My mom enters the kitchen and freezes in her clogs. “You’re up early,” she says.
I press one more key on my laptop and slam it shut. The printer croaks awake in the living room. I stand up from the table. “I had to finish something.”
My mom inserts a pod into the coffee maker. “It wouldn’t happen to be one of those scholarship essays, would it?”
“Um. Not yet. But I’ve been, like, brainstorming a ton of ideas and stuff.” I totally forgot about the essays.
“That sounds so exciting,” she says, sliding our only clean mug under the spout. “And you’re sure you don’t want to plan another night to do them together? I told you, this time I’ll just tell my boss I don’t even exist. I am nonexistent on that day. Except to you. I promise.”
She’s already apologized fifty times about blowing taco night, and I appreciate the effort, but right now those essays are the last thing on my mind. “Maybe. I’ll definitely let you know.”
“Wait. Where are you going?”
I can’t delay. I need to retrieve the papers coming out of the printer. The last time I printed out something private it fell into the wrong hands.
“Is everything okay?” she asks.
I turn around in the doorway. “Yeah, it’s just this thing for school.”
“No, I mean in general. Your session with Dr. Sherman went well? And before you answer, I want you to know that I was going to ask you about it last night, but I didn’t because I know you need time to process. How’s that for Mother of the Year material?” She laughs awkwardly.
“You’re a shoo-in,” I say, scratching loose paint off the wall. “Actually, I think I might have had a little breakthrough with Dr. Sherman.”
You would think I just handed her a winning lottery ticket. She shoots up two thumbs and dances her fists in the air. “That’s what I’m talking about.”
Another happy customer.
• • •
I catch Alana as she’s heading into homeroom. On the way to school, I folded each piece of printed paper twice to form three equal sections. They’re supposed to resemble pamphlets. Alana takes one of my pamphlets and reads the front panel.
“‘The Connor Project’?” Alana says.
“It’s the first thing that came to me,” I say. “It doesn’t have to—”
“I love it. What is it?”
“Well, it would be a student group dedicated to keeping Connor’s memory alive and showing that he… mattered. That everyone matters.”
Alana is silent. I repeat to myself what I just said aloud. It sounds preposterous now that I’m hearing it back. There are at least a dozen more of these prototype pamphlets in my bag. I wonder if the school has a paper shredder I can borrow. “It’s just a rough idea. It doesn’t have to be that, obviously.”
“I’m so honored,” Alana says. “I would love to be vice president of the Connor Project.”
“Vice president?”
“You’re right. We should be co-presidents.”
I guess that means she’s into my idea. “So you think we should actually do this?”
“Are you kidding, Evan? We have to. Like you said, not just for Connor. For everyone.” She holds up my pamphlet next to her face. “Excuse my language, but screw Ms. Bortel.”
No plan I’ve made for the future has ever actually panned out. I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do next. “I was thinking we’ll probably need a good website. I know someone who could help with that. But it might cost us.”
• • •
“Tech Consigliere,” Jared says when Alana and I approach him during lunch.
“What’s that?” Alana asks.
“It’s a Godfather thing, right?” I say.
“Precisely,” Jared says. “I will forego my normal fee in exchange for being referred to as Tech Consigliere of the Connor Project.”
“Fine, whatever,” I say. “You can list it that way on the website.”
“No, you need to call me that in normal conversation, too.”
“Jared, come on.”
“How about we give you the additional role of treasurer?” Alana offers. “It’ll look great on your college applications.”
Jared studies Alana’s face. Alana holds his stare.
“That would please my parents,” Jared says.
“I’m sure it would,” Alana says.
“Fine. Can I eat my lunch now?”
“Wait,” Alana says. “Shouldn’t we get the Murphys’ blessing before we move forward?”
I thought about that, too. “I just figured it might be a little early for that, since we’re only in the setup phase.”
“There’s really no point in putting a lot of work into this until we know we have the Murphys on board,” Alana argues. “We should pitch it to them immediately. Like, tonight.”
