by Donna Cooner
“But after lunch I felt better.” Miranda wasn’t even taking a breath. “And Mrs. Jackson, the art teacher, let us paint with real paints. I think the best color in the world is blue. What do you think, Torrey?”
I didn’t answer, looking at my phone. Three people somewhere in the world just watched my vlog. Adrenaline pumped into my body.
“I’m bored. Let’s play hide-and-seek. Come on. Please.” She was hopping all over my room.
Hide-and-seek.
It was a game we’d played together since Miranda was able to walk. Now that I thought about it, maybe even before then. When she was a baby, I’d throw her blue baby blanket over my head and “disappear.” She’d actually cry sometimes at the thought that I’d somehow left her. Or at least she would start to cry until I pulled the blanket off my head and — “ta-da!” — reappeared. Miranda had found me. She would giggle wildly — a baby laugh so contagious everyone in hearing distance would start to laugh, too. She loved that game so much, Mom would make me play it with her over and over again on long car trips. She never tired of it. It was so simple, really, but it never failed to make me feel good, too.
Now I was too grown-up, too cool, to play childish hide-and-seek games, no matter how many times she asked.
“You’re too old for that,” I told Miranda, looking back at my phone. I had a text from Zoe, telling me she thought my vlog was amazing.
“Nobody’s too old for hide-and-seek,” Miranda said, and I could tell she wasn’t going to go away that easily.
“Okay. You go hide and I’ll come find you,” I said, glancing up at my sister.
For a quick moment, her face lit up, and then she realized it was just another trick.
“You’re not coming to find me, are you?” she said sadly.
I blink, bringing myself back to the present. The guilt I feel inside buzzes like the tiny Texas June bugs beating themselves against Dr. Shelly’s office window. Suddenly I can’t sit here a second longer.
“Are we done yet?” It’s the first thing I’ve said since I entered the room, and it seems to actually surprise Dr. Shelly. She sits back in her tall black leather chair, the pad empty on her lap.
“Is that what you want?”
No. I want to get a pic of Zoe’s latest hairstyle. I want to eat Simply Strawberry gelato at the mall and tweet how delicious it is with fresh mango on top. I want to check my page views. I want to grab Cody’s hand and walk through the halls of my old school. I want to shop the coupon sale at Macy’s and then post a haul video that gets ten thousand “likes” in an hour.
I want things to be like they were before.
“Yes,” I say, and stand up.
When I come back out into the waiting room, Dad goes inside to talk to Dr. Shelly for a few minutes by himself. Later, he lectures me all the way home about my behavior, or lack thereof, with the therapist. Evidently, there is no doctor-patient confidentiality privilege where parents are concerned.
As soon as we get home, I go to my room, slamming the door behind me. I pull out my biology homework and stare at it like it’s magically going to make sense. It doesn’t.
Eventually I give up and get ready for bed, changing into pajama pants and a tank top. I brush my teeth and crawl under the covers. Then, without warning, something Dr. Shelly said pops into my head. I’d been trying to tune her out, but I must have retained more than I realized.
She’d said that sometimes grief makes you do crazy things. I wonder what she’d say if she knew about the stash of Miranda’s things I have in the bottom of my closet.
Is that crazy, Dr. Shelly?
What would she say if I told her I added a drawing of Sensational Sister to the pile last night at one thirty in the morning?
Do you think collecting things of a dead person’s is strange, Dr. Shelly?
Luis Rivera doesn’t think it’s weird. Suddenly I want to talk to him so badly I would call him, but I don’t have his number. He didn’t talk to me all week at school, and I was somewhat relieved. It allowed me to continue sitting with Blair and Mia and Emily.
But tonight I feel like I could talk to him about anything — ofrendas, courtrooms, spirits, nightmares — and I wouldn’t even care if Blair was standing right beside us. I hope I still feel that way when I meet him for lunch on Saturday. And that’s what I’m thinking about when I finally fall asleep.
