18

WHAT DID I DO? What did Ethan see?!

For once, I’m not relieved to be back in the present. I’m grasping the snatches of images left spiraling around in my mind, hoping, longing for answers, but they tumble away from me before I can make sense of them. The knot I’m left with is nothing compared to the ache in my chest. The pulse has slowed to a hollow tremble that leaves me feeling so far from alive that I’d rather not feel anything at all.

The setting sun casts a golden hue on the powder-blue walls of my bedroom and my pearlescent skin, melting away some of the chill that lingers there. I’m so relieved to be in my own room, where I lived my normal life, alone and not with Ethan. Each recaptured moment from that night makes it harder to face him, which is terrifying because he’s the only person I can face. No one else even knows I exist; maybe I don’t. Maybe this is my punishment for the bad choices I made and the hurt I caused. Maybe I’m in some sort of purgatory.

Then why can Ethan see me?

I bow my head, feeling even more confused and defeated, and see a sliver of light shining from under my closet door. On the other side, my sister is sitting on the floor with her head resting on a stack of sweaters near my shoe wall of fame: her favorite hiding spot. She pulls a pair of turquoise wedge sandals from the bottom shelf. They’re way too big, but she slips one on her left foot anyway. Her flowered pajama pants get twisted in the tie. She rolls them up, reties, and starts on the right one.

She looks absolutely ridiculous in baggy pj’s and my three-sizes-too-big shoes, but it’s Joules so it works. She twists her ankles from side to side, checking out her new footwear. I feel a twinge of comfort knowing that she’ll inherit several years’ worth of mall trips and allowances well spent.

“Those go with your eyes.” I bend down to get a closer look at my sister’s eyes, to memorize them so the image will stay with me always, and I’m struck by their vivid indigo.

Mom used to brag to anyone who would listen about how “thoughtfully” blue my eyes were, whatever that meant. Joules’s were always more of a baby blue. It’s like I’ve passed on some of my color to her. I wonder if her color will intensify even more when I’m not a ghost anymore, when I’m for-real dead, if that ever happens. That’s weird to think, but kind of nice too. I like the idea that I’ll be with her, especially in her eyes—pointing her in the right direction, helping her find her way when she’s lost, helping her avoid my mistakes.

She picks at my white mohair sweater, which is on top of the pile she’s leaning on. Before long, she has a fluffy pile of fuzzies that resembles freshly fallen snow in her lap. It reminds me of so much that I want to forget. Her eyes glisten, and I wish I could hug her and let her know I’m here.

“Jouley, do you think I was a good person, like … did you trust me?”

She gathers the fuzzies into her palm, making a faux snowball.

“I don’t know if you should have. I lied to you.” I stare down at her, waiting for some small sign that she can hear me. She keeps rolling the faux-ball between her hands until it’s small enough to mistake for a cotton ball. I continue. “A few weeks ago when I missed your skating competition and said it was because I was cramming for a Psychology test, I wasn’t at the library—nobody studies at the library pretty much ever. I can’t believe parents still buy that.” I shake my head at how easy it became for me to fabricate the truth once I had something to hide. “I was with a boy and it hurt a lot of people when they found out. You wouldn’t have approved.”

Joules got her first crush a month ago—on Hunter Farlow—and suddenly became very puritanical about the ways of love. Her eyes were only for Hunter. She started asking me questions about what to say to him at recess and what to wear to the Crescent Valley Elementary winter art show, where his paintings would be on display. She was so nervous I had to go with her to the show. His paintings were surprisingly trippy with neon swirls and black waterfalls. Deep for a fourth grader. She said they were “epic.” I’m not sure she knows what epic means, but I knew what she meant.

“Have you talked to Hunter yet?” Of course she doesn’t answer me. “You should invite him over. And when he inevitably says yes because you’re so irresistible, it’s vital you tell Dad you’re working on homework together. Mom doesn’t care as much, but Dad turns warden the second he figures out it’s a date—even an elementary-school date would wig him out.”

I know she can’t hear me, and I’m the last person who should be giving relationship advice, but I need to tell her this. It’s the good stuff we never got to. Saying it now, I hope it reaches her somehow even if it’s only subconsciously. There are so many things I need to tell her about dodging curfew and boys and sex. I feel guilty thinking of Mom telling her instead of me. I remember how mortifying it was when she gave me “the talk.” I was supposed to save Joules from that.