“You mean, all of us, together?” I ask.
Jared nods. “Yeah. Let’s go to their house.”
“I guess we could,” I say, overwhelmed but excited.
“A team outing.” Alana goes to squeeze my arm, I think, but then seeing the cast thinks better of it. “I love it. Great for morale.”
“I’ll drive,” Jared says. “Just text me a pickup time.”
“One more thing,” Alana says before Jared can leave. “How about we organize a school-wide assembly to kick this thing off?”
I knew Alana would be the right partner, that she’d be able to take the ball and really run with it. “Yeah. That sounds… great.”
“Perfect. I’ll speak to Principal Howard about it. See you guys tonight.” She walks away and so does Jared.
Last night it was just a vague, unsure concept in my mind. Now it’s this real thing that feels like it might actually happen. It’s sort of thrilling to watch it come alive so fast, and yet I’m suddenly looking around for a place to sit. My legs have gone numb.
• • •
Despite my insistence that he park on the street, Jared dumps his SUV smack in the middle of the Murphys’ C-shaped driveway. On our way to the front door, Alana flips open a folder and shows off two thick rubber-banded bundles of multicolored pamphlets. My Connor Project heading has been restyled, the small and modest font I used replaced with something thick and bold.
“I had a window in my after-school schedule,” Alana says when she catches me looking at the pamphlets.
“Shouldn’t we wait to hear what they say first?” I say.
“We have to go in there like the position is already ours.”
“But this isn’t, like, an interview.”
Alana pulls at the cuffs of her shirt so they reach down to her wrists. “Life is an interview, Evan.”
Where do you learn something like that? Alana’s parents must be supersuccessful people. I bet one is a judge and the other is a surgeon. From the moment she was born she’s been training to kick life’s ass.
“Is the maid going to answer the door or what?” Jared says, sounding the doorbell.
“They don’t have a maid,” I say.
“Look at the size of this pillar. I bet you the Murphys are swingers.”
“What? No. They’re just normal.”
Jared pretends to laugh. I notice he’s wearing one of the Connor buttons he’s been selling at school. Before I can tell him to take it off, the front door opens.
It’s Connor’s mom. “Evan, what a surprise.”
“Hi, Mrs.—Cynthia. I have something really exciting I want to share with you,” I say.
“Oh,” she says, smiling at Alana and Jared. She spots the image pinned to Jared’s shirt. I can’t read her expression before she invites us inside.
She plants us around the dinner table with miniature bottles of water and excuses herself. Alana hides the folder with all the new pamphlets on her lap under the table. Meanwhile, Jared is threatening to steal a splash of something fun from the cabinet in the corner. He also assures us that the slot in the living room ceiling houses a retractable screen for a movie projector. I wait in my seat, wiping my wet hands on my jeans. I’m nervous, but also full of anticipation.
Cynthia returns to the kitchen with Larry. I wasn’t sure Larry would even be home from work yet, but the way he’s dressed, in a polo shirt and cap, who knows, he might have skipped work and played golf instead.
Zoe arrives just behind her father and takes a seat at the table directly next to me. She doesn’t greet me with words, just a look, and as usual I’m unable to decipher what her look means.
Once everyone is settled, I take a drink of water and begin the presentation that we only vaguely sketched out on the way over. “I’ve been thinking a lot lately. I keep asking myself, what if there was a way to make sure that Connor was never forgotten? That he was always remembered? And that the memory of him could help people?”
I study our audience. I have their undivided attention.
“Connor is gone,” I say delicately. “But his legacy isn’t. It doesn’t have to be.”
I remember to breathe. There are so many things to cover.
“Okay,” I say. “Imagine, first, a beautiful and informative website designed by Jared here, our tech consigliere.”
Jared nods. “Yup. I can have that up pretty quickly.”
“This website would have links to educational materials and meaningful calls to action,” Alana says, barely able to contain herself.
