What Remains (7 page)

He sits there while the sounds of the rehearsal seep under the door. He doesn't press me to say anything else, which is good because I don't think I can talk about it. Not even with him.

But of course he says the only thing that could possibly make it okay for Lizzie's heart to be beating inside of me: “That sounds like a Lizzie thing, you know,” he says with a forced smile. “She'd like the idea of haunting you.”

It makes me smile a little too because it's so true. Lizzie would love the idea of making me squirm for the rest of my life.

I know I should let him go back to rehearsal. He's got the lead and I'm not sure how much they can do without him. My anger at him is gone and suddenly I'm just really, really tired.

Plus there's another conversation I need to have. And not with him.

“Will you pick me up for school tomorrow?” I ask.

He relaxes and smiles with relief, which makes me relax a little too. “Of course. Usual time?”

“Yeah. Thanks.” I get up. I'm still a bit shaky and put my hand out to pull him up.

He takes it and looks at me like he's trying to figure out if we're really okay or not.

“Sorry for interrupting rehearsal,” I say.

“No, that's fine. I'm sorry for … you know,” he says as he turns to the door. “Hey, Cal?”

I just look at him, wondering what he sees now when he looks at me.

“Don't be too hard on your parents.”

I can't reply, so I just shrug and turn to walk away.

The thought of going back to class to try to memorize the greatest hits of European History makes me feel like my head is going to explode. Instead I head to Lizzie's locker and stand in front of the gray metal. I reach out and lay my hand on it and it's cold under my skin, which, for some reason, brings tears to my eyes. I grab at the lock and spin the dial to open it. She always used Spencer's birthday as her combination, but then she knew my combo too (6-23-20, the uniform numbers of my favorite Tigers, and Spencer's 22-2-45, the address of his favorite Broadway theater) and we were always in and out of each other's lockers. I only want one thing; I want to see her painting. I want to feel close to her. But as I'm dialing, a picture springs into my head of her shivering in a locker-sized box in the cemetery and I can feel my lunch threatening to come back up.

I drop the lock like it's a line drive and head to the nurse's office to tell them I'm feeling tired—a gross understatement—and think I should go home. I let them poke and prod me a bit. The nurse watches as I call a cab to take me to the house. Mom is in court so there's no chance of reaching her, but they leave my dad's assistant an urgent message that I'm sure will get his attention.

Ten

When I get home I park myself on the couch in the living room, but leave the lights off. For once what I'm afraid of isn't the stuff I
don't
know; it's the stuff I
do
know. I can't say why I didn't think to ask where my donated heart came from. There's been so much going on, so much to get used to. It makes me feel selfish to think I didn't wonder. But that doesn't absolve my parents for not telling me that I was walking around with Lizzie's heart inside me.

The shadows change as the last bits of daylight move across the room. Finally a car pulls up and my dad's keys jangle in the door. He comes in and flips on the light, looking a little bit relieved, like he thought he was going to come home and find me dead on the floor.

“Hey champ, the school called. Are you feeling all right?”

I don't give him a chance to take his coat off. I move in front of him, realizing that we're the same height now. Part of me wants to settle this like a man and take a swing at him. But I can't; he's still my dad.

Instead I push a finger into his chest. Surprised, he backs up against the door.

“Her heart? Of all the people in the world, they gave me Lizzie's heart and you didn't even fucking tell me?” I don't think I've ever sworn at my dad and he looks completely shocked. He tenses and I think he's going to fight back. But then his shoulders slump and he gently moves my arm away.

“Cal. Look.”

“No, you look,” I say, pacing around the living room like a caged tiger. “She was my friend. One of my best friends in the world. And you and Mom didn't think it was important to tell me that it's her heart that's keeping me alive?” My blood pressure is going through the roof just like it isn't supposed to do and I take a deep breath to try to calm myself until I hear his answer.

“Of course, we know it's important. We know how close you were.”

This does it. This pushes me over the edge that I've barely been hanging onto. “No. You don't know. How can you know? Neither of you have really been here enough to know. Did you know that Lizzie's mom was a drunk and allowed her series of loser boyfriends to hurt her own daughter? Did you know that? Did you know that Spencer and I used to go over there and break up the fights and drag Lizzie out of there? Did you know that we've had to take her to the hospital more than once? Did you know that?” The words are pouring out of me like they can't escape fast enough. Blood rushes in front of my eyes. I'm breaking every rule that the doctor gave me and I don't really care if I drop dead here in the middle of the living room. It would serve them all right.

