Shades of Simon Gray

by Joyce McDonald

  “How’s Simon?” she asked Courtney.

  Courtney looked over at her as if she was considering how to answer this question. “He almost died last night.”

  “Oh my god.” Devin leaned forward. “What happened? Is he okay now?”

  Liz woke to the sound of voices. Her muscles ached from sleeping in the chair. She pulled herself up and stretched her stiff legs in front of her.

  Courtney was in the middle of giving Devin an account of how the mountains on the monitor had suddenly gone flat, how Simon had died right in front of her, and how the doctors had managed to bring him back. Liz had already heard the story. But she could see that Devin was badly shaken by the news.

  When Courtney finished her story and had answered all Devin’s questions—the ones she could answer—the three girls leaned back in their seats and resumed their silence. Throughout the day, they went their separate ways. They got coffee in the cafeteria and browsed in the gift shop, looking for nothing in particular except to kill time until it was again their turn to visit, except for Liz, who wasn’t allowed into the ICU.

  By midafternoon Simon’s condition hadn’t changed. It was still critical. Liz stared down at her sneakers. She wondered if she should go home. Devin and Courtney had legitimate reasons to be there. But didn’t she belong there too? She was Simon’s best friend. She loved him. Surely that was reason enough. And there was another reason. She had come because of the disturbing dream she’d had earlier that day. She had come because she was afraid for Simon.

  In the end, she decided to stay. It didn’t matter what the others thought. Whatever happened, she would be there, waiting.

  Liz closed her eyes and tried to sleep again. The image of Simon swimming in the muddy river came back to her in a rush. She saw him struggling, fighting to keep from being swept away. Up ahead was the oak tree, only a few feet from his grasp. The branches, Simon, she whispered. Grab the branches.

  The sun hovered just above the trees. Soon the sky would darken and Simon would be alone in this place. He had never been there for an entire day. And he was beginning to think he might never leave. Perhaps he would remain there for all eternity with Jessup’s silent corpse. He couldn’t remember when he had felt so desperate.

  Above him three crows circled the tree. Simon watched as they landed on the top branches. For reasons he couldn’t begin to explain, he felt he should try to climb this tree. It was stupid, he knew. When he got to the top, then what? He’d just have to come back down again. And there would be Jessup, waiting for him.

  One of the crows swooped down to the lowest branch, where Jessup’s body hung. There was no mistaking that its urgent caws were for Simon. He laughed at the bird. “Do you think I’m nuts?” he said, as if they were having an actual conversation. “That tree’s got to be a hundred feet tall.”

  One of the other crows landed right on his head and gave his hair a gentle tug. The third remained on the top branch, watching him. Simon sighed and shoved the bird off his head. It settled next to the other crow on the first branch. The branch was almost seven feet from the ground. Simon looked up at the crows and shook his head. “Fine, great, you win,” he said.

  He wrapped his arms around the base as far as they would go, dug his toes into the rough bark, and began to shinny slowly up the tree. The way Simon was beginning to see it was, there were two ways out of this place: you either pulled yourself up or you let them hang you.

  The first few feet of the oak base were the most difficult. The bark tore at his flesh, scraped his hands and feet. But he continued to climb, digging his toes into the crevices of the bark. Some pieces flaked away, causing his foot to slip, but he hung on until finally he reached the first branch, the one Jessup Wildemere’s corpse dangled from. One of the crows settled on the branch next to him and cocked its head first to one side, then to the other, as if waiting for something.

  Simon took a breath and looked down at Jessup one last time. Kyle and Danny would think Jessup was a real loser. But Simon knew that the man’s death, for all the false historic records and local tales, was an honorable one. If he ever got home, he would do everything he could to set the record straight.

