The Perfectionists (4 page)

Josh said a few more things into the phone, and finally, Caitlin slapped her arms to her sides and crossed the parking lot without him. She could do the walk to her brother's grave blindfolded: twenty paces from the car, left for thirty-three paces, and then down a little aisle next to a gravestone with a statue of a German shepherd on top of it. Tommy Maroney, who died at an appropriate age of eighty-five, had raised German shepherd champions.

And there it was:
TAYLOR ANTHONY MARTELL-LEWIS
. He died two days after his fifteenth birthday.

“Hey,” she said softly, pausing to kick off a few dried leaves from the grave. “Sorry it's been a couple weeks. I've been busy. And this crazy ankle kept me off my feet.” She held up her leg for him to see.

A gust of wind kicked up, blowing her hair into her face. Caitlin took a breath. “So I guess you heard?” she said softly. “I mean, who knows? Maybe you've . . .
seen
Nolan, wherever you are now. Although I seriously hope not.” She stared at her fingers. “Look, I don't know what you can see up there, wherever you are, and maybe you saw me . . . with him . . . that night. But I did it for you. He couldn't get away with it.”

She paused, just like she always did, pretending that Taylor, who was always so thoughtful and introspective, was taking a moment to let this sink in. Then she cleared her throat again. “I don't feel bad for what happened, though. And I don't agree with what Mom said. It wasn't enough for Nolan to live with what happened. He needed to pay.”

If he could still speak, Caitlin was sure Taylor would second her opinion that what happened to Nolan was karma. When she came home from practice one day to find a suicide note on Taylor's bedroom door, she'd been blindsided. Later that same night, Caitlin had gone into his room, which still smelled like him, and found a journal sitting in plain view on the bed:
Reasons Death Is Better Than School
, it was called. She'd opened to the first page.
September 17: Someone put a bag of dog poop in my locker. Have a feeling it was N. September 30: N and his buddies stole my clothes during gym and stuffed them in the toilet. I smelled like bleach all afternoon. October 8: Girls laughing at me in bio today. Turns out someone wrote a letter to Casey Ryan, the hottest girl in my class, and signed my name on it.

The worst part of it was that Caitlin hadn't even
seen
it happening . . . and they went to the
same school.
She'd been too busy with soccer and Josh to worry. Taylor never came to her, either. He never complained during family dinners or on weekends. He just . . .
endured
it, until he broke.

Hot tears pricked her eyes. “I'm so sorry,” she choked out, staring at her brother's grave, the guilt washing over her anew. “I wish I'd known. I wish I hadn't been so selfish.”

“Cate?”

Caitlin jumped and looked over. A tall guy in rumpled skinny jeans and a gray T-shirt was walking toward her. For a moment, she thought he was Josh, but then she realized he was Jeremy Friday—Josh's younger brother.

“H-hey,” she said. “W-what are you doing here?”

Jeremy gave her a sad smile. “Probably the same thing you are.”

Caitlin blinked. Right. Jeremy and Taylor had been friends. Whenever the families had dinner together, they'd disappear and play video games for hours.

Jeremy crouched down next to Taylor's headstone and positioned a tiny figurine on the top. “There you go, buddy,” he said softly. He moved to the back of the headstone and plucked several more figures from the ground. Though they were faded and muddy, he propped them back up next to the new one. Caitlin had always wondered who brought those figurines.

“Is that a character from
Dragon Ball Z?
” she said.

Jeremy glanced at her. “How did you know that?”

She felt her cheeks redden. “I might have watched an episode or fifty with Taylor. Just to keep him company or whatever.”

“Not because you actually
liked
it,” Jeremy joked, a smile on his face. “You know, it's okay to say you like anime. The stories are amazing. Way better than American cartoons.”

“Agreed,” Caitlin admitted, remembering how much she used to enjoy watching the episodes with her brother. They'd settled on the couch together, sharing a bowl of Parmesan-and-pepper-covered popcorn and discussing what crazy machine they'd have the inventor character Bulma build for them. “Do you still watch it?” she asked.

“Sure, though it's only available online or on DVD these days,” Jeremy said. He peeked at her. “If you're ever in the mood, I'm game.”

