All We Left Behind (7 page)

Soon—

Soon—

It will be over. And she'll take it back again.

*  *  *

Abe is in the hallway outside the locker room waiting for me. I catch him drumming his fingers against the painted cement and staring at the floor.

“Hey,” he says as I come out of the girls' room, and we share an awkward smile.

“Hi,” I say, remembering how he used to wait for me after classes when we were dating. Only Lilith's behind me, pushing her way through the door. She laughs when she sees Abe waiting.

“What's up, Babe-ra-ham?” she says obnoxiously, squeezing my side and nudging me toward him.

“Lilith,” Abe acknowledges dryly, rolling his eyes.

“Just calling it as I see it, Mr. Lincoln,” Lilith quips, but Abe shuffles his feet like he wishes she wasn't here. I nudge her to get the hint and she doesn't have to be told twice.
“Right, so, I have play practice,” she announces, checking me. “I'll get a ride home from Jen.” I nod for her to go and she squeezes me before leaving. “Later, Mr. President.”

Abe jams his hands into his pockets as she stalks away, like this has turned into a much bigger moment than he intended.

“Hi,” I say again.

“Hi,” he repeats, and my stomach tickles, suddenly hoping he's about to ask me out. Maybe that kiss
has
made him see me differently, as not that girl on the Ferris wheel saying terrible things.

“I just, you know,” he says awkwardly, looking to make sure Lilith's gone. “I know there was a bunch of us and all, but I want you to know you don't have to do that.” He nods outside to the trail.

Mud crawls through me, squeezing mush between my toes.

“Do what?” I dig my fingernail into the cement to chip away the paint.

“Let Lilith do that,” he says. “Kiss you.”

My fingernail rams into a section of paint that's stuck hard; it won't flake off.

“It's not a thing,” I say sharply. “We do it all the time. Plus, you all loved it?”

His eyes go dark, like outside, but I can't tell if that's an act or if he really enjoyed watching.

“Yeah, but I don't know if
you
like it,” he says.

My insides squirm and I don't want to be here. I pound the flat of my palm against the cement like it might ground me.

“I'm not whoever you think I am,” I say. “I'm not who I was when we—” I hate this conversation. I hate that I kissed Lilith and he could see right through it. “Just forget it, all right? It was a stupid Lilith thing. Like always.”

“Sure.” He nods, and I hate the straightforwardness in him, like he doesn't regret bringing this up and we're allowed to go back to being candid with each other after two years of silence. Like that silence hasn't changed me. “Hey.” He smiles, breaking the tension, tossing hair from his eyes. “All I meant is Lilith likes the attention, being the drama queen and all. You . . . you don't have to do what she does.”

“I'm not Lilith.”

“Exactly.”

“She's my friend,” I say, looking for the exit. “It's just fun. I don't know why you're making this a thing.”

“I'm not,” he says quickly. Only, this
is
a thing. Nobody wants me to have this power. “You're just better than that,” he says finally, and it feels like a slap.

I can't swallow and the air feels like it's gone. Abe looks at his feet.

“Right, so, I'll see you tomorrow in class,” he mumbles awkwardly, before heading down the hall, and I want to scream as he goes. Doesn't he get it? I'm not better than Lilith. Sure, I don't have to be her, but I also can't be me.

Suddenly I wish it was Kurt in those woods watching me and Lilith, whooping with the others and playing along. Kurt, who doesn't know me. Kurt, who will let me reinvent myself. Kurt, who isn't afraid of this power.

Running at practice feels like
freedom.

We do drills. Then Coach splits the team in half and we scrimmage, like boys on the playground. Field slick with dew. Mud on our shins. Troy pops the ball, high, clearing it from one side to the next, and I speed to reach it.

Sprint.

Remembering what it is to
want
something, even if that wanting is to let go, trust my feet, and not think. It isn't a choice. It's instinct. And it only happens if I give in to it, if I commit. It's the point when I accept that bones could break and shins could splint, and I don't care, because that little bit of freedom is all mine and I'm going to take it.

Hesitate and it's over. One second and the other team gets the ball. Two seconds and your kneecaps tear off. Three, forget three, it's only guilt and regret.

Don't think. Don't breathe. Charge.

I trap the ball and dribble up the line. The ease slides
over me, like a numbness, and everything else ceases to exist. I square up the shot and take it.

Like it's all I've got.

'Cause if I believe there's more—

I'll miss.

*  *  *

After practice I find Vanessa sitting on the hood of my car. She's got a basket of O'Dell's fries sitting in her lap and a Coke straw pinched between her lips. It's freezing out. But she doesn't seem to care with her tight shirt showing off just how cold it is. I think she likes the fact that it makes me stare.

“What do you want?” I say, snagging a fry.

“You're an asshole,” she says, and I shrug. I walk past her and open the door to throw my bag in the back. She twists to look at me, her black hair slipping off her shoulders. “What the fuck was that at the lake? You ignore me, then take a swim? What's your deal?”

“I'm moody,” I say, throwing her a half smile. She rolls her eyes and groans, the straw sliding from her mouth.

“A moody asshole,” she says, finding the straw again with her tongue, which looks sexy and stupid at the same time.

“Are you gonna get in the car or not?” I nod to the passenger seat, and she glares at me. I wait and she rolls herself off the hood and climbs in, which I knew she'd do.

That's exactly why I like her.

It's why this works.

I take Vanessa to the lookout, where she climbs on top of me and I forget everything else. I forget about soccer, and school, and Josie, and Marion. I remember why I like my life the way it is.

