What Remains (8 page)

“It isn't that hard. All you need to do is say hello to her,” Spencer says in that way he has of boiling things down and making them sound easier than they are.

“I've said hello,” I say, fiddling with the strap of my backpack.

Spencer rolls his eyes at me and smiles, but like all of his smiles lately it's forced and almost empty. “Yeah, and then you need to say something else.”

I flip the buckle of the seat belt open and closed, open and closed. If someone hits the car now there would be a fifty percent chance of my being protected by the belt depending on the timing. “That's where I get stuck.”

“You should have let Lizzie talk to Ally for you when she wanted to.”

I have no idea whether he's kidding or not. My breath catches a little bit anyhow. The idea of Lizzie being the one to approach Ally on my behalf was one of the most terrifying things I'd ever heard. It took weeks of begging and pleading on my part to get her to promise that she wouldn't say anything to Ally. Even then I was looking over my shoulder all the time because Lizzie wouldn't have been subtle, and she wouldn't have been vague, and I would have been mortified.

But now, if she were here, I'd almost let her. It would almost be worth whatever embarrassment came from it to have her here screwing with my life again.

“It wouldn't have ended well,” I say.

Spencer laughs a little. “Oh absolutely not. But it would have started a conversation and you need to talk to her. To Ally.”

My talking to Ally was a pipe dream before the accident. On one hand, I probably have nothing left to lose and should go for broke. On the other, it might make more sense for me to concentrate on keeping my grades together and figuring out what the hell kind of a future I have now that I can't play ball.

I don't know how to explain to Spencer, confident Spencer, who can say anything to anyone and make it sound interesting and convincing, that any chance I ever had with Ally is probably gone. I can't tell him how not being able to play baseball makes me feel like I don't even know who I am anymore. Lizzie's dreams aren't making that easier either. How much can I lose before I lose myself? Or who I thought I was?

There's no way I can throw that question at Spencer without him thinking that I'm nuts, so I make some noncommittal noise that he realizes is a noncommittal noise. Once again, he's managed to resist talking about Rob and I've managed to resist talking about Ally and we've both managed to avoid talking about Lizzie. We both know that all those conversations might be tabled, but none of them are really over.

Twelve

After a couple of days of school, I get back into the rhythm of things. Government follows English follows Chem. My brain falls back into these patterns the same way I used to
be able to step up to the plate on the first day of spring
training and fall into my swing from muscle memory.

The familiarity of taking the same classes and sitting in the same seats day after day after day actually helps more than I could have guessed. And now that everyone has pretty much stopped pointing and staring at me, I can zone out and lose myself in things I don't care about, like
Wuthering Heights
, and things I do care about, like how thunderstorms develop into tornados.

Aside from the fact that I really need to start focusing on my grades to get me through to college, classes take my mind off Lizzie, and my guilt, and the gray cloud of sadness that follows me around more often than not. Lizzie pretty much hated school. She's tuned out during the day so my head is totally mine.

“Dude. Really?” Ben leans over my arm while we're waiting for class to start. At first I have no idea what he's talking about, but then I follow his eyes down to my notebook. I slam it shut as fast as I can on what would have been a nude drawing of Spencer Yeats.

“Prank,” I say although I know he's not going to believe me. Today it's Spencer, yesterday it was a mound of skulls. Flowers were growing out of the eyes of one. Snakes slithered through another. One looked suspiciously like Assistant Principal Stiller.

I've never been able to draw. I almost flunked my distributional art class. But apparently I've gotten over it.

“Damn it, Lizzie. Stop,” I mutter under my breath. Thankfully, we have a sub today. Everyone is having their own conversations, so no one except Ben is looking at the crazy boy talking to himself in the corner and even he's moved his chair noticeably farther away from me.

I sit with my hands linked together for the rest of the day, only picking up a pen when I need to take some notes and hoping that Ben will forget what he thought he saw or at least that he stays quiet about it.

As usual, though, things get worse when class is over. In the time that used to be filled with baseball and with Lizzie—the whole Lizzie, not just her voice—I'm lost. Somehow, I have too much time on my hands and not enough. I'm lonely, but at the same time I feel like I can't get a minute alone.

With nothing else to occupy my thoughts, Lizzie is everywhere. She's in my head. Coursing through my veins. She takes over to the point that there are evenings when I wonder if any of the things I'm thinking are really mine.

I'm using my study hall hours to work out in the gym like Dr. Collins suggested. The school has been great about allowing it. But come four o'clock on days when Spencer is in rehearsal and Lizzie is just a voice inside my head, the thought of going home and being alone makes my skin crawl.

