Crush

by Stefan Petrucha

  “Well, you’re in a good mood,” Kirsty Sabine said with a smile, as she veered out of the river of kids to meet Jonathan at his locker.

  “Just having a better-than-normal day.”

  “Nothing wrong with that,” she said. “Me too, in fact.”

  “That’s cool.”

  “Thanks for the coffee the other night. I know I already said it, but you and David were really nice to let me join you. I don’t know too many people here, and there isn’t exactly a line of kids looking for new friends.”

  “I know the feeling. I’m glad you could join us.”

  “David’s really cool.”

  “He’s a good guy,” Jonathan agreed.

  “Are you ready for that test tomorrow?”

  “Pretty much. I studied last night because I’ve got work tonight. What about you?”

  “I guess. I never do well on tests. I get all dorky and forget everything.” Kirsty paused like she wanted to say something else but didn’t know how to. Then she smiled and shook her head. “Are you headed to class?” she finally asked.

  “Yeah,” he said, still buzzing from his conversation with Emma O’Neil. “I guess.”

  “Well, why don’t you walk with me and tell me about David?”

  “What do you want to know about David?” Jonathan asked, very pleased to hear the coyness in her voice.

  “I don’t know. Just stuff.”

  “I can tell you plenty of stuff,” Jonathan said, starting into the flow of students. Kirsty followed, clutching her books to her chest, her head cocked toward Jonathan as he prepared to fill her in on David.

  The librarian, Mrs. Vierra, found Emma O’Neil’s body at the end of fourth period. The elderly librarian, her hair a tight brush of white, had been stacking books and heard a scream and then a clatter in the stairwell. Panicked, she ran onto the landing and looked down to find Emma sprawled below. The books she was carrying, including Jonathan’s notebook, were scattered along the stairway. Mrs. Vierra dialed 911 as she raced down the stairs. She knelt by the girl and searched for a pulse but found nothing.

  She cast her cell phone aside and began to perform CPR. One minute later, Emma was breathing on her own, though she remained unconscious.

  Jonathan heard all of this during fifth period, while he waited for Emma to return his notebook. He’d seen the ambulance outside, heard the kids mumbling their panic as they speculated on whom the vehicle was intended for. When he heard it was for Emma, all of the excitement, the joy of the day, drained out of him as if someone had pulled a plug from his big toe to release the emotions. In fifth period Mr. Lane told them what had happened. He said Emma had fallen down the stairs. He called it an accident.

  Jonathan was in no state of mind to believe in accidents.

  When he got home from school, he called David, but his friend didn’t answer his cell or the home phone. Jonathan felt so miserable—his chest aching as if someone had punched through his ribs to bruise his heart and lungs—he didn’t know what to do. Emma. Jesus, it didn’t seem real. She was beautiful. She was nice. She played jazz piano and wrote for the school paper. She had spoken to him that morning.

  Finally. She had spoken to him, and now this.

  Falling down the stairs. Heart stopping. Being brought back to life by old Mrs. Vierra. After Mr. Weaver. After Toby. What the hell was going on?

  His mother wasn’t home, so Jonathan logged on to his computer and went online. He surfed to Westland High School’s website, praying to find news—good news—about Emma. He checked the school’s LiveJournal, and while dozens of kids had replied to the subject line ALL OUR PRAYERS FOR

  EMMA, no one had any new information.

  Jonathan went to the page for The Westie, the school newspaper. He scrolled through the newest issue until he found Emma’s picture by an article she had written about teen dating. He didn’t read the article. He looked at her picture, never wanted to stop looking at it.

  The tears filled his eyes only a moment later. Everything just hurt too much. The light that carried him through his school days had nearly been put out. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t real. Why the hell did everything have to be so bad?

  Was life always going to hurt like this?

  8

  Jonathan didn’t really sleep. He drifted off for an hour or two hours at a time, but the slumber was in no way restful. He kept picturing Emma at the top of the stairs in the library, stumbling, pinwheeling her arms for balance, then crashing downward.

  At four twenty-eight he signed on to the high school’s website. He checked the LiveJournal. At three twenty, Megan Stevens, whose father was a doctor, had posted.

