I'll Be Here Read online

  I close my eyes and take it all in: the break-up, the sad prom dress, me—friendless and still in my pajamas from the night before, the laughter at Roland’s party and Taylor’s pity.

  And a new thought takes shape in my head and it’s as real and solid as I am.

  The world spins on without you Willow.

  Crawl ‘til dawn on my hands and knees

  Goddamn these vampires for what they’ve done to me.

  ~Mountain Goats

  “Damn These Vampires”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Monday is a school holiday. It’s one of those ambiguous teacher workdays that shows up in the middle of the semester. Normally, I love these days. I’d sleep in late and Dustin would come over just before noon and we’d chill on my bedroom floor alternating between making out and eating junk food. Today I wake up to a black hole the size of multiple galaxies that’s decided to take up residence in my stomach.

  Mom and Jake are at work, and Aaron is enjoying the glue-eating and hair-pulling joys of pre-kindergarten. As I yank on a pair of baggy shorts and a wrinkly t-shirt from the dredges of my bottom drawer, I wonder if Dustin chose this weekend in particular to end things so that I would have an extra day of no school to recover. I think so. In a way, that seems nice of him, but in other ways it embarrasses me even more because I wonder just how long he’s been planning this. And how long has he been carrying on with someone else behind my back? I think about him and the still faceless girl making out, sneaking phone calls in darkened rooms, holding hands, talking about me.

  On a whim, I decide to reorganize my room. Using up all my arm strength, I move the bed from under the window to the east wall and I corner the desk and bookshelf creating a sort of nook. I hide the gold dress in the back of my closet between my winter jacket and a grey corduroy jacket that doesn’t belong to me and has a story all it’s own.

  Underneath my bed, trapped under a stack of last year’s textbooks and the sketchbooks I stopped filling diligently my sophomore year, I find an old poster of astrological signs that my mom gave me on my twelfth birthday. I decide to tack it up on the wall above the desk because the colors are bright and the illustrations are beautiful. Despite myself I start to read the descriptions of the zodiac signs.

  According to the chart, Capricorn is an earth sign and generally considered compatible with other earth signs.

  I am a Gemini—an air sign.

  Ugh! I sound like my mother. Is it even remotely possible that a thing as complex as love can be simplified by a guide written by a group of star-gazing old men a thousand years ago?

  The last thing I do is hang my silver framed Chagal print in its new location just above the bureau. When I was little it was always on the wall by the front door—even at our old loft. I would stare up at it and try to fathom the secrets buried beneath the dense colors. It made me think of sunlit parks and mythological creatures and of something else… possibility. One day when I came home from school it was just gone, replaced by a handmade paper collage that Mom bought with Brooke at an art show. I found it in the hall closet, leaning against a deflated volleyball. It’s been in my room ever since.

  Ferdinand has found a spot in the new arrangement and he looks up from his paws to stare at me while I lean against the wall and study my work. He seems satisfied and so am I. It’s the same but different. In a good way.

  My phone vibrates and chirps as I’m spreading cream cheese on a bagel for a late lunch. It’s Taylor calling me. She probably feels like a shitty friend after our last conversation. The thought makes me slightly less sad.

  “Hey,” I say and take a bite of my bagel.

  Taylor launches into a tirade about how her head is still killing her and how she ruined a new pair of shoes at the party. She explains that Roland and his girlfriend Hannah got into this huge fight over the way she was looking at some older guy that was their waiter the other night and that Hannah ended up shoving him into the pool. I laugh imagining the look on his face. Go Hannah. I’d always thought of her as one of those boneless clichéd blondes. Who would have thought she’d turn out to be such a badass?

  “Other than that, it was pretty uneventful,” she says.

  I clear my throat and ask the question. The only thing I really want to know. The thing I know that I shouldn’t want to know. “Uh. Was Dustin there?”

  Taylor is clearly uncomfortable. I imagine her splayed out on her bed with her light hair fanned around her, wincing at my mention of Dustin. I have to remind myself that he’s her good friend. She probably doesn’t know how to act about this. “Yeah, Willow. He was there.”

  “Er. Was he—uhhh—having a good time?” What’s with all my mumbling?

  Taylor sighs noisily. “I don’t know. I mean, this whole thing is sort of weird for me. Obviously I’m sorry that this all happened, but you’ll be okay, right? I mean, it’s not like you guys weren’t having problems.”

  What????

  Panic registers in my chest. Full-blown panic. I can actually feel my heart clenching and unclenching. Taylor keeps talking, oblivious to my skyrocketing pulse and the fireworks going off in my head. “And, we’re getting older, high school’s almost over and it’s time to start really thinking about college and what we want there. Things are going to change. They just are.”

  “I guess, but—”

  Taylor interrupts before I can finish the thought. “Dustin said that you’ve been growing apart for awhile. This is the natural next step, right?”

