18 Things (17 page)

Rain plinked against the window, and I gave a mild smile. I didn’t know when the shower started, but I thought of how motivating others to start a list could bring new life into this place. “I think that’s a great idea. Except eighteen things like mine would be too long for a one-fourth page. So, maybe we could ask them their top three? Oh, and we could like, have a graphic of a beach bucket for the feature. Get it, because it’s a bucket list.”

She squeezed my arm, laughing. “I get it.”

“Mrs. Cleveland, the printer’s not working again,” Steve yelled across the room.

Wiping her eyes, I noticed the lines under her lids and felt so much appreciation for the countless hours she spent in this room with us during and after school. “Duty calls. So, you’ll take care of getting that graphic for the story and creating a cool headline, too?”

The thought of what this list turned into made me warm all the way down to my toes. “Sure thing. But who should I feature first?”

She rubbed her hand over her chin and then pointed to me. “You.”

“Me?”

But she walked away. Either she ignored my objection or just didn’t hear me.

I returned to the business manager’s office.

Nic stood and stretched her arms over her head. “What’d she say about the pizza?”

I ran a hand through the frazzled curls of my hair.
Should’ve known it would rain today
. “I have to pick three things from my life list and publish them in the
Bucs’ Blade
this issue.”

“Huh?” Nic said, rubbing spit over a fresh ink mark on her shirt, smearing the blue color in a wider stain.

I piled my long curls on top of my head and crisscrossed two pens there to hold my hair, gearing up for our monthly race against the clock to meet our deadline. Newspaper was all about multitasking, so I searched for my bucket graphic on the computer and explained everything to Nic. She multitasked too, half listening as she searched the phonebook in an attempt to sell one last ad space.

“Well, that’s cool, right?” she asked.

Leaning across the desk, I peered at her more closely. “Are you serious? I mean, yeah, it’s cool to feature
other
people, but not me. I didn’t write the list with the intention of sharing it with everyone in the world.”

Rain pelted the window, hard. So hard, in fact, I thought maybe the water turned to hail.

“Whoa, take a Prozac already. It’s not the whole world, just the student body, and most of whom don’t even read the paper anyway. Plus, you already posted your eighteen things on your blog over the summer.”

“Yeah, for my own documentation, Dr. Judy, and the Jedi Order.”

She opened my blog on her computer, then turned the screen toward me. “So, what three will it be?”

“Well.” I scanned the list, thiking. “Firewalking and spending one day following what the Magic 8-ball says are kinda cool.”

Nicole hunched over the computer screen. “And I think you should include a more personal one, too. Like sailing, because everyone will get that’s about Conner.”

A half-hearted shrug is all the agreement I mustered, the thudding inside my brain getting worse. After I helped Nic organize the business ad layouts, I put all my energy into creating the ideal bucket graphic and typed my top three bucket list tasks in the center of the pail. Only the clicking of a camera snapped me out of focus. “What’s that for?”

Nicole smiled, her face always picture perfect. “We need a photo of you for your feature.”

“We do?”

“Yep! I’ll load it into the computer now. See the space next to your headline? Put it there.”

I wasn’t smiling in my picture, but I didn’t think I should be anyway. Underneath the heading, I typed up a short synopsis: A bucket list is something pushing you toward a goal to live every day as if it were your last. Because if Conner’s death taught me anything, it’s life is too short to do something you don’t love, or waste time posing as someone you aren’t. So what’s on your bucket list? Drop me an e-mail at peaceloveandponcho.wordpress.com with your ideas, and you might just be next month’s featured student.

Nic’s eyes were big as she paused for a second. “So, you went from not wanting anybody to know about your blog to advertising it in the school newspaper?”

Closing my eyes to give them a rest from the computer screen, I nodded. “I figure go big or go home.”

She patted my shoulder. “That’s my girl. You know, you never did tell me why you named your blog that. I mean, I get the peace and love thing, but why poncho?”

Opening my eyes, I rubbed a hand over my face. “To honor Conner. That was my nickname for him, our inside joke. One day when we were on this bike ride to Five Mile Hill, it started raining, and he pulled out two pocket ponchos from his jeans. I thought it was so random he had stuffed those in his pockets. We put them on and cut through the woods back to his house, the tires splashing mud on our ponchos as we laughed so hard I thought I’d crash my bike.”

That day was all fun, one of the best I spent with him. My chest ached. Ironic how I nicknamed him Poncho and then he died when in the rain. He was prepared for everything, but not dying. I wondered what was better: dying slowly from an illness so you’d have time to say goodbye and check things you wanted to do off your list, or dying quickly without suffering.

Through the window, I saw lightning fork the sky. I felt a wave of nausea when the power flickered on and off.

“Ah, Mrs. Cleveland, our work!” shrieked Veronica from the middle of the room.

Everyone scrambled to turn their computers back on to see if their final layouts were saved.

But I stayed rooted to my chair, watching rain streaking down the window like tears. I wondered if this empty void left by Poncho would be filled by the time I crossed all eighteen things off my list.

