Aspen

by Rebekah Crane

  “I’m totally gonna Instagram this.” She smiles down at the picture. “You guys don’t mind if I steal her for a while, right? I have to pee.”

  “Can I come?” Cass asks. Suzy squints her eyes at him.

  “You’re cute. I heard about you and Marcy Humphrey. She’s not the only girl with that talent.” And then she blows Cass a kiss. His eyes grow three sizes.

  “We’re getting a drink,” Kim says, violently pulling him away from Suzy by the arm. And then it’s just Katelyn’s best friend and I.

  Suzy squashes her cigarette out on the ground. I fidget with my hands, unsure of what to do, and she yanks on my shirt. “Come on. I need to piss like a race horse.”

  Inside the house, Suzy stumbles toward the stairs. I glance around, checking out the living space. A long wooden table that seats about twenty fills a white dining room, where a gigantic chandelier with what look like real crystals hangs from the ceiling. Ninny and Toaster wouldn’t know what to do with all the open table space. White furniture decorates the living room. Silver candlesticks stand over the huge fireplace, and hanging above them is a framed professional photo of Suzy, her brother and her parents posed in a field of wildflowers, the whole family smiling widely. A shiny black baby grand piano sits in the corner, not a speck of dust on it.

  Once we’re upstairs in Suzy’s room, she slams the door behind me.

  “You have a bathroom in your room?” I ask. The room smells like flowery perfume and face powder.

  “Make yourself at home.” Suzy checks her reflection in the mirror hanging over her large wooden dresser, fixing her lipstick, and proceeds to the bathroom. I wait for her to shut the door behind her, but she doesn’t. Suzy pulls down her pants and plops herself onto the toilet seat, making an “ahh” sound as she pees. “I had to break the seal,” she explains. “My bladder was about to explode.”

  She sits with her pants around her ankles on the toilet as I walk around the room like a caged animal. It was easier to be outside at the party. I could hide on the fringe and pretend all this wasn’t really happening. But being in Suzy’s room is like entering the fifth dimension of popularity.

  I look through the makeup sitting out on her dresser. She has every color of eye shadow in the rainbow. I pick up a pink lipstick and hold it to my face. Then I notice the picture stuffed into the corner of the mirror.

  Katelyn sits next to Suzy, her head resting on Suzy’s shoulder, a smile on her face. Not a big smile, just a closed-mouthed one, the kind people who hate their teeth make. Katelyn’s knees are pulled up to her chest; she’s wearing dark jeans and a Boulder soccer shirt. Suzy’s leaning her head on Katelyn’s. They look like models from Seventeen magazine. Ninny’s never even shown me how to put on Chapstick. Unable to stop myself, I pick up the picture.

  “She was beautiful.” Suzy rests her elbows on her bare knees as she sits on the toilet.

  I nod, my eyes unable to move from the picture. Katelyn looks so alive.

  “What was she like?” I ask. As I hold the picture, my stomach gets tight.

  Suzy washes her hands and says, “She could be . . . I don’t know . . . like really fun. Like the best drunk of your life.” She dries them on one of the pristine white towels in the bathroom. She stumbles toward me and looks down at the picture in my hand. “That’s my favorite,” she says, pointing at their faces. “We both look hot in it.”

  I nod, once again fixated on the girl in the picture. I try to see the fun.

  “It’s still strange that I’ll never see her again.” Suzy sways to the side. “My parents keep saying that I’ll see her when I get to heaven. Do you believe in heaven?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I think my parents are full of shit. They just want to make me feel better.”

  “That’s probably true.”

  She takes a sip out of her cup. “Katelyn’s not in heaven.”

  “Was she a virgin?” I bite my lip, pissed I let the words slip. Suzy’s feet stop, but her body moves forward a bit, like she might fall over.

  “What?”

  “I just overheard some girls . . . ” I stumble over the words in my head. “Never mind. I shouldn’t have asked.”

  “No, wait.” Suzy grabs my arm. “What did you hear?”

  “Nothing.”

  Just then the door flies open and Olivia Torres stumbles into Suzy’s room.

