by Gina Rosati
Rei is still sleeping when I cruise in at seven the next morning. Is he sick? I poke at him for a minute, which does nothing, so I bombard him with energy until he opens his eyes and stares at me.
“What?” he asks groggily.
The computer is still on. I have a feeling he stayed up late into the night surfing the internet.
You’re late for school.
He lifts his head up to read my message, and then he lies back down and closes his eyes. “I’m not going to school today. I’m going to finish my paper. Then, I don’t know, maybe I’ll hike up to Red Rocks or something. I need to get away from everything for a while to think.”
Hiking? There’s one day left until the trial and he’s going hiking?
Okay, bye.
He opens his eyes once he hears the click of the keys and reads. “Where are you going?”
You need to get away from everything.
“Not from you!”
Oh. I watch him yawn and stretch. His hair is all tousled; his eyes are still soft and sleepy; and he does look very adorable, even though I’m still kind of mad at him. He sits up and the sheet slides down to his waist. Okay, I forgive him.
“What did you do for the rest of the night?” he asks as he pulls his shorts on over the green plaid boxers he slept in.
Same thing I’ve done just about every other night since I got locked out. I watch Taylor sleep and hope she slips out during a dream. Do I snore?
“Well, as boring as that sounds, it’s good thinking on your part. And no, you don’t snore. Why?”
Because Taylor snores, so I wonder if I snore, too.
“I’ve never noticed you snoring. And even if you do snore, so what? I’ll be right back.”
This truancy is very un-Rei-like. I hear the toilet flush, the water run, and Rei’s quiet footsteps coming back down the hall.
Are you skipping school because you want to avoid Taylor?
He sits on the bed and combs his hair back with his fingers as he reads my message. “That’s part of it. I just don’t want to talk to anyone at school about the trial, and I know people will ask me questions. Plus things were so hectic last night, I never finished this paper,” he admits.
He doesn’t have much left to finish on his paper, and then he invites me to go hiking with him. It’s a relatively short drive to South Burlington, and from the parking lot, it’s only about two and a half miles until we reach the top of Red Rocks. He’s quiet on the way up the trail. I’m not sure if this is because he doesn’t want to look like a crazy person, talking to himself, or if he feels the difference in vibration now that we are so close to the lake.
Water is a good conductor, not just for electricity, but for other kinds of energy, too. I’ve spent a lot of time on the beaches of Indonesia and Australia, where day is parallel to our night, because I love the erratic vibration of the ocean. The quiet hum of the lake is soothing after this crazy week. Even the trees are at peace, surrounded by a shimmery blue.
The view is incredible from the top, eighty feet high overlooking Lake Champlain. Kids come here all the time to cliff jump into the deep water below—in fact Rei and Seth were here last summer, but Rei didn’t tell me until after they got back. You have to wear old sneakers when you jump unless you either want to swim all the way up to the sandy beach or risk shredding your feet on freshwater mussels that live on the rocks along the shore. Rei is wearing his good hiking boots today.
He sits on the edge of the cliff, one leg dangling over. Except for a few boats motoring around the lake, no one is around, so I materialize beside him and we sit in companionable silence. Every now and then he tells me something random, like how the red quartzite rocks below us got their color from thousands of years of underwater oxidation during the Cambria period, and that he once dreamed he fell into an ice-covered lake and how the sun looked shining through the ice and water above him as he ran out of oxygen.
He puts his hand out toward mine and when I line up my fingertips with his, he finally confesses he’s afraid Taylor will keep me forever. He’s sitting six inches away from an eighty foot drop, and Taylor is what he fears.
* * *
I would have loved to stay and watch the sunset with Rei, but he has to pick up his parents and Saya from the store when it closes. I get to Rei’s house before he does, and I can see the day was for nothing. Taylor sits on her front steps, wearing a pale blue cotton sundress I’ve never seen before. Her eyes are trained on Rei’s driveway. As soon as they park and his family walks into the house, she runs barefoot through the path between our houses. She looks so different from me. With her hair down and only a touch of makeup, she looks like a delicate fairy skimming over the grass, and for a moment, I’m jealous that she looks better in my body than I do. It must be the dress.