Caitlin's face reddened again. “Oh, no. That's okay.”

Jeremy looked at her evenly. “I get it. It's not really Josh's thing.”

Caitlin lowered her head. She wanted to tell him she didn't do everything with Josh, but that wasn't really true.

She looked at Jeremy again. His features looked a lot like Josh's—they both had the same honey-brown eyes, the same high cheekbones, but Jeremy's face was sharper, his chin and nose more pointed. The two of them were so different, Josh sporty and Mr. Popular, Jeremy a lot like Taylor—quiet, introspective, more into books than sports. Whenever she was at the Fridays', he would sit at the end of the dinner table reading while Josh and his buddies played
Madden
.

It was strange. When they'd been kids, Caitlin and Jeremy had shared a tent on camping vacations and spent hours together in the back of the car playing I Spy. Now they were almost strangers.

She cleared her throat and looked at the action figures, then at Jeremy. “You come here a lot, huh?”

Jeremy nodded. “I try to come every week.”

Caitlin felt more tears rush to her eyes. “You do?”

“Of course I do,” Jeremy said, pushing his hands in his pockets. “I miss him.” Then he cocked his head at her. “Aren't you supposed to be at soccer right now?”

Caitlin lowered her shoulders. “I pissed off the coach.” She looked at her brother's grave again. “And then I just needed to talk to him.”

“I know the feeling,” Jeremy said softly.

She swallowed hard. “Sometimes I'm not sure I'll
ever
get over it, you know.”

Jeremy squinted. “Maybe you don't have to. And maybe that's okay.”

It was the most perfect thing he could have said to her. It was what she always wanted
Josh
to say. “Thank you,” she said softly.

Jeremy looked surprised. “For what?”

Caitlin shrugged. “For coming here. For saying hi to Taylor. For
understanding.
”

“Well. You're welcome.” Jeremy stood up and brushed off his pants. “I should probably go.”

Caitlin nodded, and before she could overthink it, she threw her arms around Jeremy and hugged him. After a moment, he hugged her back. And as she stood there, warm in his embrace, she realized that it was the first time since her brother died that she didn't feel so terribly alone.

EARLY THURSDAY EVENING, MACKENZIE WRIGHT
, dressed in a patchwork skirt with her long, unruly blond hair clipped back from her face, sat in the passenger seat of her best friend Claire Coldwell's car, humming along to Dvořák's
New World
Symphony. Mrs. Rabinowitz, their Honors Orchestra conductor, insisted they live, breathe, and sleep the piece until their upcoming concert. Mackenzie absentmindedly moved her fingers along with the melody, as if her cello were right there in front of her rather than tucked in the hatchback of Claire's blue Ford Escape.

“Hello? Earth to Mackenzie.” Claire waved a hand in front of Mackenzie's glasses.

Mackenzie snapped to focus, realizing that Claire had been talking to her. “Oh, sorry. I'm kind of out of it today.”

Claire glanced at Mac sympathetically, her perfectly pink lips pressed together. “Me too,” she confided. “That assembly about Nolan was so awful. I can't get over that he's just . . .
gone.
”

Mackenzie glanced out the window, staring at the too-green front lawns of the passing houses. Nolan might be gone, but there were reminders of him
everywhere—
photos of him on the walls, news programs about his “accidental overdose,” the morning announcements saying that his funeral was on Sunday, just three days from now. And that assembly,
ugh.
The principal had shown the pictures of Nolan's marked-up face that
Mac
herself had posted anonymously from an internet café. Leave it to Beacon High, pressure cooker of all pressure cookers, to even make a memorial assembly intense.

But most intense were Mackenzie's own memories of that night. “Can we change the subject?” she mumbled.

“Sure. Have you heard back about your audition schedule yet?” Claire said.

The word
audition
sent another spike of fear through Mackenzie's heart like a shard of ice. Claire was talking about the Juilliard audition. “Um, yeah. It's the Friday after next. Five
PM
.”

“Yeah?” Claire straightened up, tossing her short, curly bob. It was a style that would look horrible on Mac but looked pixie-like and adorable on Claire. The hint of a smirk danced across Claire's face. “Me too. Except I'm at four. Right before you, I guess.”

