Save Steve

by Jenni Hendriks

My mind whited.

  When I came back, we were kissing. Actually kissing. And I tried not to think about why. Just that it was happening. Really happening. And that our kiss was like our conversations: easy, familiar, and yet each moment a surprise.

  When she finally pulled back, Steve was standing in the doorway behind her. A flick of my eyes must have tipped Kaia off, because she turned.

  “See, Steve,” she said, her voice ringing with triumph. “This is a good guy.” And she took my cheeks in her hands. And pulled me closer. She was going to kiss me again. In front of Steve. That was a thing that was going to happen. Right now. Her lips touched mine. And she kissed me harder. Deeper. Angrier.

  Then she pulled apart and looked up at me. And burst into tears.

  I just stared, slack jawed and goofy faced until, miraculously, my last functioning brain cell was able to suggest that I console her. I gathered her in my arms and she sobbed into the shiny satin on my tux lapel. Through her curls, I could see Steve standing at the end of the hall watching us, an inscrutable expression on his face. He gave me a thumbs-up. It sent a shiver through me.

  Kaia gave a sniff and mumbled into my shoulder, “You must have heard us fighting, right?” I nodded, still trying to process the thumbs-up. “How could he do this? And on fucking prom?”

  “Uh . . .” I looked back to where Steve had stood, but he was gone.

  “Cam?” Kaia had stopped crying. She looked like she was waiting for me to say something, but my eyes kept darting back to the empty space where Steve had been. Kaia’s expression clouded. “I’m such an idiot.”

  “What? No, you aren’t.”

  “You tried to tell me about Steve. I mean, you said he was faking, which was crazy, but you must have sensed something. And you tried to be a good friend and warn me. And I was so mean to you. I yelled. And I didn’t go to the shark thing. And I didn’t text you. And . . . I’m sorry.” Kaia wiped her eyes, smearing mascara everywhere.

  “Oh.” I tried to think of something else to say, but before I could, she heaved a huge sigh.

  “Crap. I still have to go to prom. I’m on the freaking committee. I have to check everyone in. And I have this stupid dress.” She smiled at me, a little uncertain. “I know this is lame and you totally don’t have to, but . . . would you maybe want to be no fun with me at prom?”

  I couldn’t get Steve’s thumbs-up out of my mind.

  “Cam?”

  I realized I was leaving her hanging. And while everything seemed twisted in a Gordian knot, I couldn’t hurt her more. “Of course I’ll take you to prom.”

  Kaia smiled and sniffed. “Well, taking isn’t necessary. I’m on decorating duty, too. Just . . . meet me there? And dance with me?”

  “Yeah. Yeah, I’d . . . I’d love that.”

  Kaia stepped back, releasing me. “I need to go and fix myself up. And punch something Steve-shaped. But see you later?”

  “Yeah.”

  She reached up and pulled a crushed flower from my hair, then kissed me softly on the cheek. “You’re the best.” Her words pierced me as she walked away. I stood under the wedding arc, realizing I was going to prom with Kaia. Just like I’d dreamed. And I had no idea why.

  Wobbly and confused, I walked to the greenroom. Steve was sitting on the fake leather couch, his head in his hands. He looked up as I entered.

  “Did you know cancer was supposed to change me? That I was supposed to grow and blossom as a person? I thought it was just my body making mutant cells that would slowly shut down my organs and kill me, but apparently, I was supposed to learn shit, too. Oh well, missed that memo.”

  “Why did you do that?”

  Steve’s smile was bleak. “It’s exactly what you wanted, right? Happy?”

  It was. And I wasn’t. “But . . . why?”

  Steve stood and started to pace. “Oh, no big reason. Just . . . got some test results back. Shit was supposed to be all gone, but I guess there’s some left. Apparently, my cancer might be ‘resistant to chemo.’ Kinda surprised everyone, even my doc. Cool, huh?” He grabbed another bagel off the plate and took a bite.

  “But . . . it has a ninety-four percent cure rate.” I’d read the statistics over and over. It was the good cancer. It was the good—

  “Looks like I might be the other six percent!” Crumbs fell from his lips and he pumped his fist and made his voice sound like his dad’s. “Killin’ it. Or it’s killing me.” He swallowed. “Did I tell you, you and Kaia look super cute together? You make such an adorable uptight couple.” He tossed the mostly uneaten bagel in the trash with such force the basket almost tipped over.

