Chapter Twenty

Then

After Elena, everything at school was sort of quiet—zombie teens at school, going through our zombie motions, until another boy jumped in front of the train.

This time at twilight, a sophomore, on his way home from volunteering at a soup kitchen downtown (another volunteer item for future college applications!), who, rumor had it, was mid-mental breakdown over SATs studying and extra-curriculars.

Then a week later, there was another one. Another Asian boy, a junior, very well-liked. Apparently he thought he shamed his parents about something school-related and decided to jump in front of a train instead of face their disappointment.

This was the fourth death by suicide.

The fourth death by train.

Parents were flipping out. Cornell was a fluke. Elena was a sad copycat. But the third and the fourth—both Asian boys—and the school was in chaos, drenched in fear that someone they knew, or worse, them, would be next.

Officially, the worry was the taboo of suicide had been lifted and now my peers were choosing the physical pain of trains and razor blades over dealing with the emotional pain of disappointment and heartache. We were being trained to be perfect. We didn’t know how to handle disappointment. Or failure. We weren’t taught resilience. So on the tracks waiting for the commuter train to barrel into him at fifty miles an hour, instead of sucking it up and being resilient like my dad was being with his horrendous ALS, this other kid jumped in front of the train.

ENOUGH IS ENOUGH read the local headlines.

Parents raised a “ coalition of the willing”—willing to sit from dusk till long after dark along the tracks, lined up on either side, stuffed into REI chairs, wiggling uncomfortably in metal frames, as they dug deeper and deeper into the bloodstained dirt.

Cradling carafes of customized and made-to-order free trade coffee, their anxious eyes skimmed back and forth from the path behind the tracks, back to their Arts & Leisure sections of the New York Times, back to the tracks. They waited. Watched and waited under the intense fluorescent spotlight the police put up, their artificial moon.

The farther I was away from that home, the clearer I understood how insane it all was. We were teenagers. Why were we taking college classes in high school? Why were we spending endless hours studying at home and in the library instead of attending football games and rallies and dances?

Our reality was nothing like theirs.

After the first, after the hoopla surrounding Cornell and then Elena, they tried the minimalist approach. Less is more. Or, in this case, less is less. It was a bit like my mother’s “If I don’t believe it, it didn’t happen” approach to life. All the while my fellow mice continued their studies, dancing on their glass stages. The teachers focused on keeping us alive instead of wondering why the others were dead, lest they be partially to blame.

I learned later this was the first stage of grief: Denial.

Tick tick tick tick.

My English teacher, Mr. T, pulled me aside after class. All the teachers acted as therapists now. Checking in with us about our grief, our stress levels. Today was my turn.

“My mother went back to school after she had me, business school, and she paid her own way. My dad is a cowboy. He lives in Wyoming. I don’t really care that much which college I get accepted to as long as it’s….”

Far Away from Here. He looked at me weird so I took it a step further.

“I got accepted to Wesleyan. They have a decent creative writing program and that’s what I want to do, so…”

Still he stared. Listening.

“Look, even if I hadn’t gotten in, my mother threw out all of our disposable razors—much to my stepfather’s chagrin—so you don’t have to worry about that, either.”

Mr. T looked uncomfortable, but then, after taking another sip of his water, smiled as if he could feel his pay raise. Above and Beyond his job responsibilities. Like he’d achieved the highly esteemed position of Mentor. Truth was, I did want him to be my mentor. Just not an emotional one.

“That’s wonderful about Wesleyan. It’s a fine liberal arts education. How is your creative writing project going?” he asked.

“Good. I mean. Okay. I’m having a hard time getting started. I feel so…distracted all the time.”

“There’s a lot going on here. Sometimes I find that’s the best time to write. When there’s so much going on around you that only words on a page can help you find order in the chaos.”

“That makes sense.”

“Glad something does,” he said, looking like his dog just died.