“Right. Yes. And that’s just the beginning.” I start running through the list that we brainstormed. “There would be steady outreach through social media… community events…”
Alana takes over. “Partnerships with strategic sponsors… a massive fundraising drive… suicide prevention resources… mental health education.”
“This way we can try to help people just like Connor,” I say.
“Exactly,” Alana says. “And it’s all part of this new initiative we’ve come here to present to you. We’re calling it—”
“The Connor Project,” I say.
While I do value Alana’s enthusiasm, this whole thing was my idea. Also, I didn’t mean to say it so loudly.
“The Connor Project,” Cynthia says, turning to her husband.
“Yes,” I say. I glance at Alana, signaling that it’s time.
She opens her folder and hands everyone a pamphlet. I’m surprised, when I get mine, how substantial the paper feels.
“We want to kick off the Connor Project in the right fashion,” Alana says. “I already spoke to Principal Howard about doing a memorial assembly this Friday. Students, teachers, whoever wants to, they can get up and they can talk.”
“About how all this has been affecting them,” I say.
“Right. How they’re feeling.”
“About Connor.”
“Yes. What he meant to them.”
“What he meant to all of us.”
It seems a good place to stop, and somehow we all sense it. I turn to Alana and Jared, feeling a sense of pride and accomplishment. The room is eerily still and mute until the ice maker produces a loud clink. It takes a few sips of water and more inspection of the pamphlets before Connor’s parents are ready to speak.
“I didn’t realize Connor meant this much to people,” Larry says.
“Oh my god,” Alana says. “He was one of my closest acquaintances. He was my lab partner in chemistry, and we presented together on Huck Finn in English. He was so funny. Instead of calling it Huck Finn, he switched out the Huck, you know, and he called it…” She catches herself. “Nobody else in our class thought of that.”
Zoe hasn’t looked up from her pamphlet since she got it. If she’s not on board with our plan, I’m not sure I can be, either. “I was thinking,” I say, “for the assembly, maybe the jazz band could do something.”
Zoe glances up. “Oh. Yeah. Maybe. I can ask Mr. Contrell.”
Jared slaps me on the back. “Great idea, Evan.”
“Thank you, Jared,” I say through clenched teeth.
“Honey?” Larry says, touching Cynthia’s shoulder. “What do you think?”
Usually Cynthia is the one who does most of the talking for the Murphys, but she’s been awfully quiet. She’s looking straight at me, but not at my eyes. It’s like she can’t see past the space between us.
And then, she emerges from her waking sleep. “Oh, Evan. This is just… this is wonderful. Thank you.” She grabs my hand from across the table and squeezes it. It feels so nice that I almost forget to be embarrassed.
• • •
Once again I’m in Connor’s bedroom, only this time with his mother. Alana and Jared already left. We were all getting ready to leave together when Cynthia pulled me aside and asked if I could stay a little longer. I don’t mind taking the bus home.
Now she’s looking in Connor’s closet. Through the walls, I hear a voice singing over guitar. After a few stops and starts, I realize it’s not a recording.
Cynthia turns around. She’s holding a tie. After studying the tie a moment, she extends it to me. “For the assembly.”
“Oh.”
“When Connor started seventh grade, all my girlfriends said, ‘Here comes bar mitzvah season. He’s going to have a different party every Saturday.’ I took him to get a suit, some shirts… a tie.” She pauses. “He didn’t get invited to a single one.”
We both look down at the tie in her hands. Connor’s tie. His only tie. He never wore it. Never had a reason to.
“I thought you could wear this for your speech,” she says.
The taste of panic on my tongue. “My what?”
“Well, Alana said that anyone who wanted to would have a chance to say something at the assembly. I think we all assumed that you would be the first to sign up.”
