“Is she okay?”
It is Gran, I think. I push my hands against my chest. My heart is fluttering oddly. For the first time, I really grasp that Gran is Mom’s mother, just like Mom is my own, and even though I don’t like Gran very much, I want desperately for her to be okay.
“So they’re keeping her in the hospital?” my mother asks. Her voice is surprisingly calm. All I can think is that I’ve never really talked to Gran. We haven’t even gotten to know each other. She never did tell my mother about that day she caught Zelia and me panhandling, and again I wonder why not.
“Okay,” my mother says. A pause. “Okay, I will.” Another long pause.
I feel frantic with anxiety. I dig my bare toes into the carpet and wonder whether I should go in.
“Not tonight,” she is saying. “It’s almost midnight. I’m not waking her up.”
I slip through the door. “Mom,” I whisper. “It’s okay, I’m up.”
Mom is sitting up in bed, covers pulled over her bent knees. She looks up, startled, and motions to me to be quiet.
“You’re not on your own there, are you?” she asks. “Mmm. Okay, good.” She pauses, listening. “I know. But she’ll be taken good care of. She’s safe there. I’ll talk to Sophie and call you in the morning.”
I can’t follow this; I wonder who she is talking to. Gran has lived alone since Granddad died.
“Mmm-hmm,” my mother is saying. “I know. I know. She’s going to be okay.” She leans back on the pillows. “There’s nothing more you can do tonight. Just hang in there. Mmm-hmm...I know, but try not to worry too much. Mmm-hmm... Okay. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
Mom puts the phone down. The soft click sounds loud in the quiet of the dim bedroom. She pats the bed beside her. “Come sit here, honey.”
I cross the room and sit on the edge of her bed. “Is it Gran?” I ask. My breath catches oddly in my throat.
My mother shakes her head. She reaches out and puts her arm around my shoulders. “It’s Zelia.”
“Zelia?”
“She...oh, honey. Apparently she tried to kill herself.”
“Tried to...”
Mom pulls me closer to her, and I don’t resist.
“That was Lee on the phone,” she says. She pulls her comforter over my legs. “She was pretty upset, so I’m not totally clear on what happened, but it sounds like Zelia tried to cut her wrists.”
“Is she...will she be okay?”
Mom nods. “She’s had stitches, and they’re keeping her at the hospital for now. She’s still in emergency, but they’ll admit her for a psych assessment. You can go in and see her tomorrow.”
I stare at her, feeling slow and stupid. The words are barely making sense to me. I keep thinking about the cut I saw on her arm. Had she been thinking about doing this even back then?
Mom lifts my hair off my face and tucks it behind my ears. “Sophie, honey...has Zelia ever talked about suicide?”
“No,” I say. I think of that little rhyme she recited, sitting on the sidewalk outside the bookstore: Guns aren’t legal...I can’t remember how it went, but I remember what she said afterward. There’s supposed to be some line in there about razors too. And, clear as if it were yesterday, I can see her tossing her hair back and saying, If I decided to do it, I’d just do it.
I look at my mother, and then look away, down at the comforter over our knees. “Not seriously,” I say. “I was kind of worried about her, but then we had that fight...I never thought she would do something like this.” The comforter blurs into swirls of burgundy. I blink and let fat tears drop onto the bed.
Mom takes my chin in her hand and tilts my face up toward hers. “This isn’t your fault, Sophie.” She holds my gaze. “People don’t try to kill themselves just because they have a fight with their best friend. There must be something else going on.”
I nod a couple of times. Mom lets go of my chin and closes her eyes for a moment. When she opens them again, they are wet and shiny.
“Sophie...promise you’ll talk to me if you’re ever that unhappy?” she whispers.
“I promise,” I whisper back. Then I snuggle down under the covers and close my eyes. Mom turns out the light. She lies down beside me, and she keeps her arm around me until I fall asleep.
Twenty-three
WHEN I WAKE up it is morning, and I am alone in my mother’s bed. I am disoriented for a second; then it all comes crashing in. I roll over and bury my face in the soft pillows, smell my mother’s shampoo. I want to cry, but no tears come.
