dedication
For Jason, who never had any doubts
contents
Dedication
One: Senior Year
Two: Sophomore Year
Three: Senior Year
Four: Sophomore Year
Five: Senior Year
Six: Sophomore Year
Seven: Senior Year
Eight: Sophomore Year
Nine: Senior Year
Ten: Sophomore Year
Eleven: Senior Year
Twelve: Sophomore Year
Thirteen: Senior Year
Fourteen: Sophomore Year
Fifteen: Senior Year
Sixteen: Sophomore Year
Seventeen: Senior Year
Eighteen: Sophomore Year
Nineteen: Senior Year
Twenty: Sophomore Year
Twenty-One: Senior Year
Twenty-Two: Sophomore Year
Twenty-Three: Senior Year
Twenty-Four: Sophomore Year
Twenty-Five: Senior Year
Twenty-Six: Sophomore Year
Twenty-Seven: Senior Year
Twenty-Eight: Senior Year
Twenty-Nine: Senior Year
Thirty: Three Months Later
Acknowledgments
Back Ad
About the Author
Books by Rebecca Phillips
Credits
Copyright
About the Publisher
one
Senior Year
I AM A STATUE.
“Dara.” My mother touches my arm. Gently, of course, the same way she’s been doing pretty much everything since I got back last week. “Mr. Lind asked you a question.”
I shift my gaze to Mr. Lind, Hadfield High’s principal and yet another addition to the long line of concerned adults in my life. “Sorry,” I say, not wanting to add that I was too busy focusing on being a statue to hear what he said. Striving to be motionless isn’t something healthy, coping girls are supposed to do.
Mr. Lind smiles with his lips closed and tries again. “I see from the transcripts Somerset Prep sent us that you did especially well in World History last year. Is that something you’d like to pursue in college?”
“Not really.” The only reason I liked history so much was because I got to submerge myself in the distant past, where people faced things like war and death and famine and somehow, miraculously, moved on.
“Actually, Dara wants to be a police officer,” my mother pipes up.
The principal nods at me, impressed, and leans back in his leather desk chair. “Is that so?”
“Mom,” I say.
She fidgets. “Well, you do. Did.”
Did. Exactly. And now I don’t want to be anything, except maybe a statue. I’ve developed quite the talent for keeping still.
The office grows quiet. Outside the closed door, I can make out voices, laughter. Teachers and staff gathering to prepare for tomorrow, the first day of the new school year. Mr. Lind, well aware of my unique circumstance—along with everyone else in this town—called last week to suggest this meeting, a preemptive strike for what’s to come. Now, if I have a mental breakdown in the middle of math class, he can say he did his part. He’d given me this special attention and tried to ease my way back into the general population of Hadfield High, where everyone knows me and knows what happened and what part I played in it all.
My hand twitches, and I press it firm against my thigh. Steady.
“Mrs. Shepard.”
Mr. Lind is speaking again and I focus on his mustache. Who has a mustache anymore? He looks like he’s straight out of an old detective show, wide and bald and sweating in his ill-fitting suit.
“I know Dara’s reentry won’t be easy, but I think with the support of the staff and her counselor, it’ll be a positive step for her. For everyone.”
Dara’s reentry. Like I’ve been in prison for the past thirteen months instead of eight hundred miles west at my aunt and uncle’s house. Like I have to be integrated back into society. Like I’m a dangerous criminal at risk for reoffending.
Maybe that’s how everyone will think of me now. I’m guessing my presence offends a lot of people around here. Including, I think, Mr. Lind. We’ve been sitting in his office for twenty minutes, and he still hasn’t looked me in the eye.
My mother opens her mouth to say something and is interrupted by a light knock on the door. Lind, grateful for the interruption, bellows, “Come in!” without bothering to stand up from his desk. A woman I’ve never seen before pops her head in and says something about a meeting that’s about to start.
