The First True Thing

by Claire Needell

  “Okay,” James says. “I’m calling a vote on Disrespect.” This is one of those things in the back pages of the Center manual that I didn’t really think I’d ever see. A vote on Disrespect is like the death penalty at the Center. It’s the nuclear option. You can basically reapply after shooting up, after going on a weeklong binge. You go back through intake and probation and Accountability and Goals all over again. But if they vote you out on Disrespect, that’s it. You can’t come back. Ever.

  Martin sits stone-still. “All at the table who vote Martin for a Disrespect card, please raise your hand,” James says, while immediately raising his own. Ali, reluctantly, raises his hand as well, his face a mask of grief; Cyndi, poker-faced, raises hers; then Chuck, looking pale, but maybe a little confused about whether he is supposed to even vote, raises his hand too. Then little Maria raises her pale, skinny arm.

  I am the only one not voting against Martin. I can’t. My hand just won’t go up. I’m the last person to want to stand out from the crowd, but I can’t seem to follow along. I also want nothing more than to get beyond the Martin crisis, and since Disrespect is a unanimous decision, I am the one holding everything up. But I’ve done nothing my entire life but go along with what everyone else is doing, sit in admiration for the other kids who seem smarter, prettier, or more self-assured than me. But what if they aren’t? What if the other kids here, including Cyndi and James, are the same as me—just dumb, fucked-up kids doing the best they can?

  I know the Center has rules, and they are supposed to apply to everyone equally, and zero tolerance is our biggest, most important rule ever, but I can’t pretend to understand pushing Martin out. It seems cruel to make him leave, confess repeatedly, and reapply. To tell him he can never come back just seems horrible. I imagine him going home and his dad screaming at him and his mother’s silent fury. I imagine the whole scene, and I want to go up and hug Martin. I am tired of angry, disappointed people. I don’t want to push Martin back down into the hell I’ve been living in, the hell of everyone looking at you like you’re the bomb that’s about to explode.

  James stares at me. “Marcelle? You’re not in favor of a vote of Disrespect?”

  I shake my head. “No,” I say. “No, I’m not. I know I’m new,” I whisper, “but I don’t think Martin is showing a disrespect for the rules.”

  “Marcelle, he . . .” Cyndi starts to disagree, but James raises his hand to silence her.

  “Go on,” he says.

  “Well, I know we’re a zero-tolerance program, and we have all sworn off drug use. But I think Martin came to us for help. I don’t see him disrespecting the rules by asking for a second chance. I think he’s being brave and asking for us to help him stay on track. So I think he’s doing everything he can in this situation. Maybe he should reapply, I can’t say about that. But I don’t see disrespect going on. I know what the manual says about slips, but even in the real world people sometimes bend the rules. People sometimes go with their instincts. They have sympathy. They care about people. I think Martin learned something when he messed up. Like now he really knows he wants to be here. Like he actually knows why he’s here and what this Group is really for.”

  The Group is silent. Martin shakes his head in disbelief. I’m in shock, myself. It’s like I’ve split in two, and there’s the Marcelle who is sitting here, as usual, just hoping things will go my way, but there’s a new Marcelle, too, who’s sick of other people controlling everything. The new Marcelle has taken possession of my voice.

  Thirty-One

  FOR A MINUTE I’m afraid James will turn on me—that I’ve said or done something that will get me tossed from Group along with Martin. But James doesn’t miss a beat. It’s like there’s nothing he isn’t prepared for. “Okay,” James says. “Since our Disrespect vote has failed, and Marcelle does not see Martin’s actions as equaling Disrespect, I rescind the vote. Martin’s slip will be noted in our official minutes and submitted to Kevin for review. Let’s take a five-minute break before we go on, then we have Accountability Group.” I start to ask James where I should sit for my accountability talk, but then to my surprise, Chuck interrupts.

