The Language of Silence

by Tiffany Truitt

  I need her to move past me.

  It took me till the end of the day to realize she wasn’t in school yesterday.

  I’m a jerk.

  When the door opens, my breath catches inside my throat. She looks horrible. Her face is pale, her hair a mess, and her eyes are red. I think I see vomit on her t-shirt. She closes her eyes, shudders, and runs toward the bathroom.

  This girl is a vomit machine.

  I come inside the house and shut the door behind me. I can hear her retching behind the closed door. I grab a glass of water from the kitchen and a cool, wet rag. I open the door to the restroom only to find Brett laying her face against the tiled floor. I brush the hair from her forehead. I press the damp cloth against her face and neck. She reaches for my hand. She quickly sits up and begins to throw up again in the toilet.

  It’s another half hour before she’s done. I help her upstairs to her bed. We haven’t said a single word to each other. I can’t leave her. Not like this.

  I find the bottle of Vodka in the upstairs bathroom. I empty it down the drain.

  For a wild, crazy moment, I abandon any notion of ending this. She seems so vulnerable. So helpless. But I only think on this for a moment, because if I stay with her, I’ll ruin her. I’m not a good person. I spent an hour today texting Evelyn, a girl I’m not sure I even like, rather than be there for the girl I love.

  I’ll have to do it. I just can’t do it tonight.

  Once I think Brett is asleep, I move to go and call my mom and tell her I am going to miss our dinner plans. But Brett isn’t asleep.

  “Tell me,” she whispers.

  I clear my throat. I’ll even miss hangover Brett.

  “Tell you what?” I run my fingers through her tangled hair, hoping to find some peace for both of us.

  “I want to know three things you like about me.”

  I chuckle.

  She attempts a smile. “Come on. I’ve waited a long time. I have been very patient. Tell me.” She reaches up and grabs my hand, placing it over her rapidly beating heart.

  I give her hand a squeeze. I don’t know why, but my eyes prick with tears. “I like how stubborn you are, your ability to make your views known about everything, and fight for them. I like the way you sing to The Smiths. I could listen to you sing them every day. I like how you can look cute even after you puke. And let’s be honest, you puke a lot.”

  “Awesome,” she says, rolling her eyes.

  “I guess I just like you.”

  “Good answer,” she replies. And the smile I love graces her face.

  I shift so I am lying next to her on the bed. We fall back into silence.

  “I want to go to the spring formal,” she says.

  “You do?”

  She nods. “Will you take me, Ed? I know it’s not your thing, but will you take me?”

  The way she looks at me makes it impossible to say no. I tell her I will. I don’t ask why she wants to go so badly. I don’t tell her that it’s probably a promise I won’t be able to keep. I don’t tell her how much I love her, or how I keep thinking about having sex with Evelyn.

  I just lay there and hold her hand.

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Brett:

  I have made a promise to myself never to drink again. Seriously, I have. I intend on keeping it. Alcohol hasn’t done any good for anyone in my family. It didn’t even make me feel good. In fact, I felt like crap. For days.

  My mom is home now. She’s very quiet and keeps to her room. I make a point of going to the store and getting her favorite junk food and magazines. I leave them in the kitchen for her. When I wake up in the morning, they’re gone. It’s the only sign she’s back in the house.

  I had to ask my dad for the credit card to buy a dress for the formal. He quickly gave it to me, choosing to forget about my earlier transgressions. Back to pretending our family isn’t some kind of joke.

  I’m done fighting it. I’m just going to let whatever happens happen. If I’m feeling down, I am going to let myself feel down. If I find some happiness, I am going to let myself feel happy. I refuse to question it anymore.

  Yesterday, my math teacher had to call my name three times. I was lost in the memories of my brother. I had been thinking about last year when I watched him and Sophia go to the spring formal. He seemed happy. He came home that night and told me he enjoyed himself. He said it was mock-tastic.