“Hi, Rei.”
“Hey, Taylor.” Rei has the hatchback open and he’s reaching for his backpack.
“You weren’t in school today.”
“Nope.” He shrugs the nearly empty backpack onto one shoulder and slams the hatch.
“Where were you?”
“Hiking.”
“Oh. You were gone all day. You must be exhausted.”
“Not so much.”
“Did you think about what we talked about last night?”
“Yes, I did,” Rei says very seriously. “I thought about it all day, Taylor.”
She steps up closer and stands on tiptoes so she can look into his eyes. “And?” Rei doesn’t say anything for a minute. He just looks at her with a torn look on his face. Just when I think I may have to poke him to get him moving again, he lets the backpack slide off his shoulder and he leans down to kiss her.
Okay, that was unexpected.
It’s a good kiss, though, much better than the one on the porch. I stare at him in shock and awe for a moment and then it hits me: an unexpected wave of jealousy crashes into me. This was his idea. He wants to kiss her! His color blushes pink, a few shades lighter than Taylor’s. Ugh! I should give him some privacy and leave, I know, but I can’t seem to tear myself away. It’s like I’m experiencing this vicariously, imagining his hands come up and brush gently around my neck instead of hers, his fingers slide up into my hair, his thumbs circle the soft spot where her pulse counts out what were once my heartbeats, one by one.
And then something else hits me.…
What was the name of that pressure point?
She’s all into the kiss, up on her toes like a ballerina, her hands making their way up his arms and around his shoulders, and she’s breathing so heavily, I doubt she’d notice the lack of oxygen if he were to …
Squeeze.
Thirty seconds. That’s all he said it should take. Part of me wants him to do this, to press down on that soft, vulnerable pulse point until she passes out from the lack of oxygen to her brain, and then maybe, just maybe, I can yank her out while she is unconscious. The other part of me, the part of me that wants no harm to come to Rei, wants him to stop. What if she accuses him of trying to strangle her? What if he likes kissing her? What if he likes kissing her?
I’m so close to them I can see her tongue slide past his lips and the creases on the joints of his thumbs grow more pronounced as he presses slowly into the soft flesh of her neck.
Just a little longer.
Suddenly, he stops. He stops pressing. He stops kissing her. He lets go of her and reaches down to pick up the backpack.
“I can’t do it,” he says, almost apologetically.
Her breath is ragged and I can see the vibration of her heartbeat pounding through the thin dress.
“What? Why?”
He pauses. “How can I sell out one friend for another, Taylor? I couldn’t live with that.”
“What? So you’ll just let Seth down?”
Rei shrugs. “He’s already down. They’ll get up together or I’ll go down with them.”
That’s not why he stopped. I’m sure what he told her is true, but I can tell he’s hiding someth
ing else behind that poker face of his.
As she absently rubs her neck, her expression morphs from disbelief into something sad and wistful and wanting.
“Rei?”
Rei swings the backpack over one shoulder and shrugs as if he didn’t hear her. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” he says, and he heads toward the house without looking back.
As I watch her watch him slip away from her, one more thing hits me: whatever Taylor is feeling for Rei has gone beyond lust, beyond need, beyond her desire to own a man like others would own a pet. She is not chasing after him with threats or ultimatums, she just watches him walk away with tears in her eyes. She sincerely likes him.
Only when he shuts his front door behind him do the tears finally spill over, and she turns and slowly makes her way back to my house.
* * *
I’m waiting for her in my room, and the computer is powered up and ready to go when she gets there.
Hello, Taylor, I materialize as I type and the click of the keyboard startles her.