Dad goes pale and looks like he's going to be sick. He's afraid of me and right now he should be.

“We knew her mother drank, but no, Cal. We … ” He fumbles for words, but I don't care what he has to say.

I poke him in the chest again to emphasis each word. “Then. Do. Not. Tell. Me. You. Knew. How. Close. We. Were.” I spin around to keep from slamming his head into the wall. I'm shaking and the tears start, but I don't want him to see them. I don't want to be the one who backs down. Not this time. “You didn't know anything.”

I stand there, facing the window, on the verge of sobbing, trying to catch my breath. Dad comes up behind me, but wisely doesn't touch me. I feel coiled as tight as a spring. The slightest thing will make all of this anger explode.

“We weren't keeping this from you. We just wanted to wait until you were stronger.”

I turn around and clasp my hands together like I used to when I was a little kid and Mom would take me to stores filled with glass things. She taught me to keep my hands away from anything fragile. Anything that can break. Anything I can smash.

Dad stares, pleading with me to understand, to forgive. But I don't. I can't. I've spent a month wondering if I was losing my mind, not able to tell anyone about the dreams and the voices. Figuring that I deserved them after what I'd done to Lizzie. But now I know differently. This is all her. And as much as I try, I'm not a little kid any more. And it's too late to keep me from breaking anything. Lizzie is proof of that.

I do my homework and go to bed before Mom even comes home. I turn on the nightstand light and then turn it off, and then turn it on again. It's like an SOS signal, only there's no one out there to see it. For once the light isn't helping. I don't know what to do to keep the shadows at bay when they're already inside me, beating like a badly timed drum.

Stars and planets glow on my ceiling. I put them up there sometime in middle school and never took them down. I spent weeks getting the configurations right and to be honest, I've sometimes wondered what it would be like to make out with a girl, Ally really, under these stars. I wonder if wishes on plastic stars can still come true.

But the only girl who has ever been in my room is Lizzie and she doesn't really count. She thought the stars were just some sort of bullshit nightlight.

I must fall asleep at some point because the next thing I know, I bolt straight up in bed and hear noise down the hall. Mom and Dad aren't exactly arguing but their voices are tense and loud in the way they get when they're upset, but self-aware enough to know it and trying to be quiet.

My shirt is damp with sweat, so I pull it off. The L-shaped scar that runs around my chest is so ugly I can't stand to look at it. The edges are puckered and red. The doctors say it will fade with time but for now I look like the monster I am.

It's weird to think that somewhere under my skin is Lizzie's heart beating away inside me. Even thinking about it gives me chills so I put my shirt back on and reach my hand under the bed for my baseball mitt.

The leather is warm and smells like summer, freshly mowed grass, and sweat. It's the one I was going to keep for … it doesn't matter anymore. Still, it feels good to have it on. If I close my eyes and run my hands over the worn laces, I can pretend for a minute that none of this has happened. That the season will start soon and that my biggest decision is going to be whether to play college ball or pray for a minor league contract.

I fall asleep that way. Holding onto the glove like a security blanket. I'm still wearing it when my mom comes in and wakes me up in the middle of the night. I don't think she means to because she's just sitting there, but it's like her thoughts are loud enough to pull me out of whatever thankfully dreamless sleep I've taken refuge in.

“I'm sorry, honey,” she says when I open my eyes. “I'm sorry that we didn't know what was going on with Lizzie, and I'm sorry that we didn't tell you what happened.”

My mouth opens and then closes. I'm more tired and sad than I am angry at this point. I know she really
is
sorry, but there's nothing I can say.

“When they brought you all into the hospital, everything happened very quickly. Lizzie was a registered organ donor, but because she was a minor they needed her mother's approval,” Mom says.

“That nutcase actually agreed to do something nice for someone?” I can't imagine Lizzie's mom approving of anything like that.

Mom gives me a look like she's going to tell me to watch my mouth, but she holds back.

“I think her mother's specific words were that she didn't care one way or the other.” Mom's mouth tightens when she admits this and I'm sure that bit of honesty cost her something. I want to ask if Lizzie's mom was drunk at the time, but as she's pretty much drunk all the time, it's a fair bet she was and it doesn't really matter. Ultimately, it was Lizzie's choice, which is the only thing out of all this craziness that makes me feel a little bit better.