  From here on, Simon moved carefully from one branch to the next. Two of the crows kept one branch ahead of him; the third waited at the top. With each movement, each grasp of the next branch, another painful memory coursed through him. He remembered Kyle telling him how he’d overheard Principal Schroder talking to George McCabe about a computer security problem. He remembered thinking it would be only a matter of time before McCabe discovered the keystroke recorder program, remembered how he and Kyle had worked like crazy to uninstall the software from three of the school’s computers. He remembered feeling sick about what he had done, and how easy it had been for the others to flatter him into showing off what he was capable of. Although he had been mostly showing off for Devin. Devin. These were the most painful memories of all. Because they were also his happiest and he knew such moments would never come again.

  He had no illusions about what would be waiting for him when he got back. Possibly criminal charges, his father’s fury, the town’s stunned shock, and who knew what else. He knew he hadn’t actually hacked into the school’s network. Hacking was definitely a criminal offense. But he wasn’t sure how the school administrators would handle a situation like this. He had, after all, used software to obtain several teachers’ passwords, then accessed their computers and printed out exams for his friends. When he had finally gotten his hands on George McCabe’s password, it was carte blanche. He could log on to any place in the system, any account. He figured he would probably be expelled for something like that. Still, no matter how bad it got, he’d find a way to live with it. It was better than the alternative. It was better than being dead.

  Simon reached out and pulled himself to the next branch. The physical pain was becoming unbearable. With each movement, red-hot wires coursed through his body in place of his veins. He would have screamed if he could. But his jaw was locked tight.

  Fragments of memories, of Kyle, Danny, and Devin, of the past year, of all he had done, images of the frogs, the night of the accident, every horrifying moment, seared through his brain.

  Some part of him knew he could stop the agony. And then there would be only the fog, the gray nothing. But he had already come this far.

  Each branch was more of a struggle than the one before it. He was exhausted. He didn’t think he could climb much farther. He stopped to catch his breath, pressed his forehead against the tree. He felt dizzy. The pain was so fierce, Simon thought he might faint and fall, landing on the asphalt or sidewalk.

  When he looked up again, the sky was swirling with crows. The birds circled so fast, Simon felt as if he were staring into an upside-down tornado. The faster the birds spun, the more Simon felt himself being pulled upward.

  Near the top, the branches were thinner and precariously flexible. Simon stayed close to the base. He wedged his feet into the crooks. The three crows now sat on the uppermost branches. They cawed loudly and flew into the air to join the others as Simon pulled himself to the very top. Overhead hundreds of goldfinches circled between the crows, coming to land on the branches. Their fluttering yellow wings flickered as they descended. Simon, too, flung his arms outward, and all of them, together, caught the golden rays of the setting sun in one glorious burst of light.

  Simon didn’t realize, until he felt someone’s hands on his shoulders, gently pressing him down, that he was screaming, shrieking as loudly as any newborn pulled from the womb. And he did not stop until he felt a sharp prick in his arm and cool waves wash over him as he squinted, dizzy with the morphine, into the bright light above his hospital bed.

  THE NIGHT SIMON GRAY RETURNED FROM THE DEAD, the crows dispersed into the air like a black mist dissolving. Only the occasional black feathers, found floating in glasses of iced tea or clinging to the sticky leaves of petunias, reminded the people of Bellehaven of those two strange weeks
in April.

  There were no more cases of the West Nile virus, and soon the news crews and the people from the National Institutes of Health drifted out of town as silently as they had arrived, in search of more interesting events. Only the local businesses, which had fared well during the past week, were sorry to see them go.

  People no longer talked of curses or black magic. Frogs, crows, heat waves, snowstorms, viruses—they were the stuff of everyday life. Now they shook their heads in wonder and joked about how Nature had gone haywire. They laughed over how so many of the residents had panicked and left town, although it was a nervous kind of laughter, the kind made by elementary-school boys daring each other to walk through the cemetery after midnight.

  By Monday morning everyone at Bellehaven High knew Simon Gray had come out of his coma, and they were relieved. But the real talk was about George McCabe. Word had spread that he had confessed to giving his password to some of the seniors on the football team, allowing them to log on to the Net and download porn. It was only one of many passwords he used, but its most treasured feature was that he had set up the account to bypass the firewall designed to screen out undesirable sites.

