I awoke to a knock on the door.
“Lindsey,” a male voice said. “Your mother and I have to go deal with this. Will you be okay?”
Lindsey sat upright and saw me lying there on top of the bed. She cleared her throat. “Yeah, Dad. You go do what you have to do.”
Then a woman’s voice said, “Lindsey, are you sure you’re okay? Can I come in?”
“No, Mom. Really. I’m okay. Don’t come in. I just want to be left alone right now. I just want to sleep.”
“Okay,” she said. And I heard their footsteps on the stairs, and then the front door opened and closed.
I sat up beside Lindsey and looked around her room. It seemed odd that it was filled with so many little-girl kind of things—dolls, stuffed animals and photos of her when she was younger.
I was still blinking the sleep out of my eyes when she leaned into me and began to cry again. “I can’t believe he’s gone. This can’t be happening,” she said. “I just want to go somewhere and hide.”
“Were you two close?”
“We used to be. When we were young we did a lot of things together. Bike riding, swimming, skateboarding.”
“Somehow I can’t picture you on a skateboard.”
“I was awesome,” she said, trying to smile, but the smile gave way to a new wave of sadness.
“I bet you were.”
“But we were bad too.”
“I can believe that,” I said.
“We put our parents through hell.” She looked at me long and hard. “And now this.”
“Yeah, this.” I hugged her to me and couldn’t help but think about my own loss.
“Caleb wasn’t much good at any particular thing until he got into the graffiti. I mean, he was always trying too hard to be like someone else. Always trying to be good at sports when he wasn’t. Trying to be tough when it wasn’t his nature. Trying to win over girls when they didn’t want anything to do with him. He would get depressed. Really depressed. For days at a time. And I’d try to snap him out of it.
“And then he decided he wanted to be an artist, and he ended up with spray cans of paint. Most people would think of it as vandalism, but it was his thing. He was proud of what he did. Kids admired him for it. The crazy dangerous and difficult places where his work would show up. And he never got caught. Not once. But he didn’t deserve this.”
“No, he didn’t. I wish I could have gotten to know him.”
“Thanks for saying that.”
We sat in the kitchen and drank coffee. There was mostly silence between us now. I was wishing I could do more, say the right things, but I knew from my own experience that it didn’t matter much what people said to you. The pain didn’t go away. After a while Lindsey’s cell phone beeped. She had a text.
She read it and then pounded back some message, with an angry look on her face.
“What?” I asked after she slammed the phone down on the table.
“They’re at a funeral home. They want me to get a cab and meet them there. I said no way.”
By midmorning she said she just wanted to go back to bed and sleep. “It would be better if you weren’t here when my parents get home.”
I didn’t ask why, but I didn’t want to complicate things. I kissed Lindsey on the forehead and held her hands. “Just let me know what I can do,” I said. “I’ll do anything to help.” And I meant it.
She didn’t answer her phone or return my calls again for two days. I talked to Darren for some advice.
“When people grieve, they tend to shut others out of their lives. Sounds like she had already shut her parents out. And that’s not good. But keep at it. Don’t give up.”
I’d been holding back, giving her space, but after that I figured I better do something. I went back to her house and rang the doorbell. Her mother answered.
“Can I see Lindsey?”
“She isn’t here. Who are you?”
“Josh. I’m a friend.”
“She never mentioned you.” I knew Lindsey didn’t communicate much of anything to her parents, so it didn’t surprise me that she hadn’t mentioned me.
“I know about Caleb,” I said. “I wanted to see if I can help.”
Lindsey’s mom looked me in the eye with suspicion, but then she looked down and let out a sigh. “You could help find Lindsey. We haven’t seen her since…” But she didn’t finish the sentence.
“She hasn’t been home?”
“No. We’re very worried.” Now Lindsey’s mom started to cry.
“I’ll find her,” I said. “I promise.” And I turned to go.
Lindsey’s mom grabbed my sleeve and pulled me back. “The funeral is tomorrow. It would be a terrible thing if she wasn’t there.”
“I’ll find her,” I repeated.