Claire's Song (11 page)

            Panic seizes my heart and I refuse to let them win, not after they stopped calling for a month. I grab the guitar pick and start twisting it between my fingers, but that's not even helping.

            "Claire," Ryder calls through the door. His voice is low enough that my parents can't hear, but just loud enough. I don't want to talk to him about it. It's embarrassing and I'm weak. Jamie would be ashamed of me, I know it.  My gut twists and nausea settles in.

            "Ryder, go away," I manage to choke out. I hear him move away. The phone calls are always the same. They always start out with a guy pretending to be Jamie. Then the girl pretends to be me. She says I'm just a tease, that Jamie killed himself over the fact that I was his only friend and he couldn't do any better. Then it gets real. She starts saying it was all my fault that he killed himself because I knew something was wrong, but didn't do anything. It's like a knife to the heart, but the worst part is the laughter and the Black Widow nickname. I know it's Lindy, but how can I prove it? The calls took a break and she even seemed to back off a little bit, but now she's picked back up and she chose tonight of all nights to call.

            "Why?" I finally scream and grab one of the frames of Jamie in my hand. I throw it across the room and watch the glass shatter all across my plush, carpeted floor. The picture of him, a school photo, floats to the ground, completely unharmed. The anger ignites in my veins as I sit there staring at his smiling face. I didn't see all the signs, I didn't know. I really didn't. I knew something was different that night, but never that he would take his own life. 

            Sobs rack my body as I slide down into the corner of my room, glass and all. My heart breaks all over again, because I didn't even know Jamie had drugs, that he took pills. Vicodin, oxycontin, sleeping pills, whatever. I always wonder why he kept it from me when we shared just about everything. When I get like this, Dr. Robinson says to redirect my thinking. My fingers itch to reread his last words to me, to read why he really did it, but I don’t. I can't when I'm so upset. He left me and he left me alone with all this crap to deal with. I know Lindy's always hated me, mainly because she wanted Jamie and he wouldn't even give her the time of day. He said she was too dumb for him and that she looked like a horse in the face. When we'd walk to class together, she'd shoot me evil looks but she'd never say a word. Ever. I know she spread rumors about me when he was still alive, but she was never flat out vicious. Jamie was my buffer, I guess.

            I hear paper rustle and then it appears beneath my door. I manage to get up and walk over to it. It's folded in half and there's messy handwriting inside.

           
Claire- Don't worry about them. I'll handle it. What they said isn't true. You can't let them get to you. Ryder

            A small smile threatens to split upon my lips as I stare at the piece of paper. He's right. I know he is. And I know Jamie's probably cussing me out right now for being such an idiot. I'm tougher than this. I have to be if I'm going to make it, and I'm pretty determined to do just that.

RYDER

            It's 8 am and I'm still wide awake. Not sleeping isn't unusual for me, but how wired and pissed off I am about that phone call is. The look on Claire's face told me that wasn't the first time. It was sick and disturbing and reeked of Lindy. No wonder Claire's having a hard getting over Jamie's death. People keep screwing with her mind.

            It killed me to hear her in her room yelling and shattering glass. And those sobs completely ruined any chance for peace. I thought maybe she'd at least open the door, but she didn't. The defeat was in her voice and I didn’t know what else to do. So I wrote her that cheesy note. I meant every word of it too. I'm going to deal with Lindy and whoever that prick was on the phone with her. Claire won't ever have to answer the phone again as long as I'm here. I want to protect her from anything else like that.

            Then the thought hits me: I won't be here much longer. Who will protect her then? A guy like Jamie? Someone like me? Someone completely different? Or will she be able to take care of herself? I can't take it, the thoughts overcrowding my brain, so I get up and pull my guitar out of its case. I grab a notepad and pen and get to work. A song's been in my mind, replaying over and over, just begging to be put to paper. Of course it's about Claire. I start playing, soft and slow, and write down the words as I sing them. Each line is about the girl in the room across the hall. I even smile like an idiot as I write the lines down as they come.

