Ghosting

by Edith Pattou

  and popcorn.

  Before I can react

  she is on my couch,

  TV remote in

  her hand.

  Come on in, I say, still standing by the front door.

  Yeah, well, thing is, Maxie, Emma says, I hear you’re like a total recluse. And me, I’m sick of my friends being so fake nice all the time. And I know all they want to do is get back to normal, go out, and get drunk on a Saturday night. So I thought maybe you and I could hang out.

  I look at her, my arms crossed

  over my chest.

  We don’t have to talk, Emma says.

  Okay, I say, and sit beside her on the couch. What’d you bring?

  So we settle back,

  eat popcorn,

  and watch a movie

  about time travel.

  We don’t talk.

  It isn’t until the movie’s over

  and she’s getting ready to go,

  that I blurt out,

  Have you seen Brendan?

  She doesn’t speak,

  just stands there

  leaning on

  her crutches.

  The silence hangs

  between us.

  No, she says finally.

  Do you know anything, how he is?

  No, she says again, her voice flat. And yes, I’ve heard the rumors, too, that he’s brain dead in some Chicago hospital.

  Her eyes suddenly fill

  with tears.

  I start to go to her,

  to hug her,

  but she puts up a hand

  to hold me away.

  I’m fine, she says.

  But she isn’t.

  And how could she be?

  Whatever’s happened to Brendan

  happened because he was

  trying to

  save her life.

  Monday, October 11

  CHLOE

  “Spirit Week”

  Before ghosting I loved Spirit Week,

  the whole gung-ho, rah rah,

  support-your-school thing.

  Coming up with silly, over-the-top outfits

  while still trying to look cute.

  But when I get the schedule

  for this year’s Spirit Week

  I feel sick to my stomach.

  MONDAY—Tie-dye

  TUESDAY—Rock band/Concert T-shirts

  WEDNESDAY—Patriotic

  THURSDAY—School Pride (scarlet and yellow)

  FRIDAY—yellow ribbons to honor shooting victims

  I mean that’s great,

  everyone showing their sympathy and support,

  but what good are a bunch of cheap little yellow ribbons

  going to do for

  Faith,

  Emma,

  Felix,

  and

  Brendan?

  Friday, October 15

  MAXIE

  Poor Rita Bell.

  Rita,

  cheerleading captain,

  vice president of student council,

  queen of community service,

  not to mention

  friendly green eyes,

  tumbling black curls,

  wide smile,

  whitest teeth.

  In a normal year,

  a year with

  no ghosting,

  no Walter Smith,

  Rita would’ve been

  a shoo-in for

  Homecoming Queen.

  Sure, Emma and Chloe

  would’ve come close,

  but no more than second and third,

  probably in that order.

  But because of

  that night,

  poor Rita

  comes in a distant third.

  Even though Emma

  told everyone not to

  vote for her

  since she wouldn’t even

  be in town for Homecoming,

  a third surgery,

  in Boston this time,

  she comes in

  second anyway.

  It’s Chloe

  who is crowned

  Homecoming Queen.

  By a landslide.

  And she looks luminous,

  a simple white dress,

  her honey-colored hair

  hanging loose,

  her face pale,

  standing beside

  the Homecoming King.

  Brendan.

  In his wheelchair.

  BRENDAN

  Homecoming King.

  What a fucking joke.

  I wave to all the faceless,

  clueless people in the stands.

  Then my eyes light on Bobby,

  sitting in the front row, between our parents.

  He’s got this huge smile, beaming like I’m

  some kind of hero. And that’s what I am, right?

  The guy who stepped between Emma

  and a bullet. Except for one thing.

  I’m also the asshole who fired off Daddy’s gun

  and got us shot, maimed, almost killed.

  But hell, in this country

  we like our messed-up heroes.

  So here I sit in my wheelchair,

  Homecoming King.

  Got my khakis, button-down shirt,

  red tie, hair neatly combed.

  Right smack dab in the middle of the field

  I used to play lacrosse on.

  But it doesn’t matter,

  none of it fucking matters.

  Then Chloe leans down

  and whispers soft in my ear.

  This sucks, doesn’t it?

  I look up at her in surprise.

  Yes, I say. It sucks.

  EMMA

  If someone takes a bullet for you,

  saves your life,

  what do you owe them?

  Everything?

  Or the truth?

  BRENDAN

  I’ll never forget the moment

  when my dad realized.

  When the last expensive doctor

  spelled it out for us in black and white.

  That no amount of money,

  no number of pulled strings,

  no browbeating or foot stomping,

  yelling or bullying,

  that no ramped-up brand of positive thinking

  would get him a son with legs that worked.

  We were sitting in the office of the best orthopedic

  surgeon in the United States of America.

  I am very sorry to have to tell you, Brendan, Mr. Donnelly, Dr. Wyamussing said, looking at each of us in turn, but there is nothing that can be done to reverse the paralysis.

  My dad went all quiet.

  Then the doctor’s pager beeped.

  Sorry, I have to take this, Dr. Wyamussing said, after a quick look at the pager. Take however long you need.

  I can’t say it was a big shock.

  I think I knew it that first moment.

  When I woke up in the hospital

  and couldn’t feel my legs.

  But the finality of the doctor’s words,

  the cold, hard fact

  that I would never walk, run,

  play lacrosse, swim, ski,

  that I would never do

  any of the things you do with legs . . .

  Well, it gave me this sick, frozen feeling

  that made it hard to breathe.

  Okay, Dad says. So now we know.