At some point Mom comes in and says something about school today. I turn my face away and say nothing. All morning I slip in and out of a drowsy unsettled sleep. I dream about Zelia. I dream that we are on a bus riding through the night, and rain is falling on the dark streets outside. Zelia keeps getting up and trying to get off the bus, and it is very important somehow that I persuade her to stay with me.
I guess Mom decided we would both take the day off, because when she comes back it is past noon. She is wearing sweats and carrying a tray with toast, peanut butter and a sliced apple.
She slides a pile of books and academic journals off her bedside table to make room for the tray. “Sophie, honey...”
“Hi, Mom.”
She perches on the edge of the bed. “How are you doing?”
“Okay.”
“I brought you some lunch,” she says, gesturing toward the tray. “Try to eat something.”
I’m about to decline automatically, to say I’m not hungry, when I remember Max’s eyes locked on mine and her voice saying, How is that any different from what Zelia is doing?
“Okay,” I say. I really am not hungry, but I eat a little toast anyway and some of the apple.
Mom watches me eat. “Sophie, if you want to go up to the hospital this afternoon...”
I shake my head. “No, I don’t.”
She studies my face for a minute. Then she stands up. “Okay, honey. I’m just downstairs if you change your mind.”
I watch her leave. Then I snuggle back down under the covers and close my eyes. My dream pulls at me strongly; it feels more real than anything else. Maybe if I can convince Zelia to stay on the night bus, everything will be okay when I wake up. Maybe none of this will have happened.
Time drifts by. I’m half awake, half asleep. I don’t think about anything, although when the phone rings I wonder if it is Lee.
Sometime later, Mom comes back in. “Sophie, I’ve run you a bath. I’m going out for a bit. Go get in the tub and have a soak. Then maybe you could come downstairs for a while.”
I let Mom help me out of bed. My legs are wobbly and feeble, like I’ve been sick. In the bathroom, the light is too bright for my eyes. My usually pink-cheeked face looks pale and ugly in the mirror.
Lying in the tub, my mind slowly starts to fill up with thoughts again. Zelia. The shoplifting, her anger, the cut on her arm. The thing with Michael that no one else knows about. Our fight. Me talking to Max about being worried but not doing anything more about it. Zelia. In hospital. I picture her lying in a narrow hospital bed, white sheets pulled up tightly, tubes dripping liquid into her bandaged arms. For the eyeing of my scars, there is a charge. I try to remember the rest of that poem, but all I can remember is one other line: Dying is an art, like everything else.
Even at the very worst times I have never wanted to die.
I slide down and let my head slip under the water. Warm. Quiet. I can hear my heart beating.
The water is getting cold by the time I finally emerge. I pull on flannel pajama bottoms and a baggy T-shirt and head downstairs. My mother is sitting in the living room with Gran. Anxiety shoots through my body like stray electricity. I had been so scared when I thought something had happened to Gran, but now I just don’t feel tough enough to cope with her. I look down at my hands, which are pink from the hot bath. They look how I feel: raw and sort of newborn.
Gran beckons to me. “Sophie, come here.” She pats a spot besi
de her on the couch. “Your mother told me about your friend. Zelia.”
I cross the living room slowly and sit down beside her. “Yeah.”
She purses her lips tightly and studies my face. “She’ll be okay. They always are, that type. They don’t give up so easily.”
I stiffen. I’m not in the mood to hear criticism of Zelia right now.
Mom notices and tries to come to the rescue. “Sophie, why don’t you come in the kitchen with me and help get dinner ready?”
I start to get to my feet but Gran grabs my arm. “Sit down, Sophie.” She turns to my mother. “Jeanie, why don’t you go in the kitchen and start? I want to talk to Sophie.”
Mom’s eyes meet mine in a silent apology. “Okay.”
Gran turns and looks at me. “Now, don’t you be getting your knickers in a knot. I’m not going to pass judgment on your friend.”
I look at her, wary but curious.
She doesn’t say anything for a moment. I start to fidget uncomfortably. I wish she’d just get on with it.
“I could tell that girl had problems,” she says.