            A soft knock comes at the door. I finish the line I'm working on, put down the guitar and pull on a t-shirt and a pair of shorts over my boxers. Claire's standing at the door, looking unbelievably cute, but the puffy, red-rimmed eyes tell me she didn't get much rest either. She's holding two cups of coffee in her hands.

            "Crack," she says as she offers a cup to me. I take it and then freeze. My leather bands are covering my wrists, but my new cuts are exposed. Of course Claire zeroes in on them. She's observant like that.

            "Thanks," I say, hoping she'll leave it alone. I open the door further and step back inside, closing up my notebook.

            "Did your Mom do that too?" Claire finally asks with her worried eyes on me. She's looking at my forearms like they are a train wreck.

            I shake my head and just cough. I don't want to talk about it, especially not with her.

            "Huh," she says before she takes a sip of her coffee. "I heard you playing," she continues, catching my hint. But if I know anything about Claire, I know she won't drop it for good. The topic will make its way back around.

            I rub the back of my neck, hoping she couldn't hear the actual lyrics. "Yeah. It's a nice way to just settle down."

            Claire nods. She moves forward and takes my free hand with hers. "Thank you for your note. And for answering the phone last night." She squeezes my hand and I'm alive again. I can feel my heart beat faster; everything's just brighter, better when she's around.

            "No problem, I meant what I said. I'll take care of it."

            Claire shakes her head, "Don't do that. I can take care of it. I've got to learn, right?" The sadness in her voice is evident. With one more squeeze of my hand, she dismisses herself from the room and goes downstairs. I hate myself for what I'm doing to her, but I never claimed to be the good guy here.

            The entire Watkins clan sits down to breakfast like a normal family and then we split up to head to the courthouse. Claire drives so I can pick up my car and we meet her parents there. When we pull up, I see that Mrs. Weathersby is there, along with Jack and Mrs. James, Mr. Clark, and the nurse. I fill them in on the latest developments and everyone seems really happy about it. After the proceedings and everything is situated, I'm formerly a resident of 1212 Bluebird Lane. Mrs. Weathersby pulls Claire and me aside. She hands us both a stack of papers.

            "You guys can't get behind on your assignments, you know," she smiles.

            "Hey, what's going to happen to my mom?" I ask. The question has been on my mind, but I didn't know who to ask and I can't seem to think of anything else.

            To Mrs. Weathersby's credit, she doesn't look uncomfortable. She cuts the crap and that's what I like about her. "I don't know, Ryder. She abused you and for a long time, too. She's probably going to stay in jail. You'll have to testify at her trial, I'm sure. Jack will keep you updated."

            I nod, accepting that. I hate to do it, but I'll get up there and tell the truth. I'll tell everyone about the screwed up nights and days spent in that hellhole of a trailer with the woman who claimed to be my mother.

            After everything is finalized, Claire's parents leave for work and tell us to behave at the house. I park my car on the curb and take a look at my new home, two stories, much like the house I lived in with both of my parents. Claire is already standing at the door waiting for me to come inside.

             "Come on!" she calls out to me. She's a bossy little thing, but a smile creeps upon my face despite my efforts to appear unaffected.

            When we get inside, she yells for me to come up to her room. My heart trips over itself. What does she want with me? Of course I'm a guy and my mind goes to one thing, but I know Claire better than that. She's got movies spread across the comforter of her bed and she's got two sodas on her dresser and a bag of chips.

            "We've got all afternoon and all night to do school work, so I figured why not have a movie day?" She looks so happy, so excited, sitting there on her bed motioning to the rows of DVDs, that I know I can't tell her no.

            "Sure," I try to smile as I move forward to look at her collection. Mostly girl stuff. Figures. "What about TV shows?" I ask.

            She turns around and digs through a shelf and pulls out
The Office.

            "Perfect," I say as I grab the soda and open it. I sit down in the rolling chair as Claire cleans off her bed and puts the DVD in the player. She plops back on her bed and looks over at me.

