Catalyst (The Best Days #1) (6 page)

Before Rory could make a hasty exit out of there, the stall door opened.  There stood Grace, cheeks tear-stained and eyes puffy.  “Hi,” she said softly, dabbing at her face with toilet paper she’d grabbed from the dispenser.

Rory gulped.  She hated when people cried.  It always made her so uncomfortable and she never knew what to say.  But she had to say something.  She licked her lips nervously. “Hi.”  Rory hesitated and then meekly asked, “Are you okay?” 

Grace smiled wanly.  For a fleeting moment, Rory couldn’t help but think that she looked like the saddest girl in the entire world.  It was something in her eyes.  But a moment later, the expression was gone. 

“I’m fine,” Grace replied, blowing her nose and then stepping past Rory to the trash receptacle beside the sinks.  “I didn’t make out with Jeremy, you know.  We were just talking.  I wanted to find out what he was really like when he wasn’t doing stupid things to try to make his friends laugh.”

Rory was at a loss for words. 

“But it doesn’t matter,” Grace continued.  “Now everyone thinks I was making out with him.”  She fixed her hair in the mirror and then turned to face Rory.  “It’s okay, I guess.  I just wanted you to know the truth.” 

“Okay.”  Rory wanted to say more. 
She wanted to assure her that she wasn’t ugly.  She wanted to tell Grace that everything would be alright.  She might have to weather the storm for a while, but eventually the school gossips would be distracted by something or someone else.  While they might not forget about Grace completely, she wouldn’t be in the spotlight forever. 

But the words wouldn’t come out.  Instead, Rory blurted out, “I have to pee.” 

“Alright, well I’d better get to class anyway,” Grace replied.  “Bye.” 

Rory locked herself in a stall and listened to make sure Grace was gone.  Then she hungrily tore into her chocolate bar, greedily cramming the gooey concoction into her mouth.
  It didn’t taste as good as she’d expected now that it had been soured by her uncomfortable run-in with Grace.

Doubts and regrets plagued Rory.  She didn’t think she was a bad person but sometimes it was so hard to make her behavior reflect her heart. 
Why had she blown Grace off like that?  She should have talked to her...despite what Grace claimed, she clearly wasn’t okay.  Who would be, after being humiliated in such a public way?

As Rory polished off her chocolate bar,
she felt uneasy.  She knew it couldn’t feel good to be the target of unwanted, negative attention and figured Grace could use a friend right now.  Rory grabbed her bag, threw her chocolate bar wrapper away and quickly exited the bathroom, vowing to talk to Grace at lunchtime.

Rory nearly collided with Sheck in the hallway outside the washroom.  “Whoa!” she uttered, taking a step back.  “What are you doing here?” she added curiously, noting that the hallway was all but deserted,
classes having started five minutes earlier.  Trust her to be late to class again – Sheck always joked that Rory just
had
to make a grand entrance by barging in after class had already begun.  She, in turn, cheerfully told him to shut it.

Sheck grinned and twirled his keychain on his finger.  “I’m waiting for you. 
Let’s go for a ride.”

Rory hesitated briefly, but then decided that the prospect
of sitting through another tedious class wasn’t particularly exciting.  Besides, Sheck needed a friend so maybe in a way skipping class was actually altruistic.  “Okay,” she replied, hoisting her backpack over her shoulder.  “Where are we headed?”

As it turned out, Rory and Sheck were headed to Cricket Lake. 

Despite its unappealing name, it was a picturesque little vacation getaway.  During the summer months, its campground was typically occupied to capacity.  The cottages surrounding part of the lake were also well-used, with young families and retirees alike wanting to soak up every bit of summer at the lake that they could.  It also had all the typical amenities of a well-run, well-used campground, including a recreation centre, baseball diamonds and a putt-putt course. 

During the off season, however, Cricket Lake was all but deserted.  The buildings were all locked up, the campground was empty and it was rare to see a
soul around.  That was the case on Thursday. 