Disposable like this.

Good like this.

At home I lock my
bedroom door and turn out the light. I climb under the covers and lean back, sliding my legs between the feather down and cotton.

Dad is still at work and everything's quiet.

It's just me, and this bed.

I think about Lilith and that power she has. That fire burning somewhere inside. Those boys reacted when I kissed her, but that energy, it was all her. Not me. I'm not sure such a thing could be mine. Or how to find it. That power is like my hair, it enchants, but it comes from someplace outside of me, and I have no control over who or why.

If you want it, take it.

The sheets are cold against my skin. I pull the covers up to my neck and think about being someone else. With someone else.

I think about the bonfire. I think about my skin, soft
and puffy. Think about Kurt's skin, his shoulders, his chest. I think about stretching, and limbs, and wet.

I reach down, over my belly, below. . .

Not sure if I should—

The water could drown me.

It's dark when I drop
Vanessa off at her house. It's even darker when I drop my practice bag on the floor and notice how empty
my
house is. Quiet. It's the complete opposite of the way it was with Mom. No more music. No more Josie blasting the world out with her stereo set on high. Just silence and ash. I let it hum and don't disturb it with the TV or the record player. I like it like this.

The quiet's mine.

In my room, I flip through my chemistry book and attempt to do my homework. But chemistry makes me think of Marion sitting those three seats ahead of me with that lab partner of hers. The one she used to date, who makes her laugh like he's the funniest thing on earth. Not that I want to make Marion laugh. Or do anything with her. Except maybe unbutton that shirt of hers and get her out of my system.

I try to focus, but I can't. Blond-fire's got me annoyed. I get up. Circle the kitchen. Pick through the cabinets. I flip
through Mom's records in the living room: Alison Krauss, Joni Mitchell, Waylon Jennings. Of course, I'm not going to listen to any of them. I chew through an energy bar and half a cup of ice, only to find myself in the bathroom, which is the only room in the house with a door that locks.

If I'm going to think about Marion, then I'm going to think about her like this.

I ease myself down onto the linoleum and I imagine her with her hair down. Biting her lip like Vanessa does. My feet hit the bathtub and my spine curls against the door. She inches up her skirt and—my head rolls back and I enjoy it. The thought of her hair rocking forward. Her hips. The hitch in her breath. My mouth, her—

The room smells like sweat when I'm finished. I open a window, but that lets in the hiss of the neighbor's sprinkler and the chatter of dogs yapping with their chains scraping against cement. I wash my hands and think I might go for a run or play my guitar, but I don't want any of it.

Instead, I go into Josie's room and lie on her bed. The sheets are straight and perfect. Waiting for her. If she wants back here.

I get out my cell phone, pull up her number, and hit send.

It rings and rings and rings. She doesn't pick up. There used to be a phone message after all that ringing, but there isn't even that anymore. Of course I know she isn't going to answer.

I call to listen to the silence. To remember what I can't change.

I'm late for class.

The afternoon bell rang five minutes ago and I take the stairs two at a time, counting my steps like I'm keeping rhythm on my guitar. I make a pattern of it—two-three, two-four, two-six—when I practically crash into her.

Marion.

I flinch and move to the side and we both find our balance. My hand catches the railing and Marion's grabs the wall, and we stand there looking at each other, half between steps. Not going up. Not going down.

Her mouth is part open, her hair up, and there's dust in the sun between us. I think I should say something, but the railing sticks to my palm and my neck starts to itch.

“Hi,” she says, and I watch her mouth close. Swallow and don't say anything.

I wait for her to talk and she waits for me, and somewhere in the hall below us comes the clang of metal against the floor. It's probably one of the cafeteria workers unloading ketchup.

I push off the railing and walk away from her, regaining my balance enough to wipe my palms on my jeans. At the top platform, I can't help but look back. In the same way I can't help calling my sister. I want Marion to be there.

She is, sunned with dust in her hair.

“Hey,” I say.

She perks up and kind of smiles. But this is like the lake, where I don't have anything to follow it.

So I just nod. And go to class.

My eyes scan the soccer
field. It's been forty minutes since the last bell and the parking lot's deserted.

Yet here I am, watching.

That hello in the stairwell wasn't an invitation, but it was
something
. And I don't know how much time that hello will grant me before this small door of space slams shut again.
If I want it—

Kurt's number eleven. He's easy to pick out because he's fast, slipping past his teammates like a trick of the light. It keeps me glued to this patch of grass, with my hands finger-hooked through the chain link, trying to kindle that power Lilith has. Not sure if I even know how. If it takes flint or skin. But here I am, because I don't want to be the girl Abe thinks I am.

Take it . . .

Kurt's wet from running. His shirt's soaked like when he sat next to me at the party, after the swimming, when the fire
was out of reach and there was nothing but silence and wetness between us.

Wanting.

But having nothing to say.

Kurt clears the ball and I catch him stealing a look at me, but then he spends the next five minutes focused on the ball. Reacts. Runs.

Their coach yells for a water break and that swiftness in him catches me off guard, because he strides right past the water cooler and heads for me.

I straighten up, but my hair gets caught in the fence. I mess with it, my head tilted awkwardly as I try to get it unhooked, when suddenly he's here.

In front of me.

Chain link between us.

“Hey,” he says, but the word slides out of him, more like an exhale of breath than something actually said. His cleats dig into the mud and I bite my lip, trying to make my head tilt look natural. His fingers curl through the fence, and his thumb grazes the thin strip of my hair.