Page 54 of What You Left Me

We shift and squirm underneath the wiped tears and deep exhales, searching for a way to make it all better.

“So yeah,” I say to break the mood, letting out a small laugh even though it isn’t funny. “There’s also this other little thing. I didn’t graduate.”

Daniel and Aminah laugh like it’s a joke they don’t get but know that they should.

“She’s serious,” Cameron affirms. “She’s supposed to retake her Honors Algebra II final tomorrow.”

“Hornsby? What do you mean? I took that class with you. You were sick, but you went back and—ohhhhhh.” Daniel spins his finger around an imaginary globe. “It’s all connected.”

Aminah stretches out the wordwhatlike taffy.

Our verbal conversation has at least ten different body language conversations beneath it. The entire car is an opus of movement: confusion covering fear, squeezing nervous, tracing circles into the jeans of baffled.

“Have you even studied?” Cameron exclaims. Her face is flushed with urgency. She just put this part of the puzzle together.

“No.” I look down at my shoes. My oldest sneakers. They’re caked with dirt. I guess they’ve been this way for a while, but it’s now I choose to care. I grab a napkin from the pile of random things underneath my feet and start to scrub. White reveals itself as the color underneath the chalky brown side panel. The dirt shakes off into the random assortment of junk in Daniel’s car.

“Petra Margaret!” she shrieks.

“Cameron Catherine Elizabeth,” I parrot back. She doesn’t keep going, so I look up from my shoes and find her misty-eyed. Her face is so filled with regret that I whisper, “It’s okay,” because I hate to see her like this. As I say it, I remember it’s the same empty nothing Brooke told me just hours before.

“No.” Cameron replies the same way I did. “It’s really not.”

“Here’s an idea,” Aminah says. I perk up, praying for respite. “Why don’t we go inside like we planned? I’m sure we can find study guides online. And there’s definitely ice cream in his freezer. And comfy clothes. I’ve spent twenty-four hours in a string bikini under a romper. It’s time for the injustice to end.”

“I second this motion,” Daniel says. “Let’s take a little breather before we immerse ourselves in the world of hospitals again. That lighting wounds my soul.”

My eyes swell with tears again, but not for the same reason as before. Maybe my friends don’t say all the things they should. And we all let secrets and problems go unnoticed for too long. But we always find a way to push away the swaying pendulum of despair. The truth is a wobble not just for me, but for everyone who hears it. When steadier ground is offered, no matter how temporary, we will always sprint toward it full speed.

• • •

• • •

Aminah packed a lot of things into my backpack. Unfortunately, the sum of those parts does not equal a full outfit, so Daniel’s sleepwear fills in the gaps. It is marvelous to be out of jean shorts and in sweatpants. We pile onto his downstairs sectional, lights off, legs tossed over thighs, heads in laps, and bowls of ice cream around us. Aminah and Daniel were right. We needed a break so desperately that the relief is almost too good. Inappropriately good, considering the events that led us here. Cameron has Daniel’s laptop out, scouring the internet for Honors Algebra II study guides. Daniel starts up our yearbook DVD to provide some background noise.

The menu screen is a collection of discarded yearbook photos on rotation. A girl huffing past the finish line at a track meet. Brooke mid-dance number at a school assembly. A group of people huddled around a locker. Three guys in football uniforms kneeling in prayer. A wide shot of a parade. Two actors on stage. Daniel presses play.

Cameron puts the laptop down. Legs shift off thighs. Heads scoot from laps. Even Daniel, usually ripe for commentary and quick asides, watches in silent introspection. As each picture fades out and another pops up, I hold my breath. A crowd shot from the homecoming game appears. It’s a sea of faces. So many people. So far away.

“Wait! Pause it.” I fall inside the frozen image on the screen. There he is: far corner of the picture, in profile. Just the right side of his face. Undamaged. The TV screen is so large that the image distorts as I get closer.

Martin becomes pixels. Then he becomes nothing.

“Sorry,” Daniel says. “I hit Stop on accident.”

• • •

• • •

“What’s going to happen to him?” Cameron asks.

“I’ve heard stories of people coming back from this before,” Aminah offers.

“Me too,” Daniel adds.

Cameron nods. “It’s very possible.”

Martin has become a kind of mythical entity. Untouchable. Impossible. Every new piece of the puzzle only elevates his presence in my life. It’s spiraling me into madness. I can hear it in my friends’ voices. The way they’re coddling me, as if I’m fragile. As if I need this miracle to be realized. “I’m going to lie down for a bit,” I tell them.