The Last Words We Said

by Leah Scheier

  I updated Danny as soon as I got my phone back. He was tapping on my window fifteen minutes later.

  “Do they know about the tree?” he whispered as I pushed up the glass.

  I shook my head. “They’ll cut the branches if they realize you’ve been climbing into my room. Or they’ll just seal my window.”

  He scrambled over the sill and dropped quietly onto the rug. “So what do you want to do?”

  I shrugged and walked over to my door. “I’ll say I’m going to bed before you come. And then I’ll turn the lock.” I clicked it softly into place. “There.” I smiled as I turned back to him. “Now, where were we?”

  I did feel a little sorry for my parents. They were really just trying to protect me. But by enforcing the “no alone time” rule, they inadvertently made the whole adventure even hotter.

  And it was so so hot. That extra layer of forbidden made every kiss into a victory, the thrill of each touch more wild and electric, as we crossed boundary after boundary.

  We still stopped just short of PG-13 territory. Panting, sweaty, and shaking, we generally managed to pull apart before things went too far. We were, after all, religious kids, and I wasn’t ready to throw away all my convictions. But it was pretty impressive how very flexible those convictions were, and how quickly they were tested.

  We managed to keep the shomer couple charade going for two whole weeks before Deenie and Rae found out. They’d both suspected ever since the coded note in the muffin basket, but one afternoon we got a bit sloppy and sneaked a kiss in the basement while our friends were upstairs gathering snacks. Rae came down sooner than expected, and her reaction was predictable.

  “Well! It’s about time.”

  Deenie’s reaction was stunned silence.

  We swore them both to secrecy even though Rae protested that nobody at our school cared whether we were shomer or not.

  Turns out, they did.

  Just three weeks after I promised my parents that Danny and I had gone back to being shomer, a video of the two of us making out appeared on the class WhatsApp group—sent from Danny’s phone.

  The effect was immediate. People who didn’t even know us shared the video; in one morning it spread to neighboring schools. Elderly members of our congregation saw it. Rabbi Garner saw it.

  My parents saw it.

  Two teens kissing wouldn’t normally have caused such a stir, but Danny and I were known as the “shomer couple of the year.” Parents had used us as an example when talking to their kids about relationships in high school. So our classmates couldn’t wait to knock us off the pedestal.

  Everyone enjoys a good rumor—and everybody hates a hypocrite. We never stood a chance.

  The day that video went viral Danny and I were hanging out on the bench behind the parking lot. It was our secret spot, the perfect place to make out during free period. After about an hour, I finally checked my phone; we’d heard it buzzing in my purse, but Danny and I had been otherwise occupied for a while and I’d ignored it. There were two messages from Rae, one from Deenie. And about ten from my parents.

  Rae’s texts basically spelled out what had happened. “Check your WhatsApp! Everyone’s seen it. There’s a rumor going around that you’re pregnant.”

  I stared, speechless, at the screen for a moment. Next to me, Danny was glaring at his cell. His face had gone white.

  “It came from your phone,” I said. “Did you tape us—”

  “God, no!” he cried. “How could you think that?”

  “Then how did this happen?” I asked him. “I thought no one knew about our hideaway.”

  He wouldn’t meet my eyes.

  “Danny. Who could have filmed us? Who knows about this spot?”

  He swallowed hard. “I told Greg about us,” he admitted in a low voice. “But he said he wouldn’t tell anyone—”

  “You told Greg?” I exclaimed. “After you promised you wouldn’t?”

  “I’m sorry. I can’t believe he did this—”

  “Danny, he was playing with your phone after history this morning. I saw him. Of course he did it!”

  “Let me just talk to him—”

  “Talk to him?!” I shouted, springing to my feet. “I don’t care what he has to say! That doesn’t matter—don’t you get it? What matters is that you promised me you wouldn’t tell anyone. And then you went ahead and bragged about it—”

  “I didn’t brag—”

  But I wasn’t listening anymore. My phone lit up with another text from my mom, and I tossed it at him with a cry. “It’s over, do you understand?” I yelled at him. “My parents know everything. They’re not going to let me see you again—” I shuddered as Rae’s words flew through my mind. “People are saying that we’re liars, Danny! Have you read the comments on the group? Everyone is laughing at us. Why would you do that to me?”