“I don’t…”
Panic has a salty taste. It’s like I’m standing in a small glass tank and the tank is filling up with water. I’m guessing the water is coming from the sea, because of the saltiness. The seawater rushes into my tank. It’s already at my mouth, and in a moment it will cover my face and I’ll drown. There’s no way out of the tank. All I can do is wait as the water surrounds me. I stretch my neck up for that last bit of air. I’m gasping. And then, when I can barely catch my breath, it stops. The water recedes, always. I never end up drowning, but it doesn’t matter. The feeling of almost drowning is even worse than actually drowning. Actually drowning is peace. Almost drowning is pure pain.
“The thing is just, I don’t really do very well with, um, with public speaking. I’m not very good at it. You wouldn’t want me to. Trust me.”
“Of course I would want you to,” Cynthia says. “I’m sure the whole school wants to hear from you. I know Larry and I do, and Zoe…”
She puts the tie in my hands.
“Think about it.”
She leaves me alone in Connor’s room. I stand there, paralyzed, waiting for all the water to drain away.
I stare down at Connor’s tie. Thick and rough. Navy with light blue diagonal stripes running down it. Like rolling waves through a dark, violent ocean. The water came for Connor, too. He must have fought for air until he just didn’t feel like fighting anymore. If I can understand anything, I can certainly understand that.
A sound in the doorway. Zoe stands there with her arms crossed.
“Sorry,” I tell her. “I’m leaving. Your mom and I were just talking.”
She steps into the room and makes a slow circle around me before finally resting on the bed. The last time we were alone like this in Connor’s room I apparently lost my mind. I’ll keep better track of it this time.
Zoe didn’t say much after our presentation. When it was over, she just disappeared upstairs. I wait for her to speak, and when she doesn’t, I proceed with extreme care. “Was that you playing guitar just now?”
She nods.
“I didn’t know you sing,” I say.
“I don’t. I mean, I’m not very good. It’s sort of a new thing. Actually, this past Sunday I played my first open mic night at Capitol Café. Just a few songs.”
“Wow. No way. Like, covers or…?”
“My own stuff,” she says, looking a little hesitant but fighting through it. “It’s weird. It’s like I’ve had these songs waiting inside me. And now they’re finally ready to come out.”
I understand. I’m jealous, actually. I wish I had some way of releasing all the stuff that’s been churning inside me.
I sit down on the bed, as far away from her as I can possibly be without falling off. “That’s awesome.”
She turns to me. “You shouldn’t have kissed me the other night. That was annoying.”
Damn. I sat myself right into that one. “I know. I’m sorry.”
“But,” she says, “I shouldn’t have freaked out. I overreacted.”
“No, you underreacted. I don’t even know why I did it.”
She stares down at the floor, her shoes scrunched up, as if they’re trying to push right through the wood. “I think grief can make you do weird things. Things you wouldn’t do normally.”
I give her the only answer I can. “I think that’s probably true.”
She stands up and paces around. I follow her movements until she stops and faces me head-on. “Why did he push you that day?”
“What? Oh. I mean. I think…” The seawater returns. I was just starting to dry off. “Didn’t I tell you before?”
She shakes her head. “I don’t believe you.”
My heart cracks. I look away, studying Connor’s wall as if it were a cheat sheet, but what I see only confuses me more. I close my eyes and search inward instead. “I sometimes… I get scared talking to people, I guess, sort of.” The truth of it calms me down. I slowly open my eyes. “Connor was always trying to get me to be more outgoing. And he’d get annoyed sometimes. If he thought I wasn’t trying hard enough. That sort of thing.”
She takes it in. “Well, my mom is in love with you. This whole Connor Project thing, too, she’s obsessed.”
I feel my heart gluing back together again. “She’s really awesome.”
Zoe glances at the open door, seeing something I can’t see. “She likes you being here. You make her feel like Connor is still here, I think, in a way. Like you bring him with you somehow. But not like how she remembers him. Different. Better than she remembers him.”
“That’s what happens when people leave, I think. When they’re gone, you don’t have to be reminded of all the bad things. They can just stay the way you want them forever. Perfect.”
I’m not sure if that made any sense. I watch Zoe, waiting for some kind of reaction. She stands there for a moment, saying nothing. Finally she nods, turns, and goes.