  I chose a light blue dress to wear to formal. It’s strapless and stops midway down my thigh. I have decided to wear my hair down. Nothing too fancy. Very status-quo, but the only person I want to notice me is the one coming to pick me up.

  I’m glad Ed agreed to go with me tonight. If I have to suffer another two years of high school, I want some high school memories to think fondly of later in life. I’m sure it will be awkward, but I guess that’s how these things are supposed to go.

  Except, I’m starting to wonder if the boy plans on showing up at all. Ed’s late. I look at the clock on the microware for the billionth time. I have become a walking cliché. When did I become the girl that waits around for a boy? Feminism be screwed. I close my eyes and count to ten. I can find logic in this. I can.

  He’s only going for me. I’m sure he’s in no hurry to watch a bunch of people attempt to dance to whatever techno/dubstep song is climbing the charts.

  I take a few more deep breaths to stem off the anger that has begun to move through me. Or maybe it’s not anger—maybe it’s fear. I decide to kill time by finding my digital camera. I’ll make a point of taking a picture. Maybe my mom will want to see them one day.

  Despite promising myself that I wouldn’t, I look at the clock again. Ed is now an hour late. I try calling his cell phone, but he doesn’t answer. I grit my teeth and slam the phone against the kitchen counter. After pacing back and forth a bit, I snatch the phone back up and try calling again. I call over and over until the sound of his voicemail sets my nerves on edge.

  I can hear my mom moving around upstairs. I wonder if she is anxious for me to leave, so she can come downstairs and pretend this is still her house.

  I try calling Ed again.

  No answer.

  He is two hours late.

  He isn’t coming.

  “Brett? Is that you?” my mom calls hesitantly from the top of the stairs. I blink back the tears that want to fall. I hear her begin to slowly make her way down the steps. I begin to panic, scrambling to find where I put the car keys.

  I can’t have her see me like this. Abandoned. Ditched. I can’t bear to watch her try and be a mother and fail miserably at it.

  The minute my hands touch the keys, my mother appears in the kitchen. She doesn’t look haggard or worried. She looks like she spent the past month at the spa. Her eyes travel up and down me. She swallows and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. “You look very pretty tonight, Brett. Are you going to the formal?”

  I manage to nod, but that’s all she gets from me. I exit as fast as I can, finding it so much easier to breathe outside the place I’m supposed to consider a home. I cringe when I realize how much I am starting to sound like Ed.

  I don’t try and call him again. His absence is message enough. I’m sure I will feel the weight of this all later. I just don’t feel much of anything right now.

  ****

  I linger outside of the cafeteria a little before I enter. I’m ashamed that I wonder what others will think of me attending the dance alone. I take a deep breath and welcome the noise that greets me as I open the doors. It’s like a scene from the movie Footloose. Balloons everywhere, and considering the new trend is body painting, I swear there is actual glitter falling from the ceiling.

  It’s so very, very loud. I let the noise enter my brain and shut all the other voices out. It’s nice to let the waves of whomp whomp consume me. I’m not alone for very long. Everyone I know seems to stop by and say hello. Even Evelyn.

  “You look great,” she yells over the music. I offer her a small smile in return.
“I see Ed’s not with you,” she says.

  I nod. She looks back at her bubble gum-glitter friends and motions that she’ll be right back. She pulls me toward the hallway, and I wonder what we could possibly talk about. Not anything more important than the cha-cha slide, at least.

  She leans against a locker and pulls out a tube of lip gloss from her clutch purse. She reapplies and then raises an eyebrow as if to signal a response from me. I nod, affirming she still looks good enough to make it on multiple pages of the yearbook.

  Evelyn sighs and crosses her arms. “He told you, huh?”

  “Yeah he told me,” I reply, having no idea what she’s talking about. My ears are still ringing.

  “Look. I warned him, you know. I told him he should break up with you. Even before it happened, I asked him to do it. He just couldn’t.”

  I’m starting to feel something now. Flashbacks of heaving all the contents of my stomach into the toilet while Ed held my hair are rushing back to me. It’s a similar feeling that controls me now. I just don’t know why I’m feeling it.

