There Will Come a Time (6 page)

“Thank you.”

She lets go as soon as she gets her footing. I kind of wish there were more rocks. I'm not used to having anyone with me, so I feel the pressure of being a tour guide.

“Lots of people run or walk here. The path connects to the Rose Bowl. Of course, most people come during the day.” At the bottom of the hill, the pathway opens, exposing us to skinny trees whose pale bones cast eerie shadows. At night it's creepy, a perfect spot to set a horror movie or Stephen King novel. I almost expect a zombie to jump out at us.

Our feet crunch on decaying leaves as we walk, making it impossible to hide our presence from anyone within a mile of hearing. I notice Hanna walks very close to me, as if she's a little scared, though she wouldn't tell me that. Hanna is strong for a girl. She doesn't let much bother her, except maybe her mom. They've had some killer fights. I can hear them sometimes through my open window. The next day Hanna acts like everything's fine, even though it isn't. She used to come talk to Grace about it.

I'm beginning to regret bringing Hanna here. I don't want to have to explain myself.

“Wow,” she says. “It's so big.”

She's referring to the base of the bridge. She's right. The bridge's chunky legs are curved like the base of a very old grandfather clock. The design looks like it could be in 1920s Paris or something. The globed street standards, which line both sides of the bridge in clusters of five every thirty yards or so, look like small floating full moons from where we are.

There's an old walkway lined by a stone wall that we take. We climb the crumbling rock steps and make our way to the concrete slab of the bridge's foundation and dam for the Arroyo Seco riverbed. Behind us, there's a spot where the water pools before it moves down into the channel. Most of the time there's hardly any water here, except for during rainy seasons, when flash floods can come through. Tonight the water trickles from the pool.

I sit down on the ledge. The concrete is cold through my jeans.

Hanna sits next to me. “So, what do you do here?”

“It's just a good place to think. Listen.” The cars speed by in a kind of syncopated rhythm above us. The water moves below. Sometimes the leaves on the bushes rustle. “People say there's ghosts here.”

“Have you ever seen anything?”

“No, but I read about how ghost hunters have come here to try to catch them on film. It's stupid.” Ghosts are just pieces of memory. They haunt us because we don't want to forget. We are the ghost makers. We take fragments of the dead and project them onto shadows and sounds, trying to make sense of loss by assigning it a new shape. Ghosts aren't real. Dead is dead. There is no getting someone back.

I'm starting to forget the small things. The way Grace smiled at me. How her voice sounded when she was angry. What color nail polish she wore. Her smell. Smell is supposed to be our sense with the strongest ties to memory. Sometimes I pull out one of her shirts to remind me of her scent because I can feel Grace slipping from me. And I'm terrified of what that means.

“He just wanted to talk,” Hanna says.

“Who?”

“River. It's hard on him, too.”

I can't remember Grace's laugh correctly either. Did she let it out all at once or did it build? I picture her playing tag with Fern. Suddenly I can hear it again. Her laugh came in quick spurts, like a motor being revved before it gets going.

“You should talk to him,” Hanna says.

“Maybe,” I say, though I have no intention of speaking with River again. Our last encounter, even if it was my fault, hadn't gone well. With Grace dead, I figured I'd never see
him again. I didn't count on Hanna bringing him back into the equation. I didn't count on finding the bracelet. I get up. “Let's keep moving.”

We make our way back to the arroyo and walk along the pathway, following it to the top of the bridge.

The air up here is cooler with a thin layer of fog. As far as I can tell, we're the only ones on the bridge. Hanna has her arms wrapped around her middle, so I take off my jacket and put it over her shoulders. She starts to protest.

“Stop it. You're cold. No arguments.” I rub her arms.

“But now you'll be cold.”

“I'm fine.”

She leans in and rests her head against my chest and I wrap my arms around her. My heart races, and I try to remain very still. The last time Hanna and I hugged was after Grace's funeral. She was the one who reached for me, and I just stood there.

She starts to shake. And I can't tell if it's because she's upset or cold.

“You okay?” I ask with my mouth close to her ear.

“All good,” she says, and pushes away. We start walking again.