I rub my horseshoe pendant, wondering where to start. “Never kiss a boy until the third date—but if you don’t want to kiss him on the first, don’t even bother. And wait as long as you can for that first kiss.” I pause. “You should save your kisses, Jouley. I didn’t, and look where it got me.”

I press my cold fingers to my even colder lips and gaze at my sister, gathering more white fluff from my sweater and spreading it over her lap, creating a protective barrier of warmth against her grief. I think about when and where her first kiss will be and who it might be with. She still has every one of her kisses left. So many possibilities. So much more time …

“You’re the best sister ever, Jouley. Promise lah-miss.” I laugh a little at our rhyme and poke her on the tip of her nose. It stings, but it’s worth it to feel normal.

I wish I could take back lying to her, maybe, most out of everybody. Until recently I had never lied to my sister, even when she asked me if the tooth fairy was real. But I had never needed to. I had never had anything to hide from her until Mom moved out and Caleb … I grit my teeth, wanting so badly to blame Caleb for what happened between us, but he isn’t solely to blame. And despite whatever insider information Madison gave him, she’s not to blame either. I was the one who agreed to go to his house.

I sit with Joules, hoping to offer some form of comfort, but the memory I recently came out of infects my every thought. I can’t get it to match up with my memory of drinking schnapps. The faces were so clear during the argument, but the schnapps memory is full of shadows and the voices are distorted. The drinking had to have happened before Ethan found Caleb and me. I can’t imagine hanging around with him to finish off a bottle after I told him he was “the biggest mistake I’ve ever made in my entire life.” I’m not sure why it’s so unclear though. Maybe because I was drinking?

You’re not ready to know. The thought is a faint echo, but it rings through loud and annoyingly clear. If I’m not ready now, when will I be—and how do I get to that point?

The closet door opens. It’s Mom looking tired and relieved. “She’s in here, Rodger,” she calls to Dad. He rushes into my room from the hall and kneels next to Mom. “She was in here the whole time. Can you believe it?” She gazes over at Dad like they’re two comrades back from battle. “Our baby is safe.”

Dad wraps one arm around Mom and gently shakes Joules’s shoulder with his other hand. Joules stifles a yawn, pretending to be asleep. When Dad scoops her up into his arms, the strongest dose of jealousy imaginable fills me. He’ll never carry me like that ever again. I try to pull the six and a half years I had as his only daughter to the front of my mind so I can remember the piggyback rides and upside-down hugs I had completely to myself before Joules was born and not feel this festering envy for my little sister, but it’s not working. The memories are too distant. I know they happened, but I don’t get a replay.

“Hey,” Joules protests, landing a weak punch on Dad’s chest. “I want to stay.”

Dad stops walking. “I miss her too, but your mom”—he glances down at Mom, picking up the fluffy mess Joules made—“she can’t exactly handle anyone being in here right now.”

“Well, I can’t exactly handle not being in here right now.” I’m sure she meant it to sound snarky, but it came out dispirited. Mom stands, clasps my turquoise sandal that’s dangling off Joules’s foot, and gives her a wistful smile.

“Jouley,” Dad starts, but Mom stops him.

“She can stay in here if she’d like. If that’s what she needs.”

Dad bends to kiss Mom on the cheek, and she wraps her arms around him and my sister. Part of me wants to be mad at Mom for waltzing back into their lives like she didn’t leave with my suitcase three weeks ago with every intention of never coming back, but a bigger part oddly understands how she must have felt when she decided to leave. After remembering what happened between Caleb and me, I get how life can stumble so far off track that you don’t know how to live it anymore.

As they walk out the door, something cold and comforting fills me at seeing them together, really together and solid like a family should be. No more fighting. Mom takes hold of Dad’s hand as she closes my bedroom door. They’re a family. Without me.

The quiet of my room surrounds me. I feel so utterly alone. The prospect of roaming aimlessly, ghosting through all of eternity, is unbearable. Even though the pulse in my chest guides me more strongly than ever, I have no idea where it’s pointing me. I feel so completely lost.

I close my eyes and let go of everything. I push back my questions and half-remembered moments and succumb to the pulse, concentrating on its slow beat, letting it pull me where it wills.

A slow chill creeps up my arms and legs. When I open my eyes, I’m standing outside in a white plume of smoke. The dense air shifts as it dissipates, then reforms into a new puff.

Caleb is leaning against a tall wooden fence with his head tilted back and his hood pulled down over his eyes. I’m not sure if the vapor coming from his mouth is his breath or smoke from the joint pinched between his thumb and middle finger.