“Spencer knew because he was the one who brought Lizzie's mom to the hospital after he was checked out. There wasn't a lot of time and we didn't want to leave you. Don't be mad at him, honey. He's a good friend.”

I smile a little because it's a silly thing for her to be telling me. “No, Mom, it's okay. Spencer and I are fine.”

She nods. “Good. And we would have told you, too. It's just that you've been through so much and I can only imagine … ” She stops and puts her hand on my wrist, the one that still has the mitt on it, and looks at me like she's really seeing me for the first time in forever. “No … sorry. I can't really imagine what you're feeling. It's hard sometimes for parents to understand that their kids aren't really kids anymore. But I hope you know that we love you. And that we're here for you.”

I choke up a little. This is the most I've heard my mom say in a while that didn't involve notes about keeping my grades up, reminders about changing the oil in the car, or apologies for not making it to my games.

“Thanks,” I manage to squeak out.

She gets up to leave and then turns back and takes a card out of her pocket. She looks at it, and then at me, and then back at the card. There's a long pause and then she places it on the nightstand. “Cal, do me one favor. Think about calling Dr. Reynolds. It can't hurt to talk to someone.” And then she leaves without waiting for an answer.

I put my glove back under the bed and pick up the card. It's totally official-looking and kind of imposing. Even though I can't imagine why I'd need to talk to anyone other than Spencer about what's going on, I slip it into my mitt so that I'll know where it is. If I need it.

Eleven

There's an old maple near the middle school that Spencer, Lizzie, and I carved our names into when we were in seventh grade. Spencer worried that we might damage the tree, but Lizzie was insistent that we do it and, for once, I sided with her against Spencer. I liked the idea of permanence.

We stand in front of it now, me and Spencer, marveling at how much that tree has grown. Even I have to reach up to touch the names we carved with the pocket knife I'd swiped from my dad.

“I never thought we'd end up like this,” Spencer says. “I mean, just the two of us.”

A breeze picks up and rustles the leaves of the tree, allowing the light to bounce off Spencer's hair. As I watch, the sunshine turns to snow—big, golfball-sized flakes that seem too large to be real.

Spencer leans into me and I can feel his warmth. It's like a fire when you've been freezing, a steak when you've been starving. It fills me until I'm no longer empty.

We stand there, silent, snow falling around our feet until I'm not sure we'll be able to move. Maybe we'll be stuck here next to this old tree for all eternity. I link my arm through Spencer's and the snow starts to fall faster, obscuring my view of everything except the tree and the boy next to me.

“Maybe we shouldn't be here,” I say.

Spencer turns to me. He lifts my collar up but leaves his hand, hot, on my neck.

“It doesn't matter where we are, so long as we're together.” He leans in, lips parted. His breath is warm enough to melt the snow as it falls, but I shiver anyhow. Shiver hard enough to wake up.

Fucking Lizzie and her dreams.

I try to get back to sleep, but can't get comfortable and just toss and turn. I can't sleep on my stomach or my side like I usually do because of the incision and I've never really liked sleeping on my back. Plus, there's this train that keeps running through my head and the wheels are making that
clack, clack
sound over and over. Lizzie's heart is beating so loudly that it's filling my ears. It gets like this sometimes. Like she wants something, only she's asking for it in a language I can't understand.

Finally I haul myself out of bed and boot up my computer. I'm not sure what to search for. I just feel like there has to be an explanation out there somewhere.

A quick search tells me that the average heart of a
seventeen-year-old girl weighs less than a pound.

I type in “organ donation” but get all sorts of legal stuff. Then “Who can donate organs?” but it basically tells me what I already knew, that Lizzie's mom had to agree because Lizzie was under eighteen. I read through all the pages about how normally donated organs would go onto the national registry that Jessica was talking about, so that the organs go to the people who need them most. I guess I understand now why she seemed so pissed at me. Sometimes people have to wait years on the list. Some even die before an organ match is found.

I don't know who would have gotten Lizzie's heart had it not gone to me. And it's strange to think that there might be other bits of her scattered around in other people. Are they feeling her as strongly inside them as I am, or am I the only one hearing her voice because I knew her so well? Or because she knew me?

I click on “directed donation” and find out that it
means you give an organ to someone specifically and
bypass the registry. Usually this happens when someone gives their sister a kidney or something like that. It doesn't really come into play when someone dies out of the blue. But I guess, in a way, that's what happened to me.