But when I wake up just a few hours later, panting from my latest nightmare, all I can think of are the boxes in the garage. The pull is irresistible. It’s time to add to my collection.
Stumbling out to the garage, I search through the stack of boxes. Opening up the third one, I uncover a tiny blue baby blanket with a big yellow duck on the front. Hide-and-seek. I carefully carry it back to my bedroom and tuck it away inside the backpack in my closet.
“Sometimes people forget I’m just like anybody else.” —Torrey Grey, Beautystarz15
I got my license. Somehow, I managed to make it through the driving test without freaking out, and I did it — I can now go where I want, when I want, in a car.
Which is also terrifying.
But I’m determined to drive myself to lunch with Luis. I’m shocked Dad lets me drive the car. If Mom weren’t lying down in the bedroom, I know she’d never allow it. But I can tell Dad doesn’t want to keep me from meeting a friend, because it’s been a while since I’ve actually had friends to meet. Finally, after some hemming and hawing, he hands over the keys. Before I walk outside, he goes over all the same directions he’s already told me a million times, and then he gives me a hug.
I get in the car, feeling a little shaky. I turn the key in the ignition. I’m surprised it starts. Now I have to actually drive. By myself.
I put the car into reverse, squeezing the wheel tightly with both hands, and push down on the accelerator with my right foot. The car lurches backward down the driveway and out into the street. I put it in drive and wave to my dad, standing on the front sidewalk, watching. He frowns and waves back halfheartedly. A little heavy-footed on the brake, I shudder to a hard standstill at the intersection and look both ways. I take a deep breath and turn the blinker on.
It’s really only a couple of turns, and there’s very little traffic on these streets. I hardly even see another car. I just need to make sure and watch for the road signs. And the speed limit signs.
And watch out for kids in crosswalks.
Don’t think how the car looked that day with its crumpled hood. Don’t think of Miranda lying broken and unconscious in the street.
There’s a parking spot near the square downtown and I inch into it with room to spare on both sides. I turn the car off, my hands trembling, and sit there for a minute trying to calm my thumping heart.
You’re fine. You did it. Nothing happened.
After a few minutes, I look in the mirror, checking my reflection. I pinch my cheeks to bring back some color and quickly finger-comb my hair. The woman getting in the car next to me looks at me curiously. It’s probably strange to see someone sitting in a closed-up car in this heat, so I don’t take the time to reapply my lip gloss. Instead I get out of the car and nod at her like I’m totally used to driving and it’s no big deal.
I walk quickly down the sidewalk, checking my phone for directions to the restaurant. The temperature is still warm, but everyone is talking about the change that’s coming. This roller-coaster weather is evidently typical for Texas, especially for October. I pass a white wooden gazebo in the town square. The romantic, old-fashioned structure reminds me of old movies: brass bands playing to picnicking people. That’s where the fantasy ends. Instead of a lush lawn of grassy park stretching out around the gazebo, it’s crammed in beside a thick, gigantic block of brick that is the Walker County Courthouse.
I think of the courthouse back in Colorado. The victim impact statement. My stomach tightens. I won’t think about that now.
I keep walking and I pass a moose. A two-story-high plastic moose, standing on top of the Tri-State Sp
orting Goods and Archery Shop, with a broken right ear. Looking up at it, I think it has probably been standing guard there, between the Triangle Bowling Alley and Adelaide’s Resale Shop, for a long, long time. I pass an assortment of abandoned wedding dresses in the plate glass windows of the resale shop and quickly head toward the bright yellow door of La Ventana. Luis is waiting right inside the door.
“Hi,” I say.
He watches me put my keys away in my bag. “You’re driving?” he asks, his eyebrows furrowing.
“Just got my license. First outing by myself.”
“Congrats,” he says, but his expression tells me he understands what a feat this really was.
I nod. “Thanks.”
He greets the woman behind the counter in fluent Spanish and they carry on a quick conversation that leaves me understanding only about one word out of four. I might have understood more, but I am busy looking around the small restaurant for anyone who might recognize me.
