Alive (23 page)

Grabbing my fluffy sheepskin boots, I shove my bare feet inside and toss the quilt back onto the naked twin bed. “I miss you. I do, but—”

Henry’s nails dig into the leg of his pajama bottoms and he chews hard on his lip. “But for all the wrong reasons, Stel.”

CONFIDENTIAL

St. David’s Healthcare: Confidential Document

This information is subject to all federal and state laws regarding confidentiality and privacy and to the policies and procedures of St. David’s
Healthcare regarding patient information. Any unauthorized use, disclosure, or reproduction of this information is strictly prohibited.

*Final Report*

*Final Report*

Post–Heart Transplant Note

Basic Information

History of Present Illness

I notice the pain more now in its absence than I did in its presence. It has, I realize, become a source of background noise, and the moment I see Levi, it’s as if
someone switched it off completely. My body unwinds, adjusting to its new normal. The immediate wash of relief.

Take it slowly
, I remind myself, as I lace my fingers with his.

We walk hand in hand down the hallway. Other students stream past us. Levi hands me an earbud and together we listen to Mudhoney, a band I’ve recently discovered through him. They’re
part of my education, he says, a musical romp through Seattle’s rock history, which I soak in effortlessly.

I like to sneak glances at Levi while he’s listening to music. Even when we’re walking, he’ll shut his eyes for several beats too long, and I have to steer him clear of any
oncoming traffic. I like the way there are two lines that form a triangle between his eyebrows when he’s listening to a complicated guitar solo. I like how his teeth bite his lip and he rocks
his head to the music. I think about what Levi told me about Kurt Cobain, about how one day he stopped feeling the excitement of listening to music, and I wonder if that will happen to Levi. I hope
not, because this is what I like most about him. My favorite part.

I must look up at Levi one too many times, because something catches my ankle and I fly forward into the back of a lowerclassman walking several feet in front of me.

I push into her backpack. The earbud is yanked from my ear and I’m thrown from the happy bubble Levi and I have been occupying, and we both tumble to the ground.

“Hey, watch it!” The petite blond girl glares at me. Scooting myself off of her and feeling like a giant in comparison, I reach down to help her up, but she pushes my hand away.
“I’m fine.” She brushes off her khakis and collects her books from the hallway floor.

Behind me there’s a loud cackle. I turn to see Tess slapping her thighs. Levi sees her the same moment I do. I push past him, hiking my book bag up on my shoulder. “What was
that?” I demand when I’m close enough that I could spit in her face.

“What?” She looks to Brandon and Connor with this can-you-believe-this-girl face I wish I could smack right off.

“You tripped me.”

“Hardly.” She drops her fake smile. “Honestly, I think everyone’s growing a bit tired of the victim card.”

“Liar.” People are watching, whispering. “You tripped me.”

“Then maybe”—she cocks her head—“you should look where you’re going.”

I take a step forward. “What’s your problem with me, Tess?” People are all around now, pushing and shoving like wolves. Closing in on me. A ring.

“Ooh. Tough girl. You know your little punk-rock-princess act isn’t fooling anyone, right? Under all that eyeliner you’re still the girl people are only nice to because they
feel sorry for you.” Several sharp intakes of breath from the crowd. My pulse drums wildly out of control. Humming in my ears.

“Shut up.” I don’t know what makes me do it, but without thinking, I shove Tess. At first I think I’ve shoved just hard enough to give her a jolt, but her head whips back
and she loses her footing. She rocks back on her heels. Her hands reach for me but grab thin air before her head clangs into the rusted metal edge of an open locker. In that instant, when her body
makes impact, my vision shifts.

Her eyelashes flutter against her cheeks. She doesn’t say a word. Her back slams against the bottom row of lockers and her knees buckle. The whites of her eyes take over the pupils and
it’s only in the fraction of time before she crumples that I know something’s wrong.

Her torso makes an anticlimactic slump to the floor, her cheek pressed against dirtied linoleum, speckled with the shadows of footprints and the gray sweeps of a janitor’s mop.

“Oh God,” I whisper.

She lies on her side, and if this weren’t the middle of the hallway in the middle of a school day, she might be sleeping. A single drop of blood plops onto the white tile. The crown of her
hair is already matted dark red.

Her wrists, turned up to the ceiling, suddenly look to me to be unnaturally thin, with bones as fragile as a bird’s. There’s a ringing in my ears. I can’t remember why I pushed
her. I shake my head slowly at first and then frantically.

More drops stand out, bright as poppies. I’m mesmerized by the pool of blood. And something deeper, more visceral, rises out of the horror in my gut—satisfaction. I swallow it down,
frightened of my own fascination. Her eyes go still first. Her mouth hangs open.

“What the hell?” My vision shifts again. I gulp back a wad of spit and the ringing stops. Tess is there, screaming at me, flattening her pleated skirt. “She pushed me!”
she shrieks to anyone who will listen. “She pushed me!”