“Oh. It’s you.” She bites her bottom lip. “I suppose you’ve come to gloat because Rei wants nothing to do with me.”
It’s not you. It’s his mother. She doesn’t think I’m good enough for Rei.
“Well, no offense, but … never mind.” Taylor pulls out the new desk chair my mom bought for her and sits down. “Why doesn’t she think you’re good enough for Rei?”
Look around you. Alcoholism can be hereditary. And I’m not exactly the brightest star in the sky when it comes to school. I don’t think these are traits she wants passed down to her grandchildren.
This seems to make her melancholy, and the colors around her deepen. “But I looked through all your photo albums. You and Rei have this whole history together. How can his mother just throw you under the bus like that?”
Because Rei is her baby boy and I’m just the girl next door. And it’s not like she’s thrown me under a bus—she’s been really good to me all my life. You know what it’s like to live here with my father. Can you imagine what my life would have been like if I hadn’t had Rei and his family next door?
“Your father scares the shit out of me!”
I know. He scares me, too. But you didn’t have to hit him with that bottle. You could have easily outrun him. And you shouldn’t be drinking unless you want to end up like him someday.
She gives me a dirty look. “What do you want, Anna? I found all your travel brochures and stuff you downloaded. Why don’t you go someplace exotic and leave me alone?”
What do YOU want, Taylor?
“What difference does it make what I want? I never get what I want.” She takes a deep breath and unleashes her frustrations. “I wanted to go out with Dylan, and he dumped me as soon as he found out I was pregnant. I wanted to have my baby, but my parents wouldn’t let me. I did not want to move to Vermont, that’s for sure. I don’t want to go to Yale. I don’t want to become a lawyer. I wanted to go out with Seth, but we all know how that worked out. Jason Trent is a total ass. And who knows what’s up with Rei. What difference does it make what I want? I never get what I want.”
Well, you wanted my body and you have that.
“Anna, no offense, but I did not want this body. I needed a body. It was here, and now I’m stuck in it.”
I can talk you out.
“I knew it! I knew you had to have an agenda. Save it, Anna. I have nowhere else to go.”
It’s hard to stay positive in the face of so much negativity. It’s hard to feel love for this girl who has so much hate within her. It’s hard to see her as a victim when she seems so intent on hurting others. It’s hard to forgive her, but that’s exactly what I have to do. If I can’t replace her negativity with something positive, I’ll never be able to summon the light.
You do have somewhere to go, I type, and then I think back to the cradle of the willow, to the feeling of harmony and peace. I apologize to the light for bothering it yet again for another false alarm, because I know she’s not ready to cross over yet, but I want her to know it’s there. We’re taking baby steps here, Light, I tell it. Please work with me.
“Anna, what are you doing? You look … weird.”
And then I hear her gasp and I know even before I open my eyes that it’s worked, that she sees the light and when I open my eyes, there it is, illuminating the room in all its glory.
You do have somewhere to go, Taylor, and this is how you get there.
CHAPTER 34
Think this looks okay to wear to court? I stand in front of Rei, smoothing out imaginary wrinkles on the puddle bunny T-shirt I’ve worn since Taylor pirated my body. The big plus in this dimension is you never get dirty and you never sweat, so there’s no need to shower. What would Rei do with all that free time?
Rei has on his trusty beige chinos and white polo shirt. I swear, if I ever get my body back, I am taking that boy shopping.
“Who’s going to see you besides me?”
You never know.
Rei looks at me. “What are you up to?” he asks suspiciously.
Nothing.
“Really!”
I smile innocently at him. I’ll see you in court.
“Hey, Anna?”
I look up at him.
“Stay close to Taylor today.” His voice is a little too casual. Something is up.
What are YOU up to?
He doesn’t smile back at me. “Maybe nothing. Maybe something. I haven’t decided yet. Just try to stay close to her, okay?”