“This is where I end up? With you?” I point at Caleb, shaking my head, then mutter, “Thanks a lot almighty pulse.” The fact that I haven’t seen Caleb sober once since I ghosted back to life doesn’t help much with rationalizing why I risked everything I had with Ethan to be with him. I want to leave, but the pulse within me has grown too strong to fight. I’m trapped here with my mistake.

“So Aimée was right. It was you on the bridge.” I stare at Caleb, waiting for his eyes to open or for him to talk, some kind of a response.

Nothing. He merely kicks at the snow that’s piled high along the fence.

“Why were you even at my party? You knew I didn’t want you there—” I shake my head. “Madison.” Everything was planned: him showing up at my party, those girls gossiping about a breakup … I rub my forehead as my thought veers off, looking down at Caleb. Madison must have been very persuasive to get him to listen to her over me. “Why would you write that note? You’ve already gotten away with … whatever you did. Why incriminate yourself by confessing to the one person who doesn’t believe I jumped? Do you want Aimée to know it was you? Is the guilt getting to you that much?”

Caleb starts digging around in his baggy jeans pocket for his cell. He texts Refill to a contact saved as Doc. I frown at the obvious code for someone who must be his dealer.

I jump when he abruptly flicks the remaining nub of his joint to the ground. It sizzles as it sinks into the snow. I can’t look away from the wisps of smoke escaping the melted hole. They look like tiny rivers rushing upward to join the lingering haze covering the sinking springtime sun.

His cell chimes, pulling my attention from the tiny smoke rivers. When I look up, he’s gone and there’s a trail of footprints leading to a loose board at the far end of the fence.

I close my eyes and think of Caleb doing cannonballs at my seventh-grade swim party, and appear in a squishy pile of melted snow underneath someone’s swing set. Yuck. At least my feet don’t feel the wetness. I scan the yard and spot Caleb speed-walking under a row of pine trees alongside the house with the swing set. I join him on the snow-free path, but I keep my distance, studying the houses. This neighborhood seems familiar.

Caleb hops a low picket fence that I walk through and stops behind a small cedar gazebo I recognize. He digs his cell out of his pocket again and texts: Outside.

This must be a meeting place, a coincidence. No way it’s what I think it is.

“Doc” takes her time quietly shutting the back door to her hunter-green colonial and wraps her arms tight around her stomach when her furry white boots crunch into the snow covering her backyard.

Neither of them says a word, but I’m screaming. “Madison! Oh my god! First you’re hooking up with Drew, now this?”

Madison holds out her hand like she’s waiting for test results. Caleb pulls out that Tic Tac container he’s been carrying around and hands it over to her. She holds it close to her face to see what’s inside.

“I gave you enough to last at least a month. Where’d the rest go?”

“My bloodstream.”

I gape at her. “Are you some sort of high-end drug dealer now? And for him?” I’m right up in Madison’s face and beyond fuming because she doesn’t even blink at my yelling. I let out an exasperated scream. “Somebody answer me!” Caleb’s eyes are glued to the ground, but Madison is staring right at him with the strangest combination of triumph and regret.

She purses her lips. “You would’ve had to take five a day to get through the whole bottle already.” Caleb shrugs and Madison’s eyebrows spike. “You’d be dead to the world if you took that many.”

“Not dead enough.” Madison starts to say something else, but he cuts her off. “I need more, okay?”

“What, do you have a tab with her?” I scoff.

She tells Caleb, “I didn’t agree to helping you OD.”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t agree to Cassidy dying.”

Silence hangs heavy in the air. I can’t get any words out. I can’t think.

Finally, Madison slips the container up the sleeve of her cashmere sweater and hands Caleb a small packet of what looks like pill samples from her front pocket. “That’s the best I could do on short notice without my dad getting suspicious, and this is the last time you come to my house.” She points at the little white ovals inside the packet that Caleb is examining. “So you better make those last.” Madison bounces anxiously on her toes. “Aimée said you were messed up at school again.”

“Yeah, well, you can tell her and the testosterone twins to lay off the verbal assaults.”

Madison cringes for the smallest second, then resets her expression. “Aimée’s über suspicious of everyone who was at the party—especially you. You’re going to make yourself look guilty if you keep this up.”

Caleb looks up, meeting her eyes for the first time. “Go ahead, ask me if I did it.”

“If you had anything to confess, you would have already.” Madison starts toward the house.