            "You…you don't have to sit there. I'm okay with you laying on the bed," her voice is small. She's the first girl since ninth grade that's not worried about me drugging her or trying to get her to do stuff against her will. She knows the rumors Lindy spread are crap.

            Part of me wants to stay in that chair, because I can't control my emotions the way that I want to. The other part of me wants to lay on the bed just to be closer to her. So that's what I do. I kick off my ratty old Converses and crawl on the bed with Claire. She's pressed play and the episode is starting, but I get a look at her out of the corner of my eye. She looks so tired.

            "Claire, if you need to sleep we can do this another time, okay?" I turn to face her.             She shakes her head against the pillow. "No," she yawns. We both laugh, but turn to watch the episode. We make cracks about our favorite characters and episodes. Claire keeps moving around, restless as can be. Finally she stills and I hear her soft breathing. She's asleep, her eyelashes fanned out across her pale cheeks. After a while, my eyes grow tired and I fall asleep for the first time in a while. 

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CLAIRE

I wake up in Ryder's arms. His arms are flung across my waist and we are spooning. I'm spooning with Ryder Andrews. His hands feel so warm on my stomach and I realize that's the best sleep I've had in nine months. It's only one in the afternoon, so we've got a while before my parents come home. Call me crazy, but I decide to enjoy this rare moment. It feels…perfect. Ryder feels perfect. The sleeves of his hoodie have slid up and I see those angry slashes again. I trace them lightly trying to figure out what they are. I'm assuming it's his mother's handiwork, even though he told me they weren't.

Ryder stirs a little and I put my hands back underneath my pillow.

"Crap," he whispers once he realizes that he's cuddling me. He disentangles himself carefully, thinking I'm still asleep.

'You're an idiot," I laugh.

"You're awake?" he stills.

'Yes," I flip over and face him. He's completely mortified and it's a pretty good look on him or maybe I'm just sadistic. "So someone likes to cuddle," I joke, attempting to pay him back for always making inappropriate jokes.

He gets off the bed, his hands scrubbing over his face. "I'm so sorry. I don't know what happened, I mean…I don't really sleep a lot anyway." Vulnerability radiates from him and he won't even look at me.

"Ryder," I say as I reach for his hand.

He moves his other hand from his face and finally glances at me. "I'm really sorry. I should probably go, huh?" He takes a step to leave, but I'm holding him in place.

"Please don’t. I'm not upset. I actually got a nice nap in," I smile at him. Ryder watches me, his jaw working and I wonder what he's thinking. It seems like he's trying to see if I'm telling the truth about being creeped out. I know the rumors but it's not like I ever believed them.

"You sure? God, I'm really sorry," he sits on the edge of my bed, still scared to be near me. I move my hand from his and hop up. My backpack's in the corner of the room and I dig through it until I find
The Highwayman
project for Mrs. Weathersby's class.

"I'm totally sure. It's not a big deal."

It actually is a big deal. I loved the way his arms felt resting on my hips and the brush of his fingers on my stomach. Something inside of me connected with him and although I've fallen asleep thousands of times with Jamie, it felt different. It felt completely natural and secure. I hold up the packet with a smile, hoping I can mask how affected I am by Ryder and his presence.

"Besides, you've been through a lot and needed the rest. Now we can work on this."

Ryder groans, "That thing again?"

With a laugh, I spread everything out on the bed.

"Yes, some of us want to graduate. Maybe we should read the poem first," I hand him a copy.

He looks at me suspiciously but then offers a smile. We sit on the bed reading it in silence. The narrative moves me and I find myself gasping when Bess sacrifices herself for the highwayman. I feel Ryder move and look at me, but he says nothing. I continue reading, my heart aching for the highwayman as he learns of his true love's death and his reckless retaliation. The ending, where they come back to each other as ghosts, gives me chills.

"Wow," I whisper as I put down my paper.

Ryder looks at me, "Pretty crazy, right?"

I nod, "But beautiful at the same time."