“It’s kind of spooky out here,” Rory commented as Sheck pulled his car into the deserted gravel parking lot down by the water.  “It’s like a ghost town...well, ghost
campground
.  You know what I mean.” 

“I like it,” Sheck replied, staring out the window at the water wistfully.  “It’s like having a private campground.  I like coming out here to think.”

Rory snorted.  “Is that what getting high is called these days?” 

Sheck shrugged and pulled a joint out of the pocket of his well worn denim jacket.  “You know me too well,” he grinned sheepishly, fishing around for a lighter. 

It was funny, Rory thought, because right now she felt like she didn’t know him at all.  “If you’re getting high then I get to drive home,” she informed him firmly. 

“You don’t even hav
e your driver’s licence,” he reminded her.  It was true.  She’d failed the written test so hadn’t even had the chance to take her actual driving test yet.  Instead, she was stuck repeating the whole stupid course.

“It’s still better than you driving home high,” Rory retorted, her tone letting him know that the matter wasn’t up for discussion.
  “And I’m not waiting out here all night for you to come down.  So either I drive us home or you don’t get high,” she insisted, secretly hoping he’d choose the second option.

“Fine,” Sheck relented. 
“You can drive us home.”

As the fumes filled the car, Rory wrinkled her nose and rolled down the window to get some air.  Despite her efforts, the cold spring wind soon had her rolling the window back up.  Sheck looked over at her guiltily as she coughed. 

“Sorry,” he apologized, sounding like his usual kind, considerate self again.  “I’ll put it out.”  The two sat in silence for a moment and then Sheck turned to Rory.  “Thanks for coming out here with me,” he said quietly.  “It was getting a bit lonely being out here on my own all the time.” 

“If you’re lonely, why don’t you come to school?”

Sheck looked defeated.  “I can’t concentrate.  Ever since this junk with my parents...it’s just been really hard, you know?  Everyone at school is all caught up in their own stupid drama and meanwhile my family is falling apart.  It’s hard.”

Rory wanted to hug Sheck b
ut decided that would be weird as they weren’t the kind of friends who hugged. Instead, she settled for turning on the radio.  “I love this song,” she commented as one of her favourite alternative rock ballads came on.  “Where is your dad now?”

“He’s at a hotel for the time being
.  He’s going to look for something more permanent, but he’s been busy with work lately.  He’s been asking me to go hang out with him at the hotel...keeps telling me they have a nice pool there.  Like a fancy waterslide is suddenly going to magically make everything okay again?  It’s so stupid.”

“So you haven’t seen him since he...left?” 

“No.  And I’m not sure I want to.” 

Rory contemplated this for a moment.  “Did he...cheat on your mom or something?”  She couldn’t imagine
kind, dependable Clive doing that to vivacious, beautiful Val, but then again, she couldn’t imagine the two of them splitting up, either.  But anything was possible, she supposed.  That much had become clear to her when they’d split, unfortunately.

“Dad? 
Pfft, no,” Sheck scoffed.  “The only affair he’s had is with his job.  Mom says he’s never home and that he’d rather be at work than spend time with her.  He says she nags him too much, so of course he’d rather spend time at work than at home.  Whenever he
is
home, all they do is argue.  It’s exhausting to be around.”

“So you...blame him, then?” Rory asked carefully. 

Sheck’s shoulders slumped.  “I don’t know.”  He looked so tired.  “I just wish he hadn’t moved out.  Until he left I just thought okay, they’re fighting a lot but they’ll get over it sooner or later.  Him moving out just made the whole thing real, you know?” 

Rory nodded even though she didn’t actually know.  
Her parents’ occasional arguments had never gone that far, thank God.

Abruptly, Sheck started singing along with the radio and playing air guitar, signalling that the conversation was over.   Then he reached into his pocket and pulled out a tiny little plastic bag full of brightly covered pills. 

“I shouldn’t even offer you any, right?” he asked.  “I mean, you can have some if you want but it’s your call…no pressure.” 

Rory eyed the bag warily.  “What are they?”