  Danny had risen to face me; he tried to grab my hands, but I pulled away from him.

  “Don’t you touch me!” I screamed. “You’re not supposed to touch me!”

  “Ellie, calm down,” he begged. “It’s only stupid gossip. Nobody really cares about this—”

  I cut him off with a sharp laugh. “You don’t have to go home to my parents! You aren’t going to be grounded forever.”

  “I’ll talk to your parents—”

  “And tell them what? That we—” I picked the phone off the ground. “That I make cow noises when you touch me?” I scrolled through the texts. “That we like to make out in my parents’ bed? Ugh! God!”

  A brief smile flashed across his face. “They’re just jokes.”

  “To you! This is a joke to you!” My voice was rising to a hysterical pitch. It cracked as I waved my buzzing phone in his face. “How can you be smiling? This is just a funny story to you, isn’t it?”

  “Look, I know I shouldn’t have told Greg,” he pleaded. “And I am sorry. But I don’t understand why you care so much about the gossip. Why are you so worried about what everybody thinks?”

  He reached out to take my hand again, but I batted him away.

  “You don’t get to touch me!”

  “Ellie, I messed up. I get it. Let me try to make it right. Can I at least give you a hug?”

  I pushed him back. “No! That’s not allowed, remember?” I snapped. I turned away, ignoring the pained look in his eyes. “I have to go face the music at home. Don’t follow me, okay? Don’t come tapping at my window tonight. Just leave me alone.”

  Chapter 20

  I’m at Publix, picking up last-minute ingredients for Shabbat, when I run into Greg in the cereal aisle. It’s too late to back away; he calls out my name as he approaches, and I steel myself for a conversation I’ve been trying to avoid for months.

  In the end, I never actually called out Greg for what he did. At the time, my fight was with Danny, and I was so angry about his betrayal, I had no space for smaller battles. Only a week after our fight, Danny disappeared, and all my energy went to desperate prayers for his return. In the urgency of my despair, my anger at Greg evaporated and I welcomed his support, the hours and late nights he volunteered with the search party, the updates he posted on the Bring Danny Home page. And then the efforts dried up, hope dwindled, and I faded from the world. The video that had started it all no longer mattered. And so, neither did the person who’d filmed it.

  Rae broke up with Greg when his role in our fight was revealed, and shortly afterward he managed to convince his parents to let him finish up the year in the local public high school. So he vanished from my radar, and I was grateful not to have him as a constant reminder of the worst days of my life.

  And now, here he is in front of me, holding a crumpled box of Froot Loops in his arms. He’s even taller than I remember, but the thick muscles he’d trained so hard to build have shrunk; he seems gaunt, bowed by the weight of his own broad shoulders.

  “I hear you’re collecting stories about Danny,” he says with no introduction. “I’m a little hurt you never asked me for
one.”

  “Yeah, well, I’m a little hurt you never apologized.”

  He doesn’t say anything for a moment. “I did apologize,” he says in a low voice. “He didn’t forgive me.”

  “Of course he didn’t. You were the reason we broke up.”

  His dark eyes flash and he straightens suddenly. “No, Ellie, you were the reason you two broke up.”

  “You sent the video!”

  “Yeah, I sent it because I wanted to knock that self-righteous chip off your shoulder. I didn’t know you would blowtorch your relationship over it. But you went ahead and broke up with your boyfriend because he ruined your good-girl image.”

  “What are you talking about? I don’t care about my image!”

  He rolls his eyes. “Well, you sure did then. Seems like it was all you cared about.”

  I bristle at the insult, but he doesn’t let me speak.

  “And it wasn’t enough that you were a total hypocrite. You made Danny a hypocrite too. That’s what I couldn’t handle.”

