All These Lives (11 page)

I sit quietly and watch pieces of my hair twirl to the ground. Mom squints and frowns and trims. When she is done, I’m disappointed at how much I still look like myself. How much hair do you need to start with, to cut and cut and keep recognizing yourself? How much hair do you have to lose to become unrecognizable?

I don’t even notice, until Jena points it out, that the bangs are slightly uneven.

*   *   *

On Wednesday when I walk into the cafeteria, the smell of B.O. and mystery meat thick in the air, I can’t shake the feeling that I’ve just lost another friend. Since I crashed his motorcycle, Spencer hasn’t said one word to me. He didn’t even come to the hospital after. I would sit with Lauren again, but it’s her first day back post-suspension and she stayed in to catch up on Spanish. So I walk toward Spencer and Candy’s table.

The sparkle in Candy’s eyes, her confidence and the fact that she actually
brightens
to see me approaching, only reinforces my feeling of unease. “Oh, hi, Danielle. We were just talking about you.”

I drop my tray beside Spencer, whose head is straight down, seemingly extra-attentive to his food.

“Funny, because everyone’s talking about that nose piercing you got.” And the accompanying infection.

She perks ups. “Really?”

“I haven’t seen you in forever,” I tell Spencer, who still hasn’t looked at me.

Candy butts in. “Actually, that’s just what we were talking about.” Her voice is high-pitched and so ecstatic she seems to be tripping over her words. “Spencer and I
love
you. We do.”

“Not as much as I love you, Spencer. And you too, what is it,
Hard Candy Core
?”

She narrows her eyes at me, all out of sweetness. “We no longer want you to sit with us. Poor Spencer has enough crap on his plate without you going and crashing his motorcycle.”

“Does
poor Spencer
have so much crap on his plate that he can’t tell me himself?” I’m looking at him, not her. He’s still looking at his burger.

“I’ve been in trouble before,” he mumbles. “The last thing I needed was to spend an hour getting questioned by the police. And I could have been fired.”

“It was an accident,” I say, forgetting for a minute not to care.

“Well.” Candy claps her hands. “We’re lucky the cops saw it that way and that we were able to avoid a potentially nasty situation. I’m glad we all agree that the best thing is to go our separate ways.” She draws the imaginary separating line with her and Spencer on one side, and me on the other. “Spencey and I knew you’d understand.”

Even he reacts to that one. “Don’t effing call me that.”

“Sorry,” she says quickly, and I realize that they, Spandy or Canspence, are going to self-destruct. She’s too eager to please, too desperate to prove herself, and Spencer is kind of an asshead.

I go from the cafeteria to the bathroom, lock myself in a stall, and wait for lunchtime to pass. Sadly, time slows down, moving at sixty-one seconds a minute and sixty-one minutes an hour, so that being trapped in a five-inch-by-five-inch space quickly loses its novelty. I claw my way out and head down the hall again, stopping at the empty classroom where we usually have math. The wise thing would be for me to start in on the mountain of homework that was sent home—and which I managed to ignore—when I missed school last week.

Instead, I shuffle to a desk at the back and rest my head on it.

I’m starting to doze when I hear footsteps, and then in walks Halbrook, his face stuck between the covers of a book.

He’s startled when he notices me. “Oh, hi, Danielle. I didn’t see you there.” His book is
War and Peace
and I half-wonder if he’ll decide to read aloud to us next class, instead of us working on our assignments.

“Are you all right?”

I’m surprised he hasn’t gone back to his reading yet. “Perfect.”

“How’s your sister doing?”

Halbrook hates Jena. She used to forge notes all the time for fake track meets and sporting events. That’s not why he hates her, though. I think it has to do with the fact that she once did it for every student in his math class. It was only a joke, of course, but Halbrook isn’t exactly known for his sense of humor.

My parents gave her the third degree when they learned of her activities. If she did something like that now, they’d be secretly delighted. We’re all searching for signs the old Jena still exists.

“Perfect, too,” I mutter, feeling the desk beginning to imprint itself on my cheek.

“And how’s your project coming?”

Here’s a question for him: Why is he expressing teacherly concern over me instead of reading
War and Freaking Peace
?

