Fade to Black (6 page)

“But that’s not fair. Alex is nice. He lets us play with his computer games. And he can’t help being sick. It’s just ’cause he had a trans … trans…”

“Transfusion,” I say, though I wonder if he really got it from a transfusion. Most people who have AIDS are homos, right? Crusan doesn’t look like a homo, but sometimes you can’t always tell. He talks like one sometimes with those big words he uses, acting like he’s better than everyone.

“Right. What’s a transfusion?”

“It’s when you get in an accident or something, and you lose a lot of blood. So they give you some blood that someone donated.” I remember last year, before the Crusans moved here, they had a blood drive for homecoming at school. A lot of people didn’t want to donate ’cause they were afraid they’d get sick. You don’t always know where those needles have been, no matter what they tell you. I was glad it was only seniors and alumni who could donate. Otherwise, I’m sure my friends would’ve been on me to give. And I’d have given … given
in
, that is. They aren’t having a blood drive this year. I’m glad.

“Like when Dad and I were in that accident?”

She’s talking about when Dad hit a tree last year, just before him and Mom broke up … which Mom said was
why
her and Dad broke up.

“You didn’t need a transfusion,” I say. “It wasn’t that bad an accident.”

“But if I had, would everyone be mad at me, like they’re mad at Alex?”

“They’re not mad at Alex.”

“They’re mean to him.”

“They just don’t want to get sick by being around him. That’s different than being mad. It’s a really bad disease he has. No one wants to take any chances.”

“Carolina’s around him all the time, and she’s not sick.”

That we know of
.

“But it’s a risk,” I say. “People don’t want to take the chance.”

“If I got sick like Alex, would you still want to be around me?”

“Sure I would. I’m your brother.”

“Then, why—”

“Look!” I’m yelling now. “I’m trying to do my homework. I don’t have an IQ of one-fifty like you. I need to concentrate.”

“Sorry.”

We sit in silence a few minutes, but the numbers swim before me, and I can’t do the problem.

Monday, 2:35 p.m., Bickell residence, out in front, near the trees

DARIA

I saw

Clinton

on a bike
,

riding by
.

I saw

Clinton

in a blue jacket
,

riding by
.

I saw

Alex Crusan’s

red truck

riding by
.

I saw

the baseball

bat

a blue

jacket

the crash-smash

glass
.

I saw

darkness

no face

the blue

jacket

smashed glass
.

I knew

who

it was
.

I told them so
.

Monday, 2:35 p.m., Memorial Hospital

ALEX

“More flowers?” I ask.

“You’re awake.” Jennifer examines my face, and I wonder for the first time how bad I’m going to look. Now that the painkillers have worn off, I’m conscious of the pain. I have a ton of stitches, and my face probably looks cut up and scary. I still haven’t looked in the mirror. It’s a game I’m playing at this point, to see how long I can
not
look. But I wonder if it will heal or if I’ll have scars on top of everything. I can be like Freddy Krueger, that guy in the horror movies, with the burned-up face.

I don’t want to look scary in front of Jennifer. I don’t know why. It’s not like girls have any interest in me. And it’s not like she’s a supermodel or anything, just an average girl with—sheesh—freckles on her nose. But I just—I don’t know—like the idea of someone to talk to. She’s the first girl I’ve met in Pinedale who’s acted normal around me.

The first week at school, I was by my locker and this girl with long blonde hair walked by. Now I know her name was Kendall Barker, and she was way out of my league—especially now. But that day the planets aligned, and she was (I’m pretty sure I’m not flattering myself here) checking me out. I’m not bad looking. I’m tall, tall and skinny, actually, but usually I can hide that by wearing baggy clothes. I always thought I had okay eyes. They’re grayish. I started to say hi to her. Then some other girl whispers something, and Kendall looked at me like I was a leper and one of my fingers had fallen off and rolled down the hallway. That was the first sign I had that people here knew about me. The school isn’t supposed to tell the students, but they did. I guess she was afraid I’d get her sick. But you can’t get infected by talking to someone.