  I grabbed Steve’s arm, stopping him. “But . . . no. This doesn’t make any sense. Why did you fake being sick the other night?” None of this was right. This was another of Steve’s games. There must be something I wasn’t seeing. Some advantage he was working.

  Steve blinked. “Fake?”

  “At the pool. After I dropped you off, I came back to give you your jacket and saw you. You were dancing. You made me admit all that stuff, pretended to be my friend, just so I would give up on Kaia. You were jumping around singing ‘We Are the Champions.’ You were laughing at me!” My voice cracked on the last sentence.

  Steve studied me for a long moment. “Wow. That’s a lot to unpack, Cam.”

  “Why did you do it?!”

  Steve flinched. The room seemed suddenly, eerily quiet after my outburst. “I wasn’t faking being sick with you, Cam,” Steve finally said, his voice low. “I was faking being well with my dad.”

  I stepped back. “No . . . that’s not . . .”

  Steve shook his head. “I guess you’d have a hard time believing me after what I did to you. But, honestly, would you have ever believed anything good about me?” Steve paused, waiting for an answer that wasn’t going to come. “Anyway, it actually works out. Once I got those results, I knew how sad Kaia would be and I . . . I didn’t want that. I was going to break up with her. Make her really hate me. Hating me is so much better than being sad, right?” He flashed the bitterest smile I’d ever seen. When I didn’t react, he started to pace again. “I was kinda stumped on how to do that, being all pukey and shaky and shit. Makes it hard to truly misbehave. But then you gave me such a perfect opportunity. Nice job. Anyway, when she confronted me, I was thinking, Thank you, Cam, for being such a fucking dick! You’re saving me so much work!” He spread his arms wide in a grand gesture.

  I stared. This wasn’t possible. This wasn’t what was supposed to happened. It was some sort of terrible joke. Because if it wasn’t, it meant that night was real. It meant Steve had been—

  “Guys, we’re ready for you!” Exclamation Lady was back. “Where’s”—she checked her notebook—“Kaia?”

  “She had to go. Emergency.” Steve’s tone was wooden.

  “Oh well!” she said brightly. “It’s you two people we want to see anyway! Cam, are you going to dance for us?”

  I didn’t respond.

  Exclamation Lady clapped her hands together, taking my catatonic state for consent. “Okay! Let’s do this!”

  She herded us into the hall. We weaved through various set pieces, past more props and some guy in a hot dog suit, all the while getting closer to the bright white lights of the stage. I could feel a blast of heat coming off them, warming my face. It was the only thing I could feel. Just as we were about to cross the boundary from the dark shadows of backstage to the blinding glow of the set, Steve leaned in close and whispered in my ear.

  “Congratulations, Cam. You win.”

  Something happened after that. I couldn’t remember what. A lady with really thick fake eyelashes asked questions. A man who was a lot older than her and slightly orange laughed too loud when I stood up and danced a little. Steve smiled at me. He called me “buddy” and “Cam my man” and “bro.” He never called me friend.

  Then it was over.

  “You are such an amazing guy, Cam!” Exclamation Lady was making me sign some pape
rwork. My tux felt too tight. “Steve is lucky to have someone like you!” My head jerked up at the sound of his name. Where was Steve? We’d walked off the set side by side. I looked around, searching, but I already knew he was gone.

  Outside, the marine layer had cleared and the sun flashed off the rows of parked cars. But other than a few seagulls, the parking lot was empty.

  I drove home.

  Down Main Street.

  Past the posters Kaia and I had hung.

  Steve’s face repeated in the windows of every shop.

  Somehow, I got back to my room. As I stood in the center of it, still wearing my prom tux, the full weight of what had happened this morning became crystal clear—I had ruined everything.

  The photo of Steve caught my eye. Sick Steve. Selfless Steve. Good Steve. I had tried to take advantage of a kid with cancer. I had tried to steal his girlfriend. I was the one who should be wearing the devil horns.

  “Local Hero!” proclaimed an article about me that I had proudly tacked next to his picture. Bullshit. BULL. SHIT. I stomped over, ripped it from the wall, crushed it into a wad, and chucked it into the trash. The trash. Where my good deeds belonged.

