The bell rang, loud as always, and I closed my eyes, suddenly feeling sick. All around me, people were gathering up their stuff and pushing toward the door, but I just sat there, the words blurring before me. It wasn’t until my teacher, Mrs. Sacher, said my name that I realized I was the only one left in the room.
“Sydney?” I looked up at her. She taught English and was young and nice, with a kind face and a tendency to belly laugh. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” I said, putting my phone in my backpack. “Sorry.”
For the rest of the morning, whenever I had a chance, I made myself read more of the article. During the few free minutes between the end of History and the bell. At my locker, when I had a short way to go from English to Calculus. By the time I got to lunch, I had only one paragraph to go.
There are times David is angry about what happened to him. When he can’t help but think how things could have been different. If he’d just stayed at his cousin’s house. If he’d left ten minutes earlier. It’s hard not to follow this line of thinking, and all the dark places it can lead him. But right now, he’s not doing that. Today is a good day.
“Here you go,” the guy behind the counter at the Great Grillers food truck said. I looked up to see him holding the bag with the sandwich I’d ordered. “Need anything else?”
I shook my head, suddenly sure that if I spoke, I might burst into tears. So instead I just took some deep breaths and walked over to where Layla and everyone else was sitting. The topic of conversation was band names, one that came up regularly during these discussions. Hey Dude’s new concept, Eric maintained, warranted a new moniker. But, of course, it had to be perfect.
“What about the Logan Oxford Experience?” Irv asked. “Like Hendrix, but not.”
Eric just looked at him. “That is so far away from what I’m talking about, I can’t even justify it with a response.”
Irv shrugged, hardly bothered. Layla said, “It should have something to do with boy bands, though. But with a twist.”
“No, no.” Eric sighed, as if our collective ignorance literally pained him. “What I need is a name that works with the wider concept, not a gimmick. Able to really explain the meaning, the irony, because people are clearly not getting it. I can’t have people thinking we’re just a retro cover band.”
“Then maybe you shouldn’t be playing covers of old songs,” Layla pointed out.
“It’s not about covers,” he told her. “It’s about the universal experience of mass consumption of music. How a song can remind you of something specific in your own life, like it belongs to you. But how personal can it really be if a million other people feel the same way about it? It’s like a fake meaning, on top of a manufactured meaning, divided by a true meaning.”
Silence. Then Irv said, “Dude. Did you take your Ritalin today?”
Over on his own bench, where he was cramming for a math test, Mac snorted and opened a stick of string cheese. Since the night he’d shown up at Jenn’s a week earlier, I’d had trouble forgetting that moment we’d stood with both our hands on that five-dollar bill. It, however, was a memory I liked to relive. Unlike the one currently in my head, which was canceling out more than my appetite.
“You okay?” Layla asked me. She nodded at my lunch, still in the bag. “You’re not eating.”
“Not hungry,” I told her.
“What’s that like?” Irv asked, and everyone laughed. Layla, however, kept her eyes on me long enough that I picked up the bag and took out my sandwich. The fries that came with it I handed over to her without comment.
“Great Grillers?” she asked. I nodded, and she wrinkled her nose. “They’re too skinny for my taste, usually. I don’t like a spindly fry. But since you’re offering . . .”
She started her typical extensive preparations. I took a halfhearted bite of my sandwich, then put it down, overwhelmed suddenly with the urge to call my mom. Since my earlier efforts, when she’d shut me down with the party line, we didn’t talk about David Ibarra ever. But sitting there, I suddenly felt so alone and craved someone, anyone, who might understand.
“Hey,” I heard a voice say. I looked up to see Mac, his trash in hand, standing over me. “You sure you’re okay?”
“Sydney?” Layla said. “What’s wrong?”
I shook my head, quickly getting to my feet. The attention, added to the scrutiny I’d imagined all day, was suddenly too much. “I . . . I need to go,” I said. “I’ll see you guys later.”
No one said anything as I walked away. Nobody tried to follow me. I went to the bathroom and locked myself in a stall. Finally, I was alone, just like I’d wanted. It felt so awful. Like it was just what I deserved.
*
By that evening, things were back to normal at home. The paper was in the recycling, the news was moving on, and we would as well. But while my mom puttered around the kitchen making dinner and the usual conversation, I still felt strange. Not only about the article, but the way I’d walked away from Layla and everyone else. She knew Peyton’s history; I could have told her about the story. And yet, I hadn’t. I still wasn’t sure why.