My Time as Caz Hazard (7 page)

I could hear the hymns from inside. I heard a woman's voice, but I couldn't hear the words. What would you say in a eulogy for someone who committed suicide? She loved life? She had great hopes and dreams? Apparently not.

When I thought too much about Dodie, when I thought about the lipsticked mirror or the spilled orange juice or her ripped shirt, I felt like my chest was closing. I couldn't breathe. So I tried not to think of her at all, but she surfaced in my head like the oil slicks on the puddles in the parking lot.

I heard the scrape of wood against wood and the rustle of people rising. Before someone could open the double doors and find me sitting there, I ducked around to the wall in the shadow of the stairs. Still clutching my coat around me, I watched everyone spill slowly outside.

“Terrible,” I heard the principal say to one of the teachers, shaking his head and clicking his tongue against the roof of his mouth.

“That poor woman. She looks like she's aged a decade overnight,” another teacher whispered to the man beside her, nodding her head in the direction of the woman and little girl who had arrived last. Was that Dodie's foster mom? Was the girl her sister?

“Brad! Quit it!” Amanda's bright voice was out of place, a splash of color in a black-and-white film. “Shhh …” she giggled. “You're going to get us both in trouble.” She skipped down the stairs, followed closely by Brad, who seemed to be trying to nibble her ear. Nibble her ear? Had I fallen asleep and ended up in some other dimension?

“Amanda,” I called, stepping out from the shadows. “I didn't see you go in,” I lied. I avoided looking in Brad's direction.

She stopped and looked at me coldly. “So you're back, are you? You disappeared this weekend. I guess you've rejoined the world of the living now?”

“I guess,” I shrugged.

She sneered, reaching behind her for Brad's hand. “Too bad the world has passed you by.” Her laugh made heads swivel in the crowded parking lot.

“Amanda,” I hissed. She turned slowly back to me.

“How can you be like this? What if this was our fault?” I could feel my voice growing loud and shrill.

“Shut up!” Amanda grabbed my arm, hard. “You're not making sense. What did we have to do with it? No one kills herself over a ripped shirt. Understand?”

I nodded mutely. Brad pulled at Amanda's other hand, looking uncomfortable.

“I'm leaving. We're not going to say another word about this. Ever.” She looked at me steadily for a moment to make sure I had heard her. Then she tossed her hair and nuzzled close to Brad once more.

Ducking my head, I wove quickly out of the parking lot.

“Don't hang up!” I said as soon as Mel answered the phone. “I know I've been a jerk.”

“You have been a jerk,” she said warily.

It was almost nice to have someone actually say that. Everywhere I'd gone all week I had seen people who thought I was better than I am. I got an A on the history paper that Ms. Samuels helped me rewrite. My dad was practically glowing with the news. Even Mom called to congratulate me. Then she asked if I wanted to come for dinner on the weekend.

“I sleep at home after?”

“Wherever you'd like,” she said.

“I'd like to sleep at home.”

“That's fine,” she said, as if we were discussing pizza toppings. “Ask Ted if he'd like to join us.” Ted said no, of course, but I told him that I would serve as the advance force. (I think he understands these things better in video-game language.)

“Hello, are you still there?” Mel's voice echoed in my ear. I'd almost forgotten her on the other end of the phone line.

“Listen, I'm not hanging out with Amanda anymore and I'm sorry I treated you so badly and I hate fighting with you.” I said all that in one breath, not giving myself a chance to chicken out.

She was quiet for a minute and I could almost see her biting her bottom lip, considering. “How's the belly button ring?” she asked, finally.

“I took it out. It killed whenever I did up my jeans.”

Mel cracked up, and it appeared that I was forgiven.

Forgiveness seemed to be coming easily — almost too easily.

After the scene with Amanda in the parking lot of the church, I'd kept my word and not mentioned being mean to Dodie. Still, Ms. Samuels caught me after class one morning.

“We've all said things we regret,” she said softly. “But Dodie's been troubled for a long time.”

I shrugged, but as soon as she said Dodie's name, my eyes started to water.

“This isn't your fault,” she continued, touching me on the shoulder.

I nodded and turned to go, then changed my mind. “It's not that it's my fault, necessarily,” I said quietly. “It's just that I made this situation worse. Maybe I could have made it better.”

“Caz…one more thing,” she said as I turned to go. “I think your art teacher would
like to speak with you. We're putting together a memorial display and he would like to include one of your sketches.”

I knew which one it was without asking. It was a charcoal portrait of Dodie in her new shirt, ripped sleeve included. I had drawn it in the days between her death and the funeral.

I nodded. When Ms. Samuels had gone, I collapsed into a chair and plunked my forehead down on the table. My chest hurt. It was as if my throat had grown smaller on the day Dodie died, leaving only a straw width for air to pass through. Every time I managed to suck in a breath, I sucked in guilt.

“I'm a terrible person,” I muttered to the table.

Suddenly I heard a chair creak. I looked up to find Rob gazing at me — directly at me. Rob never looked directly at anyone.

“I didn't know you were here,” I said.

“You're not so bad. Not terrible. I think you're good underneath,” he said.

Stunned, I looked behind me to see if anyone else had witnessed him speaking. There was no one there.

“I thought you didn't talk,” I said stupidly. Rob looked at me for another minute, silent. Slowly, he started rocking again, his finger tapping on the table.

I repeated his assessment in my head. “You're not so bad. I think you're good underneath.” Was it true? It hadn't been true lately. As I sat there, my throat seemed to open up a notch and I took a deep breath.

Maybe I could make it true.

Tanya Lloyd Kyi
grew up in Creston, British Columbia, where someone she knew once punched a hockey player, inspiring the opening scene of
My Time as Caz Hazard
. Tanya has worked as a waitress, an aerobics instructor, a newspaper reporter and a graphic designer. She now lives with her family in Vancouver, British Columbia. She is the author of
Truth, Crystal Connection, Canadian Girls Who Rocked the World
and
Fires!

NEW Orca Soundings novel

Cody Dillon comes and rescues me (RESCUES ME!). He takes me to his apartment (HIS OWN APARTMENT!) and runs me a bubble bath. He lights a bunch of candles and turns the light off. He sits on the floor and keeps me company. He says I can stay here as long as I want. Um, hello, heaven? Izzy McAfferty has arrived, in case anyone wants to know
.

Izzy's mother works far away and leaves Izzy at home, alone with Rob the Slob. Angry at her mother and trying to deal with school, friends and the attentions of charismatic Cody Dillon, Izzy finds her life swirling out of control. After “borrowing” money from her mother's boyfriend she is forced to leave home until she can repay it. Ending up with Cody and living in the city, Izzy makes misguided choices that are all wrong.

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