  Thank God! Emma’s awake. Dad says she woke up at three and asked for a glass of water. I already told you about the X-rays, no serious damage. So I think we can all breathe a little better. Dad thinks she’s going to be okay. Totally okay. Thank God!

  “Thank God,” is right, Jonathan thought. A night’s worth of tension fell from his shoulders. He smiled, even laughed a little with relief. He went over the post again and then again to make sure he had read the note properly, letting the wonderful news sink in and be real.

  …She’s going to be okay. Totally okay.

  Jonathan closed his eyes and breathed deeply. He signed off of the Web, shut down his computer, and went to bed.

  Friday night Jonathan stood at the counter at Perky’s. His father had shown up at home late that afternoon seeming flush with cash. He gave Jonathan forty bucks and told him to “make a night of it.”

  Some night. All day he’d thought about visiting Emma in the hospital, but fear of embarrassment kept him away. He didn’t really know her. They weren’t close, no matter how badly he wanted to believe they could be. So he’d struggled with going, talked himself out of it, and then struggled some more. Finally he’d decided to stay away. Her real friends would be visiting; her family would be there. She was okay, and for now that had to be enough.

  So he hadn’t gone to the hospital, and he didn’t know what to do. David already had plans. He was going to dinner with his parents. Jonathan didn’t want to go to a movie by himself because that just screamed “loser,” and he certainly wasn’t going to sit around the house to see his father’s good mood cross the finish line. He’d walked down to the outdoor mall and browsed through the DVD store for about an hour, checking out the latest titles. He’d checked out the electronics store, comparing the specs on digital cameras, televisions, PlayStations and X Boxes. Things he couldn’t afford—not if he wanted to get out of Warren and away from his parents—but things he definitely wanted.

  Then he found himself outside of Perky’s. The usual high-school crowd was gathered, with the notable exceptions of Emma and Toby Skabich. Ox and Cade were inside, sharing a small round-topped table with a couple of girls Jonathan didn’t recognize.

  Whatever, Jonathan thought. Without Toby, Ox and Cade seemed to have become helpless. They were like a snake without a head.

  He walked into Perky’s and went right up to the counter and ordered himself a mochachino, because he’d always wanted to try one. (And maybe with the leftover cash I can send flowers to the hospital…for Emma.) The guy behind the counter reminded him of Myrna from Bentley’s Bookstore Café. He spoke slowly, his eyes clouded and distant. Maybe all coffee clerks were a little burned out.

  Jonathan grabbed his drink and turned from the counter to begin the search for a table. It was unlikely. On Fridays, from the moment school let out until the shop closed, the place was slammed. Kids came and went in shifts. A lot of adults, too. But luck was on his side, and he found a small table in the back shoved against the window, across a narrow alley from the men’s room.

  The counter blocked his view of Ox and Cade, which meant it blocked their view of him, and Jonathan was happy as hell about that. He pulled a book from his backpack and opened it on the table.

  He wouldn’t read. The book was a prop. Nothing more. It was weird enough being out on a Friday nigh
t. Usually he hung out at David’s, watching direct-to-DVD trashy slasher movies. But David had plans. Jonathan was on his own, but he didn’t want to just sit in Perky’s staring at everyone. So, he pulled out the book.

  He’d picked the paperback based on its lurid cover. Something cheesy, so people wouldn’t tag him as too brainy. He had no idea what the book was about, just one of the dozen remainders he’d bought cheap from the store and brought home. It didn’t matter what it was about, though. It was, after all, just a prop.

  Every time he stopped moving, every time he wasn’t distracted by conversation or motion, he thought about Emma. Or he thought about the murders.

  All week at school, everyone had been in mourning, talking endlessly about how “great” Toby had been. Even the kids he’d picked on joined in the chorus of his coolness. A lot of the kids looked scared, and Jonathan understood that. What he didn’t understand was how so many of Toby’s victims could suddenly act like they’d lost such a great friend. He felt bad Toby was dead, but he just couldn’t bring himself to join his fan club.

  He took a sip of his drink and was surprised by how sweet it was. It tasted good and all, but he was used to coffee tasting like coffee. He never used sugar, rarely added milk. The taste so surprised him that he swallowed wrong and started coughing, just about the time Ox appeared over the counter.