  The whole school was in an uproar. Rumors began to circulate that the police had been investigating a breach in the computer security system and that Simon Gray had been under suspicion, although no one believed for a minute that Simon could ever be involved in something like that.

  Now the finger seemed to be pointing at half the football team, a few of whom had athletic scholarships for the fall. Any one of them, or all of them, for that matter, could have used Mr. McCabe’s password to get into the system. They would be able to print out exams, change grades, do whatever they wanted, although each of them had vehemently denied this.

  The situation became far worse than anyone could have imagined when Roger Garvey pointed out to Principal Schroder that the boys under suspicion could have shared this password with any number of other people, who in turn could have used the knowledge to secure all sorts of information—not the least of which might be exams—from the school’s system. It was as if a computer virus had spread through the entire school, contaminating each and every student. There was nothing left to do but change everyone’s password and hope for the best.

  That was when the board of ed got involved and the superintendent recommended proceeding with caution. This was, according to him, “a rather delicate matter.” The parents of the implicated members of the football team were nearly apoplectic—especially those whose sons had athletic scholarships. They were, in fact, more upset over their sons’ losing their financial aid than they were about their boys’ being accused of downloading pornography on the school computers.

  By now everyone was saying George McCabe had probably given the police Simon’s name just to get the monkey off his back. And while they were glad Simon was no longer under suspicion, no one was happy about a week’s suspension for half the football team, either.

  Nobody, however, was the least bit surprised to learn that George McCabe had turned in his resignation first thing that morning before classes began. It seemed that two of the senior football team members were still under age eighteen. Exposing minors to pornography, as George McCabe had learned, was a criminal offense.

  Liz Shapiro couldn’t wait to tell Simon what was going on. He would probably get a good laugh out of it, especially the rumors about his being under investigation. How could anyone even think Simon might have been involved in all this nasty computer business? She knew him better than that.

  Liz was so relieved to have him back, she skipped eighth period and headed straight to the hospital.

  Like everyone else at school, Devin McCafferty was stunned by the news about Alan Caldwell and some of the other senior football players. But she had no illusions about her own situation. Their actions, however wrong, were separate from the ones she’d been involved in. Still, it would have been pointless for her to go to the authorities and confess her own misdeeds. It wouldn’t have any impact on the outcome of this latest case. All she would accomplish would be to get Simon and the others in deep trouble. And she couldn’t bring herself to do that. Although she was sorely tempted when Kyle cornered her outside art class and made a joke about what happened to people who tried to play the game and got careless.

  Before Devin broke up with him, they would have been heading down to the cafeteria for lunch. Now she looked him straight in the eye, as if he were a total stranger. “I hate what we’ve been doing,” she said. “I hate this whole business.”

  Kyle glanced nervously up and down the hall to make sure no one had heard her. He took her by the arm and gently ushered her back into the art room. No one was there. He closed the door.

  Devin stood with her back against a metal supply cabinet and let her backpack drop to the floor. Kyle leaned toward her. He put the palms of his hands on the cold metal just above her shoulders, as if he were going to kiss her. But the expression on his face suggested that kissing was the last thing on his mind.

  “Look, Dev, I know things haven’t been good between us lately. But this isn’t just about me. If you’re thinking about unburdening your conscience, consider what it would do to Simon and Danny.”

  It was all she could do not to laugh in his face. “You’re right, I’d never do that to Simon. So you can relax.”

  Kyle pushed himself away from the cabinet and cocked his head at her. “Is that the reason you broke it off with me? Simon?”

  Devin rolled her eyes toward the ceiling. “No. I broke it off with you because of you.” She recovered her backpack and started for the door.

  “I don’t see what the big deal is. We didn’t get caught. We won’t, either, as long as Simon keeps his mouth shut. No one got hurt. And you’re going to Cornell next fall.”