  Evelyn’s just staring at me waiting to say something. She sighs again, and I realize this is her way of seeking absolution from me. She feels bad for something.

  And then I know.

  “You two hooked up?” I ask shakily.

  I don’t wait for her to answer. I walk down the hallway toward my locker. I don’t even know how I’m walking. How strange the brain is. It still knows what to do when it’s so preoccupied with something else. Something terrible. Something I should have seen coming. I’m shivering. It’s freezing in this building. This darn building. My locker is far from the dance and even farther from the life inside of it.

  I want to cry, but I can’t.

  I open my locker and pull out my cardigan. I press the cardigan against my mouth. For a minute I just want to suffocate.

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Ed:

  I just ridiculously hoped Brett would avoid me at school, but she doesn’t.

  I never made it to her house to pick her up for the dance. I could hardly look at myself in the mirror since hooking up with Evelyn, let alone get in some stupid rent-a-tux and pretend I was some joyous teenager.

  I should have been a man, brave. I should have been the one to tell her. I shouldn’t have let things get so far.

  Disjointed.

  Ruined.

  When Evelyn asked me to come over the day before the dance, I knew we were going to have sex. I didn’t even think about not going over there. Isn’t that sad? Pathetic? When she opened the door, she flashed me that damn knowing smile. For a brief second, I wanted to run away. I wanted to drive straight to Brett’s house and ask her to leave with me. I wanted to get out of this God-forsaken town.

  But it’s not the town’s fault. The town didn’t make me do the things I did. I can see that now. A town is just a place. It’s the people in it who are screwed up.

  I have been blaming everyone for my screwed up existence for seventeen years. My absent father. My dead friend. This town. It’s what’s inside me that’s screwed up. It’s me.

  Evelyn got the drop on me.

  Not that I blame her.

  I knew who she was. She didn’t hide it from me.

  Even before I had her shirt off, she whispered into my ear that I should call Brett. I should end things. It would be worse for Brett if I did this before breaking up with her. I just pressed my lips harder against Evelyn’s in order to get her to shut up.

  After she asked me why I had come over, I told her it was because I didn’t know the difference between love and hate. And maybe she didn’t either.

  I haven’t talk to Evelyn since, and she hasn’t called me.

  I had to force myself go to school. I was going to have to face Brett someday, and it seemed better, smarter to just get it over with. Besides, some insane part of me wanted to see her, needed to see her. Make sure I hadn’t damaged her beyond repair. I wasn’t sure if she knew about Evelyn. The moment I saw her changed that. I could see it written all over her face.

  Accusation.

  Regret.

  Hate.

  She looked like she was going to turn the other way, but she went still. She took a deep breath and lifted her head up. She walked right toward me, not hesitating to look me right in the eyes. And then she was gone. She moved past me like I was nothing.

  I felt like nothing.

  I had no right to complain.

  It’s what I wanted. Right?

  ****

  Two guys in my Spanish class are talking about Brett. One of them wants to ask her out. He looks quickly back at me. Like I can stop him. I guess they figure if Brett can slum it with me, anyone has a chance.

  The kid hovers around Brett’s locker after class. I watch as he leans over her. Her hands tightly grip onto the straps of her book bag, but her face is all smiles and bright eyes. I’m hoping she will tell him yes. But I see the word “no” issue from her lips. I can’t actually hear it. All I hear are all the lies I have told lately. Lies to Evelyn. Lies to Brett. Lies to myself. It makes me feel sick.

  After school. I have nowhere to go. No friends. I have pretty much ruined all that. For some reason, I find myself driving to the bus station. I buy a ticket for Sunday.

  I’m gonna run.

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Brett:

  I run into Ed’s mom at the grocery store. My mom has run out of shampoo. I haven’t seen her since the night of the ill-fated dance. There’s this little part of me, the little girl part who begged her mom to be a Girl Scout leader for months before her mom bought all the patches, sewed them on a sash, and told her to drop it, that wishes she would ask me again what was wrong. She thought back then that I was seeking acknowledgement and awards. She didn’t see that I was just seeking her.

