It was an accident.
And now it’s a secret.
But I don’t know for how long, because now it happened and there’s nothing I can do to fix it or make it not have happened. I hate myself.
I can’t breathe. I have to pull myself together and clean up the mess before Mom gets back home and sees the shattered plate in three chunks and a hundred slivers and infinity molecules of powder on the kitchen floor.
I just . . . I don’t know. We always put cookies on Bret’s handprint plate. That’s where cookies go. Well, not always. Sometimes. Usually not when we’re bringing them to somebody’s house. Why didn’t I just put them in a Tupperware?
Why is there no delete key in time?
Why can’t I just turn time back? Not years. I’m not even asking for that. Just two minutes’ worth of rewind—tocktick, like on the DVR, like the time-warp trumpeter—and I would leave the plate with Bret’s handprint on it up where it belongs, in the cabinet above the fridge.
But no.
Tempus just ceaselessly fugits. Ticktock, always: ticktock. Never ever tocktick.
Mom was about to come home to walk me down to the party at Michaela’s, where my best friend was probably going to have to kiss her new boyfriend, maybe in front of everybody, and I had said I would bring homemade cookies. I figured it would give me something to do, and keep me from having to watch them all sportsing after school.
I stood there in my kitchen, staring at the mess all over the floor and on my socks, hating myself. Think, think, think. Lightning was heading toward me, looking like she wanted to taste some plate dust. No!
I got the broom and dustpan to collect the mess that used to be the plate that had had my sister’s handprint on it. Swept it all up and then dumped it into the garbage pail, like just trash instead of the most precious piece of art my family ever owned.
Gone. The plate Bret had indelibly touched. Fugit.
How many times have I measured my hand against Bret’s handprint? My whole life. That funny, precarious R, the ridgy brushstrokes. Her handprint.
The powdery bits were drizzling down among the garbage in the bag, sounding like the rain stick I used to love shaking. It had sounded so peaceful. This didn’t. Not the good kind of pretend rain.
I grabbed the bag out of the bin. I had maybe five minutes, possibly less. Tying the bag as I dashed down the hall, I looked for my shoes. Forget it. I grabbed my keys.
I hate going down to the basement; it creeps me out. Dad usually brings down the trash, even though that’s kind of gendered behavior. Mom told him not to make me go down myself when he asked me to bring it one time. Maybe it’s dangerous down there? She didn’t specify why. I just assumed it was too dangerous for me alone. What if there’s a bad guy? How would I escape? Who would hear me scream?
I had myself pretty worked up into a major anxiety attack by the time the elevator got down to B. I wished I’d grabbed a shoe to wedge the door open so the elevator wouldn’t leave me down there with the wild animals and bad guys and criminals and zombies I was by then sure were all hanging out together, waiting for me in the basement. How could I wedge the door open? Should I have taken a weapon? Is this why Emmett has all the (Nerf) weapons? There was a box on top of the newspaper recycling pile. Perfect. I grabbed it, placed it across the door tracks, and hurdled it with my sack of garbage. It was bright and clean in the basement, like normal when I go down there with an adult. Nobody seemed to be around. I got back to the elevator as the door was trying to close. Ha! Didn’t even need that box. I jumped over it and kicked it away.
The door beeped, whining about being made to wait there too long, and closed.
Phew.
Ding. The elevator door opened in the lobby. Mom got in.
“Oh!” she said. “Hi! Were you coming down to meet me?”
“Um, yes!”
“Well, I just need to put down my workbag and go to the bathroom,” she said. “Is that okay? Are you in a rush?”
“Nope,” I said.
The elevator stopped at 4. Emmett’s mom got on.
“Oh, hi!” Mom said to her, too. “Sorry, you caught us going up.”
“No problem! I haven’t seen you in forever! New haircut?”
Mom ran her fingers through her hair. “Highlights!”
She got highlights? When?
“Looks great,” Emmett’s mom said. “Really brightens you up!”
“You’re so sweet,” Mom said as the elevator door closed again. “Sorry to drag you on a detour up to eight. Gracie was meeting me downstairs, but I have to get my act together.”
“It’s fine. Glad to see you,” Emmett’s mom said to Mom. And then she asked me, “Are you heading over to Michaela’s too?”
I nodded. “I baked some cookies. Is why I didn’t go to the game. Or the other game. There’s two. At least. Games!”
The moms looked at me like I was unhinged.
I nodded. Fair point.
Eighth floor. Ding. The doors opened. The moms said good-bye to each other and made promises to get together for a walk down by the river or for a coffee soon, agreeing that they’d both love that.
“Let me know about Saturday,” Emmett’s mom called through the closing elevator door. “And don’t forget shoes!”
Mom and I looked down at my feet in their socks.
She squinted at me, blinked twice, and waited.
“Good thing you needed a minute,” I said. “Oh, and I have to put the cookies I made in a Tupperware!”
“You okay?” Mom asked me.
“I’m fine!” I lied. “Just, yeah! Great!”
“I wanted to ask you about—”
“Mom,” I said, more impatiently than I’d intended. “Can we? I just . . . I promised Sienna I wouldn’t be late to this party and—”
“Okay,” Mom said, and unlocked the door. We hung our keys on their side-by-side hooks and she slipped her shoes off beneath them. I could’ve flipped the secret don’t-automatically-lock thing, I realized. Oh, well.
I found a Tupperware and stacked the fresh-made cookies in it while Mom changed and went to the bathroom. I vowed to myself that I’d be brave and admit what had happened, as soon as she came out. I would say, Hey, Mom, I have to tell you something: I broke Bret’s plate. And threw away the evidence. That’s why I was in the elevator. Then I’d apologize, and handle however mad she’d get, and, even worse, however sad. She’d never have that treasured plate again, that connection to Bret. I wouldn’t pretend it wasn’t me who shattered it. I wouldn’t take the coward’s way out.
“Those look great,” she said, crumpling the used piece of aluminum foil I’d left on the counter.
I opened my mouth, but my confession refused to fall out.
She opened the garbage cabinet and pulled out the pail to toss the crumpled silver ball in. No bag. “Ugh,” she grumbled. “I hate when Daddy forgets to . . .” She took a deep breath. “Hate is an awfully strong word for a lack of garbage bag, isn’t it? Well, you’re in a rush. We’ll deal with garbage bag replacement later. Ready?”
I nodded. Another lie.