn?” she asked. She had the loopy smile of Drunk Lottie.

  “I . . .” I started the sentence, but I had nothing to finish it with. I hadn’t thought this all the way through. I had been so convinced that what I’d find on the other side of this door would warrant a call to the police, I hadn’t even considered any other scenario.

  But as soon as I saw her face, as soon as I caught a glimpse of half-naked twentysomething Pete through the crack in the door, I knew what I had to do.

  “Something happened,” I said, forcing the brokenness into my voice.

  Lottie’s loopiness vanished. Sexy Drunk Lottie was replaced with Concerned Best Friend Lottie. “What?”

  I looked down and whispered. “I can’t talk about it here. But I really need you to come home with me.”

  She didn’t hesitate. “Give me three seconds,” she said. “Don’t go anywhere. Stay right by this door.”

  I nodded, adding a sniffle for effect.

  The door closed, and, true to her word, Lottie was back in record time. Her dress was on backward, her hair was a mess, and she was still putting on her shoes when she reappeared. She wrapped one arm around my shoulders and led me toward the front door. We didn’t speak the whole way.

  I felt guilty for bluffing. For playing the only card I knew would win in a poker game against Lottie. The Ace of Friendship.

  But seeing her in the passenger seat of my mom’s Prius, safely removed from that place, eased my conscience enough.

  I didn’t know what I was going to say to her. Once again, I hadn’t thought it all the way through. We drove the first few minutes in respectful silence, but I knew it was only a matter of time before she asked. And I would have to show my true cards. I would have to admit that I bluffed her. I had stolen the pot with a risky bet.

  But I didn’t care about that.

  All that mattered was that I had won.

  And this victory felt anything but empty.

  It turns out airport parties are a lot like high school parties. Word gets around fast. Within an hour it feels like every single person who was once out there in the concourse is now packed into this tiny hotel room on the ninth floor of the Westin Denver airport hotel.

  The decorations scattered throughout the room are suspect. They don’t seem to have any apparent theme. In fact, most of them don’t even seem to be decorations at all, but rather random items repurposed as decorations. A pendant necklace hangs from the ceiling over the makeshift dance floor, serving as the world’s tiniest disco ball. A collection of sparkly purses have been secured to the walls like bizarre modern art installations. A bobblehead of some politician I don’t recognize nods away on the desk-turned-refreshment-table. The candles Siri lifted from the chapel are scattered around the room, thankfully unlit. And sitting on one of the beds in the corner is an inflated female blow-up doll wearing a gray blazer, sunglasses, and bangle bracelets, and holding an e-reader.

  Xander left to get a drink ten minutes ago and I haven’t seen him since. You would think it would be easy to keep track of someone in such a small room, but with this many bodies shoved inside, I can barely keep track of my own thoughts.

  For the past twenty minutes Troy has been trying to explain to me the theory of Schrödinger’s cat. He doesn’t realize that I pretty much stopped listening nineteen minutes ago. I just occasionally nod and purse my lips like he’s saying something really fascinating.

  “So you see,” he says, wheeling his hands in the air. “Until you actually open the box, the cat is both dead and alive, proving that multiple dimensions are a scientific reality.”

  “Mmm,” I say in response.

  “Which means there’s a version of this reality in which you aren’t even here. In which you were booked on a nonstop flight home and are now sleeping soundly in your bed.”

  How do I get to that reality? I want to ask, but I’m afraid he might start talking about wormholes or time loops or some other timey-wimey Doctor Who stuff.

  “I’m gonna get a drink,” I announce to Troy and push my way through the people, toward the refreshment table. Troy follows behind me, still talking passionately about the half-dead, half-alive cat.

  The drink table has been completely looted. I search for something nonalcoholic. All I need right now is to get Irrational Ryn drunk. I find a half-empty can of Coke and pour the rest into a cup, taking small sips in an effort to make it last longer.

  The desk is littered with countless tiny liquor bottles, all empty. It makes me think of the stash Lottie used to have hidden in her tree house. The one my mother still thinks belonged to me. Hundreds of bottles in every variety. Vodka, gin, whiskey, bourbon, rum. Lottie was running her own tiny saloon up in that tree house. She said she would steal them from her dad’s briefcase when he got back from business trips, but where did he get them?

  Did he really buy tiny liquor bottles only to store them in his bag?

  Or were they given to him? Perhaps by someone who worked on an airplane?

  Lottie? I try. I don’t have high hopes that she’ll answer me. She hasn’t answered me in a while. I’m not sure if she’s mad or just running some strategic plot to get me to talk to people other than my dead best friend. I wouldn’t put that past her.

  “How’s my favorite Mopey Girl?” Siri sidles up to me and bumps her hip against mine, spilling some of her drink in the process. I can tell she’s already tipsy. After being the only sober one at so many parties that Lottie dragged me to, you start to get a radar for these kinds of things. I’m probably more accurate than a Breathalyzer.

  “You have interesting taste in decorations.” I motion toward the curiously dressed blow-up doll on the bed.

  Siri giggles and I can smell the alcohol on her breath. “Everything you see here Jimmy got from the airport Lost and Found.”

  I give her a scandalized look. “He stole from the Lost and Found?”

  “Not stole. Borrowed. We’re gonna put it all back when we’re done.” She picks up a snorkel mask that’s been propped up on the
refreshment table. “People leave the strangest things at airports.” She puts the mask on and then attempts to take a sip of her drink. The liquid runs down her chin, causing her to snort.

  “So,” she says, holding her hand in front of the mask and miming a fish swimming by. “Are you having fun yet?”

  I give her a fake smile. “Absolutely. Troy, tell Siri what you just told me.”

  Troy’s face lights up with pride. He starts from the beginning. “Schrödinger’s cat, first proposed by Erwin Schrödinger in 1935, illustrates the quantum theory principle of . . .”

  “Whoa, whoa,” Siri interrupts, holding her head. For a moment I think she might vomit, and I take a step back. “Nerd Boy. Why don’t you go find some other drunk chick to talk to about your Dinger?”

  Troy does not look amused. “It’s Schrödinger and it has nothing to do with the male anatomy.”

  “Well, at least he understands euphemism,” Siri whispers to me through her mask, but it’s loud enough for Troy to hear.

  “I beg your pardon,” he huffs. “I have a physics degree from Stanford. I know a euphemism when I hear one, and I’m afraid that was not one. What you did was simply turn something you didn’t understand into a bad sex joke.”

  I bite my lip to stifle a laugh.

  “Bad sex joke?” Siri retorts, slurring her words slightly. “Okay, brainiac, let’s hear you come up with a better one.”

  Troy rolls his eyes. “My mind is far too occupied pondering worthwhile concepts to waste any time conjuring up lewd jokes. That would be like asking a brilliant surgeon to use his hands to pick up trash on the side of the highway.”

  “Well . . . ,” Siri begins gruffly but then quickly runs out of steam.

  Troy is a child prodigy who also happens to be sober. Siri’s biting wit is no match.

  “Well,” she says again as she lifts her mask to take a sip of her drink and then nearly spits it all over me as a thought comes to her. “Aha! Here’s a math joke for you, genius boy. What is 6.9?”

  Troy flashes me a look. “Um, a rational number.”

  “Ha! Wrong! It’s great sex interrupted by a period.”