Pieces of Us (24 page)

Alex

I
don’t know who I am around her anymore, whether I’m playing a part or it’s me. So I try to forget her. Picture other girls when we’re fucking. Last night never happened. Went to a club tonight and grinded under the lights. The music was loud and pussy after pussy rubbed against me. This was the life. None of those bitches mattered. One dragged me outside and pushed me against the wall to blow me. I pulled at her hair. She acted like she liked it. Then she had the nerve to try to kiss me after, like I’d like the taste. I pushed her away and went to my car. “Thanks,” I said, and she stuck up her middle finger at me. Stupid slut.

I get back to the cottage at one, and Katie is waiting on the back stoop. She’s wearing sweats and one of those thin long-sleeved shirts that do nothing against the cold Catskill nights. She doesn’t shiver, doesn’t even seem to know where she is. It starts to rain.

“You lost?” I’m nothing if not funny.

She laughs quietly. “For a long time.”

The rain is cold and my ass is freezing. “I’m going inside.”

She nods but makes no show of moving. The rain clings to her clothes, making them look painted on. It weighs her hair down, too. I don’t know the last time I really looked at her. There seems to be less to look at. Less hair. More bones. Like an anorexic in recovery. Fuck. Her face is shadowed, which is good because I don’t want to see it.

I go inside, thinking she’ll follow, but she doesn’t move. Doesn’t even seem like she’s breathing. I don’t need this. I go outside and pick her up. Shit, my pinkies could carry her. I lay her on my bed and back away when I see her face in the light. Makeup streaming down reveals black and blues, swelling. Fuck. I don’t want to know how that happened.

She curls into a ball, spooking me out. I rummage through my drawers and find a sweatshirt and pants that will fall off her skeletal body, but they’re better than what she’s wearing now.

I’d tell her to take a shower and warm herself up, but the way she lies there, barely moving, I think she’d drown. Why are girls so crazy?

“Put these on,” I say, tossing the dry clothes on the bed. “I’m going to make tea.”

She doesn’t move. Fuck, what if she took something? I don’t need that on my conscience. I put on the kettle and get cookies out too. There’s soft murmuring in my room and I peek in. My grandmother is stroking Katie’s hair, helping her out of the soaked clothes. I walk back to the kitchen and grab the cookies and then make my way to the bedroom. My grandmother sees me and she pulls Katie close to her and waves me away, a look of disgust on her face. Why is everything my fault? The girl could have said no. I didn’t break her.

In the kitchen, I wait until the water boils and then put the flame on low. I know I should leave, but I can’t block out the glimpse I just caught of her body. Fresh cuts with trickling blood. So bony and bruised. Like a pile of broken bones. Like the carcasses.

I want her to get up. To be like those headless chickens who flew circles around my head. But she doesn’t even move. Fuckin’ A.

Katie

At first

I want to take pebbles with me

or water from the creek, sealed in Tupperware

I sit on the grass

and wait

for my parents to come get me

I don’t know how long it is

but then

I hear their voices

from the bottom of the hill

tired, angry, annoyed

I think at me.

Julie disappeared

Ashamed

I’m sure to have more of my stench on her

Scared probably

that it would become a part of her clothes and skin

forever

A sick part of me wants Alex

Still thinks he’ll look at me like he once did

I clutch the stones harder

hoping to leave their imprint on my palm

Something

to remember this place by

My father

Holds my hand tight

Like he thinks I will flee

But I chickened out long ago

There are no more Katie/Katya games to play

Neither girl wants to fight anymore

I slump low in the car seat

Up the gravel

to the highway

I think

of opening the door and jumping

to be one with the SWOOSH

I close my eyes and pretend

I’m in the small space beside the road

I venture past the line

I’m gone

Kyle

T
hanks to the school calendar, your mother lets you stay an extra week at the lake house. “Lets,” like you want to stay there. More like she wants the extra time for herself.

You would rather leave. It’s dark here. When you ask your grandmother what happened, she pales. Says Katie looked just like your father in the last days. “Just like your father.” Your grandmother mumbles the words to you, screams them to Alex. She and your grandfather walk around like your father has died all over again. Is that what will happen? Will that be Katie’s fate?

Alex won’t tell you what happened. Slams the door each time your grandmother mentions her name. This morning, he packed all his things and threw them into the car. Didn’t even think to say good-bye to you or say he’d come back to get you.

When he leaves, your grandparents don’t say good-bye to him, either. They shake their heads, faces painted in disappointment, but they seem lighter, too, once the sound of his car is no longer heard.

