Just Listen

by Sarah Dessen

  Telling my family had been harder, in the end, than telling Owen. But I did it. Even through the hard parts, even when I heard my mother catch her breath, could feel my father’s eyes narrowing, felt Kirsten shaking beside me, I kept on. And when I felt myself really wavering, I looked at Whitney, who never flinched. She was strongest of us all, and I kept my eyes on her, all the way to the end.

  My mother had surprised me most. She had not fallen apart, or crumpled, although I knew hearing what had happened to me was not easy for her. Instead, while Kirsten cried, and Whitney helped my dad find Andrea Thomlinson’s card in my room so he could call her for more details, my mother sat beside me, her arm around my shoulder, just smoothing her hand over my head, again and again.

  That morning, on the way to the courthouse, I’d sat in the backseat between my sisters, watching my parents. Every once in a while my mother’s shoulder would move, and I knew she was reaching over to pat my father’s hand, as he had done to her on another drive, on another day when secrets had begun to come out, not so long ago.

  All my life, I realized, I’d only seen my parents one way, as if it was the only way they could be. One weak, one strong. One scared, one bold. I was beginning to understand, though, that there were no such things as absolutes, not in life or in people. Like Owen said, it was day by day, if not moment by moment. All you could do was take on as much weight as you can bear. And if you’re lucky, there’s someone close enough by to shoulder the rest.

  When we walked up to the courthouse it was just before eight forty-five, and I scanned the crowd in the square around the fountain, looking for Owen. He wasn’t there. Not then, and not after my mother and I met with Andrea Thomlinson in a nearby office to go over my story again. Not even when the courtroom opened and we filed inside, taking our seats just down the row from Emily and her mom. I kept looking for him, thinking he would slide in at the last minute, just in time, but he didn’t. It was so not like him, and it worried me.

  An hour and a half later, the prosecutor called my name. I stood up, my palm slick on the bench in front of me as I slid my hand along its back, walking past my sisters to the end of the row. Then I stepped out into the aisle and was on my own.

  As I crossed the floor I finally had a clear view of everything—the crowd, the judge, the prosecutors and defense attorneys—and I made a point of focusing only on the bailiff, who was waiting for me by the witness stand. I took my seat, feeling my heart pounding as I answered his questions and the judge turned, nodding at me. It was only after the prosecutor stood and started toward me that I finally let myself look at Will Cash.

  It wasn’t his fancy suit I noticed first. Or his new haircut, short and schoolboyish, which was probably intended to make him look young and innocent. The look on his face—narrowed eyes, pursed lips—didn’t really register, either. The only thing I could see, actually, was the black circle around his left eye, the redness of the cheek beneath. Someone had tried to cover it up with makeup, but it was still there. Clear as day.

  “State your name for the record,” the prosecutor asked me.

  “Annabel Greene,” I said. My voice was shaking.

  “Are you acquainted with William Cash, Annabel?”

  “Yes.”

  “Could you point him out to me, please?”

  After being silent for so long, I felt like I had talked so much in the last twenty-four hours. But with any luck, this would be the last time for a while. Which was maybe why it wasn’t so hard to quiet myself, to take in that first breath, to begin.

  “There,” I said, raising my finger and pointing at him. “He’s right there.”

  When it was finally over, we walked through the dark of the courthouse lobby into a noontime sun so bright it took my eyes a moment to adjust. When they did, Owen was the first thing I saw.

  He was sitting on the edge of the fountain, wearing jeans and a white T-shirt, a blue jacket over it, his earphones hanging around his neck. It was lunchtime, and the square was packed with people crossing back and forth: businessmen with briefcases, students from the university, a bunch of preschoolers walking in a line, all holding hands. When Owen saw me, he stood up.

  “I think,” my mother was saying, running a hand down my arm, “that we should all go get something to eat. What do you think, Annabel? Are you hungry?”

  I looked at Owen, who was watching me, his hands now in his pockets. “Yeah,” I told her. “Just give me one second.”

