“He’s just … off.” Jayvee frowns across the cafeteria at a boy I assume must be Poor Walt Casey, sitting by himself. As if he’s trying to illustrate her point, he starts picking his nose.
Bailey keeps right on. “But I mean, if you’d told me something like that happened and asked me to guess who was behind it, I never would have guessed Jack Masselin. Never. There are a lot of other people I would have guessed before him. Dave Kaminski being one, and Seth Powell. And the Hunts, of course, and Reed Young and Shane Oguz and Sterling Emery …” On and on, naming every boy in the history of the universe.
“I think he’s really sorry he did it.”
They look at me.
“He wasn’t thinking. He did this stupid thing and he feels pretty bad about it.”
Iris goes, “You’re defending him?”
“I’m just crawling around inside his skin.”
Jayvee says, “Atticus Finch.” She holds up a hand so we can high-five. “If it was me he did that to, I’d go super-ninja on him.” Jayvee would go super-ninja on anyone who pissed her off.
“Haven’t you ever done something you regretted?” I look right at Bailey.
Jayvee says, “Does last year’s school picture count?”
I poke at my food—at this lunch my dad so carefully prepared—and then shove it aside. I can’t eat. Not in here where everyone is staring at me. Iris says, “Did you hear about Terri Collins? She’s moving to Minnesota.”
Jayvee’s hair goes swish swish swish. “Poor Terri.”
I say, “She’s a Damsel, right?”
Jayvee holds up a finger. “Was.”
In the cafeteria, Kam and Seth and the other idiots I call friends can’t talk about anything else. Seth is giving those who missed it a play-by-play.
“Shit, Mass,” one of the idiots says, and you can hear the admiration in his voice, see it there on his face.
I hitch up one corner of my mouth, as if I’m just too fucking cool to smile all the way, and hold up my hands like, Whatever, man, all in a day’s work. “That’s why I’m me and you’re you, baby.” I slap Seth five and go back to watching the large girl by the window, who I’m pretty sure is Libby Strout.
At some point I feel Kam staring at me. “Whatcha looking at?”
“Nothing.”
He turns and looks toward the window, hangs out there for a few seconds, then turns back to me.
“You know, sometimes I can’t figure you out. Are you as dickish as the rest of us? Or is there a heart beating in that underdeveloped chest of yours?”
I fake-grin. “I couldn’t possibly be as dickish as the rest of you.”
And this is why I like Kam, in spite of himself. He’s no dummy, and someday, about fifteen or twenty years from now, he may even become a nice guy. Which is more than I can say for the rest of them.
Seth and the others are congratulating me on how goddamn hilarious I am, and I’m feeling smaller and smaller, when a girl comes over, trailed by a group of girls, and they all look exactly the same. Same hair. Same lip gloss. Same clothes. Same bodies. The leader goes, “Why don’t you pick on someone your own size, Jack Masselin?” And empties her Diet Snapple on my head.
Someone yells, “Not the hair! Anything but the hair!” Laughter.
I jump to my feet, dripping everywhere, and now people are applauding. The girl goes storming away, and Kam says to me, “If you’re only picking on people your own size, I’m afraid that’s going to limit you to freshmen.” And then he pulls out his flask, unscrews the top, and—for the first time ever—offers it to me.
“I hope that’s orange juice.” It’s a woman’s voice, over my shoulder.
I’m looking at Kam, and he goes, “Of course, Mrs. Chapman. Vitamin C is not only crucial to our development, it protects us from scurvy.”
Monica Chapman shakes her head at Kam and then, in front of everyone, turns to me and goes, “I wanted to make sure you’re okay.” She’s eyeing my wet clothes and the puddle of Diet Snapple at my feet.
“I’m super, thanks.”
“I know today can’t be easy.” To her credit, she lowers her voice, but this actually makes it worse. Like she’s conspiring with me. As if we’re the ones with the secret. “There’s nothing that bonds people more than judging someone else, and even when we’ve done something wrong, it often doesn’t warrant those judgments …”
And now she’s talking about her, not me. I feel the rubber band compressing my cold, dead heart snap in two, and without a word, I’m outta there.
I escape outside into the fresh air and let out all the breath I’ve been holding for the past hour. You returned to the crime scene and you survived. Now that I can breathe again, it’s coming in a rush, and I feel dizzy from so much oxygen in my chest and in my brain. It’s important I keep my blood pressure low and steady. It’s a matter of life and death. I am serious. Life. And. Death. Because this could be how it starts—soaring blood pressure followed by dizziness followed by goodbye, Libby.
It can run in families.
Like that, the time machine that lives in my head teleports me back to that day. I’m standing beside my mom’s bed and wondering how something like this—her, unconscious in that bed—could happen.
“She looks peaceful,” my dad said on the ride to the hospital. “Like she’s sleeping.”
In the ICU, my mom was connected to all these tubes and wires, and a machine was breathing for her. I didn’t know what to do, so I sat by her and then I took her hand, and she was still warm, but not as warm as usual. I squeezed her fingers, but not too hard because I didn’t want to hurt her. Her head was back, her eyes open, like she was just waking up. She didn’t look peaceful. She looked empty.
I said, “I’m here. Please don’t go. Please stay. Wake up. Please wake up. Please don’t leave me. Please please please. If anyone can come back, it’s you. Please come back. Please don’t go. Please don’t leave me alone.” Because if she went away, that’s what I would be.
Outside the school, the sky is a mix of white and blue, but the cool air feels like a kiss against my hot, hot skin.
I dig a marker out of my bag. I find a blank space on one sneaker. I write: You just hold your head high and keep those fists down. (Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird) I tell my brain to focus on the good—the fact that no one tried to ride me like a bull in the cafeteria today, the fact that I seem to have three actual friends, and the fact that Terri Collins is moving to Minnesota. The Damsels will need to replace her. Yet I can’t seem to shake the feeling that everyone belongs here but me.
I think about Mary Katherine Blackwood from We Have Always Lived in the Castle. I’ve always loved her and felt sorry for her because she’s quirky and weird, just like me, and—I’ve told myself—misunderstood. But right now I have this unsettling, someone’s-hiding-in-the-closet feeling, like maybe I was wrong. Maybe it’s better that she’s locked away from the rest of the world. Maybe she’s not cut out to live like other people with other people. Maybe she belongs in that house forever.
In the ocean of people, I see this very large girl coming toward me, and it’s her—Libby Strout. A group of girls elbows each other, and even though they’re whispering, I can hear them say something about Fat Girl Rodeo. They stare at Libby, and that’s the moment it hits me, square in the face. This is what I’ve done to her—painted a giant red target on her back.
As they’re gawking, she stops in front of me and hands me a note. “Here.” This sends the girls into a giggling fit, and I can already hear the gossip mill churning.