I could chalk it up to her being a bitch … but they can’t
all
be bitches.

“You
are
awake, aren’t you?” Jennifer says.

“What? Um, yeah. I’m awake. I was pretending to sleep in case you were my mother.”

“That’s kind of weird. I mean, your mom seems nice.”

“She
is
nice. It’s just…” I wave my hand in the air like, forget it, knowing I probably majorly screwed up her opinion of me. “What are you doing here?”

“I’m on break. Thought I’d come say hi. I could leave if you want.”

“No!” I don’t mean to raise my voice. Maybe I have a personality disorder in addition to HIV. “No, stay. My mother… I mean, it’s frustrating. She’s upset and it’s my fault, and there’s nothing I can do about it.”

Shut up now, Alex
.

Jennifer reaches up to touch her hair. Her blonde curls are whipped into submission in a ponytail and two red barrettes that look like something for a younger girl, like Carolina.

“I guess I could see that.” She takes out one of the barrettes and pushes the hair around. “Where is your mom now?”

“Home checking on my sister. Carolina wasn’t answering the phone.”

“Maybe she went to a neighbor’s house.”

“The neighbors haven’t exactly been over with the Welcome Wagon.”

“Sorry. That was stupid.” She replaces the barrette. “Can you believe they make us wear this dumb hairstyle, to keep the hair off our faces? We’re supposed to wear hats, too, but I pretend I lost mine. The nurses don’t wear hats anymore, so why should I? Most places, the hospital aides just wear T-shirts instead of this dumb uniform. Pinedale is so retro—and not in a good way.”

“I think your hair looks good like that.” I think a hat might be kind of hot looking too, like nurses in those World War II movies, but I don’t say it.

“Yeah, right.” She takes out the other barrette. A piece of hair falls in her eyes and, on second look, she’s a lot prettier than I thought. “Is Carolina your sister?”

“Right. I thought the school gave everyone a full briefing on my life history before I came here.”

“They didn’t … well, maybe a little. They had an assembly.”

“I know. They aren’t supposed to tell the students. That’s the law.”

“They didn’t tell us everything. It was mostly about dealing with blood products.” She replaces the second barrette.

“In case I started spontaneously bleeding at school or something?”

“I think it was more in case you got hurt.” She gazes at my face, and I think with a twinge that I have, in fact, gotten hurt. That under the bandages are all the contaminated blood products everyone’s so worried about. “They didn’t do it to be mean.”

“I know. No one does anything to be mean.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t go that far. I think some people are mean, just not everyone.”

My parents wanted to sue the school for having that assembly, but I told them no. I told them I wouldn’t go to school if they sued. Everyone knew already. It’s not like they could make the school
un
-tell people by suing. I’m already the kid with HIV. If I sued, I’d be the kid with HIV who’s suing everyone. I wish I could just be Alex.

“I used to play baseball,” I say.

“What?”

“In Miami. I used to play baseball. I was a great hitter. I wanted to be the next Sammy Sosa. Do you know who that is?”

“The guy who was trying for the home run record a while back, right? The guy who got in trouble for the corked bat.”

“Right.” I ignore the corked bat comment, which is still a sore point with me. “He got so screwed when you think of it. Roger Maris had that record—sixty-one homers—for thirty-seven years. Sosa got sixty-six that season. He’s an excellent hitter. If he’d done it the season before, he’d have made the record books, at least for the year. Everyone would know about his record. He’d have been immortal.” I stop, thinking about the word.
Immortal
. “But Mark McGuire had to come along the same season and do just a little better. Seventy runs.”

“I remember,” Jennifer says. “Chicago, right? I remember thinking that wasn’t fair.”

“Depends how you look at it. Sosa’s great. McGuire’s just better. Anyway, Sosa was my hero. I wanted to grow up and be like him, and like I said, I was a good player. And when I got diagnosed, the doctor said it was fine if I kept playing as long as I felt okay. Baseball’s not a contact sport, so there was really no risk to anyone. And there’s no reason to think I couldn’t do anything I want.”