  I don’t know what to say. On the one hand, I know he’s right. I was a hypocrite. But wasn’t everyone a little bit of a hypocrite online? No one posts their true self on social media. That’s not what it is for.

  I glance around the aisle desperately, searching for a hint of Danny’s shadow behind the shelves. He always shows up when I need him; if he were here, he’d say something that would soften the sting of his friend’s words.

  When I don’t speak, Greg shakes his head, and the light in his eyes fades. “Just—forget it. That’s not what I came over here to say.” He sighs. “And, look, I’ll say I’m sorry, if you want. I’ll say it a hundred times, if you’ll just listen to my story.”

  I study his earnest expression for a moment and shake my head. “I—I don’t understand. Why do you care so much about my collection?”

  “I don’t care about it. But I want you to have this story,” he explains. “Because I know he’d want you to hear it.”

  I nod and feel my anger fade with his. It really doesn’t matter now, I realize; it never really mattered.

  He takes my silence as agreement and draws a deep breath. “A couple of weeks before the New Year’s party, the two of us were walking behind the school,” he tells me. “Danny was trying to get me to apologize to Rae for—something. Some stupid disagreement. I didn’t understand why he cared.

  “ ‘It’s all temporary anyway,’ I told him. ‘We’re not going to last. High school relationships spoil quicker than milk.’

  “He shook his head. ‘Speak for yourself,’ he said. ‘Ellie and I are going to last.’

  “I laughed at him. ‘What—like through graduation?’

  “ ‘No. Like forever.’

  “ ‘Are you serious?!’ I shouted. ‘She’s your first girlfriend. Nobody marries their first girlfriend. Nobody even thinks of marrying their first girlfriend!’

  “He shrugged. ‘That’s because they start off dating the wrong people. It’s different for us. I can’t picture my life without Ellie.’

  “ ‘Yeah, well, I can’t picture my life without Rae right now,’ I said. ‘But you know she’s going to dump me eventually. Then we’ll both move on. And one day I’ll have trouble remembering her last name. That’s high school. You can’t get too attached.’

  “ ‘What if I like being attached?’

  “ ‘Of course you like it. You two have been joined at the hip since you hit puberty. You don’t know any better.’

  “He just grinned at me. ‘Whatever. We should get back. Lunch is almost over.’ I could tell that he was sorry he’d spoken to me. But I wasn’t going to let it go.

  “ ‘Dude, you haven’t even kissed her yet,’ I pointed out. ‘Do you understand how weird that is?’

  “He’d started to walk away from me, but he turned around then. Cleared his throat. ‘We’re late to class,’ he said, but I could see that he was hiding something—and not very well, either. It wasn’t going to be hard to get him to spill; I knew exactly where to push.

  “I grabbed him by the shoulder. ‘You’re talking about marrying this girl? And you haven’t even touched her. Look, if she cared about you at all, she’d have shown you by now.’

  “We’d had this conversation a hundred times, and he’d always defended you, defended religion, defended whatever. But now he didn’t fight, didn’t react at all—and I knew I had him.

  “ ‘Hey, what’s going on?’ I challenged him. ‘Are you holding out on me?’

  “He didn’t answer me at first. Glanced at his watch and at the school entrance.

  “ ‘You have kissed her!’

  “He smiled at me. Hesitated for a second. And then he caved. ‘What can I say? It was worth the wait.’

  “ ‘Holy shit, Danny! It’s about time!’

  “It took a couple more pokes, and the details came spilling out. He told me about climbing into your room at midnight. Told me about the bench behind the school.”

  Greg pauses and glances at me for the first time since beginning the story. He scans my face, as if trying to read my thoughts. And in that moment, I don’t care if he sees the tears in my eyes. I’m too upset to care that I’m transparent. I want him to see how much his words have hurt me.

  I knew that Danny had told Greg our secret. I thought he’d bragged about it, the way some guys brag about their “conquests.” But that’s not what had happened at all. He shouldn’t have done it, of course, but then, I hadn’t let him explain his side of things. I’d imagined how the scene had gone, and then convicted him based on the story I invented.