  “There you are.” Olivia holds onto the door. Her long black hair falls over her shoulders, resting against the royal blue sleeveless shirt she’s wearing. Her brown eyes are glazed over as she looks at Suzy and then me. “What are you doing here?”

  “Suzy invited me,” I say, quickly. My stomach turns in on itself as I stand in Suzy’s room with Katelyn’s two best friends.

  “Oh,” Olivia says, still keeping herself steady on the doorknob. “I was coming to tell Suzy that we’re gonna do a shot for Katelyn.”

  Suzy’s seriousness melts in an instant, and she says, “I love shots.”

  “Katelyn loved shots.” Olivia’s voice wobbles and her bottom lip quivers, but her eyes don’t leave me. It’s almost like she can sense the guilt seeping out of my pores.

  “Don’t start, Liv, or I’ll start.” Suzy meets her at the door, wrapping her arms around Olivia’s neck. They both start crying.

  “I just can’t believe she’s not here,” Olivia says into Suzy’s shoulder.

  I look down at the picture in my hand. Katelyn belongs here, with her pretty face and shiny hair and shots, with her best friends. Tears prickle my eyes and the picture in my hand starts to shake. When it falls to the ground, a word comes out of my mouth without me thinking.

  “Olives.”

  “What?” Olivia asks, through her tears.

  “I had olives on my pizza tonight.”

  “I love olives,” Suzy says, lifting her head off of Olivia’s shoulder.

  And then I walk out of Suzy’s room, down her grand staircase, through the dining room with the huge chandelier, and out the back door, mumbling “olives” the entire time. I look for Cass and Kim in the crowd of people, but my vision blurs, mixing everyone together.

  This is Katelyn’s party. For the first time, I actually try to find her in the crowd. She used to throw her head back and laugh whenever Jeremy Christman hit on her in chemistry.

  “Aspen?” a voice says.

  Are there stars on your panties? Because your ass is out of this world, Jeremy would say. Katelyn would laugh and say that “panties” was her most-hated word.

  “Aspen, you’re shaking.” Someone grabs my hand. My eyes snap into focus, and I choke back the tears collecting in them.

  Ben Tyler stands in front of me.

  CHAPTER 7

  “Are you okay?” Ben asks, his eyes serious.

  “Everyone keeps asking me that.” I pull my hand out of his.

  “I’ll try to stop.”

  “It’s nice coming from you,” I say, and instantly wish I could put the words back in my mouth.

  Ben stuffs his hands in the pockets of his gray hooded sweatshirt. “What are you doing here?”

  “You don’t think I should be here either?”

  “No. Did someone say that to you?” Ben’s eyebrows pull tight. “I only meant a party like this seems a little pedestrian for a girl like you.”

  “A girl like me?”

  “That’s not what I mean. I just—” Ben runs his hands through his black hair. “What is wrong with me?”

  I cover my mouth to stifle my giggles.

  “Now you’re laughing at me.”

  “Did you just use the word ‘pedestrian’?”

  “You make me nervous,” he says.

  “I make you nervous?”

  “Did you just call me out for saying ‘pedestrian’?”

  “I did,” I say.

  “What’s wrong with that word?”

  “Nothing.” I shrug. It was on our English vocabulary list this past week.

  We stand, silent, both of
us looking around Suzy’s yard, avoiding eye contact.

  “Do you want some?” Ben holds out his red plastic cup, but before I can grab it, he pulls back. “What about herpes?”

  “You wouldn’t dare.” I squint my eyes at him and snatch the cup, slugging down a huge gulp. “Beer?”

  “I can get you something else.”

  “No. I like beer.” I drink down the rest, fast. A bit drips down my chin, and Ben wipes it up with his sweatshirt. My eyes get wide as I realize: He just touched me. I hand him the cup and take a step back.

  “I think I need to walk,” I say. When neither of us moves, I add, “You want to come?”

  Ben looks over his shoulder at the group of guys standing on the lawn, laughing. I recognize Tom’s voice.