“If it was as easy as turning myself in, I wouldn’t need to down a horse’s dose of these.” Madison turns to see Caleb shaking the packet of pills she gave him. He clasps it between his palms, pleading, “Ask me what I saw.”

“Ask him,” I yell at Madison. I turn to Caleb. “Tell her.”

Madison coils a lock of her hair tight around her pinkie and glances nervously over her shoulder. “I better get back inside.” She takes one step toward the house but turns back. “I didn’t agree to that either—Cassidy … That’s not why I invited you.”

“But you did invite me,” he retorts. “And lied about her relationship status that day outside Wirlkee’s class before all this began. Isn’t that why you told me she was still into me? You wanted me to do your dirty work for you, and I was chump enough to fall for it. If I knew I could’ve been getting quality pharms out of the deal, I’d have started having anxiety attacks sooner.”

She exhales a ragged breath. “I only wanted Ethan.”

“Guess it was an all-around loss then.” Caleb pulls the drawstrings of his hood tight and heads back the way he came, making sure to step in the exact prints he made on the way here. “See ya ’round.” He holds up the pill packet. “Or not.”

So Madison invited Caleb to crash the party because she wanted Ethan. I almost laugh because he’s still mine, even in death. She doesn’t have a chance in this life or the next.

I storm after her, beating her to the back door. “Explain. Now.” She walks through me into the mudroom. I bite back the prickling pain and frustration as I wait for the dusty bits of me to settle. As soon as I’m whole again, I turn on my toes. “Tell me now, Mads, or I’m going to suspect the worst.” I already do.

“There you are,” Madison’s mom says from the kitchen. “Why are you wearing those god-awful boots?” She leans against the rich mahogany cabinets with two apples in her hand, glaring disapprovingly at Madison’s favorite boots.

Madison pretends to struggle with the laces as she wipes her eyes dry. “I went to check the mailbox,” she lies flawlessly.

“I already got the mail today.”

“Probably why it was empty.” As she walks into the kitchen, Madison forces a smile and grabs a Chips Ahoy! from the pantry, ignoring her mom’s offer of the second apple.

Mrs. Scott snatches the cookie out of Madison’s hand and replaces it with the apple. “Did you see today’s newspaper?”

Madison shakes her head at her mom’s question, twisting the stem of her apple until it snaps off.

“There’s a tasteful announcement in the obituaries for Cassidy.”

“Tasteful?” A short laugh hiccups out of Madison. “Good word, Mom.”

I’m so confused and angry right now that I read an array of terrible things into her sarcastic laugh.

“Well, considering how she died, intentionally and drunk.” Mrs. Scott whispers the last word like it’s dirty and shudders. “Her family must be so disappointed.”

I glare at her over the center island. What a hypocrite. She has half a bottle of wine with dinner every night.

“Yeah, I’m sure they’re overcome with disappointment about Cassidy’s death.” Madison slams her apple into the fruit bowl next to the sink. “I’ve lost my appetite.”

“Madison Rose, I think you’re overreacting a bit.”

“Oh?” Madison stops at the top of the stairs and spins to face her mom. “And what would be the acceptable way to react to my best friend’s suicide, Mother? Sending flowers? A tasteful wreath of greens for her grave?”

“Well,” Mrs. Scott sputters, crossing her arms.

“Yeah, Mom. Well.” Madison laughs again, but tears shine in her eyes. Once inside her bedroom with the door shut, she shakes out her sleeve and whips the Tic Tac container Caleb gave her across the room. She slumps against the door and lets out this frustrated growl of a sob.

I struggle to keep my voice even. “What is going on with you, Mads? You’re dealing pharmaceuticals that I’m sure you got from your dad by faking symptoms, and you obviously have some secret vendetta against me. How long has this been going on? Does Aimée know?” I hesitate. “What did I do to make you hate me this much?”

Madison reaches under her desk and fumbles through several messy piles of photos. They seem to be sorted into two categories: my birthday party, and everything else. She pulls out one of her, me, and Ethan from an everything-else pile. Aimée took it at her first bonfire, the week before we started high school. It was supposed to be of Ethan and Madison together, but Ethan pulled me over and insisted I be in it too.

The memory of the bat crashing into the bridge comes back to me. Madison invited Ethan to that party. She’d practically declared him her future boyfriend, but right after this picture was taken Ethan asked me about the bats and we ended up having our first kiss together on the covered bridge.