  The Save Steve wall loomed over me. There was the poster again. The T-shirts I’d designed. Letters from people telling me how great I was. How thoughtful. Articles. Praise. It wasn’t a wall for Steve. It was a wall of my own self-importance. A wall of my lies.

  With sudden fury, I tore at the wall. “The Fundraising Genius.” Rip! “You’re an inspiration!” Rip! “SuperCam!” Rip! All of it, down . . . down . . . down. Into the fucking trash. Until all that was left were bits of paper under a constellation of thumbtacks.

  My breathing was heavy and my blood rushing. It felt good. But it didn’t feel like enough. I spun to the other walls. Save the shark. The wetlands. The straws. The sand dunes. It was all bullshit. Because I was bullshit. I couldn’t look at that bullshit anymore.

  It had to go. My arms whirled like propellers, ridding the walls of my arrogance. Citizenship awards torn into pieces. A letter from the Sierra Club, dismembered. My Amnesty International merit badge, discarded. All the conceited do-goodery, eradicated. But there were still shelves of pseudo- accomplishments that needed to be destroyed. I whizzed around my room. The trophy from Junior United Nations, shattered. A plaque from the Lions Club, smashed. A commemorative tree from the Arbor Day Foundation, snapped in two. The trash overflowed. I stomped on it. Hard. I needed to obliterate any remnant of my smugness.

  The top of my dresser was cleared. The walls bare. The shelves empty. All of it gone. Except one thing.

  With shaking hands, I gripped the framed photo of Michelle Obama. I held it for a brief moment and then discarded it, facedown into the trash. I heard the glass crack and, for a moment, thought that was it. I was done.

  But I needed full erasure.

  Clutching my pile of hypocrisy and our fire extinguisher, I walked out of our town house and into the backyard. I looked for a place to set the garbage pile down, but the area was too exposed. The fence behind us was too low for privacy and I could hear the neighbors’ kids splashing and shrieking in their pool. It wasn’t the right place for my final act.

  I headed down the side yard until I reached the door to the garage.

  Inside, I flipped on the light and closed the door behind me. Quiet. My mom wasn’t home so there was plenty of space. I placed the pile in the center, sat down in front of it with the extinguisher next to me, and pulled a lighter out of my tux jacket. I stared at the pile. In transporting it, Michelle’s photo had shifted, and her face was now visible in the clutter.

  “I went low.” I snapped the lighter to life. Tipping the flame to the corner of the “Local Hero” article, I watched as it took the fire and quickly spread to my other unworthy achievements. Sierra Club. Surfrider Foundation. Pride parade. Gun control. All catching the flame.

  “I went fucking low.”

  The heat grew and I slid back. This was what my efforts were worth. Destruction. Immolation. Eradication. I hugged my knees, hoping it would make the pain in my chest hurt a little less.

  Ash floated out of the pile and danced in the air. The clear plastic covers on the Save Steve buttons turned a burnt caramel and curled inward. The raised hands on plastic trophies singed and melted. The heat and smoke caused my eyes to water. I wiped the wet away and then I saw it—the flickering red flame licking the edge of Michelle Obama’s photo. She was still staring at me and I forced myself to look at her. To watch. The paper curled as it accepted the fire’s full rage. The words Go high burned to a crisp. My name, in smooth black Sharpie, eaten away. Unable to watch as the flames spread to her proud smile, I closed my eyes.

  The darkness felt right. I coughed. That was where I belonged. A perfect void for the worst person. I coughed, again.

  After a moment, the air started to feel thicker and I opened my eyes. The flames had grown even higher and, above me, a dense cloud of smoke threatened. I felt the particles in my lungs and coughed deeper. A sharp jab of panic gripped me. I reached for the fire extinguisher. But I moved too fast and knocked it over. Its metal cylinder clanged across the floor. Shit.

  The smoke descended and the toxic plume was beginning to make me light-headed. Vinyl acetate. Polyacrylonitriles. Polyethylene. I was unleashing them into the world. Fuck. I couldn’t even get this right.