“You’ll be blown away,” I tell him, though Jack and I got next to nothing done during lunch on Monday.

When he leaves the classroom again, I close my eyes and try to fall asleep. I dream Mr. Halbrook hovers over me, halo made of concern as his book sits unattended at his desk. I dream he and the rest of the world hesitate around me, pray for me and try to help, and yet I don’t let them.

I wake up with a self-prescribed mandate for normalcy. Tomorrow, I will catch up on all the work I’ve missed. Tomorrow, I will bring my T. rex–sized bag of M&M’s and share with all my classmates, let them sift through the round nuggets of deception, trying to sort good from evil, peanut from peanut butter. Peanut butter is a wolf in peanut’s clothing. Shame on it.

Focus, Dani.

Tomorrow, when I return to popularity and humanity and
normalcy
, I will not give people any more reasons to wonder.

Lots of people have sisters with cancer. Lots and lots of people. Some people have buried their sisters and brothers and mothers and fathers and aunts and uncles, and I have not.

Some people have sat by their loved ones and watched them hack or hurt or throw up early, too early in the morning, so often that they can no longer fall asleep, and so, they now draw all over themselves and do strange voodoo, and I have not.

Some people have gotten cancer and had to quit school and stay home to Be Sick, a full-time calling, but one that is thoroughly wrong for them since they are the strong ones and they win state soccer championships and so they can’t have cancer, and I have not.

I should be grateful, ecstatic.

Many people have died from car crashes, from infections, from drowning, from motorcycles, and I have not.

I keep waking up.

18

Saturday morning brings my father standing over me, nudging me awake. Today is the makeup callback.

I tell him I’d rather stay in bed and let it swallow me whole. He laughs and squeezes my shoulder. “Come on, sleepyhead.”

Still asleep, I trudge into the bathroom and splash cold water on my face. We use Colgate, not Whitaden, around here. Since I don’t want things to be awkward at the callback, I decide to forgo toothpaste and brushing entirely.

Thanks to the bangs, the only visible reminder of the accident is the cast around my left arm. Mom spoke to Brody Richardson about my most unfortunate accident, and since they won’t actually be filming the commercial for another two months, they’re willing to overlook the broken wrist.

I walk all the way across the hall. The door to Jena’s room is wide open, the torn pieces of paper still hanging limply there, skulls without bones and wordless warning signs.

When I go in, there is no movement, no sound. Even though the door is open, her room is too warm, smells like sweat and dirty laundry. I see a lump in her bed.

Finally, she turns from the wall to face me and I hear myself breathing again. “Where are you going?” she asks.

I can only see her face; the rest is blanket.

“The callback.”

“Good luck,” she says. I nod, holding on to the doorknob. I mean to pull it toward me to shut the door, but I’m frozen.

Something is wrong.

“See you when you get back,” she says. I know that’s supposed to tell me she’s okay.

I shut the door.

“Hey, there you are!” Dad calls from the foot of the stairs. “I made you some coffee.”

“Coffee stains teeth,” I say. “You’re trying to sabotage me, aren’t you?”

Dad laughs, winking at me. “Don’t tell your mother.” I take the mug from him, bringing it to my lips.

“Where is she?” I ask. “Mom, I mean.”

He glances up the stairs. “Asleep. You ready?”

My fingers tingle and my heart sneezes. Dad acts appropriately enthusiastic as we walk to the garage and get into the car, but I still can’t shake the feeling that something isn’t right. It’s nine a.m. on Saturday. The only way Mom is sleeping is if she’s sedated.

But maybe she is.

I fold myself into the car and try to shut off the crappy brain stuff—the fear, the thoughts. I delete all of it.

Dad doesn’t try to make conversation. He presses play on the CD in the car, a
Phantom of the Opera
soundtrack, which my mother had to have left in there. His fingers drum on the steering wheel as he stares out of the glass, far into a darkness I can’t see.

“Is something wrong?” I ask.

“There’s nothing to worry about.” He gives me a tired smile. “I promise. Coffee makes me fidgety.”