“Ah.” Lind huffs to his feet. “Duty calls. Mrs. Shepard, Dara, thank you for coming in today. If there are any problems, anything at all, don’t hesitate to contact me. Okay?”
Mom and I stand too, and Lind smiles at Mom before throwing me a cursory glance. He fulfilled his duty and now he wants us gone.
“Thank you so much,” my mother says as she shakes his hand. “I appreciate you calling us in here today. Dara’s been . . . well, it’s not easy.”
“Of course not.” He walks us to the door and shows us out. The office is bustling with people and noise, and the air smells like burned coffee. “We’ll see you tomorrow morning, Dara. You have your schedule?”
I nod. It’s in my back pocket but I haven’t even looked at it. I picked my courses during late registration two days after I arrived home, and I know even if the classes I chose were already full, they would make an exception for me. That’s what happens sometimes when people know you’ve been through something horrible—they bend rules to accommodate your fragile mental state.
“It’s okay, baby,” my mother says as we step out into the early September sunshine. “If it doesn’t work out, you can always go back to Somerset. Jared and Lydia said the offer is always open.”
I glance at her and notice, for the first time, that her pale blond hair—the same shade as mine—is shot through with silver. Even though I was gone all year, the strain of dealing with me has taken a physical toll.
“I know,” I say, though I’m positive I’ll never go back. Aunt Lydia and Uncle Jared’s offer to take me in last year was a generous one, but I’m determined to do my senior year in Hyde Creek. It’s my home. It’s the setting for all my memories, both the good ones and the really, really bad. And after more than a year away, I’m back to face all of them.
The drive home is short, and I feel my mother’s eyes on me at every stop sign. I’m not surprised when she detours down a side street, avoiding Fulham Road altogether. I wonder if she always avoids driving there, or if she only does it when I’m in the car.
“I’m going to pick up your brother,” Mom says as she pulls into our driveway and kills the engine. “I’ll be right back, okay?”
She searches my face as she says this, as if trying to determine if she can leave me unsupervised for longer than thirty seconds. I haven’t been alone in days. Mom took the entire week off work and has been sticking to my side like a burr. She doesn’t even take a shower unless Dad is home.
I go inside while Mom heads down the street to collect my brother from his friend Brock’s house. Taking advantage of the quiet, I wander around the main floor, letting the memories flow through me uninterrupted. Each room holds a small reminder of Aubrey—the kitchen, where we baked countless cookies and cupcakes. The main floor bathroom, where we spilled nail polish on the counter and left a red stain that has never fully faded. The living room, where we sprawled on the couch to watch movies. My room, where we did homework and sang along with Taylor Swift.
My aunt and uncle’s condo didn’t trigger any memories. There, I didn’t have traces of my dead best friend everywh
ere I looked.
But now I’m back, and so is she.
“Dara?”
My mother’s voice is overly casual, but I hear the worry underneath. “In here,” I say from the kitchen, where I’m leaning against the counter and examining my schedule.
Mom enters the room, the furrow between her eyes relaxing at the sight of me. My brother, Tobias, is behind her, his freckled face smudged with dirt. He smiles when he sees me, but it’s a shy smile, unsure, and it disappears quickly.
“Hey,” I greet him, stuffing my schedule back in my pocket.
“Hi.” He walks past me to the fridge and extracts a carton of chocolate milk. I watch him, my chest aching. I wish I could call him “Tobes” and ruffle his shaggy brown hair and ask him if he’s excited about starting fourth grade tomorrow. I wish I could pick him up and swing him around and then chase him through the house when he wiggles free and runs. But I’m not that person anymore, and we both know it.
I manage to hide out in my room until Dad gets home from work, then the four of us sit around the dining room table and eat dinner together. Like a family, the way we’ve been doing all week. Mom doesn’t mention our meeting today with Mr. Lind, but my dad knows about it. He doesn’t discuss it with me, though, or ask how I feel about starting school tomorrow. He hasn’t had much to say to me since I got home. Instead he’s been weird and distant, like he’s not sure how to relate to me anymore.