I gape at her, dumbstruck.

“Students, students.” I hear the voice of old Mrs. Truitt. I see her gnarled hands trying to part the crowd.

I back away. Slowly. Slowly. No, I think. Not happening. No. I try to disappear in the mess of people. Where’s Levi? I lost him. I can’t wait for him.

“She pushed me? Did anyone see that?” I turn. And I go.

When someone catches my arm I think immediately that it’s him. I spin into his chest, grateful that he’s found me. The breath I’ve been holding is already on its way out.

“Stella. What happened back there? Why is Tess saying that you pushed her?”

It was Henry. I glance over his shoulder at the dissipating crowd and tug at the sleeves of my school-issued sweater to pull them down over my knuckles.

“Don’t worry, your little designer doll is fine,” I mutter. “It was stupid.”

“I don’t care about her. I care about you.” He ducks to look me straight in the eyes. “What’s going on?”

I’m shaking. Tremors shoot through my hands. Henry grabs them and holds them together in a strong grip. I find this oddly comforting. “Talk to me,” he says. “What’s
wrong?”

I swallow down the ache in my chest. “I don’t know.” We’ve resumed a certain degree of normalcy since my midnight visit, not comfortable, but something. “I thought
I saw—”

“Thought you saw what?” Henry’s eyes search mine. He holds my hands close to his body. His chest is warm. “What did she do to you?”

I look down. His hands clasped around mine. “Nothing,” I mumble. “I don’t know.” Tess. Dead. My fault. The thoughts are disjointed. More so when I keep having to
come to the same revelation that none of it is true. “I was with Levi and—”

“Where is he?” There’s a growl to Henry’s question and I can tell he’s latched on to Levi as some crucial part of the story.

“I don’t know.” I clench my teeth to keep tears from forming. If I could only get the trembling to stop. It had seemed so real.

“This isn’t you, Stella.” He glances over both shoulders. “I know you. You’re not yourself when he’s around.”

“I—” My eyes snap up to his. My mouth falls open. “I thought you were…I don’t know…being
supportive
, not looking for an excuse to bring up your
one-sided grudge match with Levi.”

“I am being supportive, but…” He sighs. “Stel, there’s something creepy about that guy. And since you met him you’ve been acting—” He squeezes my
hands and I snatch them away.

“Creepy, huh? You think my boyfriend’s creepy? God, Henry, I should have known this whole be-a-good-friend bit was just that. A bit.”

“Okay. I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He drags out the words. Henry tugs his hat down over his eyes. I swear, I can tell the ten degrees of Henry’s
discomfort just based on how he maneuvers that damn baseball cap. “I mean, he follows you, Stella. Like, I don’t know, like a stalker. That’s kind of creepy. I’ve seen him
just, you know, trailing behind you, watching you. There were times
you
didn’t know he was there.”

I drop my chin and glare at him. I feel my lower jaw go stiff. “Did it ever occur to you that maybe Levi and I go to the same school? There are only so many places to go.”

“Yes.” Henry glances in both directions again and lowers his voice. “Of course it did. At first I thought it was just a coincidence or something, too. But then…Look, this
is going to sound weird, but I was at the mall the other day.” I narrow my eyes. “My mom asked me to pick up her alterations. Anyway. I was walking by the costume store and saw Levi
hovering outside and only realized later it was the exact same time you were in the store with Brynn.”

Anger opens up in me like a pit. “It sounds like you’re the one who’s stalking me, Henry.
Now
who’s creepy?”

“For Christ’s sake, I’m not stalking you

“So let me get this straight. You saw Levi quote-unquote following me. So in order to check that he was quote-unquote up to no good, you checked up with Brynn about me. And Levi’s
the stalker?”

“Okay, it’s not just the stalking thing. What about Halloween? Did you not think it was weird how he jumped on you just for talking to me? I know you noticed it too. We’ve been
friends for years and—”

“Maybe Levi thinks you want more than just friendship. Shocking, I know, since you have quite obviously headed up the welcoming committee.”

I start to leave, but Henry catches my wrist to stop me. “Stella, I’m worried about you. And about him. I’m telling you, there’s something wrong with that guy.”

“Enough, Henry. Drop the act. I made it perfectly clear that I wasn’t available.”

“Made it perfectly clear in my bedroom, in the middle of the night. I’d call that murky at best,” he says, but I can tell he wishes he didn’t as soon as it’s
out.

I inhale deeply. “My boyfriend’s not evil, Henry, and this isn’t
Lunatic Outpost
. If you’ve begun to think that everything and everyone is conspiring against you,
then clearly you’ve been taking that stuff way more seriously than I have.” Suddenly all the hours we spent laughing over our crazy theories about Roswell and the Kennedy assassination
don’t seem so funny. I twist my arm out of his grip.

“But—”