The
Bucs’ Blade
was distributed yesterday, Friday, and today I woke up checked my blog, and discovered 401 e-mails, all about bucket lists. I almost choked on my waffle.

I pulled my legs up Indian style, tucking my feet into the warmth of my own skin. My laptop sat open on the patio table. The September mornings were cold, but still warmer than the inside of my apartment.

Mom’s almost total silent treatment approached the three-month mark. Just when I thought she’d talk to me again, I joined the cheerleading squad, effectively throwing the baby out with the bath water.

At least the fall weather provided a beautiful distraction. The sky streaked with the light orange and reds of sunrise, matching the color of the surrounding evergreen trees. Studying the screen again, I shut the computer abruptly. I expected to answer ten e-mails tops. No way could I think of how to respond in the little time I had now. My shift at The Bookman started at nine, but first I needed to meet the Jedi Order for breakfast in a half-hour.

I pulled open the patio door, then stepped inside to tell my parents goodbye and gather my things, laptop bag already slung over my shoulder. We kept my bike in the foyer of our apartment building, since the ten speed was better protected from the elements there. I yanked the handlebars off the wall, then pushed my Ladies’ Beach Cruiser outside.

A black cat appeared from the row of bushes just below our front window, flicking his long tail just once. I stooped to stroke his fur when the squeaking wheels of Nate’s skateboard startled me.

“What is that?”

He soared down the slope of the sidewalk, arms out like a surfer. “Saw your feature in the
Bucs’ Blade
.” Reaching an arm behind him, he pulled the paper from the back of his corduroys. “It inspired me to start crossing things off my list, like riding my old skateboard, remember?”

I hopped on my bike, put one foot on the pedal and kept one on the ground. “Yeah, well it looks like the feature inspired the masses. I have 401 e-mails to sort through today.”

Nate circled around me twice before he stopped, pulled a wildflower from beside the sidewalk, then handed it to me, clearly not surprised. “You belong among the wildflowers.”

I blushed but tried to iron out my face into a cooler expression, sniffing the white petals. “Tom Petty?”

Nate’s mouth dropped open. “You caught that reference? Nice.”

Pedaling, I pulled into the parking lot so there was enough room for him to skate beside me. “Why am I a wildflower, exactly?”

“Because a wildflower grows wild.”

I waved a palm in the air as though swatting away a fly. “Thanks for the articulate explanation.”

He threw his head back in laughter.

His amusement kinda hurt to hear when I felt so tense. My tired mind clicked off the things on my to-do list: respond to hundreds of e-mails, take inventory after The Bookman closed tonight, write a ten page research paper tomorrow for my English class, wash and fold all my laundry since I wore my last clean outfit, complete my extra homework for Math Team, practice two new cheers for this week’s game, and somehow let go of my guilt over killing my best friend.

Nate slowed down his skateboard to turn onto the main road. “I mean, it wasn’t intentionally planted. Just like you and your revolution.”

“I don’t know if I can do this. Spotlights, revolutions, cheerleading… they’re not my area of expertise.” Just thinking about all the tasks gave me a fresh wave of nausea.

He blinked at me several times, looking flabbergasted. “Didn’t anyone tell you? You can be anything you want to be, do anything you set your mind to!”

I looked at him and swallowed the urge to reach out and touch his face. Sometimes he didn’t feel real, like this was all a dream. People like him were too good to be true. “Um, no.”

Releasing the grip on my handlebars, I balanced and tried to imagine the feel of Dad’s hand on the back of my bike seat, Mom’s footsteps slapping the pavement behind me, shouting encouragement. But things didn’t happen that way. If it weren’t for Conner, I would’ve been on my own while learning how to ride a bike, or for any childhood milestone. I was on my own now.

Nate smiled at me. “Well, now someone has.”

His statement was so simple, but also freeing.

A tear trickled down my cheek, and I dried it with the back of my cold hand.

“Are you crying?”

Meeting his gaze for a second, I sneered. “Just shut up. I knew there was a good reason I didn’t want a philosopher for a best friend.”

His expression fell. I hated that look. Maybe Tammy and Nicole were right; maybe Nate did want to be more than ‘friends’.

“Oh, come on. If you’re going to start a revolution, I think a philosopher is exactly the kind of best friend you want.”

“Right on,” I said, pedaling faster, thinking of how tired I’d be after typing answers to 401 e-mails… and counting. “Does that mean you’ll help me respond to all my e-mails?”

Nate waved the
Bucs’ Blade
in the air as he bumped over the curb. “You’re going to answer all the bucket list suggestions?”

“It seems like the right thing to do.”

“It seems insane, but I like it. Sure. I’ll help. Excellent clichéd advice at your service, ma’am.” He took a bow.

“While you’re at it, got any advice on how to deal with my mother, who’s barely spoken to me in three months?”

He rubbed a hand over his goatee. “Honesty is the best policy. You don’t want to get caught up in saying things just because you think that’s what she wants to hear, so until you’re ready to practice the item on your list about telling people what you really think, mum’s the word.”

I smiled. The whisper of the autumn leaves drifting to the ground had always been my favorite sound, but Nate’s voice was coming in at a close second.