I manage to get down half a plate of my mom’s homemade mac and cheese before escaping to my room again. The food is an iron ball in my stomach, and I have the urge to shut my door, crawl into bed, stick in my earbuds, and block out everything. I don’t want to sit in here, pretending to read a novel but not absorbing anything. I don’t want to look at my schedule or plan my first-day-of-school outfit or wonder if I’ll be able to sleep tonight.
I especially don’t want to think about tomorrow, when I’ll have to walk into school and face the kids I’ve known for years, people who remember Aubrey and what happened between us on Fulham Road on that warm, sunny, almost-summer morning.
And even worse than that, I’ll have to face Ethan.
Ethan, who I haven’t seen since that day at the graveyard almost fifteen months ago, when a box containing his sister—and my best friend—was lowered into the cool, damp earth. He knew I was there, but didn’t look at me once. That suited me fine because I didn’t want him to have to look at me.
But now that I’m back, I no longer have any choice in the matter. And neither does he.
The iron ball in my stomach shifts and I sprint across the hall to the bathroom, shutting the door behind me. Then I lean over the toilet bowl and retch.
My first order of business the next morning is to check in with Mrs. Dover, my guidance counselor. More reentry cushioning.
I get to school early but not early enough, as there are several people hanging out in the lobby, talking and laughing and taking selfies with their phones. I slip by and head into the main office, where I tell the receptionist that Mrs. Dover is expecting me. She waves me through.
Mrs. Dover’s door is open and I stand silently at the threshold, waiting for her to glance up and notice me. When she does, she smiles. Unlike Mr. Lind, her dark eyes don’t flick away from mine. Mrs. Dover and I already know each other; she used to teach freshman English and I was in her class. But even if I hadn’t been, I’d still know her. Everyone does. It’s hard to miss someone who looks like a taller version of Halle Berry. Boys trip over themselves when Mrs. Dover passes by. Or at least they used to, back in freshman and sophomore year. I have no idea what changed around here while I was away.
“Dara.” She stands up from her desk and comes over to clasp my hand. “Welcome back.”
I mumble my thanks. I notice that my foot is tapping against the carpeted floor, so I shift my weight onto it, forcing it still.
“Nervous?” Mrs. Dover moves back behind her desk and motions me to the chair across from her.
I slip off my backpack and sit down. “Yeah.”
“That’s understandable,” she says, her eyes on me again. The warmth and directness in them makes me feel both uneasy and comforted. She knows what happened, has probably read the newspaper articles and heard all the gory details like everyone else, but I can sense she’s not going to judge me. I wonder why. Maybe she still remembers the girl I was, the plucky little ninth-grader who laughed openly and lived fearlessly and got into mischief with her best friend.
But that was then. Both those girls are gone now.
“It’ll take some getting used to,” Mrs. Dover goes on. “Being here without Aubrey.”
I swallow. My eyes, dry and swollen from lack of sleep, itch like crazy but I don’t rub them. Applying pressure might release the tears that have been hovering on the brink for days.
Mrs. Dover lowers her gaze to some papers on her desk, giving me a moment to collect myself. When she looks at me again, I’m steady. In control.
“It’s a very brave thing you’re doing, Dara,” she says in her soft, even voice. “Coming back here. Facing everyone. This has to be scary for you.”
I nod, unable to speak. My mother said the same thing when I told her I wanted to come home and do my senior year at Hadfield. That I’m brave. What I didn’t tell her then, and what I don’t tell Mrs. Dover now, is my decision has nothing to do with bravery. In therapy I learned about forgiveness, and that forgiving yourself means living in the present and letting go of blame. It means self-acceptance. A nice thought, but one that’s a lot easier in theory. I’m not ready to let go yet.
Mrs. Dover watches me quietly for another moment before adding, “If you ever need to talk, my door’s always open.”