  “I should probably . . . ” He glances back and forth between the guys and me, and then he says, “What the hell. A walk would be a nice change.” His tone is flat and I can’t tell if he really wants to come or if he’s just doing it because I had a minor freak-out moments ago. But as we head down Suzy’s driveway, away from the party, I find I don’t care.

  I fill my lungs and push everything out. The nights are turning cold now. I look up through the trees to the cloudless sky. All the leaves are starting to change to yellow and orange. When I take a step into the street, Ben grabs my arm. “Where are you going?”

  “To the middle of the street.”

  He stares at me for a moment. “That’s not safe.”

  “Life isn’t safe.” I pull my arm from Ben’s hand and go to lie down in the middle of the road. Getting a clear view of the sky, I make a wish on the first star I see. Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight. I wish I may, I wish I might, have this wish I wish tonight: I wish I had straight hair. It’s the same wish I’ve had my whole life. I know it won’t come true, but that’s the thing with wishes. The whole point of wishes is to try to make the impossible possible.

  Ben stands on the curb, the tips of his shoes hanging off the edge, like he’s deciding whether or not to jump. I spread my arms and legs out wide, making my body into a human star. Wind blows up the bell-bottoms of my jeans, chilling my legs.

  “Isn’t it weird to think that everyone in the world is breathing the same air?” I roll my head to face Ben. He’s still perched on the side of the curb, looking down at his feet.

  “That’s a lot of bad breath,” he says.

  “The air the one thing the entire world touches.”

  Ben lifts his leg out past the curb and dangles his foot over the street. He pauses, his shoe inches off the ground, and then, like he’s sick of fighting gravity, he steps towards me and lets himself fall.

  “What are we doing here?” Ben says as he lies down next to me, his arms and legs extended like mine.

  “I haven’t decided yet. Maybe we should see what happens.” I take in Ben’s jeans, his black and white checkered Vans. “By the way, you look better tonight. More comfortable.”

  “Someone once told me that no one in high school is comfortable,” Ben says, his eyes staring up at the sky.

  “That’s genius.”

  “Actually, she wasn’t that smart.” Ben’s cheeks fall slack and I know he’s talking about Katelyn.

  “Do you miss her?” I ask and then roll my eyes at my stupid question. Of course he misses her. “You don’t have to answer that.”

  “I do,” Ben pauses, his eyes still focused above him. “Miss her.”

  “I think a lot of people miss her.”

  “What makes you say that?”

  “She just seems to be all anyone talks about lately.”

  Ben sits up on his elbows. “What are people saying?” His voice has an edge to it I’ve never heard before. It’s not cutting—more like a parent protecting a child.

  “Just that she was kind of perfect,” I qualify.

  He eases back onto the cement.

  We lie silently for a long while, not looking at each other. As the silence goes longer and longer, I wonder what the hell I was thinking, asking him to come with me. Now I’m stuck in the middle of the road with Katelyn’s boyfriend and the wind up my pants.

  “Want to play a game?” I say.

  “What’s the game?”

  I sit up and cross my legs. “You have to say the first thing that pops into your head.”

  “That’s not a game.”

  “Yes it is. The definition of ‘game’ is an amusing activity. This is an activity.”

  “How do you know the definition?”

  “They’re my specialty.” I wave my hand through the air. “But whatever, are you in or out?”

  Ben sits up in the road, crossing his legs underneath him. “This might be embarrassing.”

  “Even better.” I resituate myself on the ground, finding a more comfortable position. “Okay, favorite band.” Ben takes a few seconds, his eyes searching the space around us for the answer. “You’re taking too long,” I snap.

  “Okay, okay. Vampire Weekend.”

  “Favorite color.”

  “Purple.”

  “Purple? You’re right. You should be embarrassed.”

  “What? Boys can like purple. We’re supposed to be honest, right? And you’re wearing Jesus sandals.” Ben points at my one Birkenstock-covered foot.

  “Fine. Favorite food?”

  “Tacos.”

  “Favorite song?”

  “Anything by Vampire Weekend.”

  “That’s cheating but I’ll let it slide. Favorite sport?”

  “Soccer.” Ben smiles. The air seems to lighten around us as we talk. “This is kind of fun.”

  “Sweet or salty?” I ask.

