Page 36 of The Last to Let Go
Then she smiles that award-winning toothpaste smile at him and adds, “I really wish you could’ve known him when he was your age. He was a different person then.” I wait for Aaron to detonate. But, thankfully, the bell on the door dings, interrupting her.
I consider telling Aaron that I’ll help him study, but something keeps me standing here, silent. Maybe it’s because I’m starting to get really sick of taking care of everyone else. Sick of feeling responsible for everything that goes right, everything that goes wrong. So I stand here, feeling so weighed down I can’t even move, with both of their backs facing me.
Jackie picks up the pot of coffee, tousling Aaron’s hair with her free hand before walking away to greet the new customer.
Then it’s the three of us: me, Aaron, and Callie, forming a triangle in the empty space. A constellation. Something invisible holds us in formation, keeping us from moving toward one another, but keeping us from moving away, too.
“Brooke?” Jackie calls across the room, snapping me out of my trance. “Can you give me a hand?”
Somehow I didn’t notice that there’s now a line forming at the front counter. When I look back, both Aaron and Callie are watching me. While I’m rushing to fill coffee and tea orders, I see Aaron, out of the corner of my eye, walk over and sit down at the little table with Callie. His back is to me, so I can’t tell what he says to make her laugh. But she does.
I have the overwhelming urge to scream at the top of my lungs, to shout both of their names, get them to turn around, to look at me and see that I’m my own person and I have my own life and I’m so sick of worrying about them all the time. But I don’t. I reach into my pocket for my phone instead.
Hi, Dani! Sorry, I forgot to respond the other day. How’s your weekend going?
She writes back nearly instantly, and I start to feel a little lighter:going great now, girl! you?
OK...
what r u doing right now? wanna hang?
I can’t. Sorry. At work.
bummer :*(
I take a deep breath, fill my lungs with air, releasing it slowly as I type what feels like the riskiest words I’ve ever dared even to think:I was going to stay after school tomorrow to study in the library. Wanted to let you know. Just in case...
I lower my phone as the screen fades to black, trying, unsuccessfully, not to get my hopes up as I wait for a response. Just when I begin to think this reckless experiment has become an utter failure, as I’m shoving my phone back into my pocket where it belongs, I hear the most wonderful one-note chime. I fumble to get my phone out of my pocket, nearly dropping it.
i’ll be there! :)
I smile to myself, the screen glowing at me like a signal from a different star across the galaxy.
FREAKS
I LOOK OUT THE WINDOW.Fall has swooped in silently, like a fever breaking. And overnight the trees have taken on the appearance of bursting into flames—oranges, reds, yellows—the whole world suddenly combustible.
I reserved a table for Dani and myself in the library. It’s become our ritual over the past couple of weeks. I have exactly fifty-two minutes before the next bus leaves. We’re going to cram in one last study session for our first psych exam of the semester, which, Dr. Robinson warned the class, is going to be a “make or break” kind of exam.
I check my phone for the time and see that Dr. Greenberg has left another voice mail. That’s the third one in two weeks. Each time he calls, I let it go to voice mail. He’s concerned. He wants me to reschedule. I don’t call back, over and over again. You’d think he’d get that I’m not going to return the call. I delete the message.
Dani’s three minutes late.
Waiting is the absolute worst. When I’m waiting, I’m stuck in the present. I can’t lie to myself when I’m in the present. When I think aboutnow, I can’t help but accept how complicated everything has become. I don’t have enough space in my mind to keep track of everything. School, for one thing. I had no idea how much more work these extra AP classes were going to be. Then there’s Aaron, Callie, Mom—always Mom, there in the back of my mind—taking up all my thoughts. Being in the present is like coming up for air, and coming up for air only makes me realize I’ve been suffocating. Easier not to breathe at all, like maybe with enough practice I can learn to live underwater like those aquarium fish, lie myself into believing things are okay, that this is what life is supposed to be like.
“Hey, sorry.” Dani comes in like a whirlwind of energy, talking fast. “Tyler’s having an existential crisis over some boy he met online.” She starts explaining more about whatever it is that’s going on with Tyler and how he thinks he’s being catfished, but I’m having trouble paying attention—the air in the room feels too thin. “What’s wrong?” she asks.
“What?” I clear my throat. “Nothing,” I lie.
“Are you sure?” she asks, squinting like she’s trying to see me better. She pulls out the chair opposite me.
“I just have a lot on my mind, I guess. Sorry.” I quickly try to wall up those soft places inside of me, the ones that want to show themselves too often these days, especially when I’m with Dani. She sits down and lets her arms fall against the table, and the series of silver bangles lining her wrists clang, making so much noise people turn to look.
Whenever she’s around, I feel like people are looking. But then again, whenever she’s around, I’m always looking too. I could try to build up an immunity to Dani, and then I wouldn’t have to feel my insides turn to gelatinous mush every time I saw her, except for the fact that I don’t really want to be immune anymore.
I shrug and tell her, “Family drama,” as if it could ever be that simple. I try to laugh, but it falls apart in my throat, and somehow I think I might actually start crying in front of her. I feel my chin tremble in that way it does. “God—sorry!”
“No, don’t be sorry,” she tells me, her voice gentler and quieter than I’ve ever heard it before. “Seriously, what’s going on?” She reaches across the table to touch my arm.