So I've developed this kind of route that takes me around the school. I hang out in the library talking to Mrs. Finn, the librarian, about new books that have come in that I'll probably never read. I hover in the music rooms to listen to the choir practice and watch the marching band go through its drills. Today, I head to the auditorium to sit in on part of Spencer's rehearsal.

I'm almost to the door when I see her. Ally. Leaning against the wall, dressed in white for the show, and holding a sword. She looks like some fierce angel and I don't really realize it until I see her, but I've been avoiding her since I came back to school.

I imagine walking up to her, asking her to dance with me in the halls or run outside to play in the rain. For one minute it doesn't matter that I have this scar and these medications like some old man. For a minute I'm going to take charge.

Just do it already.

“God, Lizzie … ” The words escape my mouth before I can stop them and my stomach clenches with worry. Hearing her voice is one thing. Talking back to it in front of other people is another kind of crazy and it's starting to become a bad habit.

When I look back at Ally, she catches my eye. It makes me so flustered that I walk right by her. Spencer would kill me if he knew I'd chickened out. Lizzie would have been giving me a crazy hard time as well. I will the voice in my head to stay quiet just this once.

But then I stop again. For a minute I picture myself turning around and going back. Talking to her. Just saying something. Anything to break this stupid stalemate.

Then, as I'm about to turn, I hear a voice behind me. “Hey, sweet cheeks.” It's Justin Dillard, and I know he isn't talking to me.

I'm halfway inside the door. In front of me, ribbons of fabric unfurl from the top of the stage. I turn my head and crane my neck back to see Ally offer Dillard a tired smile.

“Hey, Justin.” Just hearing her say his name makes me want to hit something.

I wonder if they're dating, wonder if the entire world has gone crazy while I've been gone.

In the space of time it takes him to answer, I ride a roller-coaster ride of emotions: anger at him for being such a jerk, disgust at myself for even thinking I'd have a chance with her, fury at the universe for not letting me catch a break, and a sadness so deep and acidic that it feels like I'm burning up from the inside.

His response, “I want to talk about prom,” propels me away from them and down the stairs.

I'm gasping for air, feel like I'm going to throw up.

Before I know it, I'm in The Cave. It's the first time I've been here since the night of Lizzie's birthday and it feels like our laughter from that night is trapped in the black of the walls, mocking me. I can hear our voices in my mind. Not like the ones that sound like Lizzie is whispering straight into my ear. These are more like an old scratchy record that's stuck in a groove on repeat.

It's freezing and dark. Spencer isn't here so there are no candles lit and I feel more alone than I ever have. Even with Lizzie inside me.

Then I remember the ghost.

“Alice, are you here?” I ask the air. It's stupid, but if I can feel Lizzie inside me shouldn't I be able to contact this poor girl whose spirit is supposed to be here somewhere?

I don't know what I'm expecting. Like maybe all of a sudden I'm some ghost whisperer? I keep calling her name louder and louder, but there's no answer. Even the damned ghost doesn't want anything to do with me. Even she knows who I am: someone who kills their friends. Someone who has nothing left.

I don't notice the door opening and the recessed lighting coming on until suddenly, it's light and Spencer is there with his arm around me.

“It's okay. It's all going to be okay,” he murmurs.

For the first time, Spencer's reassurances sound false. Maybe he actually believes that things are going to be fine because for Spencer they always are. But I'm starting to think he needs to understand that the rest of the world isn't so lucky.

“I saw you in the doorway at rehearsal. Why didn't you come in?” he asks when I don't reply.

I pull away. I can't stand still. My mind is reeling with regret. After over a year I was almost considering
doing
something instead of hanging back like a scared little kid. I was seconds away from talking to Ally instead of just sitting back, but as usual I waited too long and now I'm screwed.

“Ally. Are she and Justin together?” My words come out breathy like I've been running sprints.

He shrugs. It's obvious he has no idea what has me so worked up. “What? I don't think so. I've seen him hanging around, but he doesn't exactly seem like her type.”

My thoughts are cycling, jumping from one horrible thought to another and I'm not sure which one to address first.

“Why don't they lock me up?” I ask him. After all, that's what they do with people who kill their friends. I don't get it. Do they think I'm going to die so it won't matter anyhow?”

Now Spencer looks completely confused. “For what?”

“God, Spencer, I killed Lizzie. I could have killed you too.”