The first bell rings, a warning that classes start in five minutes. I grab my backpack and meet Mrs. Dover’s eyes. “Thank you.”
She nods and stands up, squeezing my shoulder as she walks with me out to the reception area. “Have a good first day, Dara,” she says, and just like that, I’m on my own.
My first class is English, on the second floor. I join the mass of bodies heading toward the stairs, tucking in my elbows so I don’t accidentally jostle someone. No one even looks at me. Everyone is caught up in the first-day-of-school frenzy, comparing schedules and summers and tans. I float by unnoticed, my body tense as I wait for someone to recognize the tall girl with hair the color of butter who disappeared the summer before junior year and didn’t come back. Until today.
But no one does, and I’m just starting to wonder if I’m invisible when I turn a corner and almost collide with Paige Monteiro and Travis Rausch, who are walking hand in hand in the opposite direction. Their eyes pop at the sight of me. Travis hasn’t changed much—he might have gotten a bit taller. Paige isn’t as skinny as she was at the end of sophomore year, and her hair is shorter, but otherwise she’s the same too.
“Dara?”
She says my name like I’m an unwelcome surprise, here to ruin her day. My mind scrambles for something to say to them, but Travis takes Paige’s hand and leads her away from me before I can even open my mouth.
Cheeks burning, I glance around the crowded hallway. A couple of people are watching me curiously, like they’re trying to place me. Others whisper back and forth, eyes wide as they wait to see what I’ll do next. They know exactly who I am.
I start walking again, head down and long hair draped over my face, protective. My neck is sweating, and I feel like puking up the granola bar my mother made me eat on the way to school, but that’s okay. This is part of the reason I came back here, why I wanted to face all these people who know who I am and who Aubrey was and what happened to her.
Because they’ll never let me forget that my best friend fell into the path of an oncoming pickup truck and was crushed to death right in front of me.
And they definitely won’t let me forget that I’m the one who pushed her.
two
Sophomore Year
“DO YOU SEE HIM ANYWHERE?”
/> Aubrey stood on her tiptoes, adding a few inches of height to her tiny frame, and peered across the crowded cafeteria. Her features shifted into a familiar concerned expression—eyebrows bunched, front teeth clamped over bottom lip. I called it her mother-hen face.
“Aubrey.” I hooked my fingers into the strap of her backpack and dragged her toward the food line. “He’s fourteen now. A freshman. He can take care of himself.”
We took our place in line and she glanced around again, brown eyes scanning the room for a moment before returning to rest on me. She shrugged. “You know what he’s like.”
I nodded. Yes, I knew what her brother was like—shy, sensitive, a lamb in a den of lions. But I also knew what Aubrey was like. She was fiercely protective, even though Ethan had grown about a foot over the summer and no longer needed his big sister to look out for him.
We shifted forward in line.
“Maybe I should text him,” Aubrey said, twisting her long dark hair into a side braid.
“Maybe you should leave him alone and let him make friends during his first week of high school.”
She unwound her braid and raised one dark eyebrow. We both knew Ethan had trouble making friends. That was why he’d been sitting with us for the past two days. “Maybe my best friend should stop acting like such a beeyotch.”
I stood perfectly straight and glared down at her, pretending to try to intimidate her with my stature; judging from the way Aubrey smirked at me, it wasn’t working. I was already five-eight at fifteen; my six-five father liked to tease me that I’d be taller than him one day. My mother, almost as short as Aubrey, said I was “tall like a supermodel,” which always made me laugh. Supermodels were also super skinny and super beautiful, two qualities I super lacked.
Aubrey paused in her search long enough for us to buy slices of pizza and squeeze into a table near the cafeteria entrance. Then she continued to keep watch, her leg jiggling against the table as she absently nibbled her crust. Unlike me, Aubrey only fidgeted when she was worried. I was never still, not even when I slept.
These Things I’ve Done Page 1