I skip all the parts about survival rates and problems with donated organs being rejected. Somehow I know that my body isn't going to reject Lizzie's heart and not just because I'm being pumped full of drugs to make sure that doesn't happen.

But reading through the information, I'm amazed at all of the ways that things could have gone wrong. Really, the odds of my getting Lizzie's heart were less than the odds of my being hit by lightning. I mean, first of all she had to be there, and be in the correct condition to donate. Then someone had to get her drunken mother there in time and talk her into signing the papers.

And then there are the really hard things. The fact that Lizzie was a tiny bird girl compared to me and that the doctors like the recipient to be the same general size as the donor. And our blood types needed to be the same, which they were. I didn't even know that before.

Next I come across posts about something called cellular memory. It's only a theory really, and I hate theories. But I have to pay attention to this one. It basically says that memories aren't only stored in your brain; they're stored in the cells of your other organs as well.

Like your heart.

So the theory is that when you get someone else's organ, you get their memories. Or at least their likes and dislikes.

Some of the stories I read are funny. There's a guy in Ohio who got a kidney from a girl in Kansas. The girl was some sort of mushroom expert and this guy, who had always hated mushrooms, suddenly wanted them at every meal.

But some of the stories aren't so funny. One is about a guy who got the heart of someone who'd been murdered. And now he was having nightmares about being chased through the woods by a masked killer with a knife.

The articles start to creep me out, so I turn on the rest of the lights in the room, but it really doesn't help. I should shut my computer, but can't look away. Even more, I know Spencer was right. Lizzie would be eating all of this up—she'd totally love it. The freak-out factor would have her researching donated organs for weeks and tormenting me about my loaner heart endlessly.

Something about that idea makes sense, though. Perhaps that's the only way she can still punish me for what I've done to her.

I think it's kind of funny that I don't have any of her tastes. I mean, I haven't suddenly started to listen to old 1960s protest songs and I haven't developed tastes for lacy clothes or rocky road ice cream.

And thankfully, aside from the vague whispers left by her dreams, I don't have any of her memories. I can't imagine having to relive all the crap that went on with her mom. Lizzie was way stronger than I am. I don't know how she put up with all that shit and I'm not sure I could do it. Not even now.

The one thing she hasn't let go of are her feelings for Spencer. I get it. But the dreams are making me crazy. And it isn't like I can just give up sleeping.

Lizzie's voice.
LIZZIE'S VOICE
is like some background noise in my head. What sucks the most is that I have no way of talking to her without feeling like a total idiot. I'd do anything to be able to tell her how sorry I am. I wouldn't even ask her to forgive me because I know that would be impossible. But I'd still want to tell her.

I'm so tired when my alarm goes off that I can barely force my eyes open. I'd love to ditch school today, but then I'd have to explain it to my teachers, and worse, to Spencer and I don't want to be that kid—the one too sick to come to class, the one who needs special considerations.

According to my calendar, the team is having fielding drills today in advance of next week's opening game. Just thinking about it makes my muscles want to make that throw to first. It's funny, I like batting. My average, which now might be frozen like I'm Babe Ruth or some other dead slugger, is .312. I'm one of the team's top hitters in a pretty competitive division, which is rare for a shortstop. But there is something about standing in the field, bent down, waiting for the pitch to be thrown, watching the concentration of the batter and that expectant feeling of waiting for the ball to be hit to me, that I really love. A perfectly turned double play, short-to-second-to-first, is one of the most beautiful things I can think of.

On the field, I'm not afraid of anything. Baseball makes me brave. I trust myself. I trust my teammates. When I'm out there during a game, I don't notice the spectators or anything else. It's just me and the ball and the machine that I form with the rest of the guys.

And now Justin Dillard will be taking my place at short and that thought kills me. It isn't only that I won't be playing, it's that
he
will. He can smack the hell out of a ball even if he can't field one effectively half the time. In fact, his average is only slightly lower than mine. I get that Coach Byrne really has no choice but to play him. That just doesn't make me feel any better.

Ultimately, it's personal.

Earlier this year we were doing these drills where you throw the ball while down on one knee one time, and then from a standing position the next, only you need to keep your body aligned with a stripe on the floor. It would have been fine. Boring, but fine. Except that Dillard kept deliberately throwing the ball slightly off so I had to get up and chase it down through the gym.