“I thought you said you weren’t going to pass judgment.”
She glares at me. “I’m just stating facts. She was obviously a bad influence.”
I roll my eyes. “Are you going to give me a lecture about peer pressure now?”
Gran lifts her chin and looks at me with hard eyes. “Friends have all things in common. That’s from Plato, miss. I don’t suppose anyone studies the classics anymore, but I suggest you think about it.”
I tense up. “You can’t blame Zelia for the way I am,” I say, glaring right back at her. “I make my own choices, you know.”
“Do you now?”
There is a challenge in her voice. I stand up; then I turn and look down at her. “Yeah. I do.”
There is a long pause. Finally Gran shakes her head and looks away, like she’s giving up on me.
I start to walk away.
“I was a teenager once, you know,” she calls after me.
It’s such a cliché. I can hardly believe she actually said it. I spin around. “Yeah. A hundred years ago.”
She looks right at me. “Do you think anyone ever forgets?”
Her face is neutral, but I feel like she just slapped me. Never, I think. Not in a hundred years.
IN THE KITCHEN, Mom is stirring a pot on the stove. She jumps slightly when I come in. “Don’t tell Gran it’s not homemade,” she says. She rinses the empty cans and drops them into the recycling bin. Then she turns and looks at me. “Everything okay?”
I shrug. “I guess.”
“Is Gran giving you a hard time?”
“Just being Gran. You know.”
Mom makes a face. “I do know, believe me.” She squeezes my shoulder. “She does care about you. And she isn’t good at showing it, but she means well.”
“Yeah.” I don’t think meaning well is much use at all, but I don’t say anything. I stare at my reflection in the dark window. “I don’t want to go to the hospital tonight,” I whisper. “I don’t want to see her.”
Mom stops stirring and turns to look at me. Her forehead is furrowed with concern. “Because of that fight you had?” she asks. “Or are you scared because of what she tried to do?”
I wait for a moment and check around inside to see if I know the answer. My mind stays blank, and I feel empty, hollow and tired. “I don’t know.”
Mom touches my cheek quickly and so softly I can barely feel it. “Honey...I don’t want to put pressure on you...but I think you are probably a lot more important to Zelia than you realize. More important than she lets on.” She hesitates. “She must have been feeling pretty desperate to do something like this.”
“Do you think it’s my fault?” I whisper.
“No, of course it isn’t. Like I said before, people don’t try to kill themselves just because of a fight with a friend. It’s a lot more complicated than that.” She ducks her head, trying to get me to meet her eyes. “Would you say it’s my fault because I told Zelia to leave after she broke into my files?”
I shake my head. “Of course not.”
“Well, okay then. And it’s not your fault either.”
I blink back tears. “I think I’m going to go back to bed,” I say.
Mom pours some soup into a bowl. “Take this up with you,” she says. “And, Sophie? Please try to eat it.”
Twenty-four
THE NEXT MORNING I get up and go to school as if everything is normal. Mom doesn’t mention Zelia, though I can tell she is thinking about her. She is softer and quieter than usual, treating me like I am made of glass. I sit through my morning classes in a daze, doodling tiny inky pictures in the margins of my notebooks: horses, girls’ faces, the night bus Zelia and I rode in my dream.
At lunchtime, Max meets me at my locker.
“Thought I’d see what you were up to,” she says.
“Not much.” I want Max to know what’s going on, but I don’t know quite how to tell her. It sounds so unreal, so melodramatic,to say that Zelia tried to commit suicide.“Max... can we go somewhere to talk?”
“Sure.” She frowns. “Are you okay? Stupid question. Again. You’re not okay. Obviously.” She takes my arm and steers me through the crowded hallway and outside. We walk in silence across the wet Weld and down into the square.
Max gestures to the empty steps in front of the theater. I sit. She sits beside me, sideways on the step, with her knees pulled up to her chest and her arms wrapped around them. “So,” she says.
“So,” I say. “So...” I tug at my lower lip with my teeth; then I just blurt it out. “Zelia tried to kill herself.”