I don’t believe it’s just the coffee. “If they’re planning to put her down while I’m gone…”

“What?” Dad frowns. “Dani, you can’t talk … You can’t say stuff like that. People will take it the wrong way.”

“Which people?”

“
No
, nothing … Everything is fine. Would I lie to you?”

Yes
.
Grandma died peacefully in her sleep
.

“Listen, Dans, you have to start trusting people. It’s not you against the world, it’s
us
against the world. And I’m telling you—today, we’re covered.”

Silence.

“First, don’t ever call me Dans again. Second, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Sure you do,” he says. “You know exactly what I’m talking about. Let’s focus on booking this commercial and giving your mom and sister some good news tonight, okay?”

I don’t answer.

“Okay?”

I fiddle with the radio. All this wailing is giving me a headache. And not the kind that kills you, so what’s the point?

“Okay?”

A pop song fills the car.

“Okay?”

“Dad. For crap’s sake.”

“O-kay?” he repeats, obnoxiously.

“Whatever.” As his mouth opens again, I rush on. “I mean, fine. Sure. Let’s do this shit.”

“Danielle!”

The next five minutes are devoted to the in-car equivalent of me washing my mouth with soap. I try to point out that a) I’ve heard Dad curse before, and b) Mom isn’t here. So most likely, God isn’t either.

“I’m not quite sure that’s how it works.”

“How
does
it work?” My eyes widen and I turn to face him, attentive and questioning.

He coughs. “Well, you know your mother’s the religious one, but I think God is … everywhere.”

“Really?” If my eyes get any wider, they’ll fall out of my head. “Even in the shower and bathroom? Because that’s kind of creepy.”

“Well…”

“And if He’s everywhere, why doesn’t He stop bad things from happening?”

Dad sighs. “I don’t know, Danielle. What do you think?”

I think I’m starting to feel sorry for him. I lean back in my seat. “It doesn’t matter. What I think doesn’t affect His existence or nonexistence. He either does or doesn’t.”

He turns to look at me. “That’s a good answer. Got any more of those?” His eyes travel back to the road and I get the sense again that today is about more than a toothpaste commercial, and maybe Dad is using me as a buffer between him and the world. By the time we reach our destination, I’m slightly concerned about my breath situation. It’s a delicate mix of morning and coffee breath, with bias toward the former.

There are only two of us auditioning today—a blond girl with glistening white teeth. Every time she smiles, it transforms her face, but she doesn’t do so often. I wonder who’s dying in her family.

At first, I’m there just because I have to be. The first time I read lines, I sort of mumble them, barely trying to conceal my coffee-stained teeth and my irreverent apathy. But then I make the mistake of glancing up at my father, sitting with his hand propped under his chin, watching me.

I thought I’d killed my conscience by now, but she shows up anyway.

If I actually got this part, it would make what has been a universally crappy year for my parents, and Jena, slightly better.

I jerk my chin up and attempt to project horizontally. To say my lines so these people can actually hear them.

My plastic smile falters more than once, but the one on my father’s face holds it there. He was proud when I was sort-of-mumbling, practically sleeping up here, shaming his name and taking advantage of his goodness and his need to please Mom. He is still proud.

I am decent in my second-last take, try to go one better for the last, and then I’m done.

Still smiling, I excuse myself and find the nearest bathroom. What was supposed to be a few minutes of (mainly) self-congratulations takes a sharp turn.

My chest starts to hurt. I pull down the cover and collapse on the toilet seat.

I think,
I am on five lives and that’s too much
. But that’s not it.

My palms sweat, my fingers shake, my eyes well up.

I don’t know why and I can’t stop it and I hate that I’m sitting on a public toilet doing this and is God here watching creepily or am I alone and
make it stop.

It doesn’t.

And then I realize what it is.

I just know. Like the time Jena wandered off during our family hiking trip when we were nine. Though I couldn’t explain it, I’d just known she was by the lake, and that was where we found her. A twin thing, I suppose.

I run from the bathroom and find my father, who is making some pleasant conversation with a suit. I want to say, “It’s too late for flirting, even with a deceptively well-dressed cameraman. And FYI, I said to go for stage moms. Nothing about cameramen.”

I don’t say that.