Spencer shakes his head like he can't believe I've brought it up again. His voice is almost a monotone as he repeats the mantra I've heard from him over and over since the accident. “You didn't kill anybody. That driver … ”

“Wasn't paying attention. I get it,” I scream at him. My voice bounces off the walls and I'm surprised at how good it feels to yell, and to not care if I'm being nice or saying what I'm supposed to say. “Everybody needs to stop fucking using that as some sort of excuse. We could have left five minutes later. I could have insisted that she put her seat belt back on. I could have let you drive.” I'm spinning out of control, but I can't seem to stop. This anger, this explosive rage, isn't Lizzie either. It's all me.

Spencer grabs me by the arms and his face is something I'm not sure I've ever really seen, not even onstage. He's seriously angry. I can only hope that he's angry at me because he finally understands that this is all my fault; but really, I'm not sure what he's thinking.

“Do you think I'm lying to you?” he hisses.

“What?” I yank my arm and try to pull out of his
grasp but he's stronger than I've given him credit for and he doesn't let go.

“Do you think I'm just saying all of this to make you feel better? I mean, because it was just some girl who died, right? Someone who didn't matter to me at all?”

His anger, his sarcasm, shocks the hell out of me because it's so unlike him. I feel like one of those bullets that shatter into a million pieces when it hits a target, only Spencer is the closest thing to me and he keeps getting hit with the shrapnel. Whatever guilt I'm already wrestling with boils over and I can feel hot tears burst out from some dam inside me and come streaming down my face.

Rain delay
.

Lizzie is still such a smart-ass. But her words force me to take a breath.

“Yeats, I didn't mean it like that. I just … I should have done something, you know? It should have been me,” I say. This time I do pull away and smack the nearest one of those damned cubes as hard as I can. I barely feel it. My jumbled emotions are too strong for me to pay attention to anything else.

“Don't do that, Cal. Don't you dare do that,” Spencer says from across the room. He and I have never fought
about anything. This is uncharted territory for us and I
don't like it.

“Do what?” I swipe at the tears that keep falling down my face.

“Say that it should have been you. I've already lost one best friend; I can't lose you, too. There was nothing … ” Now that he's stalked over to me, I can see tears hanging in the corner of his eyes too. “There was nothing you could have done.” He takes a deep breath and then admits, “I know that you've had other things on your mind. I know this all sucks, but it's hard for me too. To know that a part of her is inside you. It's like I'm talking to both of you at once.”

His words hit me like a hundred-mile-an-hour fastball to the chest. They push me back until I'm sitting and for a second I can't breathe. Not once with everything that's gone on have I really stopped to think about how this was affecting him. I thought about Lizzie. I thought about myself. Hell, I even thought about how this would affect the team. But not once did I give any thought to how it would affect my best friend to have lost Lizzie, who was one of his best friends, who he
slept with
, and to have her heart inside me.

“Fuck, Yeats. I'm sorry, I'm sorry,” I say over and over. I can't seem to find any other words, but I've offered too many apologies for any of them to carry any weight. I rest my head in my hands and wish that I could disappear or turn back the clock.

Spencer sighs and sits down on the cube next to me. His shoulder presses against mine and I can feel him pulling himself together before he starts to talk again. “You know … Lizzie and I … ” he begins and I know what he's about to say. For a second I think about letting him wrestle with the words and have to say them. It would serve him right and the part of me deep inside that is Lizzie wants him to have to articulate it, but ultimately, the part that is me can't stand the look of loss that crosses his face.

“I know,” I blurt out, wondering why it seemed so important to both of them to confess to me, when neither of them said anything at the time. “She told me.”

He looks surprised, but nods as if he's thinking, “Of course she did. How could I have thought otherwise?”

“She didn't tell me any details, not even about when it happened.” I'm fishing and I know that it isn't any of my business and I'm not even sure why I care. What difference does it really make anymore? But of course Spencer can hear the curiosity in my voice.

“It was after the
Bacchus
cast party right before Thanksgiving. Remember she came with you, but you had a test the next day and left early so I said I'd drive her home?”

I do remember that night. And so does Lizzie because I feel … something … pulse inside me as he speaks.

“I hate closing nights,” Spencer continues, but I know this. The only time he ever seems depressed and down is after a show ends. And I get it. It's pretty much how I've always felt at the end of a baseball season. “But I was really wired that night for some reason. And Lizzie was in rare form. I don't think I stopped laughing the whole time.”

We both sit there wrapped in our own memories of Lizzie and my brain is buzzing like I just had a six pack of cola injected into my veins.

Then Spencer sighs again. “Her mom and the loser were both out when I got her home and took her up to her room. Simon spiked the punch and she'd had a bit. She wasn't drunk or anything, I just wanted to make sure that she fell asleep upstairs and away from them, you know? That she remembered to lock the door behind her.