  As I started down the steps, I could hear my father asking where I was going, and my mother responding she had no idea. I was sure they were all watching me, but I didn’t look back as I crossed the square, walking up to Owen, who had the strangest look on his face, one I’d never seen before. He was shifting in place, clearly uncomfortable.

  “Hey,” he said quickly, as soon as I was in earshot.

  “Hi.”

  He took in a breath, about to speak, then stopped, running a hand over his face. “Look,” he said. “I know you’re pissed off at me.”

  The weird thing was that I wasn’t. While initially, I’d been surprised, then worried when he hadn’t shown up, the entire experience had been so overwhelming—although cathartic—that I’d kind of forgotten about it once I got up on the stand. I opened my mouth to tell him this, but he was already talking again.

  “The basic fact is that I should have been here. I have no excuse. There is no excuse.” He looked down at the ground, scuffing his foot across the pavement. “I mean, there is a reason. But it’s not an excuse.”

  “Owen,” I said. “It’s—”

  “Something happened.” He sighed, shaking his head. His face was flushed, and he was still fidgeting. “Something stupid. I made a mistake, and—”

  Then, and only then, did I put it altogether. His absence. This shuffling embarrassment. And Will Cash’s black eye. Oh my God, I thought.

  “Owen,” I said, my voice low. “No way.”

  “It was an error in judgment,” he said quickly. “And something I regret.”

  “Something,” I repeated.

  “Yes.”

  A businessman talking loudly on a cell phone passed us, talking about mergers. “Placeholder,” I told him.

  He winced. “I thought you might say that.”

  “Come on,” I said. “You knew I would say that.”

  “Fine, fine.” He pulled a hand through his hair. “I was having an in-depth discussion with my mother. One that I could not easily extract myself from.”

  “A discussion,” I repeated. “About what?”

  Again, he flinched. This was killing him. And yet I could not help myself. After being on the other side of the truth for so long, I realized I kind of liked asking the questions.

  “Well,” he said, then coughed. “Basically, I’m supposed to be under punishment right now. For the foreseeable future, in fact. So I had to negotiate a furlough. It took longer than I expected.”

  “You’re grounded,” I said, clarifying.

  “Yes.”

  “For what?”

  He winced, then shook his head, looking over at the fountain. Who knew the truth could be so hard for Owen Armstrong, the most honest boy in the world. But if I asked, he would tell. That I knew for sure.

  “Owen,” I said as he squirmed, noticeably, his shoulder wriggling, “what did you do?”

  He just looked at me for a minute. Then he sighed. “I punched Will Cash in the face.”

  “What were you thinking?”

  “Well, clearly I wasn’t.” He flushed a deeper red. “I didn’t intend to do it.”

  “You punched him by accident.”

  “No.” He shot me a look. “Okay, you really want to know?”

  “Am I not asking?”

  “Look,” Owen said, “the truth is, after you left yesterday, I was really pissed off. I mean, I’m human, right?”

  “You are,” I agreed.

  “I really only wanted to get a good look at him. That was all. And I knew he some
times plays with that shitty Perkins Day band that was in a showcase last night at Bendo, so I figured he might be there. And he was. Which, really, when you think about it, is despicable. What kind of a person goes to a club—to see a shitty band, no less—the night before he’s due in court? It’s—”

  “Owen,” I said.

  “I’m serious! Do you know how much they suck? Seriously, even for a cover band they’re pathetic. I mean, if you’re going to just come out and admit you can’t write your own songs, at least be able to play other people’s well….”

  I just looked at him.

  “Right,” he said. He ran a hand through his hair again. “So anyway, he was there, I got a look at him, end of story.”

  “Clearly,” I said sternly, “that is not the end of the story.”

  Owen continued, reluctantly. “I watched their set. Which, as I said, sucked. I went out for some air, and he was outside smoking a cigarette. And he starts talking to me. Like we know each other. Like he’s not the freaking scum of the earth, a total fucking asshole.”

