Teen Phantom

by Chandler Baker

  I stared at her. Moment of truth—I could leave her hanging or I could open my mouth and pray that whatever came out was right. “Thou knew’st too well, my heart was to thy rudder tied by the strings, and thou shouldst tow me after: o’er my spirit thy full supremacy thou knew’st, and that thy beck might from the bidding of the gods command me.”

  She didn’t laugh. Quite the opposite. She picked up at the next verse like I was someone capable of holding a tune with Honor Hyde. And we kept going like that, she and I, singing, getting louder and louder. Sometimes I was moved to stand up and others she was and at one point she had wrapped her hand over mine but it was gone by the next line.

  She was beautiful and I meant that in a completely non-I-want-to-take-off-her-clothes-or-drive-a-Ferrari-to-get-her-attention type way. It was more like the type of beauty experienced when seeing a lioness in its natural habitat, which while I’d never done, I’d seen National Geographic and if that captured the half of it then I was at least part of the way there to describing Honor when she was performing. She was in her element.

  Somewhere along the line we lost track of time and when we stopped rehearsing, we were both hoarse and giddy with laughter and fatigue. In some small way, I felt like I was pulling something over on my dad, that no matter how many people he bossed around on and off Broadway, he may never know what it was like to participate.

  I suppose I never would have known, either, had I not come here. And even though it was a small thing, it was something to hold on to.

  Evening was setting in outside, and the high-pitched chirp of crickets could be heard through the windows. My room was growing increasingly dark and neither Honor nor I had moved to turn on the lights.

  Honor lay back, head on my pillow, and I knew that I would smell the scent of her hair when I fell asleep tonight. She pointed to a photograph I’d taken of the Flatiron Building.

  “Do you really think I might not get in?” she asked.

  “To the Flatiron?”

  “To the program.”

  “Oh.” We hadn’t ever addressed what I’d said to her when she’d told me about the summer intensive. So much had happened since then that I’d forgotten about it, but clearly she hadn’t. I was glad that her eyes were closed and that our faces were both pointed to the ceiling so that I didn’t have to look at her. “Of course I think you’ll get in. That’s the reason why I was so jealous.”

  Her lips curled into a dreamy smile. Her eyes stayed closed, and I could tell she was picturing it. A new everything. But slowly the corners of her mouth flattened out. Two creases formed between her brows.

  “If you knew my sister, you wouldn’t have even been able to see me,” she said. “That’s how big and dark her shadow was. Is.” She propped herself up on her elbows. The mattress squeaked.

  “It doesn’t seem that way to me,” I said.

  “I had to find a literal spotlight for anyone to notice me. First, I was the little sister of Polly Perfect and now I’m the sister of the girl who went psycho and then sometimes I was the girl … well…” I could tell she wanted to say something. She looked down at her hands in her lap and I could swear that there were tears pooling on her eyelids and there wasn’t a breath freshener around that we could blame. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter.” She got up on her knees and studied the photographs. She tapped her finger on one of them. “There. I’m going to make it. I’m going to leave behind this … this place. You’ll see.”

  I smiled up at her. I wanted to touch her hand. But ever so slowly I was learning not to be a total idiot. So instead I said simply, “I already do.”

  SIXTEEN

  Lena

  I was starting to think that getting rid of Drake was a mistake. With police still in and out of the school, I was being forced to stay at home much longer than I had wanted and that was making it harder to avoid Misty altogether. At last a news bulletin came over the television that Hollow Pines High would be returning to session after a hiatus following the recent death of a teacher and maiming of a senior. Photos of Mrs. Dolsey and Drake flashed on screen. Mrs. Dolsey’s was a goofy picture with her brothers and sisters wearing an ugly Christmas sweater. Drake looked like he’d gotten head shots taken at the mall.

  I texted Chris right away with the good news because he’d been stuck at home, his aunt and uncle freaked out about recent events as if those would ever happen to Chris.

  I’ll admit, to avoid going home, I enjoyed going to Chris’s house to check on him. To watch him. To feel like I was taking care of him.