“Man, I wouldn't have thought that even you could get this rusty in just a couple of months.” Really I should have known better and just kept my mouth shut.

“Well, at least I know what side of the plate I'm batting from,” he sneered back at me. I knew his words had nothing to do with baseball.

I remember biting the inside of my cheek to keep from saying anything and whipping the ball at him hard enough that it forced him to take a few steps back. He was the loudest of those who still cared about keeping the gossip about me, Spencer, and Lizzie alive.

What really did it was his next comment.

“Cat got your tongue? Or perhaps you left it in Yeats' mouth.”

I was usually able to ignore Dillard's blather. But he pushed it when he mentioned Spencer, and it had been building up inside me for so long that I couldn't just write his words off as the same bullshit he was always spouting.

I landed a hell of a punch before Coach pulled me off him.

He ordered us to the showers and then into his office.

“Which one of you wants to talk first?” Coach asked.

I eyed Dillard suspiciously, curious if there was anything he could say that wouldn't make him look like the ass that he was.

We both stayed silent.

Coach looked back and forth between us. “I'd prefer not to write you both up. I still need one of you to play short. So what do you boys think I should do? Anyone want to give me a reason not to file a report on this?”

I ground my teeth waiting for Dillard to say something stupid, but he just sat there rubbing his jaw, which was starting to swell.

“Sorry, Coach. It won't happen again.” I hoped that the fact that I'd never been caught fighting in school before would save me.

Dillard grumbled “sorry” under his breath. What he was sorry for was being caught, not mouthing off to me.

Coach stared at us and sighed. “Get out of my face before I decide to replace both of you. And Dillard, go see the nurse before your face swells up even more. You already look like a chipmunk.”

His expression as he walked out meant that he knew I'd won this round.

As I started to leave Coach's office, I heard, “Nice punch, Ryan. I heard what he said. He had it coming. But next time take it outside. Don't you dare do that in my line of sight again, got it?”

Coach kept his head buried in some paperwork, not even looking up.

“Yes sir,” I said.

“And Ryan? If there is a next time, make sure it's in the off season. I don't want you busting your hand.”

“Yes sir.” I hid my smile as I walked out to my next class.

When I ran into Lizzie and Spencer later that day, they'd already heard about the fight. Lizzie called me “slugger” like she was proud of me. Spencer nodded at me once I told him I was okay. But I never told him what had happened to make me deck Dillard.

What I did tell Spencer, and what I remember now and pretty much every time I think of throwing that punch, is this: “It felt really, really good.”

I take a super-hot shower and my meds, but still must look tired because my mom gives me one of her looks as I get ready to leave. She goes so far as to put the back of her hand on my forehead, checking to see if I have a fever and I have to push her off.

The only good thing about the morning is that when Spencer picks me up, it's with a large cup of decaf coffee. It may not be “real” coffee, but at least I can pretend that I'm drinking something that will wake me up.

Of course he also greets me with, “Man, you look like crap.”

“You always know what to say to make me feel good, Yeats,” I joke as I slide into Sweeney and gulp down the coffee.

“No, seriously, you're okay, right?” he asks, and honestly, even though he means well, I'm so sick of that question I could scream.

“Let's make a deal. You won't ask that again and I promise that you'll be the first person I tell if I'm not.”

Spencer smiles apologetically. “Sorry. It's a deal.”

There's a silence in the car that's waiting to be broken, a heavy cloud above me that's made it impossible to have a normal conversation about anything. Even more, there are ghosts of conversations that hang between me and Spencer. It's still eating at me that he and Lizzie slept together. It isn't jealousy; it's some odd twisted anger I don't understand. And our conversation yesterday about my having Lizzie's heart feels like it's demanding to be discussed. But I don't want to talk about it. I don't want to talk about hearts. I don't want to even think about how much I hate myself for what I did to Lizzie, and I certainly don't want to talk about how Lizzie's dreams of him are still invading my nights. So when I break the silence it's to ask about Spencer's kinda-sorta-boyfriend in Seattle. “So what's up with Rob?”

“What's up with Ally?” he lobs back.

“Come on, that isn't fair. You guys are at least actually friends. I mean, you email him and everything.” And what I mean by that is that he doesn't turn into a total idiot every time he even thinks of talking to Rob, like I do with Ally.