“This is amazing at night. This bridge makes me feel like we could be in London.” She lowers her voice. “As if Jack the Ripper is going to walk toward us.” She grabs my arm. Hanna's
like that. She's always pretending, making up scenarios. Most people stop that when they grow up, but not Hanna. She'd probably be a good writer one day—well, if she actually liked to write. Writing, of course, makes me think of Grace. Everything leads to Grace.

“It's safe,” I say, and I link my arm through hers.

“You'll protect me?”

“With all my secret ninja moves,” I say.

“I knew it! You
are
a spy. Explains a lot.”

We both laugh.

“Yeah, the first Filipino assassin.”

A car drives by.

“What time is it?” she asks.

I look at my phone. “One thirty.”

“I should get home. Mom will freak if she wakes up and doesn't find me in my room. Plus it's way past curfew. We could get in serious trouble.”

“She checks on you at night?” I wonder if Jenny or Dad check on me. If they do, they don't say anything.

“Sometimes. I hear the door open, but I pretend I'm asleep. Are you still seeing Chris?” she asks, casually, of course, but I know it's her way of trying to get a read on me.

“No. Last session was two weeks ago.”

“So you're finally free.”

“Unless you go telling someone about tonight.”

She pushes her shoulder into me. “You know I wouldn't do that. And thank you.”

“For what?”

“For showing me where you go. You didn't have to.”

“Yep.” I open my arms wide and spin around as if I'm taking in the whole street. “Big secret revealed. Mark Santos is a midnight bridge stalker.”

“At least you don't go around dressing up in a mask and tights like a vigilante.”

I look at her, surprised. “You really think I'm that crazy?”

“We're all that crazy,” she says dryly, and does a little dance as if to show her crazy side.

“Nice moves,” I say.

“I was thinking of something Grace used to say yesterday,” she says.

My body tenses as if she's going to hit me with her words.

“Remember how she'd say, ‘Whatever happens, happens'?”

“Did she?” I ask. I think about climbing the bars. If Hanna weren't with me, I'd be over them right now. But she'd probably freak out.

“All the time, you know that! And I found myself saying it to someone at school yesterday. This girl was telling me about how she wants to get into this college and she's all nervous about
it, and it just came out. But it wasn't like I was saying it. I heard Grace's voice in my head. And then I kind of laughed because it's as if a part of her is still here.”

I'm listening, but not listening, hoping she'll be done talking soon. I thought it'd be okay bringing Hanna here, that I was ready, but I'm not. I just want to get out of here. I sense Hanna is getting upset as she fidgets next to me.

“Why do you do that?” she asks.

“What?”

“Go somewhere else when I bring up Grace.”

“I'm right here next to you. I haven't gone anywhere.”

“I mean, in your head. It's like you won't ever talk about her, like you don't want me to bring her up around you.”

“What the hell am I supposed to say?”

“I don't know. Something. Anything. It's like you want us all to forget her.”

My head hurts. I want to tell Hanna to shut up, especially because I can tell she's going to get emotional. Why can't she see that I just want to be left alone? Why does this have to be about her?

“I miss her,” Hanna says. “Do you know how hard it is to be back at school without her? I keep thinking I'm going to run into her by her locker, or see her round a corner. That she'll walk into class. I miss her every day. We had so many plans for senior year.
And now that's all I have, just these stupid plans that we'll never get to do together.”

I stare at the cracks in the blacktop, at the gum stains and dirt. I imagine dried blood, my sister's blood, smeared across the pavement. But this isn't the spot. I know the place. It's a few paces up ahead.

“I can't,” I say.

“What?”

“I can't talk about it, about her.”

“Well, I need to,” Hanna says. “And there's her list. I don't want to feel like that's a bad thing. I want to remember her. Grace was my best friend. I loved Grace.”

I bend over and hold my head in my hands, trying to steady it and my stomach. The bile rises as if I'm going to throw up. Hanna rests her hand on my back, and I want to shrug it off, but I don't, because even though I'm mad, her touch feels good. It shouldn't, though; nothing should ever feel good again. I hear her sniffle, and I can't take her tears. I want to scream.

I stand up. “Let's go.”

“Mark?”