  Her hand was already on the doorknob. She glanced back at him. “I’m not going to Cornell.”

  “Middlebury, then. Whatever.”

  “Or Middlebury. If they’ll take me, I’m going to the community college.”

  Kyle stared at her, dumbfounded.

  Devin was amused by the look on his face. It took a lot to get a rise out of Kyle. She knew this from experience.

  “Why would you do that? You worked hard to get into those schools.”

  “But I didn’t work hard. That’s the point.” She yanked open the door and stepped into the hall. Kyle was right behind her.

  “Your SAT scores were yours. You worked hard for those. And what about all those extracurricular activities? Jeez, Dev.”

  “I need time to figure out what I want to do. Okay?”

  He shook his head. “But community college instead of Cornell? You’re throwing away the chance of a lifetime. What the hell are you thinking?”

  Devin sighed and looked away. “ ‘To know my deed, ’twere best not know myself.’ ”

  “What?”

  “Nothing. It’s a line from Macbeth.”

  The bell ending lunch period echoed through the halls.

  “I’ve got French,” Devin said as kids came storming out of the classrooms, flooding the hall.

  After school, Devin stopped at the community college to pick up an application. She felt not even the slightest twinge of regret as she sat on the bus, on her way to the hospital, filling out the forms. She was looking forward to seeing her grandmother, who had come out of her coma only a few hours after Simon had rejoined the living.

  Jeff Cole, the physical therapist, lifted Simon’s leg, gently bent it at the knee, laid it back down, then lifted the other. He was a barrel-chested man with a booming, overly enthusiastic voice, who tended to bounce on his sneakers when he walked. He told Simon he was making terrific progress. Simon let him talk. He knew there would be more weeks of physical therapy ahead.

  Every day people came to see him, Liz and Devin, even Danny on two occasions. And of course, his father and Courtney. Courtney came after school and stayed until their father showed up. Then she left.
>
  Over and over he listened to everyone’s take on what had happened in Bellehaven over the past few weeks. Simon recalled the night of the accident, how hordes of peepers had exploded out of nowhere. None of this surprised him. Not the blizzard, the heat waves, the mosquitoes, or the West Nile virus. And especially not the crows.

  Kyle was the only one who didn’t come by. Simon hadn’t expected him to. He wasn’t of any use to Kyle anymore—although Kyle had called him twice to make sure he wasn’t going to tell anyone about “the project” now that he had returned from the dead.

  It was Courtney who told Simon how he had caused a sensation, coming out of his coma the way he had. According to the nurse, who had been changing his IV bag, Simon bolted straight up in bed, eyes wide open, and began to scream like a banshee. Apparently it was extremely unusual for patients to wake up from a coma that way, unless the coma had been intentionally drug induced by the doctors, using pentobarbital to prevent swelling in the brain. That hadn’t been the case with Simon. The story was all over the hospital. Even the ladies at the information desk knew about it.

  Courtney also told him how the police had confiscated his PC. “Dad told me he’d ground me for life if I said anything to anyone about the cops coming to our house and that you were under suspicion. Like anybody’d ever believe that anyway,” Courtney said. “Simon the Good in trouble with the law?” She shook her head and laughed. “I don’t think so.”

  Simon never so much as blinked as he listened to his sister go on about the afternoon Lieutenant Santino and Sergeant Fowler showed up at the front door. He knew there was nothing in his computer related to “the project.” Nothing that would convict him, although it made him uncomfortable to know that some total stranger might have read his poems or stories.

  Danny related his own version of what he’d dubbed the McCabe Porn Caper. Simon didn’t share his relief.

  It was true that George McCabe had brought the whole mess on himself. Still, Simon didn’t kid himself about his own role in Mr. McCabe’s tragedy. None of this would have happened if he hadn’t set in motion a series of events that resulted in a police investigation of the school’s computer network.