by A. M. Henry
It dawned on me then, that first Friday back at school, that Derek probably knew about the drugs for a long time. Lots of people probably knew. I had assumed we were careful, that no one ever noticed anything was amiss.
“It feels huge,” I said. “Like a ton of bricks piled on top of my head.”
“I know. But you’ll get through it. You’re the toughest person I ever met.”
“And you’re still full of crap.”
“I feel like I should say something about the pot and kettle.”
I rolled my eyes. “Whatever.”
*
School is out of the question, but skipping it takes a lot of work these days. I get on the bus as usual and wander into homeroom with everyone else, so I can at least get marked present for the day. It gives me a little more time before my teachers report me missing and the school calls my house.
After homeroom, I head straight to the bathroom in the science wing—the one by the back door—and after the bell for first period rings, I sneak outside and bolt for the woods, so no one can see me from inside the classrooms. Jason and I sometimes used this same escape route multiple times a week.
It’s pretty tough to cut school in Harrowmill. Everyone in town knows everyone else, so a high school student wandering the streets on a weekday morning would attract attention, and before you know it, you’ve got a police escort back to school, complete with a “Tell the old man I said hello.”
I cut through the woods and come out on Blackberry Road, then follow it down to Blackbriar Road, and head for number thirty-one.
Mrs. St. Martin opens the door when I knock. She is curvy and very pretty, an ageless round face with deep brown eyes, her curly black hair short, but perfectly styled. She wears a worn pair of jeans and a frayed grey sweater—her house-cleaning clothes.
“Hi, Mrs. St. Martin,” I say.
“Shouldn’t you be in school?” she asks, folding her arms across her impressive chest.
“Yes,” I admit.
You can’t lie to Mrs. St. Martin. It’s psychologically impossible.
She gives me a frown and a disapproving “Mmm.”
“Is Derek at home?” I ask.
I know he wasn’t in school—his lemon-yellow Nissan sticks out like a beacon of hope among the boring beige and silver cars of the senior parking lot.
“He is.” Mrs. St. Martin’s expression and tone reveal nothing.
“Is he receiving guests?”
A smile flickers across her face and she steps aside to let me in. “He’s down in the basement,” she tells me, “watching Oprah.”
I go through the living room and kitchen to the basement stairs and head down, smelling Windex in the air. The St. Martins’ house is the total opposite of mine, save for the constant cleaning. They have worn, cozy furniture and little odds and ends on the surfaces, family photos on every wall, and a kitchen that always smells of spicy meats or baking pastries. My house is bland, flat, sterile.
In the half-finished basement, I see Derek sprawled on the old pink sectional watching Oprah, just as his mother said.
“Hey, guy,” I call, carefully navigating the stairs.
By “half-finished,” I mean the basement has a full entertainment center and new tiles on the floor, but the walls remain unfinished and the rickety wooden staircase has no railing, nor anything else to hold on to. Derek finds it amusing to watch me go down these stairs.
I give up on the third step and go down the stairs one at a time, on my butt. After the long journey to the bottom, I join Derek on the couch. He obligingly moves one leg so I can sit on the very edge. In the dim light of the basement, he looks normal. Even in the light, his skin is dark enough that it hides the remaining bruises.
“So,” I say, “how are things?”
He gives me the smile that makes most girls swoon and curse the god that made gorgeous, buff, clever Derek St. Martin gay.
“Things are just peachy,” he says. “You look like hell.”
“I stopped bathing. I’ve decided to become a hippie.”
“Right on.” His smile slips into a frown and he runs his hand over his buzz cut—a nervous habit from grade school, when he used to run his hand through his afro. “You’re limping worse.”
“I’ll live.”
“Did you really punch Ryan Reagan?”
No secrets in this town.
“Yes.”
Derek shakes his head, jaw tensed. “You shouldn’t have done that. It’s not your fight.”
“I know,” I say, half indignant, half ashamed.
We sit in awkward silence while Rachel Ray tells Oprah about her favorite Thanksgiving dessert recipes.
“Thanks, though,” Derek says after a few minutes. “I don’t think anyone else will be rushing to my defense.”
“I guess we’re even now.”
He moves his leg so I can sit properly and lean back rather than teeter on the edge of the cushion.
Derek was the only person who remained my friend when I started school in September, and the only one who would acknowledge me in public. Jason and I were the only ones who knew Derek was gay, back when he was still just Derek the quarterback for Harrowmill High’s varsity football team.
“When are you coming back to school?” I ask him.
He makes a funny noise in the back of his throat before responding. “I’m not.”
I say nothing.
“Mom kicked up a big stink with the principal,” he sighs. “Threatened them with lawsuits and everything else. They gave her the usual—no proof who did it, boys will be boys, and I never filed an official complaint or whatever.”
“Where are you going?”
“Greenaway. They offered me a full scholarship for the rest of the year. Said nothing like that would ever happen in their school. ‘We teach our students tolerance and acceptance’ and all that.”
I pull my knees up to my chest and wrap my arms around my legs without even realizing that I’m doing it.
“You’ll be okay,” Derek tells me.
“I don’t know about that. I think I’m going to die of boredom before Christmas.”