  I let out another thunderous cough and pawed around for the extinguisher, but I couldn’t see it. Or the door. Or the ceiling. I could only make out the glow of the flames as I gasped for air. In the miasma, I saw what looked like a monstrous hurricane swirling toward me. A hurricane? Yes. And its wind pushed me down to the ground. From the oily cement, I felt debris crash over me. When I looked up, I witnessed glaciers collapsing. Forests engulfed in flames. The environment in full apocalyptic disintegration. And I was the cause. I had brought about climate change. It was me. All of it was me. Me.

  “Are you fucking kidding?”

  I sat up and peered through the vapor. There, drifting into view, I saw her. Michelle Obama. And she looked pissed.

  “I’m so sorry, Michelle. I failed you.” I prostrated myself at her feet. “I went low.”

  Her thick waves of black hair blew in the breeze and she looked down at me, full of disappointment, the fire reflected in her eyes. “This is what you brought me here for?”

  I averted my gaze, ashamed, and mumbled something meek. But she wasn’t satisfied and continued, pausing dramatically after each word.

  “I.

  “Don’t.

  “Have.

  “Time.

  “For.

  “Your.

  “Privileged.

  “Little.

  “Butt.”

  I coughed and tried to catch my breath. There was nothing I could say. I deserved it. All of it.

  “Oh damn.” Another voice with a New York accent floated through the smoke. Lying on my side and clutching my chest, I slowly made out a curvy silhouette and I knew who it had to be.

  Cardi B. Wearing a very classy pantsuit and looking pissed as hell, she sauntered to Michelle’s side. “He’s got us trapped here in some sort of weird toxic-chemical-induced shaming ritual.”

  “That’s right,” Michelle agreed. “Because apparently, he can’t figure out shit on his own.” I coughed.

  Cardi crouched over me to examine my patheticness at close range. “Damn, you seriously hallucinated two women of color to do your emotional labor? That is next level.”

  “Oh god. I’m so, so sorry,” I moaned. “I can’t believe I did that. Um, please, go . . . back . . . to whatever you were doing. I’ll just . . . lie here . . .” I flapped my hand weakly and hoped they would just evaporate back to their more important lives. “I’m the worst.”

  “Oh my fucking god!” Michelle exclaimed, and threw her hands in the air. “Just stop! Can you get more arrogant? You really think you, Cam Webber, are the absolute worst human on the planet? Do you have any idea
the number of assholes I’ve met?”

  “Um . . .”

  Cardi B sighed, a tad bit sympathetic. “Kid, listen. I used to drug motherfuckers and rob them. Does that make me the worst? No. Sometimes you do shit you’re not proud of. But that’s not all of you. Understand? You’re not the worst.”

  “But you’re not the best either. Not even close,” Michelle made sure to clarify.

  “That’s me.” Cardi reached up and Michelle gave her a fist bump.

  “But then . . . what am I?” I asked, squinting a bit. It was getting difficult to see through the oily smoke.

  “You’re just afraid,” Michelle said. I thought I heard a little of her usual compassion slip through.

  “I know. I’m so afraid . . . ,” I agreed. “But of what?” I tried to wave the smoke away to see better, but it was hard to lift my hand.

  “I think you know,” Cardi said.

  “I do?”

  And just then, a bright light bloomed and I had to shut my eyes to block it out.

  “Oh my god. Cam? Cam!” a familiar voice screamed. And I knew this one was real—my mom. Panicked, I sprang to my feet, hacking violently.

  “No! Mom!” I needed to cover this up. She couldn’t know. As the smoke began to clear and oxygen once again entered my lungs, I searched for the words that would make it all disappear. But I was too dizzy. All I could come up with was, “I’m fine.”

  Through the haze, I made out the form of my mom rushing in. “What are you doing?” The fire extinguisher was in her hand, terror in her eyes.

  “It’s fine,” I repeated, but was unable to move. She couldn’t see this. The embarrassment. The failure. The shame. She couldn’t see any of this. I needed to explain it away, but how? It was all there at my feet. Floating in the rafters. Swirling around us. Undeniable. “I’m fine.”

  With a whoosh, she smothered the fire. Immobile, I stood like a statue of humiliation with a white mist settling around me.

  “Are you okay?” she asked, still distraught.

  “I’m fine.” I needed her to go away. To forget she’d seen this. “I’m fine.” Because how could she ever forget seeing this?