“What, Hanna? What do you want me to say? Grace is fucking dead. Dead. Okay? You want me to say that I come here to try and what? To find her? Maybe her spirit is still here? I don't know. The truth is, I'm here and she's gone. Do I want
to jump? Do I want to end it now? I don't know. I'm alive, and that's great. That's fucking great. But she's dead. Grace is dead, and I know that makes you sad, and that makes you want to cry, but you can't even imagine how I feel. I don't want to talk about it, not with you, not with my family, not with Chris, not with anyone. So back off.”

Her eyes, which widened when I started yelling, now narrow like the tip of an arrow. “Grace may not have been my twin sister, but she was like a sister to me.”

We glare at each other until Hanna raises her finger and points it at me. “You don't own the market on grief, Mark. So you're the one who needs to back off.”

She drops her hand and starts walking away from me. I follow her back to the car, and we drive home in an angry and sad silence.

I
peek out of my blinds at Hanna's room across the street. Hers are closed. After sleeping off my anger, I'm now laced with guilt, which is why I have my phone in my hand to text her. Hanna shouldn't have pressed me like that. She knows better. But I know better too. I don't think I've ever used that many F-bombs with Hanna. Grace always made fun of me when I cussed, telling me it was proof that she was smarter. She said it didn't take any creativity or intelligence to swear, until she went through a phase sophomore year when she hung out with some UK exchange students. Grace walked around saying, “Bloody hell,” all the time, and the ban on swearing was tentatively lifted as long as I used an accent.

I need to apologize to Hanna, but don't know how. I send out an exploratory message.

Hey

I wait a few minutes. Nothing. I think about sending another text, but I smell bacon. It's enough to get me to throw on some clothes and go downstairs. Everyone's sitting at the table in the kitchen nook. I don't look at the empty chair in the corner, but I know it's there.

“Mark, have some breakfast. Jenny's made ricotta pancakes,” Dad says. Late Saturday-morning breakfasts are one of our family rituals. Even when Dad gets called in to work, Jenny loves making a big breakfast. She's always trying out new recipes on us.

“Fancy.”

“Ricotta makes everything better,” Jenny says. She gets up to serve me a plate.

“I can get it, Jenny,” I say, and she sits back down. “There isn't garlic in here, is there?” I ask.

Jenny sticks her tongue out at me. “Funny guy.”

I am only sort of kidding. Jenny uses garlic like most of us use salt. During dinner, no matter what's cooking, the air is infused with either sautéed, baked, or fried garlic.

“Mark, see what I drew?” Fern says. She holds up a picture next to her half-eaten plate of food.

“Cool,” I say.

“It's our house.” She picks up a blue crayon and begins drawing stick figures.

I sit next to her and take a bite of my pancakes. “These are great. Thanks, Jenny.”

Jenny smiles a little too widely and looks at Dad, making me stiffen. I know they are concerned about me, but I'm tired of feeling like a lab rat, like everything I do is being watched, measured, and analyzed. This morning I'm doing well. I can tell by the glances she and my dad keep giving one another. I can hear their thoughts:
He's eating. He's saying please and thank you. Maybe he's back to normal.
As if there will ever be a normal again.

“What're your plans today, Mark?” Dad asks.

I shrug and check my phone. Still no text.

“We're heading over to the park,” Jenny says. “You want to come?”

“Yay!” Fern says. “Can we go to the big one with the swings?”

“Yes,” Jenny says.

“Actually I'm meeting the guys later to practice,” I say, which isn't really true. But I was planning on calling Charlie, a guitarist I met at the skate park, and Sebastian to see if they had some time, for our band, The Distorted. Although I don't really know why I bother. We've been together for more than a year and we haven't played a single gig. Well, unless you count Sebastian's cousin's eleventh birthday party. Sebastian told us he booked a paying gig, and I think all Charlie and I heard was “paying,” so we didn't ask for the details. When I pulled up to a
backyard decorated with pink and white balloons and streamers, I considered bailing, but Sebastian met me at the curb with the birthday girl, who was all smiles. She wore a white dress and looked at me as if I were a rock star, so I got out of the car and asked where to set up.