  And he was always there, just the way he said he was. Because Chris wouldn’t lie to me. He would never lie to me.

  He didn’t know I was at his house, and I liked that. It wasn’t creepy because I took video and I was going to add it to the montage I was making, so that he’d see it for himself soon. I’d taped over the footage of Mrs. Dolsey and Mr. Roy since I wouldn’t be needing it anymore, and it didn’t seem smart to save it. Chris’s video, if I did say so myself, was turning out really well. I just needed a few more parting shots and a final musical number—I was leaning toward “I’ll Stand by You” by the Pretenders, which was a little sappy but hit you right in the feels in a way that I thought Chris would appreciate.

  He texted back that he was looking forward to getting back in the “swing of things” and that he would see me tomorrow, and I literally fell back on my bed clutching my phone to my heart.

  On top of that, I was able to ignore Misty the Terrible while she stank up the house waiting for Nair to fry off her stubby leg hair.

  I fell asleep that night with my clothes on and my face plastered to a new letter to Marcy in which I was trying to tell her that I was no longer a lily liver anymore. But maybe lily livers shouldn’t need to write letters to girls who’d gone crazy and no longer wanted to talk to them.

  I wished she could tell me.

  * * *

  “EVERYONE GATHER ROUND, gather round.” Mrs. Fleury stood regally on the edge of the stage, motioning with the flaps of today’s canary yellow cape for us to clump around the orchestra pit. “Sound, lights, set designers, that includes you.” She pressed her hands together in mock prayer. “Class, class, we have only a few days left until the scheduled opening night of the fall show, and, as you all know, we have suffered a tragic loss in the form of our Mark Antony, Drake Nettles. I am loath to be the bearer of such sorrowful news, but Drake is not expected to make a full recovery from his injuries.” She paused for dramatic effect. “Though toxicology has not yet come back on what exactly caused the…” She coughed and patted her chest. Total destruction of Drake’s throat? I thought to supply. But instead I picked at the pair of fingerless mesh gloves I was wearing. “… wound.” She stumbled over the word like the mere thought of it evoked a gag reflex. “But in the meantime, police may pull some of you aside for questioning. Please cooperate to the best of your abilities. May God bless his recovery.”

  Ever the performer, Mrs. Fleury crossed herself. There were a few sidebar remarks and stirrings. Few seemed to be mourning the loss of Drake, but the loss of Mark Antony had created a black hole of uncertainty for the production’s status. As for me, standing in the mix of so many students who knew nothing about what I’d done, I felt again that my invisibility among my peers was no longer such a source of weakness. I could do and had done something that none of them would ever do. I’d changed things. All this upheaval? It was because of me.

  “So”—Mrs. Fleury clapped her hands gamely—“as I’d alluded to we have no Mark Antony, which no one needs reminding is a meaty, difficult role. Now I would hate to have to postpone the show given my well-documented philosophies. But we’ve already got Luke filling the role of Octavius and—”

  “Um, Mrs. Fleury?” Out of the grouping of students stepped Honor Hyde. Her cheeks were as pink as the cashmere of her sweater and the fringe of her hair swept just below her shoulder blades. The sight of her always stirred something in me. I never knew whether I should feel an af
finity with her for being Marcy’s technical sister or if I should dislike her for being a tie to the world that Marcy no longer felt a part of. So what I usually wound up feeling was yawning ambivalence toward her, mixed with a desire to search out any part of her physical appearance that reminded me of Marcy. The only feature I could ever determine they shared, though, was the shape of their noses, which were exact replicas of each other’s. “I think I know of someone who could fill in as Mark Antony,” she said. She always had a mousy air when she wasn’t on stage. It was a weird alchemy that occurred with her in and out of the spotlight that I couldn’t quite grasp. She was an enigma, made worse by the exposed sexting incident she’d suffered last year when she’d sent embarrassing nearly nude photos to Teddy Marks who had, in turn, shared them with the entire student body. Sometimes I looked at them on my phone when I missed Marcy. It wasn’t creepy to miss someone.