Sheck grinned and downed a couple, chasing them with a swig of warm soda from the can sitting in his car’s cup holder.  “Happy pills!” he informed her. 

Pushing her long blonde hair out of her face, Rory eyed her best friend with concern.  She wasn’t a goody two shoes like her sister and didn’t really care if people messed around with drugs.  She figured it was a personal decision and if someone wanted to get high, as long as they weren’t hurting anyone else in the process, who cared? 
Hell, maybe under the right circumstances Rory would even be up for a little experimentation. 

But despite her liberal attitude,
she was beginning to wonder if Sheck was getting carried away.  It was one thing to indulge a bit at a party but skipping school day after day to spend hours alone shitfaced in a car was something else entirely.  Rory didn’t like it.

“So you’re pretty into getting high these days,” she observed, feeling like she was walking on eggshells.  She didn’t want to make him angry – after all, he was going through an excruciatingly bad time these days and on top of everything else, certainly didn’t need to feel like she was attacking him.
  But he was her best friend.  She had to say something.  She at least had to try.

Sheck’s eyes were shut.  “I know what you’re thinking,” he mumbled, his words beginning to slur a bit.  “Maybe I’ve been overdoing it a little lately, but I’m not an addict or anything
like that.  I just like to distract myself from what’s going on in real life every so often.  This is my escape from reality because I don’t know if you got the memo but reality sucks.” 

He cracked his neck abruptly and his eyes popped open
, looking slightly out of focus.  “Hey, I feel like going for a walk.  Wanna come with?” 

Was he serious?  It was cold and windy and miserable outside
– hard to believe spring was supposed to be well underway.  So no, Rory did not particularly want to go for a walk.  But without waiting for answer, Sheck bolted from the car and ran down to the deserted beach at full speed, arms above his head like a racer crossing the finish line. 

Rolling her eyes, Rory reluctantly exited the shelter of the nice warm heated car and made her way down to the water. 
She walked slowly, her hands in her pockets and her hair swirling around her face in the wind.

“
This is so beautiful!” Sheck yelled at the top of his lungs, looking perfectly content as the wind whipped at him viciously.

Rory begged to differ.  She was
getting cold already and wanted to go back to the car.  The last thing she wanted to do was be out on a freezing deserted beach with her high friend.  In fact, she was beginning to think coming to Cricket Lake had been a bad idea all around.

“Maybe we should come back here another day when it’s warmer,” Rory suggested as she stuffed her hands
deeper into the pockets of her jeans in a futile attempt to keep them warm.  She never thought she’d see the day, but she kind of wished she was back at Belleview High, bored to death in class. 

“No way,” Sheck disagreed, his voice louder than it needed to be.  “Then oth people will be
hrr...not private anmore...noway.”  His speech was not only slurring but now he was mispronouncing words and leaving out entire syllables. 

Not knowing what it was he had taken, Rory was beginning to get worried. 

“Well maybe we can at least go somewhere more sheltered.  It’s cold down here by the water.  Why don’t we climb down that hill over there and sit under a tree?  It will be more sheltered in the forest, I think.”  Her main objective was to get him away from the water.  He was acting so unpredictable that she didn’t like his close proximity to the lake.

Sheck agreed and allowed Rory to lead him to the edge of the woods, where it was, in fact, less windy and therefore slightly warmer. 
It was actually kind of breathtaking out there in the stillness.  She couldn’t help but imagine herself there with Carson, the two of them wrapped in a blanket enjoying a romantic picnic…if only.

Rory chose a large, thick-trunked tree and sat down under it gratefully.  She patted the ground beside her, gesturing for Sheck to join her, but it was no use.  He’d spotted something in a nearby tree and had unsteadily lurched over to investigate. 

“Checkitout!” he slurred excitedly, pointing to something way up in the tree.  “It’s a birrrrr nest!  For birrrrrrs!  I wond if any eggs innit!”  His pupils were dilated and wild-looking.  He seemed manic.  Rory didn’t like it one bit.