  Like his name suggested, Ox was huge. His legs were probably bigger around than Jonathan’s waist. He had black hair cut short to his head, and his cheeks were stubbled with a five-o’clock shadow that belonged on a guy twice his age. He was dumb and cocky, a typical combination for a high-school hero, but when he saw Jonathan, he looked surprised, even embarrassed. He nodded quickly as he passed, making his way to the restroom.

  Jonathan didn’t know how to respond, so he dropped his head and pretended to read his book until the men’s room door closed. He took another sip of the too-sweet coffee.

  When Ox emerged from the men’s room, Jonathan was pretending to read again. He didn’t look up, so he was startled when Ox sat down in the chair opposite him.

  “Hey,” Ox said.

  Jonathan was almost too stunned to respond. He closed the book and searched the room over Ox’s shoulder, expecting to find Cade barreling down as part of an attack.

  “Hey,” he replied nervously.

  “Good book?” Ox asked.

  “There’s a lot of blood,” Jonathan said, though he had no idea if that was true or not. He thought it sounded dumb enough to impress Ox.

  “Cool,” Ox said, nodding his head several times after the word had left his lips. He seemed undecided about something, and he did an odd thing with his lips, sucking them in between his teeth as if he was preparing to heft a tremendous weight. “Look,” he finally said, “Cade and I were talking earlier, and we feel like crap for what’s been going on. Really, man. That locker stuff was Toby’s thing. It was just for laughs, you know? But it was totally lame.”

  Was he apologizing? Jonathan couldn’t be sure. He didn’t say anything, just watched Ox, who looked at him, then the table, then the floor.

  “It’s like nothing against you or anything,” Ox said. “It’s just something we did…for laughs, right? I don’t want you to think we have anything against you. I mean, it was Toby’s deal. Cade and I were just always there.”

  “Yeah,” Jonathan said. You were always there. Laughing. High-fiving like a pack of morons. No. Like a pride of morons, he thought.

  “It’s like, I can’t believe he’s gone. You know?”

  “Sorry,” Jonathan said. It seemed like the right response, but it felt awkward on his tongue.

  “Yeah. Thanks. You’re a cool guy. I guess I kind of always knew that,” Ox said. “You’re a bit scrawny, but a good guy.”

  Ox was trying to make a joke. Jonathan forced a smile, still thinking the monstrous kid was a dickhead, but maybe a lower-level dickhead than he’d once believed.

  “Thanks, man,” Jonathan replied.

  “So, we’re cool?” Ox asked.

  “Sure.”

  “Cool,” Ox said rapping the table with one of his giant hands. “Yeah. Okay. Cool. I gotta get back over there. I just…okay. Cool.”

  Ox stood. He appeared confused about which way to walk. He leaned toward Jonathan, who flinched. Ox rapped him lightly on the shoulder. A friendly gesture. Then he turned and made his way around the counter, leaving Jonathan stunned, confused, and relieved.

  What the hell is going on? he wondered. Were things actually getting better for him?

  Then he lifted his drink for another sip and paused with a cloud of whipped cream against his lip.

  Kirsty Sabine walked into the coffee house.

  And David was holding the door for her.

  Jonathan looked down at his book, pretending to read. He felt awkward, though there was no reason for it. David had lied to him. His best friend said he was having dinner with his folks, when he was actually on a date with Kirsty. So why did he, Jonathan, feel guilty, like he was intruding or spying on them?

  This was lame. So lame.

  “Busted,” David said, dropping into the chair across from him.

  Jonathan looked up, startled. Disappointment in his friend set his nerves on edge. He tried to play it cool, but it felt like he’d shake apart at any moment.

  “Hey,” he said, closing the book and setting it down. “What’s up?”

  David looked over his shoulder and then leaned his arms on the table. “I got a date.”

  “Doesn’t look like your parents,” Jonathan said, trying to sound amused.

  “I know,” David said. He laughed. “Thank God, right?”

  “So what’s with the blatant untruth?”

  “Yeah, sorry about that. I didn’t want you giving me a hard time about it. I mean, if we went out, and she didn’t groove on the magic that is me, I didn’t want it to be a thing, you know?”