“I haven’t seen you out at the track. Been running lately?” he asks after we’re seated by the window.
“No.” I glance outside. Anyone walking by can see us sitting here.
The waitress, a dark-haired girl with a yellow heart tattoo on her bare shoulder, slaps the menus on the table and I jump. She asks us if we’d like anything to drink and we both order Cokes.
I look across the table at Luis and my attention shifts. His eyes are so dark brown, I can’t see where the pupil ends and the deep color begins. He looks at me and only me. I glance down at the chiseled arm lying across the tabletop. His smooth brown skin. In spite of myself, I want to reach out and touch him. Blair and Mia could be standing directly outside and I wouldn’t even notice right now.
The waitress returns with our tall icy glasses of Coke. Then she puts a bowl of tortilla chips on the table along with two bowls of salsa, one red and one green. It’s a welcome interruption and gives me enough time to recover.
“Hey,” Luis says when the waitress has left. His face lights up as he grins. “My grandmother and Mrs. Annie Florence said to tell you hello.”
I can’t help but smile back.
“How are they?” I ask.
“They’re fine.” Luis grabs a chip and dips it in the green salsa. “My dad finally took the delivery van keys away from my grandmother last week after she backed into the next-door neighbors’ trash cans. She’s not too happy about that.”
“What was she delivering?” I’m thinking coffins and bodies.
“Mostly flowers. Now I guess that’s one more job I’ll need to pick up.” He bites into the chip.
“You work a lot.”
“After my brother left for college last year, my dad needed the help.”
“And you don’t miss doing things with your friends?” I ask, and then feel embarrassed because I don’t really know if he has any.
“Yeah. Sometimes,” he says. “But it was my choice.” He takes another bite of a chip, dripping salsa onto the table. “Oops.”
I pull a napkin out of the holder in the center of the table and hand it to him. He wipes up the salsa with a grimace.
“My grandmother used to write cheesy messages on napkins and put them in my lunch,” he says. “Didn’t stop until I finally begged her to in middle school. She thought it was hysterical.”
He flips over the napkin in his hand and pretends to read aloud. “‘Today is the first day of the rest of your life. Love, Tu Abuelita.’”
I laugh. “Your mom didn’t pack your lunches?” I ask. I feel a pang, remembering how Mom used to enjoy getting creative with lunches for me and Miranda. Back before the only food she cared about was tomatoes.
Luis’s smile vanishes, and I instantly feel bad. “My mom left a few years ago,” he replies softly. “Said she couldn’t stand living with all the sadness anymore. She took the truck and the dog. Left me and my brother behind.”
He glances away and rubs the back of his neck. I don’t know what to say. When he looks back at me, he says, “We haven’t seen her since.”
“Sorry …” My voice trails off into silence.
“I don’t talk about it much to most people.” He shifts his weight; his chair scrapes loudly against the floor.
Trying to be casual, I dip a tortilla chip into the green sauce and take a big bite. The spicy heat grabs me by surprise. I choke out a gasp and frantically reach for my Coke.
Luis laughs as I take a long gulp. “It’s got a kick to it.”
“No kidding,” I pant, waving a hand desperately to fan my tongue.
“Try this one. It’s not so hot.” He pushes the red sauce in my direction.
I hesitate.
“Trust me,” he says.
I take a tentative bite and am relieved that my mouth doesn’t burst into flames. It is just right. I take another bite and then another.
“Maybe we’ll make a Texas girl out of you yet,” Luis says.
“Maybe,” I say, after a pause to swallow.
“When do you go back to Colorado?” he asks.
“I’m not sure. Probably in December.” My mouth feels really dry all of a sudden and I take another long sip of Coke, glancing around the tiny café. A man sitting at the bright orange countertop is wearing a cowboy hat and suspenders. Boulder seems like another world.
“You’re still planning to speak in court?” Luis asks.
“Yes. It’s one way I can show people I’m not a monster.”
“Why would anyone think that?”