  “Salty.”

  “Swim or ski?”

  “Swim.”

  “Movies or video games?”

  “Movies.”

  “Boxers or briefs?”

  “Boxers.”

  “Worst thing that happened to you today?”

  “I remembered that Katelyn’s dead.” Ben stares at me as the words fall out of his mouth. Neither of us can move. “I’m sorry, Aspen. That just slipped out.”

  I swallow hard. “That’s the point,” I say. “You can’t help but be honest. Ninny got me to tell her about my first kiss this way.”

  “Ninny?”

  “My mom.”

  Ben pauses, picking up a loose piece of gravel and tossing it into the air. “I keep waiting for it to get better. I know it’s probably wrong, but I kind of want to forget about everything that happened, so I don’t have to feel so shitty all the time. You know what I mean?”

  “I do. I know what you mean,” I whisper.

  “Can I tell you something else?”

  I nod at Ben. I swear at this moment I’d do anything to take the pain in his eyes away.

  “I know I don’t really know you, but this is the best I’ve felt in weeks,” he says. “That’s pretty fucked up, isn’t it? Considering . . . ”

  I lie back down on the ground and stare up at the speckled night sky. “Isn’t it weird that it takes millions of years for the light of a star to actually travel to Earth? So the ones we see right now may have already burned out,” I say.

  “It is weird.” Ben lies back down next to me. When I turn my head away from the sky, his eyes are on me. “Did something happen to you at the party?” he asks.

  “No.” I lie too easily.

  And then, for too many seconds in this unexpected and unintentional moment we stare at each other.

  When Ben finally opens his mouth to say something, he gets cut off by one word.

  “OLIVES!” Cass comes screaming out of the house, a line of burly guys following him. “I HATE OLIVES!”

  “I’m going to kill you, pizza boy!” one of the guys yells.

  “She wanted it!” Cass yells over his shoulder. “I can’t help that the bottle landed on me! Her tongue went down my throat!”

  “Shut the fuck up and run, Casanova!” Kim screams, following close behind Cass.
r />   “Shit,” I get up off the ground. “Were you gonna say something?”

  Ben shakes his head. “No.”

  “Thanks for not letting me lie in the street alone.” I take off down the road, hobbling on my one good foot. When I glance back, Ben has his knees pulled up to his chest, and he’s resting his chin on them.

  In the moment before I turn away, I swear he smiles.

  I’m lying in bed when my phone flickers brightly on top of the dictionary on my desk. I get up and pick it up, checking the screen.

  It’s not the right phone.

  “I threw you away,” I say, dropping it to the ground. But the light keeps getting brighter and brighter. I scramble back against the wall and bump into something. Turning, I see Katelyn, her bright blue eyes alive, her skin clear and beautiful.

  “I’m sorry,” I say to her. “It was an accident.”

  Katelyn says nothing. Instead, she turns to the blank wall. All my sketches are gone. The Grove is dead. Katelyn raises her hand and writes the word “liar.” It drips down to the carpet, like paint. Or blood.

  That’s when I open my mouth and scream.

  I hear the piercing shriek in my dream before I realize it’s not a dream. It’s me in my bed, yelling like a baby. I sit up quickly, and grab my throat just to make sure it’s actually coming from me. The moonlight streaming in my window catches the faint outline of a girl wearing a soccer uniform, crouched in the corner of the room, her long brown hair hanging straight over her shoulders. I clamp my hands over my mouth, as Ninny bursts in the door. She flicks on the light and Katelyn disappears.

  “What is it, Aspen-tree?” Ninny’s wearing nothing but Toaster’s beat up University of Colorado T-shirt. He runs in behind her in tighty whities, and I cringe.

  “It’s nothing,” I say, wiping sweat from my forehead.

  “Honey.”

  “Just a bad dream, Mom.” I try to get my breath under control and snuggle back down into my sweat-soaked sheets.

  “Are you sure?” Ninny’s brow is pinched, her eyes scanning my face. I nod and force a smile. The hardest smile I’ve ever had to give someone. Worse than when she walked into the hospital that night, carrying the daisies, and apologized for being late.