  “You do?” Mrs. Fleury’s lips pursed. “And where have you been hiding this delicious stash of Mark Antonys, Miss Hyde?”

  Honor lifted her chin, bracing herself it seemed. “I’ve been running lines with Chris Autry, Mrs. Fleury, and he’s been doing really well.” Honor glanced over her shoulder to where Chris stood with a stunned look on his face. “He knows the part cold. Or at least almost. And he can hit the notes. I swear it.”

  At the mention of Chris, I perked up. Chris was slouching a short distance away from her. He rubbed the patched elbows of his open flannel shirt. He had on a strange pair of high-tops with a puffy shoe tongue that I’d never seen a guy wear in Hollow Pines before ever and at the sound of his own name he immediately did the nervous Chris thing where he stared down at his shoes and kicked the heel of one into the toe of the other.

  I felt myself leaning in with keen interest because Yes. Yes, Honor. I wanted to applaud her for acting as the perfect pawn and I the master architect. Chris as Mark Antony, it was inspired. Another reason for Chris to feel part of Hollow Pines and also the recognition that my best friend deserved.

  “Is this true, Mr. Autry?” Mrs. Fleury peered over the top of her glasses. The beaded chain that wrapped from the glasses around her neck to hold them in place rattled. “You’re prepared to play the part of the great Mark Antony?”

  Chris twitched and mussed his hair, which was already so messy it was suitable for a whole family of birds to move into. “I, uh, yeah, I guess so?”

  “We are either ready to take on a role, or we are not. There is no guessing.”

  His chest swelled with a deep breath and he took a long look around the circle of faces and when he found mine, the corner of his mouth quirked as if to say can you believe this. I didn’t know if he caught my nod, but I gave him one, barely there because what my heart wanted him to hear with its every beat was: Yes, Chris, I believe in you. See what I’ve done for you.

  And then as if in answer he turned to Mrs. Fleury and said, “Yes, I am.”

  I rarely smiled in a way that showed my teeth, but I made an exception.

  Mrs. Fleury looked appraisingly at Chris. A moment longer and I would have worried that she might gobble him up like the Hansel and Gretel witch. “Well, then we have a lot of work to do,” she said.

  The rest of the period passed quickly and with purpose. I, of course, hung close to congratulate Chris who had this goofy drank-too-much-wine grin on his face that he couldn’t tamp down. Also, I had felt a noticeable upgrade since having my best friend be cast as the male lead of the play. He asked me for the huge favor—please—of fetching him Drake’s old script. And I made sure to be there anytime he needed a drink of water or to be fed a line. Nobody seemed to notice or question my presence because Chris didn’t question my presence. Naturally he didn’t because we were best friends. We were always best friends. Now more than ever. Now because even if he didn’t know in fact, I knew that somewhere in his heart Chris sensed what I’d done for him.

  Chris was so focused that at the end of the rehearsal, he collapsed on stage and stared up at the rafters where we once ate lunch.

  My shadow cast a shadow over his face as I peered down at him.

  “Can you believe this?” He blinked up at me.

  “Yes,” I said.

  He rubbed his forehead. “Honor just got me the part. Just like that.” He snapped his fingers. “I was Chorus Member Number Five. Or maybe it was Four. I can’t even remember.”

  I kneeled down. The holes in the knees of my stockings widened. “Honor?” I repeated.

  He sat up. I could smell the sweat beading on his forehead. He looked like a little boy. I almost thought to wipe it for him. “Yes, wasn’t that, like, the coolest of her?”

  “But—” I bit back a correction. I felt like someone had crossed my wires and I was short-circuiting. “But,” I repeated, record scratching. What more could I say? I tried a different tack. “So after school today, we’ll—”

  He held out his hand for me to pull him to his feet, and we both stood together. His damp hands left a film of perspiration on my mesh gloves. “I think I better run lines with Honor, Lena. Sorry, it’s just a little crazy with the production and everything. We only have a few days. You get it, right?”

  I stared down at my hand. I touched the wetness with the tip of my finger and then curled my knuckles around it and held my fist to my heart. “Sure, Chris,” I said, quietly. “I get it. Always.”