  “Danny made me promise not to tell anyone,” Greg concludes when I don’t speak. “He said he didn’t want anyone to know.

  ‘ “Know what?’ I teased him. ‘That you finally made out with your girlfriend? And so now you think you have to marry her?’

  “He stopped, his hand on the door, and turned around. Looked back at me. ‘What are you talking about?’ he asked. ‘That has nothing to do with it. I’ve known she was the one since I told her my first story.’ ”

  Chapter 21

  I don’t want to hear any more stories. When I’d started the project, it had felt like the beginning of an adventure; every new entry into my journal had given me a little glimpse of the boy I loved. Classmates stopped me in the halls to tell me an anecdote they thought I’d want, and I welcomed all of them. But Greg’s story has wrecked me, and now my guilt turns each new memory bitter.

  It seems I no longer have control over Danny’s stories, though. They continue to find me even when I’m too spent to enjoy them. During my visit with Mr. Edelstein that evening, I try to talk about mundane things. For once, I want to discuss anything but Danny. But he isn’t having it. He’s heard that I’m writing about his son, he tells me. Would I like to hear about Danny’s biological parents?

  Of course I don’t say no, no matter how tired I am. I’ve wanted to learn that story for years.

  He draws an album from the corner bookcase and flips to the middle. “My brother,” he says, pulling out a wrinkled photograph of a teenager on a skateboard, poised at the top of a cement ramp. “Adam was almost fifteen years younger than me, and as different from me as you can imagine. I don’t think there was a single daredevil stunt he didn’t try before he was twenty. Mountain climbing, skydiving, swimming with sharks. Adrenaline junkies I think that’s what they call people like my brother. Always looking for the next thrill. He loved traveling, so he obtained a pilot’s license. For a while he worked for a transport company that flew racehorses across the country.”

  I can’t help smiling at this. So Danny’s father really was a pilot, after all. I love that the first story Danny told me was actually true.

  I gaze at the brash, lopsided grin of the boy on the skateboard. Danny’s father. His face is rounder than his son’s, but Danny had inherited his dad’s hazel-green eyes and wild sandy hair.

  “This is Tamar,” Mr. Edelstein says, pulling out
a photo from the bottom of the page. The girl in the picture looks barely older than me. She’s petite and athletic, sporting thick blond curls framing a sunburned face. “I couldn’t believe it when Adam wrote that he’d married her. They’d known each other three months. Met during an expedition in the Andes and eloped without telling anyone. He was impulsive in everything he did, though, so I suppose I shouldn’t have been shocked. Nine months later Danny was born—while they were camping on a mountain. Tamar barely survived the birth, and they were forced to move to Tel Aviv to live with her mother while she recovered. They stayed in Israel for a couple of years after that, but my brother’s wanderlust couldn’t be tamed. So when his wife was well, they took off again, leaving Danny with Tamar’s mother. A few months later his grandmother had had enough; she was sick and couldn’t take care of Danny anymore. So they promised to head back. Two days before their flight, their train derailed outside of Nepal. Everyone in their car was killed.”

  I stare at the carefree faces of Danny’s parents. He probably had no memory of them, and they’d never really gotten to know him. But I can see the imprint of his mother’s smile on her son’s face; the teasing spark in his father’s eyes is so familiar. I wonder how differently Danny would have turned out if they had lived to raise him.

  “How did you end up being his guardian?” I ask.

  Mr. Edelstein turns the album to the next page. “Would you believe I was the one Adam had named in his will? I didn’t, or that he even had a will to begin with. My brother and I had never really gotten along. I was religious; he was an atheist. I lived a frugal life; he’d spent most of our parents’ inheritance by the time he died. And I hadn’t even met my nephew until I flew in for his parents’ funeral. Maybe it was just process of elimination. Tamar’s mother wasn’t well enough to raise a toddler. And I was the only close relative left. So Danny came back with me to LA.”