Julie says she knows nothing. Her grandfather finally says you can go berry-picking with him. You are out from sunrise until noon. You speak only about the berries. When you’re on your way home and the sun burns your back and the heat is causing the smell of dead, rotting flesh to waft down to the willow trees, he tells you Katie was sent away. No, not home. A place. Don’t call her. Don’t see her. Not for a long time.

Julie

K
atie is gone. Alex is gone. Just Kyle and me, with all this opportunity to talk, and he spends the last week of summer hiding out in his cottage or throwing pebbles in the creek.

Tonight I make my move. There’s nothing else to lose. “Hey,” I say, forcing my mouth open, emerging from my hiding spot behind the willow tree.

He jumps. I like that I made that happen. “Hi,” he says. Plop, plop, plop. For one second my heart thumps with hope. Then I remember him and Katie by the dumpster and it slows down. I wonder if it will stop beating.

Then he looks at me, searching my face for information. Of course he wouldn’t be happy to see me—not unless he thought I finally had something to share with him about Katie. My heart grows icicles but I play dumb, forcing my words to drip honey. “How have you been?”

He throws a pebble from one hand to the other, like a boy just learning to juggle. “Been better.” The pebble falls and he picks up another. “You?”

I smile wide, just to see his reaction. “Just fine.” He takes a step back. I like that my fake cheeriness bothers him.

He turns away again and faces the water, shoulders slumping. I fight the urge to hug him. He digs up a large rock with the tip of his sandal and throws it into the water. Huge splash. “Have you heard from her?” he asks, voice low. He doesn’t look at me.

I want to say, “From who?” but that’s childish. Another icicle cools my heart. “She wouldn’t call me.” And before he can ask if maybe she called someone else, I add, “And no one tells me anything, anyway.” Most likely because I show no interest. My grandmother came close to saying something once when Mama was visiting, but she stopped her. Mama wants to forget the whole thing. I heard her tell Babushka that Katie was a drama queen. Not like Julie. Julie’s got a good head on her shoulders.

Kyle drops a few more pebbles into the water. He turns to face me again. “Well, if you hear from her, tell her I said hi.” I see his eyes tear up and he turns away.

That’s more than I can take. He never got me. Was just like Derek, falling for Katie’s act. I leave him there and walk out to where my phone has a signal.

I text Alex—the one person who probably feels like me.

Alex

~
Philadelphia, PA
~

M
y buddy Greg tosses me a beer and turns on the tube.

“Dude,” he says, taking a large swig, “I don’t know if I should bow to you or commit you for stupidity.” He lets out a large belch of punctuation, adding fumes to the already rancid-smelling basement.

“What are you talking about?” I chug my beer and let loose my own belch that shakes the room.

“The sister conquest. One down, on to the next. How did you get around that loyalty pact sisters have?”

I clench my beer. “Wasn’t an issue.”
She
texted
me
. Sexted me. And I’m only human.

Greg finishes his can and does a lay-up into the trash. “That’s what I’m talking about,” he yells when it goes in. “Hooyah!” He high-fives me. Loser.

I flip channels until a football game comes on. The players ram into each other. Man down. He lies unmoving and I suck in air.

“Shit, that had to hurt,” says Greg.

He gets back up and limps to the sidelines while the crowd applauds. I breathe again.

“You going to tap that?”

“What makes you think I haven’t?” I pound another beer.

Greg laughs. “Because even you aren’t that crazy. I mean, fuck, didn’t her sister go psycho?”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” I stare at the television.

Greg shrugs. “I know what I heard. You have some power over women.”

A commercial for Fruit Loops comes on. I raise the volume.

Greg laughs. “How’s that for irony?” He points to the screen. When I don’t say anything, he says, “Fruit Loops. Psycho. Get it?”

“Can you just shut the fuck up?”

“Whoa, a bit touchy aren’t we, Alexandra? Is it that time of the month?”

I punch him too hard on the arm and he winces in pain. “That manly enough for you?” I ask.

He puts his hands up. “Look, dude, all I’m saying is that the Julie chick is a virgin, right? If her sister has crazy genes, odds are she does, too. You can’t just fuck a virgin and split. They’re nuts, man. I’m not making that mistake twice. Fucking stalkers.”

“Thanks for the tip.” I lower the volume as the game comes on.

I feel Greg looking at me but keep my eyes on the players slamming each other. He’s not wrong, though, about the crazy part. You gotta be, right? To text the guy who put your sister in the loony bin? And what does it say about the guy who doesn’t push the sister away?

Finally Greg says, “Listen, man, did you love that Katie bitch? I thought she was a skank like the rest of them. I mean, I’ve seen that video.”

I chug another beer. “She was.” Another one and another and another until I puke and everything goes black.