Beads of sweat broke out along the back of Mackenzie's neck. Mac and Claire had met as five-year-olds at a music camp for precocious preschoolers and had been inseparable ever since. Claire was übercompetitive with Mackenzie, always trying to beat her out for first chair or dictating what they did every Friday night, but she was also the only person Mackenzie had anything in common with—even with all the pressure to be perfect at Beacon Heights High, not many people could understand the sacrifices they had to make for music. They shared everything: which boy they had secret crushes on, which music teachers they hated—how, sometimes, they didn't feel like playing at all.

Now they were both vying to get a spot at Juilliard, though the conservatory had never taken two cellists from the same school before. More than likely, there wouldn't be room for both. And given everything that had happened with them in the past year, Mackenzie wasn't sure she wanted there to be.

“Here we are.” Claire pulled over outside Cupcake Kingdom, a popular spot in Beacon Heights, right on the town square. The afternoon rain had slackened, but the pavement was still wet and slick, and the trees and streetlights dripped water to the sidewalk below in arrhythmic patterns. “Have fun at band practice.”

“Thanks for the ride,” Mackenzie said, opening the door to the backseat and carefully sliding out her cello case. Her parents had promised to buy her a top-quality professional instrument from Germany if she got into Juilliard—she'd need one if she was going to play with professionals—but she loved her current cello. She knew every little scratch and scuff in the glossy maple wood, every weird quirk it had. She'd even given it a name: Moomintroll.

“Anytime!” Claire yelled out the window. “Tell Blake I love him!”

“Right, I'll be sure to do that,” Mackenzie mumbled as Claire zoomed off.

Then she looked in the window of Cupcake Kingdom. And there he was, wiping off the counter, looking sexy even in a pink-and-white-striped apron. Blake Strustek, the reason for Claire and Mac's friend-mageddon.

Mac had become friends with Blake in junior high and joined his band, Black Lodge. They practiced weekly, but it was only in sophomore year that Mac realized she liked him as
more
than a friend . . . though she had no idea what to do with that. She stayed late at band practice, went out of her way to be in his ensembles for chamber music festivals, and at strings camp she'd linger near him every opportunity she got. The only person she confessed her crush to was Claire.

That was why it'd been such a shock when Claire came to her last year during the orchestra's trip to Disneyland. “Blake just kissed me,” she'd announced breathlessly. “I didn't kiss him back, because I know
you
like him, too.”

“Like him,
too
?” Mackenzie had echoed hollowly, thinking of Blake with his wide, curving lips, his thick, shaggy hair. His pale blue eyes, long-lashed and intense. Mackenzie had liked him forever, yes, but Claire had never mentioned liking him, too. Not ever.

“I'll just tell him no, right? That you like him, so even though I really, really like him, too, it'd be weird if we went out?” Claire went on.

“
No!
” Mackenzie had gasped, mortified. The only thing worse than Claire liking Blake was Blake knowing Mac liked him. “It's fine . . . ,” she said haltingly. “You should go for it.”

It's better this way, and you know it,
Mackenzie told herself. Boys were a distraction from what really mattered. But that didn't mean she'd totally forgiven Claire. Claire was supposed to be her
best
friend, her confidante. Claire should have known better.

Blake noticed Mac and opened the door. “Hey. You coming?”

She pointed at the cupcake on his torso. “Nice apron,” she teased.

Blake scoffed. “Hey. It takes a secure man to wear a pink cupcake on his chest.” He reached behind him and started to untie the strings. “Come on in. I'm just closing up, and then we can head back.”

She followed him into the shop, which resembled a Candy Land game board. The walls were painted with pink glitter. Bright-colored prints hung everywhere, with sayings like
LET THEM EAT CUPCAKES!
and
LIFE IS SWEET!
in simple fonts. Two vintage bistro tables sat under frosted-glass sconces, and a warm, buttery aroma set her mouth watering. In the glass case counter, a handful of beautiful frosted cupcakes sat in long rows. The “flavors” all had names like “The Fat Elvis” or “The Cherry Bomb.” The cupcakes were pretty picked-over—it looked like they'd almost sold out over the course of the day—but the leftover ones still looked scrumptious.