I watch TV with Derek for a while and then figure I should probably go back to school.
“See you later, Mrs. St. Martin,” I say to his mom on the way out.
She goes to the door to let me out and then catches me by surprise by pulling me into a hug. I don’t really know what to do, so I sort of half-hug her back.
“It’s good to see you, Angela,” she tells me.
She, like Derek, never treated me differently after The Accident. I don’t know how to tell her what that means to me.
I shrug. She pats me on the shoulder.
“Now get your skinny behind back to school,” she says, and shoos me out the door.
*
I get back to Harrowmill High a few minutes after third period starts. Since I figure I’ll already be in trouble for cutting the first two periods of the day, I go straight into the office to get a late pass. Lucky me—the vice principal, Mrs. Van Holst stands behind the desk, making a small mountain of photocopies.
“Miss Lillegard!” she exclaims.
I really wish people would just call me Angela.
“Good afternoon, Mrs. Van Holst!” I say with the same mock enthusiasm.
“Is there any particular reason you failed to make it to your morning classes?” She checks her watch.
“I was abducted by aliens. They brought me back in time for math.”
“Well, clearly they weren’t very considerate aliens.” She turns to one of the secretaries. “Get me a late pass for Miss Lillegard, will you, Pamela?”
Pamela the receptionist does as she’s told, noting my name, the date, and the time on the bright yellow late pass. Mrs. Van Holst signs it and scribbles something in the “Reason” section. She comes around from the desk and walks right up to me, staring very close into my eyes before handing me the pass.
“Hmm,” she says. “Get
to class now, Angela.”
I have a very special love-hate relationship with Vice Principal Van Holst. She despises me for my constant trouble-making, and yet I’ve probably spent more time with her (detentions and in-school suspensions) than with all the rest of Harrowmill’s teachers combined.
I leave the office and turn right down the long main hallway towards the Math Wing. The reason she wrote on my late pass: Alien abduction.
Despite my poor performance in his class, I actually like Mr. Mallon. I arrive to Algebra a few minutes after the bell and he lets out a booming laugh when he reads my late pass, and then tapes it to his Wall of Fame. That wall displays photos of his best students (including my sister, Rachel), random photos and articles that he finds amusing, the “Best Excuses” list, and anything else he feels like hanging up. The late pass gets taped to the list of excuses.
*
Dad waits for me in the living room, and pounces as soon as I get home.
“The school called this morning,” he says as I close the front door. “They said you were absent. And then they called about ten minutes later to say that you had arrived late.” He gets up from the chair and folds his arms, taking a deep breath. “Care to explain why you were cutting class?”
“I went to see Derek.” I figure I may as well go with the truth—the alien abduction excuse would be wasted on a man with no sense of humor. “He’s been out of school for a week. I wanted to make sure he’s okay.”
“I think a simple phone call would have worked just as well.”
“I suppose,” I reply with a sneer, “but I’m not allowed to call anyone at home. And I’m not allowed to carry cash, so that kind of eliminates the possibility of using a pay phone.”
His ears turn red. I head for the stairs and he glares at me before trudging off to his office.
“Rachel’s coming home tomorrow,” he calls after me. “We’re all going out for dinner.”
“Yes, sir,” I shout from my bedroom door before I slam it closed.
*
Mom actually arrives home before seven o’clock and—even weirder—she comes up to my room and asks if she can come in.
My mother works as a real estate broker. Despite her constant complaints about the bad market, she seems to sell a lot of houses and is at least busy enough that she spends close to twelve hours a day at work. I don’t really speak to Mom, but then I didn’t speak to her much before the Accident, either.
Mom’s not the sort of person who knocks on doors in her own house, so when she knocks on mine and asks to enter my room, I feel unsure about how to answer. Is this a test?
“Yeah?” I say, and I know the anxiety in my voice is obvious.
She pushes the door open, high heels clacking on the hardwood floor, and pushes the door almost closed behind her. I feel trapped. She scans the room. Her huge, blue eyes—the same eyes as Casey, but without any of her innocent concern or natural empathy—and her expression reveals nothing. Mom never shows emotion. Her eyes don’t give anything away; they don’t have that permanent look of surprise, like Casey. Mom’s mouth is always set in that motherly pencil-thin line, neither smiling nor frowning. She could make a fortune at poker.
After she takes in her surroundings, she sits down in my desk chair. I pull my legs up farther onto the bed, just in case her presence summons the monsters that live underneath it.
“So, you started therapy yesterday,” she says.
“Yes.”
“Do you like it?”
Definitely a trick question. If I like it, she won’t let me go back. If I don’t like it, she’ll accuse me of acting uncooperative.
“It’s okay,” I say, harnessing all of my mental faculties just to keep my tone completely neutral. “Dr. Allen seems nice.”
Her right eyebrow twitches. “Your father tells me you skipped some of your classes this morning.”
Dear Dad: I totally hate you.
“I went to see Derek. He still hasn’t come back to school.”
“I see,” says Mom, and I have no idea what she’s thinking. I could be in for a scream-fest, boiled in oil, locked in the cellar… Anything is possible with her.