I nod. After she saw the light last night, she sort of freaked out on me and told me to get out of her room and take that light with me. I’m not sure what her mood will be like today, so I was planning to shadow her all day, anyway.
“Anna?”
The seriousness of his expression scares me. “It’s your body. Don’t forget that. Okay?”
I nod.
“Promise me,” he insists.
I nod again. I feel like a bobblehead.
* * *
There are so many people here for the trial, the police have actually blocked off the street. Yumi and Robert closed the store for the day so they could be in court with Rei, and they end up parking in a garage two blocks away. There are television reporters snooping around the crowd and inside the courtroom people have to squeeze together on the long wooden benches in the gallery to make room. Yumi may be tiny, but she has sharp elbows and she’s not afraid to use them. I float around the judge’s chair and watch everyone assemble and wait.
Wait.
Wait.
Yawn. There are official court procedures that must be followed. I notice Taylor sitting between my mom and her parents. She looks very … grown up. She’s wearing a modest navy skirt and jacket, with a scoop neck white shirt underneath it. Even her shoes are conservative, navy pumps with a two-inch heel. Her hair is down and hides the hardware in her ears, although even if they saw it, it would in no way make her any less credible as a witness. I wish I could wiggle the jacket off her so they could see that tattoo, though, because only a psycho would permanently ink their arm with the portrait of a dead girl she barely knew.
Keys rattle and a door cranks open. At first I think, Yay! It’s the judge, but then I see, Boo! It’s Seth with his ankles and wrists shackled. He’s accompanied by two police officers with really big guns in their holsters. What’s left of Seth’s aura is the color of cement, and it clings to him in a thin layer. I make the mistake of checking to see if Rei saw Seth come in, and of course he did. Seth makes eye contact briefly with Rei, and their shared misery takes on the same gray hue. The two armed police officers direct Seth to a table where his lawyer is already seated, and once he’s settled, the officers stay nearby.
“All rise!” The bailiff sounds the same as the one on Law & Order. They must all sound the same, like sports announcers and the ladies on the phone who tell you to press one for English.
The crowd stands mechanically. The judge comes in dressed in his solemn black robe.
I scoot away from his seat before he sits on me and swoop to the back of the room. I wonder if he can see way back here with those glasses sliding down his nose.
He is making a speech about the grave nature of this trial when I decide to put this question to the test. When I materialize, it would appear I’m actually standing on the back of one of the bench seats while leaning against the back wall, all suitably attired in my gym shorts and T-shirt.
He sees me. He’s panning the audience as he makes his speech, and when his eyes reach mine, he slides his glasses up his nose which, intentionally or not, gives me the finger, and his mouth sinks into an intimidating frown. “Would the young lady in the…” I vanish. He stares at the space where I was, where I still am floating, invisibly, and his jaw goes slack. “Er, never mind.” He notices Taylor sitting between the mothers, and his frown reaches epic proportions. He takes one more quick look at the back of the room before he removes his glasses and polishes them on the baggy sleeve of his robe.
“All right, then, Defense, you may call your first witness.”
That would be Rei.
They make Rei swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help him God, and he does just that, despite the district attorney’s best efforts to trip him up by asking the same question phrased just a little differently every time. Rei is a rock, and he refuses to get tangled in the district attorney’s web of obscure questions.
Taylor’s friends are less successful with Seth’s attorney.
“She didn’t really steal it,” Vienna testifies. “She just borrowed it as a joke. She was planning to give it back to him.”
“Just answer the question, yes or no. Did Taylor Gleason take Seth Murphy’s cell phone without his permission?”
“Well, yes, but…”
“That’s all.”
“But…”
“I said, that’s all.” Seth’s attorney picks up the wrinkled note and shows it to the jury, then reads it out loud before he holds it in front of Vienna. “And did she ask you or one of your friends to tape this note to Seth Murphy’s locker?”
Vienna bursts into tears. “She’s dead! God! Can’t you just be nice to her?”