  No, Jonathan thought. He didn’t know, but he wasn’t going to get up in David’s grill over it. His best friend looked too happy for him to try and spoil it. David’s round face was glowing, his smile wider than Jonathan had seen in a long time. He liked seeing his friend having such a good time, but the lie still gnawed at him.

  “So, how’s it going?” Jonathan asked. “Is she groovin’ on your girth?”

  “We’re cool,” David said. Flashes of red rose on his cheeks, and he looked away. “Yeah, we’re cool. Full on SHAC.”

  “Okay,” Jonathan said, “what does that mean?”

  “She’s hot and cool.”

  “You’re just reaching now. SWIM was better.”

  “Well, I think she actually is, that’s the weird thing.”

  “That’s great,” Jonathan said. “But you might want to get back over to her before she has time to think about what a grotesque mistake she’s made.” He grinned and grabbed his coffee.

  David rolled his eyes.

  Before David could reply, Kirsty walked around the counter. In her hands she held a couple of tall cups of coffee. She looked great. Again, she seemed prettier than Jonathan remembered, though he had seen her in class just that morning. Maybe it was her makeup or the short jacket that revealed more of her figure.

  She saw Jonathan and smiled. “David said you were here.”

  “And here I am.”

  “I didn’t see you when we came in,” Kirsty said. She set the coffees on the table. “Can we join you?”

  “Sure,” Jonathan said, “but I was about to head out.”

  “Oh, come on,” Kirsty said. “You can stay for a few minutes.”

  Jonathan noticed the expression on David’s face—a small smile, tight with annoyance—and knew hanging out wasn’t the best idea. He almost agreed to stay, a bit of payback for the lie his friend told him, but he decided not to be a tool.

  “Nah,” he said. “I should bail.”

  Kirsty looked genuinely sad he was leaving, and Jonathan wondered if maybe she wasn’t having as good a time as David. The
n he decided she was just being nice to him. He slid the paperback off the table and fitted it into his jacket pocket.

  “You two can take the table if you want,” he said, standing up.

  “Wait,” Kirsty said. She fished in the pocket of her jacket and retrieved a thin flip phone. “I want a picture.”

  David laughed. “We just bought that thing,” he said.

  “I’m glad David was with me,” Kirsty said. “I was gonna get this totally crappy one. I mean, I don’t know anything about these things. They’re all the same to me, but he thought this one was a lot better.”

  “It’s got more features,” David said, his voice edged with pride. “And it didn’t cost much more.”

  “Okay,” Kirsty said lifting the phone in front of her face. “David first.”

  “You already took three of me outside,” David said.

  Jonathan could tell his friend was playing it cool. He liked that Kirsty wanted pictures of him. David’s posture straightened, and he ran a hand along his hair just over his ear.

  “Smile,” Kirsty said.

  “Ack!” David protested playfully.

  Kirsty looked at the phone screen and pushed a button. Jonathan heard a dull click.

  “Oh, that’s a good one,” Kirsty said. “Now Jonathan.”

  He gazed at Kirsty, again struck by how good she looked. He tried to smile, but it felt heavy on his face. He didn’t know if he could hold it. Seeing David and Kirsty together made his chest tingle. What if these two really liked each other? David had lied about his date, tried to hide it. David blew him off, and Jonathan knew it wasn’t the last time. It couldn’t be. David and Kirsty would spend time together, maybe a lot of time. Jonathan looked at his best friend, his only friend, and wondered exactly how much their lives were going to change.

  Click.

  9

  He walked along the sidewalk, the paperback in his jacket pocket, knocking against his hip. He felt miserable. Oh, he was glad for David. It was cool he and Kirsty had hooked up. But scenes from the future flooded Jonathan’s mind, scenes that showed him alone, sitting in his bedroom doing nothing. He pictured David and Kirsty sitting on the sofa in David’s basement, playing PS3 or just BS’ing the night away. He wasn’t in those scenes, and it hurt deep in his chest. In fact, it was the same ache he felt when he heard about Emma O’Neil. It was a sensation of loss, and it was just too familiar.