  “Owen,” I said softly.

  “I could feel myself getting more and more pissed off.” He winced. “I knew I should breathe, and walk away, and everything else, but I didn’t. And then, when he finished his cigarette, he clapped me on the shoulder and turned to go back inside. And I just—”

  I took a step closer to him.

  “—snapped,” he finished. “I lost it.”

  “It’s okay,” I said.

  “I knew even when I was doing it I’d regret it,” he said. “That it wasn’t worth it. But by then it was already happening. I’m really pissed off at myself, if you want to know the truth.”

  “I know.”

  “It was just one punch,” he grumbled, then added quickly, “which doesn’t make it okay. And I’m so freaking lucky the bouncer just broke us up and told us both to get out of there, and didn’t call the cops. If he had…” He trailed off. “It’s just so stupid.”

  “But you told your mom anyway,” I said.

  “When I got home, she could tell I was pissed. So she asked me what happened, and I had to tell her—”

  “Because you’re honest,” I said, taking another step.

  “Well, yeah,” he said, looking down at me. “She was livid, to say the least. Laid down this hardcore punishment, totally deserved, but then today, when I tried to leave to come here, things got kind of sticky.”

  “It’s okay,” I said again.

  “It’s not, though.” Behind him, the fountain was splashing, sunlight glinting off the water. “Because I’m not like that. Anymore. I just…freaked out.”

  I reached up, brushing his hair out of his face. “Huh,” I said. “Really.”

  “What?”

  “I don’t know.” I shrugged. “It’s just to me, that’s not freaking out.”

  “It’s not,” he said. Then he just looked at me for a second. “Oh,” he said finally. “Right.”

  “I mean, to me,” I said, moving closer, “freaking out is different. More of a running away, not telling anyone what’s wrong, slowly simmering until you burst kind of thing.”

  “Ah,” he said. “Well, I guess it’s just a matter of semantics.”

  “I guess so.”

  People were still moving all around us, on their way here and there, filling up their lunch hour however they could before the rest of the day began. I knew that somewhere behind me, my family was waiting, but still I reached my hand down to brush his.

  “You know,” Owen said, as his fingers found mine, “it sure seems like you have all the answers.”

  “Nah,” I told him. “I’m just doing the best I can, under the circumstances.”

  “How’s that going?” he asked.

  There was no short answer to this; like so much else, it was a long story. But what really makes any story real is knowing someone will hear it. And understand.

  “Well, you know,” I said to Owen now. “It’s day by day.”

  He smiled at me, and I smiled back, then stepped closer, turning my face up to meet his. As he leaned down to kiss me, I closed my eyes and saw not the flat black of the dark but something else. Something brighter, closer to light, shining small but ever steady. More than enough to go on as a part of me pushed up and out, finally, to meet it there.

  Chapter TWENTY

  I slipped on my headphones, then looked over at Rolly. When he flashed me a thumbs-up, I leaned into the microphone.

  “It’s seven fifty, and you’re listening to your community radio station, WRUS. If you’re looking for Anger Management, it will return in”—I glanced at my notepad, where, above my neatly written playlist, there was a big number two, followed by an exclamation point—“two weeks. In the meantime, I’m Annabel, and this is Story of My Life. Here’s The Clash.”

  I kept my headphones on, watching Rolly until the first notes of “Rebel Waltz” were audible. Then I finally let out the breath I felt like I’d been holding forever, just as the speaker over my head popped and Clarke came on.

  “Nice,” she said. “You barely sounded nervous.”

  “That’s still nervous,” I told her.

  “You’re doing great,” Rolly said. “And I don’t know why you get so worried anyway. It’s not like you’re walking in front of people in a bathing suit.” Clarke turned, shooting him a look. “What?” he said. “It’s true!”

  “This is harder,” I said, sliding off my headphones. “Much harder.”

  “Why?” he asked.

  I shrugged. “I don’t know,” I said. “It’s more real. Personal.”