  He tipped his two fingers to his forehead in his signature salute. “Hey, thanks for all your help today.”

  But the truth was, I didn’t get it. Not through lunch when I didn’t see Chris and was forced to eat alone in the rafters. Not through math class with our substitute teacher when all I got from him was a friendly-but-not-too-friendly smile and not through the last bell, either.

  The longer the day passed the more my insides churned into a turbulent storm of questions. Like what did he mean when he said that Honor got him the part? Because did Honor get rid of John Mark? Did Honor threaten Mrs. Dolsey for him? Did Honor liquefy Drake Nettles’s throat?

  No, no, and more no.

  Those were the things that had won Chris this part. And all Honor had to do was ask a simple question of her drama teacher and now, what, she was the one who deserved all the credit?

  Honor didn’t know Chris like I did. Honor didn’t care about Chris like I did. Honor was a piece on a chessboard and that was it. The unfairness of it brewed along my intestines, coagulating into something hard and indigestible.

  I didn’t know what exactly was going on with Chris and Honor, but I was going to get to the bottom of it. So after last period, I followed him. It was easy, really. I knew his typical pattern like a map in my head.

  I watched him visit his locker. I watched him meet Honor in front of the trophy case. After that, all I had to do was follow a safe distance behind, keeping enough warm bodies between me and them, as they made their way not to the auditorium to run lines, but to the parking lot where Chris held his car door open for Honor as she ducked into the passenger side. My eyes narrowed.

  Quickly, I fumbled in my bag for my keys and cut left to where my car was parked. I had less experience driving inconspicuously, but after the first few blocks and nearly losing them at the corner of Lockwood and Pine Ridge, I got the hang of it. As long as I stayed four or five car lengths back and a lane over, I figured there was no reason for Chris to look into the rearview mirror and notice my VW Bug trailing him.

  I twisted my hands over the top of the steering wheel and settled in. What I expected them to do was head either to Chris’s house or to Honor’s, but instead Chris drove straight through the town center and out the other side. The cityscape zipped by my windows in the span of a few heartbeats. That was how it was living in a town like Hollow Pines. Distance could be measured by pulses.

  He drove until the cotton fields stretched long into the distance and the weeds cropped up along the highway. Out in front sprawled a dark line on the horizon where the trees grew thick and unruly. I kept my headlights turned off even as the
shadow of the forest gaped and swallowed my little car.

  We were headed into the Hollows.

  I veered off before the paved road ended. I had to or else it would have been obvious to Chris that a car was following. My tires bumped on the shoulder of the road where I came to a stop. I stared down the long, straight runway of road that we’d traveled and let the breeze push back my bangs. Up ahead, the taillights of Chris’s car shined red through the trunks and then disappeared into the fold of trees. I abandoned my car where it was and took off on foot.

  My fingers worked uneasily at widening the holes in my mesh gloves. No, a little voice in my head said. No, no, no, no, no.

  I didn’t want it to be true. I didn’t want to know the “X” that marked the spot on the Chris Autry map this time. I stumbled up to the border of wild branches in time to hear the tinny clang of car doors up ahead followed by untroubled voices.

  I pushed my way after them through moss and spiderwebs, worried that I’d lose the sound of them. But I shouldn’t have been worried because we were following the familiar path to my grandfather’s old cabin and I was there to watch Chris open the door and let her inside.

  Every piece of me stiffened. I turned into a cadaver, hours dead. Push my arm and it might have snapped clean off.

  But no, he wouldn’t. No, he couldn’t. I sank my stockinged knees into the damp earth behind a thick tree trunk. The door clicked shut behind them and, before long, light flickered in the cloudy windows.

  I turned my back and pressed my spine into the tree. My knees had bits of lichen stuck to them, but I hugged them tight to my body anyway. A lump swelled in my throat so large it pushed tears into my eyes.

  I had shown him this spot. I dug my fingernails into the dirt beside me. This was our spot. It meant something to … us. I brought my hands to my cheeks and felt streaks of mud cake onto them. Why would he bring her here?