  “Actually, I got my letter in last night at around seven,” Chuck says. “So I think I’m up before Marcelle.” I only voted Chuck in yesterday. This means he has been working on his accountability letter and his Personal Goal Plan since before he was even voted in. I think this must be some sort of procedural error, something that would warrant Chuck taking two giant steps back. But I just took the whole group on over Martin. I can’t take Chuck on now too, and James and Cyndi are nodding, and have clearly accepted Chuck’s letter. I’ve been in English class with Chuck. I know he’s got skills and can write a five-page paper in an hour class, so I have no problem believing he’s gotten the letter done. Still, it seems like cheating somehow. What does Chuck even understand about this place? About being sober?

  I look around the table. Cyndi and James, Ali, Martin, Maria, everyone seems focused on Chuck. Accountability letters are complicated. There are about ten different guidelines. Once your letter is accepted, you are on to the next phase of the program where the real work is. James told me my first day here that he rewrote his accountability letter three times. Cyndi rewrote hers a staggering nine times. You are really supposed to expose not only everything you think you did wrong, but also all your fucked-up ways of thinking about other people. It’s not something you can fake. The fact that Chuck wrote his and got it accepted gives me pause. Maybe Chuck really is here for himself. If so, I’m more confused than ever about who Chuck Glasser really is.

  It doesn’t matter that Chuck got his accountability letter in before me. Whatever else the Center is doing or not doing for me, I’m learning I need to be heard. I’ve always hidden my thoughts, even from my closest friends, if I thought they’d disagree with me, even about little stuff, like music I enjoy, or teachers I like. Getting drunk is a really big way of hiding. It’s a way of hiding from the inside out. Whatever Chuck has to say, he can’t stop me from telling my story here. I peer across the table at Martin. I saved Martin’s ass. Senna and Chuck might think I’m still poor, pathetic, drunk Marcelle. But I’m not that girl. Not anymore. It’s not that I think I’ll never fuck up again. Fucking up is a part of who I am. But like Martin, I’m not afraid to lay it on the line. I’m proving that to myself, right now, at this table. I stood up for Martin. I said what I thought.

  Chuck stands behind his chair. He clears his throat and scratches his perfect chin. Everyone is silent. He has a few double-sided, typed pages in his hand. Lots of writing. But he puts the letter down on the table in front of him. You don’t have to read your whole letter to the Group when you stand for accountability. You just have to talk about it, and the Group leaders have a copy, so they can ask you about anything they want. But Chuck puts his letter facedown on the table, like it has nothing to do with what he’s about to say. “It was me,” Chuck says. He says this in a quiet voice, and no one but me seems to catch it. He stands up straighter and says it again, a little louder this time. “It was me. I killed Hannah. Or I might as well have.”

  I hear my voice before I know I am making a sound. I am saying “No, no, Chuck.” I don’t believe what I’m hearing. I realize I never really believed any of it. It was like I had been asleep for days, and this had been a bad dream, a nightmare, but suddenly it’s real and Hannah is dead. A million thoughts rush through my mind. It’s impossible to imagine. Hannah was a little girl when we met, just eleven and only four feet something. Her backpack was too big on her back. She had her hair dyed blue and she wore blue mascara to match. She was a crazy little girl bounding on the trampoline behind her house, blue hair wrapping around her neck as she flipped and flipped and flipped.

  No. Take it back. You didn’t.

  I choke out a sob. It’s Martin who comes to me, puts his arms around me, and lets me fall, crying, into his arms.

  This is real. This is not real.

  Martin pulls
an empty chair over, scoots next to me, and lets me lean into him. I grab on to his arm, his shoulder, his shirt, as Chuck stands and waits. Everyone else is frozen. Cyndi is expressionless. James looks confused, crumpled somehow from within. Ali is standing half out of his seat. Maria stands away from the Group table with her hand on the door. It makes sense, we should all be running. We should all rush out of the building together and run for help.

  But the story isn’t over yet. Everyone is as confused as I am. Obviously, Chuck didn’t write any of this in his letter. If he had, he wouldn’t be here right now.

  But why is he here, spilling his guts to us? Group is confidential. No one is supposed to be able to say anything to anyone about what they hear in this room, just like in a doctor’s office, or with a therapist. But this must be different, I think. This is someone’s life. I try to focus. I need to hear what Chuck is saying despite the blood roaring in my ears. I need to understand what is happening.