Because without me, Miranda wouldn’t have been at the mall that day. She wouldn’t have left angry. The car wouldn’t have hit her.
“There was a video,” I admit after a moment. “People saw us argue that day. It makes me look really … bad.” I stare down at the chips. “I need to show them how I really felt about Miranda.”
“Show who?” Luis asks.
“The people in the courtroom. My followers online. Everyone.”
“And everyone is important to you?” he asks. I know he’s talking about my vlog.
“The funeral home is important to you. You said you were good at it, right?” I don’t want to sound defensive, but I know I do.
“Yes,” he says.
“I’m good at vlogging. It’s not some kind of silly hobby.”
“I didn’t say it was.”
My face feels hot and I feel the anger pushing out my words. “Fashion vloggers get sponsorship deals from major brands. They turn YouTube fame into product deals, magazine spreads, and more traditional journalism gigs as well.”
“And that’s why you do it?” He waits, patiently.
“Yes,” I say, which is true, but it’s so much more than that, and I don’t even know where to start. I don’t want to talk about this. It’s obvious he doesn’t understand. I pretend to be suddenly fascinated with the menu in front of me. “It doesn’t matter,” I mumble.
“Hey.” He reaches across the table and taps on the top of the menu to get my attention. I look up, meeting his eyes. “I like that you’re so bold and opinionated. You don’t back down.”
“Really?” I’m floored.
Is that how you think of me?
He nods, and his smile switches on to full, blazing wattage. “I wish I were better at it.”
“What’ll you have?” The waitress is back, fishing a pad of paper out of her pocket and pulling a fake rose from behind her ear. It turns out to be a pen.
Luis orders chiles rellenos, extra hot, and I try to read the menu quickly and refocus. Finally, I give up and just order the chicken tacos, which seem most familiar.
Luis looks at me with raised eyebrows, still waiting, when the waitress leaves. “So have you figured out what you’re going to say? In court?”
“The district attorney told my parents the statement should focus on the person who died, who they were, the life they led. That kind of thing,” I explain, taking a chip but unable to eat it. “It’s our opportunity to tell the judge how all of this has impacted our family.�
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“That’s a lot of pressure.” Luis dips a chip in the hot salsa and takes a bite. He waits for me to keep talking, and I do.
“I’m usually good at speaking in front of people. Obviously. I mean, I never get stage fright. But this …” I stop and look down at my lap. “This is harder than I thought it would be.”
There’s a long silence. He doesn’t interrupt it.
“My sister and I just …” I say softly, tearing at my napkin, “grew apart the last few years.”
I am suddenly aware of all the other noise around us — the clink of the glasses being collected from the next table and the man in the cowboy hat speaking on his cell phone.
“So how do you usually prepare to talk to all those people?” Luis asks.
“For the vlog?” I ask, looking up to meet his eyes.
He nods.
“Research, I guess. I try out the makeup. Go to the store. Whatever. Then it comes naturally and I just talk into the camera …” My voice trails off and I unfold and refold the yellow cotton napkin in my lap.
“Maybe you should try and think of the court statement the same way,” Luis suggests. “Do some research about your sister.”
The waitress arrives with our order and we sit silently as she puts the plates in front of us.
“You need anything else?” she asks. I notice for the first time that she’s young and pretty, and giving Luis a big smile. I feel a flash of instant jealousy, but Luis doesn’t seem to pay her much attention. Instead, he looks across the table at me with raised eyebrows, and I shake my head.
“I think we’re good,” he tells the waitress.
For a few minutes we both eat without talking. The chicken tacos are delicious, better than any Mexican food I ever had in Colorado.
I work up my nerve, swallow, and say, “Maybe you could help with the research.”
“Me?” Luis smiles in surprise. “I didn’t know your sister.”
“I know, but …” Everything that’s been rattling around in my head pours out into questions with no pauses in between. “You’ve seen a lot of people talk about death, right? Memorials and stuff like that? You have, like …” I search for a word, and nothing seems right in this situation. “Practice?”