I remember being scared to tell Madison that we’d kissed. I made it through the party, but the second I saw her and Aimée at breakfast the next morning, they called me out on hiding something. I practically bit off my bottom lip trying to stay quiet. I never gave the fact that Madison had invited Ethan for herself another thought after that since she smiled and teased me along with Aimée.

That was almost three years ago. Had Madison seriously been harboring a crush on Ethan and a grudge against me that long?

She grips the picture in her hand so tightly the corners fold in. When she starts to tear it, I’m sure she’ll lob off me, but she separates herself instead, crumbling her smiling face. She sniffles and clears her throat before grabbing her cell off her bed. She dials a number and says, “I need to see you … I’ll explain when you get here.”

She hangs up and immediately strips off her dingy yoga pants with the stain on the knee from when we tie-dyed a couple summers ago and reaches into her dresser for a pair of skintight black jeans like this is a drill she’s practiced: In case of emergency, dress slutty to distract a boy from seeing the real you. She twists so she’s facing the gilt-framed mirror behind her and swoops her hair up into a messy bun with tendrils hanging around her face.

I’m so bewildered by how quickly her mood has shifted that I don’t notice the chill climbing up my arms until it’s liquefied my fingers.

I try to focus on staying in the present by following Madison around her room as she prepares for whatever she has to “explain” to whoever she called, but it only pisses me off more. Every little Madisonism reminds me of a time I laughed with her or shared a private moment, the years she pretended to be one of my closest friends when in reality she resented me. When she sprays her bare chest with her signature body mist, I back away. The spray lingering in the air reminds me too much of my dusty glitter, and the weirdness of not being able to smell it creeps me out. The scent used to remind me of Grandma Haines’s rose garden. Now the memory of the sickeningly sweet aroma carries the effluvium of a funeral.

Madison opens the bottom drawer of her jewelry box, where she keeps her many necklaces in an impossible tangle that only she can ever undo. When she pulls out the knot of silver and gold, two prescription bottles roll to the front of the drawer. They’re both prescribed to her.

“Doctor Daddy sure has you stocked,” I say with faux congratulations.

I lean forward to read the labels: Percocet—contains oxycodone, empty. That’s definitely what Caleb was popping like candy. And Xanax. I’ve seen commercials for Xanax; it’s an antianxiety drug.

I straighten, watching Madison’s fingers weave an impossible path between two silver chains that don’t so much untangle as knot together in an aesthetically pleasing way. I open my mouth, wondering what to say, how to respond, how to feel about her taking—or judging by the fullness of that bottle, not taking—antianxiety drugs.

As she picks the bottles up to put them back in their hiding spot, I notice something rattling inside the empty one. She opens it and gazes at the single aquamarine stud—my aquamarine stud that I thought I’d lost the day after I received the earrings for my sixteenth birthday.

I reach out to reclaim it, but my hand slides through and a knock on the door forces Madison to cut the moment short. She closes the drawer, pill bottles safely hidden away, slips the knotted chains over her head, and opens her bedroom door.

“I was hoping you’d call,” Drew says, grinning. “I haven’t been able to think about anything but you since lunch.”

Madison mumbles, “Must be nice,” but it’s so low there’s no way he heard her.

Drew steps inside, shutting her door, and pulls her close. She gives him a quick peck on the lips then pushes his groping hands off her body.

“Drew, we can’t. My mom is home.”

“That didn’t stop you earlier.” He lets out a conspiratorial laugh.

Madison steps back and straightens her sweater. “Well, I’m not like that anymore—or I don’t want to be.” She takes in a deep breath. “I need to talk to you about what happened with Cassidy. I did terrible things, and I need to know if—”

Drew closes the space between them. “The only thing you need to know is how perfect I think you are.”

“Really? You think I’m perfect?”

“You know I do. I love you.” Madison relaxes from her tense position, and Drew takes the opportunity to cuddle close. “Nobody blames you, so you shouldn’t blame yourself.”

“The only reason they don’t blame me is that they don’t know the truth.”

“And who’s going to tell them?”

Madison searches Drew’s face. He leans back, seeming lost in her heavy-lashed eyes, unfazed by the tears moistening her cheeks. My eyes are fading in and out of focus, making this conversation even more unsettling.

I blink to stay in the moment, determined to get answers. “Madison, what is he talking about? What did you do?” My voice gets buried in the icy downpour swallowing me. I catch a glimpse of Drew wrapping his arms around Madison before my eyes wash out completely.