  Chuck, hunched, thin, wild-eyed, biting his full bottom lip between words, continues his story.

  “She came to my house Sunday after lunch. My parents were out, and she stayed all day,” Chuck began. “We smoked, hung around, slept.” He speaks in a dark monotone. So, he and Hannah were together, behind Senna’s back, a dangerous move in itself, but not something I didn’t see coming. I knew he wanted her back.

  “I knew they were coming home from seeing my uncle in New Jersey.” He pauses and breathes. “He has this thing wrong with his leg, some sort of tumor, so they help out. My sister went too.” We all nod, like this part about New Jersey helps us understand something crucial about what happened. There is a sick uncle. No one does the usual stuff, like soccer practice or grocery shopping.

  “That’s when Hannah texted you,” he says. He looks directly at me, implicating me. “Because she didn’t want to go home, and Senna kept texting, but she wanted out of all that. She wanted to get away from him and all the shit he’d gotten her into. We were just talking at that point.”

  “Then she said she wanted to go for a walk up by the reservoir, even though it was already dark. So we walked over there, by the summer camp. We hiked up a while and then went off the trail to a place I know from when I was little.” Chuck’s family lives near these woods. There are paths all through them, most leading nowhere—someone’s backyard, back to the same trail, down to the water’s edge where people walk their dogs and jog on the wide gravel path. I can picture these places in my mind, even though it’s been years since I’ve been there.

  “We went to this cool place where there’s a big, flat rock next to an old shed, so no one could see us. We put down a blanket. I didn’t want to do anything, but then she opened her bag and pulled out her wrap. At first I said no, that the two of us should quit and get sober, like Marcelle. Things had gotten too crazy. But she started kissing me and doing other stuff, getting me into it, so I couldn’t think. Then she said we would get sober, but later, after this one time, because she had this really intense shit, and she wanted to do it with me, alone.”

  I suddenly feel even sicker, chilled, my legs shaking. Martin puts his hand on my thigh, stilling me. I need to listen. I need to know this story.

  “She had a mirror and a blade. She laid out a few lines. We did them and then talked some more. She was upset. She was talking about Alex and how he’d trapped her. About this webcam shit she did, and how it was supposed to be just a few times, just to pay for her stash. But then he wanted her to do more—to just keep on doing it, because she was really popular. All these guys are really into her—this hot young girl.” Chuck sighs. He’s looking around for a drink. Someone hands him his Coke. It’s Maria. She’s crept back to her seat next to Chuck. She’s not afraid anymore. The story has taken a familiar turn. This is not about murder. This is about drugs. This is about the same wave that knocked every one of us into the obliterating dark.

  Oh, Chuck, I think. Even you couldn’t stop her. Was she that strong? Or was she so weak, she couldn’t hold on no matter how many hands reached out for her?

  “I didn’t really want to do any more of that shit. It had a nasty aftertaste, made me feel weird, like numb in my throat. But Hannah kept laying the shit out. She wanted to talk. Do blow and talk. She has these moods.” He looks right at me when he says this. Yes, I nod, she has these moods. Hannah the talker, the singer, the dancer. Hannah the unstoppable.

  “She kept saying she wanted to be done with it all. With Senna and these guys. That maybe she needed rehab. Which she did. She really did. Because the lines kept getting spilled out, and she kept at it. So I did a couple more lines. Then we just lay there, talking, with the night getting darker. My parents were calling, looking for me. Senna was after her. We turned off our phones. I stopped caring at some point. It got later and later. She did a little more blow, then all of a sudden she said she should get going. She messed with her things, still doing lines so she could get home, study a little, maybe pull an all-nighter, getting shit done. And that’s when it happened.