  And it was. In fact, I’d been terrified when Owen had first asked me to fill in when his mom decided that taking away the radio show was the only sufficient punishment for what he’d done to Will Cash. But once he’d convinced me that Rolly (and Clarke) would be there to help with the technical stuff and make sure I stayed on time every week, I’d agreed to try it at least once. That had been four weeks ago, and while I was still nervous, I was also having fun. So much that Rolly was already bugging me to take the community radio prep course and apply for my own time slot, but I wasn’t quite ready for that yet. But never say never.

  Of course, Owen was still involved with the show. When I’d first started subbing for him, he’d insisted that I stick to his playlist, even when it meant forcing music I hated on the masses. After the first week, though (and once he realized that he really couldn’t stop me), he’d relented, and I’d started putting my own songs in here and there. There was something really great about being able to put something out into the world—a song, an introduction, even my voice—and let people make of it what they wanted. I didn’t have to worry about how I looked, or if the image of me people had fit who I really was. The music spoke for itself and for me, and after so long being watched and studied, I was finding I liked that. A lot.

  Rolly knocked on the glass between us, then signaled to me to get the next song ready to go. It was a Jenny Reef single, for Mallory—my first true fan—who made a point of setting her alarm each week so she could call in a request. I cued it up, then waited until The Clash began to fade out before hitting the button to begin its bouncy beats (a segue that I knew would annoy Owen, who for various reasons insisted on listening to the broadcast of the show in the car, alone). Once it had fully started, I shifted in my chair, glancing over at the row of pictures I had lined up next to my monitor. When I’d first started, I’d been so nervous I figured I could use all the inspiration I could get. So I’d brought in the shot of Mallory with the feather boa circling her face, to remind me at least one person was listening. The one of me Owen had taken, so I’d keep in mind that it didn’t matter if she was the only one. And then one more.

  It was shot of me and my mother and sisters, taken at New Year’s. Unlike the one in the foyer, it was hardly professional, with no dramatic vista behind us. Instead, we were all standing at the kitchen island. We’d just been talking, about what I couldn’t even re
member, and then Kirsten’s boyfriend Brian—with the class over, they were now free and clear to make their relationship public—was telling us to look here, and the shutter snapped. It was not a great picture in the technical sense. You can see the flash in the window behind us, my mother has her mouth open, and Whitney is laughing. But I loved it, because it was what we looked like. And best of all, this time no one was in the middle.

  Every time I looked at it, I was reminded how much I liked this new life, without a secret hanging over me. It was a fresh start, and now I didn’t have to be the girl who had everything, or nothing, but another girl altogether. Maybe even the one who told.

  “Two minutes until next break,” Rolly said now, and I nodded, sliding my headphones back on. As he leaned back from the microphone, Clarke reached over, ruffling his hair. He smiled at her, making a face as she went back to the Sunday crossword, which she made a point of trying to complete every week during the hour the show was on. Clarke was competitive, even with herself. It was one of many things I’d forgotten about her, but was now remembering—like how she always sang along with the radio, refused to watch scary movies, and could make me giggle uncontrollably over the stupidest things—as we cautiously worked our way back into a friendship. It wasn’t like it had been, but then neither of us would have wanted that anyway. As it was, we were just happy to be hanging out. Everything else, we took day by day.

  This was how I was dealing with everyone and everything lately, taking the good when it came, and the bad the same way, knowing each would pass in its own time. My sisters were still speaking, as well as occasionally still arguing. Kirsten was in her second filmmaking class, working away on a piece about, strangely enough, modeling, which she promised would “rock our world” (whatever that meant). In January, Whitney had enrolled in classes at the local university, where, along with a few requirements, she was taking two writing classes, one on memoir, the other fiction. In the spring, with her doctor’s blessing, she was moving into her own apartment, a place she’d made sure had enough light for some plants. In the meantime, her herbs were still in the windowsill, where I made a point to pass them whenever I could, reaching down to smooth their pungent leaves between my fingers, releasing their scent to linger to the open air behind me.