She sighs and examines her manicured nails. “Is that the poor boy who got mugged last week?”
“He wasn’t mugged,” I tell her, venom in my voice. “Half the football team beat him up. Because he’s gay.”
She frowns. “I thought everyone knew that?”
“They did. But apparently it’s a problem now that the football team keeps losing.”
“Is that why you tried to beat up Ryan Reagan behind the high school?”
She has spies everywhere; I’m sure of it.
“Never mind,” she says with a dismissive wave of her hand. She sighs again, sits up straighter, picks a piece of fluff off of her black sweater. “I think it’s time we lifted some of your restrictions. You have been trying to be on your best behavior, and I suppose we can’t go on punishing you forever.”
I feel stunned. It must show on my face, because she almost smiles.
“I think we’re turning you into a hermit,” she continues. “You need to get out.”
“Seriously?” I can’t believe I’m hearing this.
“Seriously,” she says. “Your father and I have discussed it. We’re giving you back your phone privileges, and you may go out on the weekends as long as we know exactly where you’re going and who you’re with. And you have to be home by nine o’clock.”
“Okay,” I say, but still without emotion. If I show too much enthusiasm, she might change her mind. Not like I have anyone to go out with, but freedom is freedom.
She stands to leave. “Rachel is coming home tomorrow. Did your father tell you?”
“Yeah.”
“We’re taking her to dinner at the Landmark, so be ready at six-thirty. No sweatpants.”
8.
Since Dad has nothing to do during the day, he drives down to Princeton to pick Rachel up and makes it back home by four o’clock.
Rachel and I used to be close—like twins. We used to have all our playdates together, wear each other’s clothes, wear matching outfits, and spend pretty much every waking moment together. We had loads of those best friend necklaces, with the half-hearts. But things change and I guess we grew apart as we grew up—once we both got to high school, she had become a super-nerd and I had become a super-rebel, and then we were just sisters.
Out of everyone in the family, she pushed me away the most after the Accident. Wouldn’t speak to me or even look me in the eye. Didn’t even say goodbye when she left for a pre-college summer course at Princeton in June. But then when she came home in the end of July, she came barging into my room, wrapped me in a suffocating hug, and starting sobbing into my shoulder.
“I’m so sorry,” she had said.
I said nothing and just hugged her back. Afterwards we never mentioned it again. We went back to being sisters again, but it was never quite the same as before the accident.
“Hey.” Rachel lets herself into my room and stands awkwardly at the door.
“Hey,” I say from the floor, where I have my school books scattered around me in an attempt to actually do homework.
Rachel walks over, avoiding notebooks and textbooks and pens, and sits down next to me. She looks pretty much the same as always—Dad’s sleek dark brown hair, which she has pulled up into a ponytail; Dad’s glossy dark brown eyes hidden behind glasses. She looks exactly like him—she has his small mouth and straight, severe nose, too.
“How’s your leg?” asks Rachel, glancing at my knee.
“Oh, you know,” I reply with a smile. “Constantly stiff, sore, and just irritable in general.”
“Dad said you started going to therapy.”
“Yeah. They must think I’m still unhinged.”
She turns serious. “I don’t think they know what to think. They’re terrified.”
“Terrified?”
Rachel gets up to close my bedroom door
before she sits on the desk chair.
“Dad talked about you a little,” she says. “In the car. He’s really worried about you. He says you’re like totally shut off. He’s the one that pushed for therapy. Apparently, she thinks you’re fine.”
Rachel doesn’t get along with Mom either, but at least she gets to be Dad’s princess. They’re like clones of each other in personality as well—both of them kind of dorky, sometimes silly, and prone to brooding. I don’t know how to respond to her, so I say nothing.
“Anyway,” Rachel shrugs, “Dad said they’re lifting your house arrest. You look like hell, by the way. Is that a cut on your eye?”
“I got in a fight at school.”
She laughs. “Seriously?”
I tell her about Derek and Ryan Reagan, and we fall back into the pattern of sisters, but only as close as after the Accident. A wall still stands between us, and I realize that I can’t remember if it went up before the Accident, or after.
*
I don’t like going out with my family. I haven’t enjoyed it since I was five years old. We were in the Monroe Diner one Sunday after church (back in the days before both of my parents decided religion was nonsense), and we ran into one of our church acquaintances. She looked at Rachel and Casey, replicas of my parents, and said, “What beautiful girls you have!”
Then she turned to me and said, “And who’s this? A friend? I think I saw her sitting in church with you.”
In a group, with all five of us, I stick out.
They look like a family—Dad and Rachel with the same dark hair and dark eyes, Mom and Casey with their long curls and big blue eyes. Both Rachel and Casey have mom’s heart-shaped face; and they’ve both got Dad’s nose and mouth. I look like someone else’s kid: I’m at least two shades paler than all of them; with light, grey-green eyes; and that pin-straight, flaxen blonde hair that most children grow out of, their hair getting darker as they get older. Mine never did. It would be nice if I could actually do anything with it, but it won’t respond to any kind of styling, and it’s so thin it starts falling out if I try to do anything drastic, like curling or blow drying. I have a long line of Viking ancestors to thank for this.