Max’s eyebrows fly upward. “Oh no. Shit. Is she going to be okay?”
I nod. “I guess. She’s in hospital.”
“What did she do?”
“She cut her wrists.” The square is littered with dead leaves. Someone rakes them up early in the morning, and they blow all over the place by lunchtime.
Max gives me a sideways look. “Shit,” she says again. “I can’t believe this. I mean, I knew you were worried about her, but...”
I make a face and stare at the leaves fluttering across the cobblestones. “I know. I didn’t think she’d do something like this.”
“You’re not blaming yourself, are you?” Max asks.
I shrug. “Yes and no.”
“Come on, Sophie. You’re way too smart for that.”
I grimace. “Not smart enough to see this coming.”
We sit in silence for a minute. The cold of the steps is seeping through my jeans. I tuck my hands into my jacket pockets.
“So is that why you weren’t in school yesterday? You went to see her?” Max asks.
“How’d you know I wasn’t in school?”
Max grins a little sheepishly. “Thought we could hang out. I looked for you at lunchtime.”
“Huh.” I feel a quick flash of warmth, followed by the guilty realization that a small part of me doesn’t want Zelia to come back to school. I don’t want to stop spending time with Max. I wish she and Zelia could just get along.
“So—did you?”
I sigh. “No, Mom wanted me to but...I don’t know, Max. I just couldn’t.”
Max stares at me. “What do you mean, you couldn’t?”
I can feel my cheeks turning red. “I don’t want to see her,” I mumble.
“Sophie, you’re supposed to be her best friend. She tried to kill herself. You can’t just dump her.”
My nail polish is gone so I pick at the reddened skin around my cuticle. “I’m not dumping her.”
Max continues to stare at me.
“I’m not,” I protest. “It’s just, I can’t, I...”
Max stands up. “Come on,” she says.
“What?”
“Come on. I’ve got the car here. I’ll go with you.”
I gape at her. “Now? To the hospital?”
“Yup.” She holds
out a hand to pull me up.
“What about our classes?”
Max snorts. “Please. Don’t tell me you haven’t skipped for less important things than this.”
I remember telling Gran that I make my own choices. Do I? Is this my choice or Max’s? I sit there for a long moment until I know the answer. It’s my choice. Because Max is right: I’m Zelia’s best friend, and she needs me.
I reach out and take Max’s outstretched hand. “Okay,” I say. “Let’s go.”
MAX WAITS IN the lobby, and I ride the elevator up to the third floor. The adolescent psychiatric ward is a long hallway, blocked by a reception desk. It isn’t what I pictured. There are no obviously crazy people wandering around. It just looks like any other hospital ward.
“I’m here to see Zelia,” I say.
The woman behind the desk taps her long pink nails on the shiny counter. “Zelia Keenan? Room three-one-two.”
Zelia is sitting cross-legged on her bed, reading a book and looking reassuringly normal. I try to act like I visit friends in the psych ward every day.
“Hey.”
She looks up and gives me her lopsided half grin. “Hey.”
“Are you, you know, okay?” I ask.
She nods. “Fine. Everyone is totally overreacting.”
“They are?”
“Uh-huh. I didn’t try to kill myself. God. I’m not crazy.”
I nod. I can’t help glancing at the white bandage peeking out from under the sleeve of her sweatshirt.
Zelia follows my eyes and shrugs. “I just cut myself sometimes, okay? It’s not a big deal. I didn’t mean to do it so deep.”
I stare at her. There is a strange feeling in my gut, like I’m on an elevator with a broken cable. She is looking at me as if what she said was the most normal thing in the world. As if everyone just cuts themselves, a little, sometimes.
“You...you cut yourself? On purpose?” I say. “Why?”
Zelia looks away and stares out the window. When she answers, her voice is so soft I can barely hear her. “I don’t know,” she says.
All at once, I realize that I’ve only seen what I needed to see in her. Strength, confidence, daring, that way of being so absolutely alive in every moment. All the things I wanted to be. I haven’t seen what was really there. I haven’t seen how much she must have been hurting. I swallow hard and change the subject quickly. “So...how long are you going to be here?”
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