“That’s great.”

“Yeah. Except people found out. Then a bunch of players quit the team. No explanation given. They found other players, but then a couple of teams forfeited games against us because they didn’t have enough players show up. We were having a winning season, but we’d only played about half the games. I didn’t want to ruin it for everyone else, so I quit.”

“You copped out.”

“Were you listening to the same story I just told?”

“Yeah. I’d have stayed on the team.”

I laugh. “Yeah, right. You think you would have.”

“No, really. I don’t think anyone should keep you from doing what you want.”

“Yeah. Everyone thinks they’d do something different. But after a while, you get tired of being a test case.” I want to slap myself for the way I’m sounding. “Never mind. I wouldn’t expect anyone to understand. You were nice to come visit. Tell me about you. Tell me about your plans for med school.”

“That’s really condescending.”

“What is?”

“Being all sanctimonious—assuming I couldn’t possibly understand. Actually, I think I
do
understand.”

“You HIV-positive?”

“No. But while you were in Miami, ditching the baseball team, I was in Crystal Springs, getting drummed out of the ballet recital because everyone in town knew that my father was screwing his law partner.”

“Ouch. What happened?” She looks pained, and I add, “If you don’t mind my asking.”

“No. Since it’s you.”

“Yeah, since it’s me.”

Which she ignores. “My father was a commissioner in the little town where I grew up. He planned to run for state senate. He and Mom were never, like, a perfect couple. But I thought they were okay, you know?” She walks to the door of the room, looks out, then comes back. “But about a week before Dad was going to announce his candidacy, there were these photos in the paper. Seems Dad’s opponent heard about Dad’s affair, so he hired an investigator with a long-lens camera. They got footage of Dad and Kimberley in his car.”

“Doing what?”

Jennifer looks away. “What people do in cars.”

I feel my face getting hot. She must see it too because she adds, “I mean, not that I’ve ever done that in a car. Or… I mean, anywhere… I just heard—”

“Sure.”

“Anyway, the photo was on the front page of the local paper, with a black slash over the important parts. The bigger regional papers picked it up too. Dad was out of the senate race, him and Mom split up, and I had to go to school every day knowing everyone knew about it, until we moved away six months ago.”

“And the dance recital?”

“My teacher said she thought it would be inappropriate for me to be in it. She refunded my costume deposit and everything. It was the first time I had a big part. Anyway, I guess she decided some girl from a
decent
family should do the Coffee dance from
The Nutcracker
.”

“What a bitch.”

She shrugs. “I sort of found out who my real friends were. And sometimes I’ll meet someone from Crystal Springs who says, ‘Is your father Harmon Atkinson?’ and I have to say, yep. Yep, he is. And I vowed that I was never again going to let anyone force me out of something I wanted because of some problem of theirs. So I know what it’s like … except the part about being sick, I mean.”

“Yeah, there’s that part.”

She paces to the door again. “Okay, I’m sorry. I know you can’t
die
from embarrassment … so maybe I don’t really understand at all.” She looks at her watch. “I ought to go. You’re probably tired.”

“No!” I want to get out of bed, disconnect everything, and kiss her for even trying to understand, but that would be too pathetic. “No. Don’t go. I like talking to you. I’m so lon—I mean, they gave me a single room, and it’s boring here.”

She looks around, like she’s seeing the room for the first time. “Yeah, I guess it would be. Didn’t your mom get you any magazines or something?”

I shrug. “She must be too busy worrying.” Which sounds lame, but why the hell
didn’t
Mom get magazines? She’s supposed to be so concerned, but she’s not really thinking about what
I
need. Sometimes I think she acts that way because it focuses attention on her. She doesn’t really care.

God, I am a shit
.

“Oh, well. I’ll bring you some tomorrow—we get
S.I
. I could have my mom bring them. She’s a nurse. She works the early shift, so she could get here earlier.”

“That’d be great.” I want to ask whether she’ll come in too, but I don’t. I wonder if she has a boyfriend.