  “She was standing up after doing a fat line off the back of her little mirror and her nose started to bleed and she was coughing. Then she started shaking a little all over. I told her to lie down and she did. She got next to me, but the shaking didn’t stop. She was having a hard time breathing. I started feeling something too, then, like short of breath. But she was gurgling, choking kind of, and shaking, and she started to turn a weird color. I looked for my phone in the dark, but I was pretty fucked up and everything started flashing, like there was lightning, only there wasn’t any. My hands were shaking, and finally I felt the phone under the blanket. I turned it back on and I started to dial 911, but I couldn’t get it right. It was like in a dream where you keep trying to do some simple thing, but you can’t. I tried maybe two, three times. But then I looked over at her and she was perfectly still. She had a little spit on her face, but she wasn’t shaking anymore.

  “That’s when I totally freaked. I shook her. I hit her. I hit her really hard in the face, trying to wake her up. But I was also really mad, just, like, furious because she wouldn’t listen to me. The whole fucking day I was trying to save her, tell her I love her, and she wouldn’t listen.”

  Chuck is hunched over like something is wrong with his stomach. He rocks back and forth in his chair. Maria kneels beside him now, but still no one interrupts.

  “She was so stupid. I didn’t understand. How could she love that fat psycho fuck? Let him do that to her? But then I stopped being mad, and I started getting scared all over again. Terrified. Too scared to think.

  “I realized, looking at her, that the shit we did was cut with something bad, some kind of poison. That’s why it had that weird taste. I figured whatever it was, that shit was in my brain. I was losing my mind. I was going crazy on this poison shit and hitting this dead girl—Hannah. So I went through her stuff, cut lines out of the rest of her wrap and I did it all. Then I ran around for, like, an hour in the woods. Waiting for it to take me, too. But it didn’t.

  “When I got back to where I’d left her, she looked awful. I was so scared. I almost shit right there. I wanted to die. I really did.

  “The little place we were hanging out, by that shed, isn’t easy to see from anywhere. It’s way in back of all the houses, where that summer camp had a shooting range. I kicked some leaves over her. Then I ran home. I figured when I got in I’d do something. Call the cops, 911. I wasn’t sure what. I figured my dad would be up waiting to kick the shit out of me. It was late, like four in the morning. But the house was dark.

  “There was no one to talk to, tell this crazy shit to. If my parents had been around I’d have just screamed the whole thing out, but they weren’t, and I was still high as fuck. I figured the only way forward was to fucking just do it. Off myself. So with all that shit in my system, I ran into the bathroom and took whatever else I could find. But all we had was Tylenol, Motrin, cold medicine. I still took whatever I could get my hands on. I figured it would work if I took en
ough.

  “But I just got sick. I was throwing up all over the sink, the bathtub. I don’t know how long that went on, but finally I passed out. That’s how my sister found me the next morning.”

  Everyone is silent. No one moves. But there is something wrong. Chuck’s story makes a kind of sense. I know Chuck. He’s impulsive. But I’m still confused.

  “Wait,” I say. “What about her phone?”

  Chuck looks up. Shrugs. “I had it in my pocket. When I was trying to call for help, I must have grabbed both our phones, but I was too fucked up to realize it. Monday, I still went to school, mostly because I was too scared to be alone in my house. My sister helped me clean the bathroom. My mother and father were out early. No one knew but my sister how fucked up I’d been. When I saw you Monday, Marcelle, I thought for sure you knew something, and that you’d ask me where she was, but it was like you felt guilty about covering for her, or you just didn’t want to talk to me, and that’s the way it’s been ever since with you. Senna was convinced she was with Alex, the guy she was doing the webcam shit for. Senna said he would kill the guy. Then, he was, like, Hannah wasn’t worth the time, that she was nothing to him now, just a stupid coke whore who was going to make him pay for her bullshit.

  “I drove over to the beach in Rye after school on Monday. I thought about just walking into the Sound until the water came over my head. I even started walking in, but it was low tide. You can walk across the whole fucking Sound all the way to Long Island when the tide is low. So I left. I threw her phone into the reeds out behind the amusement park and got back into my car.”

  Chuck stops. His face looks bloated, misshapen, as though his awful words are deforming him as he says them.

  I know Hannah as well as anyone. I can grasp everything Chuck is saying. I can see it in my head, like a movie. How she died. How angry he had gotten. I could almost see myself being angry at Hannah like that, for dying, for being so stupid, for not loving the right people, for loving being high more than anything else.