  I had closed my eyes,

  and was taking deep breaths.

  I felt his hand on my shoulder

  and opened my eyes.

  His eyes were bright,

  almost as if there were tears in them.

  But he was also wearing this

  wide, manic smile.

  What do the Donnellys do with lemons, son? he said.

  I stared back at him, my entire body feeling

  as if it had turned to ice.

  Make fucking lemonade, I said.

  T
hat’s my boy, he said.

  Wednesday, October 20

  FAITH

  It has

  been

  almost

  two months

  since

  that night.

  Front stoops

  in the

  neighborhood

  are dotted

  with orange

  pumpkins,

  and ghosts

  made of white

  bedsheets

  hang from

  tree limbs,

  fluttering

  in the autumn

  wind.

  We’ve

  just

  finished

  dinner,

  and Emma

  and I have

  hobbled out

  to the

  backyard

  with Polly.

  It is one

  of those

  mild nights

  you sometimes

  get in

  mid-October,

  and we’re

  lying,

  side by side,

  on the

  hammock,

  with our

  matching casts

  on our

  right legs.

  I mean,

  what are

  the odds that

  two sisters

  would have

  fractured

  bones

  in the

  same leg?

  One from

  jumping out

  of a car

  and

  the other

  from

  a bullet.

  Turns out

  Emma’s was more

  complicated,

  fractured in

  three places.

  Mine was a

  cleaner break,

  but the scar

  on my leg

  is ugly,

  a great

  puckered

  dent in

  my thigh.

  They said

  that I

  can have

  plastic surgery

  later,

  which will

  make it look

  a lot better.

  Emma likes

  to tease me,

  calling me a

  psycho nutjob

  for setting out

  that night

  on my bike

  to save

  our family.

  I don’t mind

  her teasing.

  In fact,

  I call her a

  psycho nutjob

  right back

  for jumping

  out of a

  speeding car.

  We have this

  running joke

  about which

  one of us

  got it worse.

  And tonight

  on the

  hammock,

  we start up

  again.

  Okay, Polly, you decide, Emma finally says, reaching over and rubbing Polly’s ears.

  And Polly

  looks from

  me to Emma

  as we make

  our case.

  I came this close to dying, I say, holding up my thumb and forefinger with barely a sliver of space between them. Twice.

  I’m gonna need at least three more surgeries, Emma says.

  I’m gonna need one more, plus I got a cracked skull and a burr hole, I say.

  I got a concussion, Emma says.

  I’ve got four pins in my leg, I say.

  I’ve got five pins and three screws, Emma says.

  My thigh looks like one of those sinkholes in Florida, I say, plus I lost twenty percent of my blood.

  No more soccer scholarship at Penn for me, plus I may never play soccer again, says Emma.

  I look

  sideways

  at her.

  That’s bull, I say, I mean about never playing soccer again.

  We’ll see, she says looking up at the night sky.

  Polly barks

  then,

  and lays

  her head

  on Emma’s

  thigh.

  See, I win! Emma laughs.

  Still the same old Emma, I say, grinning at her.

  Her smile

  fades.

  No, she says. Not the same old Emma.

  EMMA

  One thing that’s happened is

  I think a lot about death.

  I never used to, but now I do.

  Faith told me about the white birds

  and the quiet, peaceful feeling

  she got when she almost died.

  I felt jealous when she told me.

  And I find myself wondering if it’s

  different for each person.

  Maybe someone good and true like Faith

  is worthy of the quiet and the white birds.

  But someone like me, not so much.

  Because all of it—Brendan in a wheelchair,

  Felix in a coma, Faith almost dying

  is my fault.

  I’ve always careened through my life,

  full speed, doing exactly what I want,

  without thinking about the consequences.

  And see what happened.

  So I think about death

  and I keep wondering:

  Is it really white birds and quiet?

  Or maybe it’s a dark hole

  you get sucked into.

  Or a place of fire.

  Or maybe it’s just

  nothing.

  The scary thing is that

  these days

  nothing actually sounds good.

  Tuesday, October 26

  FAITH

  One day,

  eating

  peanut butter

  sandwiches

  in the kitchen,

  I tell Emma

  how floored

  I am by

  my friends,

  how amazing

  they’ve been,

  all those

  paper cranes.

  You deserve it, she says. That girl Francesca, the one with the tattoo on her ankle, she’s the one who organized it all, right?

  Yeah, I say.

  Emma hobbles

  to the fridge

  for more milk.

  Em, I blurt, what’s going on with you and Brendan?

  Her back

  gets stiff.

  Then she

  turns to me.

  I . . . I don’t know, Faith, she says, her face sad. And that’s the truth. I’ve seen him a couple times and he acts the same, like nothing’s happened, nothing’s wrong. But it’s all on the surface, with lots of jokes about the wheelchair, like he doesn’t care.

  She comes

  back to

  the table.

  I don’t even know if I’m his girlfriend anymore, she says.

  Do you want to be? I ask.

  Tears come

  into her

  eyes.

  Oh, Faith . . . The thing is, and this sounds like bullshit now, but I’d been planning to break up with him, once school started. But now . . .

  And she

  starts crying.

  I pull my

  chair next

  to hers

  and put

  my arms

  around her.

  It’ll be all right, I say.

  She shakes

  her head.

  I don’t see how, she says.

  And the

  hopelessness

  in her voice

  scares me.

  Thursday, November 11

  BRENDAN

  The worst times are when

  I realize I can’t do something.