  Maybe I could talk to her now. It’s not like I have anyone else to talk to anymore. I want to tell her about Tristan’s note and what has happened with Ed. I want to tell someone that I still love him. I don’t completely blame him for what happened. He kept telling me how messed up he was, and how he was afraid of hurting me. I think maybe I pushed us into something neither of us was really ready for. I need to tell someone these things. Isn’t a mother the one you’re supposed to tell them to?

  Shampoo. She left a note telling me that she needed shampoo. That’s the only communication we have shared. And so I go, run, try and please her. I get rewarded with running into my ex-boyfriend’s mom in the produce aisle.

  When I see Ed’s mom, something in me wants to run to her and fall into her arms. She offers me a weak wave. I wave back and try and turn my cart back down the aisle I just came down. I’m in such a hurry my cart crashes against hers. Some old lady molesting a tomato gives me a dirty look.

  “Sorry.” I mumble, scrunching down, trying to disappear inside the sweatshirt I threw on this morning.

  “It’s alright, Brett.”

  I eye her shopping cart. It’s filled with a large amount of men’s toiletries. I recognize Ed’s favorite toothpaste and the deodorant I can still smell on his Clash t-shirt. The one I still have. Ed’s mom notices me staring. The small smile she managed to put on falters. She gives a curt nod to the tomato perv who is still staring us down. She comes around her cart and walks close to me. “He’s leaving,” she says quietly. Her voice hitches at the end.

  My stomach drops. All the way down to the pits of hell where the reverend preached passive-aggressively on holy days where people like my brother would end up. Someone should tell him walking the earth can be pretty bad sometimes too. “What?” I choke out.

  “Sunday.”

  I feel my mouth go dry. “Leaving? Where? He still hasn’t finished school. He has like two months left before he graduates.”

  “I don’t know where he’s going, but I guess I can take some comfort in the fact he told me before he left.” Ed’s mom reaches absentmindedly for the toothpaste.

  He didn’t tell me. Didn’t I at lea
st deserve to be told?

  She reaches out her hand and places it on mine. “Maybe I shouldn’t have told you.”

  “Maybe you shouldn’t have,” I reply. My voice is hard and empty.

  I leave my cart right in the middle of the grocery store and walk out.

  Chapte r Forty-Eight

  Ed:

  Brett’s sitting in her brother’s old car outside of my house. She’s been sitting in there for ten minutes. It suddenly dawns on me that she turned sixteen last week.

  Damn.

  Tristan had made a deal with her that she got his car the moment she turned sixteen. He said he would be going off to college and he didn’t need it. Besides, he usually made me drive us everywhere anyways. Figures Brett would wait till the moment she turned sixteen to actually drive the thing.

  I’m surprised the thing’s still drivable. The front end is smashed in like it was on the wrong side of a Hulk confrontation. Someone, most likely Brett, has made an attempt to tape the bumper back on with duct tape. Almost destroyed, but not quite. Still running, but nothing to brag about. With all the money the Jensens have, you would think they would have just written it off. I wonder who went through the trouble of saving it.

  The door to her car opens and I can’t breathe. I stumble away from the window, hoping she hasn’t seen me, knowing she won’t just go away. I’m such a coward. Mom told me she ran into Brett earlier in the week and told her about my departure. I hadn’t heard from her, and assumed she didn’t care.

  I was selfish enough to take comfort in that.

  I trudged down the stairs. I try to pull myself together. I feel like I have drank a billion cups of coffee flavored with Red Bull. With a defeated sigh, I open the front door because I know she won’t go away till we have this discussion.

  Brett enters without being asked. She kicks the door shut and crosses her arms over her chest. For a second, she just sits there fuming at me. It’s hard to keep eye contact with her because it makes me feel so ashamed. So dirty. So useless. But I owe it to her.