  I’m spinning. Does she want me to confirm that he said that to her or that I think it’s true? A part of me wants to yell at her to shut up but the rest of me is desperate for her to tell me more. I feel that familiar burning sensation in the back of my throat and I know that tears can’t be far away.

  “I don’t know,” I’m practically whispering. “I think there’s somebody else. Another girl.”

  “Does it make a difference?” I try not to cringe at the slight note of annoyance that I can hear in her voice. “Willow, if you and Dustin weren’t working out, then it was already over and whether or not he’s been with somebody else isn’t even relevant.”

  It isn’t?

  “It would have ended the same way and it’s not like Dustin is a bad guy. I know he feels awful about the break-up, but this is the real world and people move on.” She chuckles. “We’re young, we’ve got our whole lives to feel guilty and stress about this sort of thing. Right now we’re supposed to have fun and follow our hearts. You don’t want to begrudge Dustin his happiness. That would make you a bitter ex-girlfriend and that’s not you Willow. Don’t you agree?”

  I have no idea if I agree or not but I can’t argue with her logic so I say “yes.”

  I suppose that Taylor’s right. I should listen to her. She has tons of experience with guys so she knows what she’s talking about.

  “Good. Good. Really, in the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t matter.”

  After we hang up, I decide to take a walk.

  The sky is wide and blue and it swallows me up. The clouds are so low and thick—almost like I could lift my arm and pluck one from the sky and it would feel like warmed marshmallows, melted and sticky between my fingers.

  I’ve brought my all-time favorite book with me and I open the pages at random and start reading a passage in the bright sunlight. Good. I love this part.

  My family has always laughed at me for this. They like to narrow their eyes and comment that I can’t make it up a spiral staircase without tripping over my feet, but I can read and walk at the same time. Apparently, the laws of physics state that the two should be mutually exclusive.

  Before I finish the chapter, I’ve walked down my street, made two right turns and am standing across from the beach. Tucking the book under my arm, I cross the single lane road and step past a few cars parked along a crooked wooden fence. In front of me the palms and scraggly Australian Pines lean out towards the open water with their claw-like branches framed against the sky. If I l
ower my eyelids a bit so that my lashes blur my vision, the trees look almost like people searching for something.

  Beneath my feet the ground changes from dirt to rock to coarse sand and I remove my shoes and carry them under the same arm as the book. Letting my toes sink deep into the sand, I walk a trail through the folding dunes. On the surface, the sun-warmed sand is too hot, but turns cool where my toes make deep indentations.

  Moving well past a group that’s blaring music and tossing a brightly colored ball back and forth, I settle into a vacant spot where the sand turns hard and crunchy. I stare out at the water as it plays with the sunlight. Moments like this my fingers itch for a pencil and some paper. I squeeze them tight and then bury them under a layer of sand.

  My brain is crowded with too many thoughts and most of them are bad. I hate being this person—this weak, on-the-verge-of-tears person. I take a deep breath and try to think of things that make me happy. Things like the water and the sand and sky above me. And the sound that the wind makes in my ears when I close my eyes. I love that. I love this place that I live. I love the way that the beach curls around the water like a comma and sometimes you can imagine that it’s just you and that you’re at the edge of the world.

  I love the smell of saltwater and the way the skin across my nose and cheeks feels tight and raw when I’ve gotten a little too much sun. I love that there are January days when I can get by in a tank top.

  People at school are always saying how they can’t wait to leave after graduation. They say that they want winter and peacoats and snow and hot chocolate in front of a fireplace like some sort of Dickens inspired fantasy. Jake laughs and says that people only think like that until they’ve had to de-ice their windshield at six in the morning to get to work on time. He’s probably right. People are just preprogrammed to want what they don’t have. It’s like it’s a universal law.

  A seagull cries out, snapping me out of my trance.

  Dusting the sand from the back of my thighs and picking up my discarded book and shoes, I stand and look out at the blue expanse in front of me a bit longer. With my right hand I push my hair away from my face as the wind rolling in off the water picks up speed around me.

  Before Dustin, I used to come to this spot all the time to sketch.

  Before Dustin.

  I half grimace, half laugh at the term and wonder how self-destructive it is to start labeling my life that way. I already know what came before. But what comes after?

  Life isn’t fair. It’s just fairer than death. That’s all.

  ~William Goldman

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The darkness and soft silence of sleep is shattered by the electronic shriek of my alarm. And I was actually having a decent dream. Then I remember that the dream involved Dustin and the familiar dread of the past few days settles upon me.

  I turn over and face my nightstand. The picture of Dustin and me made it through the rearrangement of furniture, but now it seems silly that I kept it out in plain view. I don’t know if I thought that he would call and tell me that he’d been playing some sort of twisted practical joke or if he’d show up outside of my window in the middle of the night with a boombox over his head shouting that he loves me. Neither of those things has occurred. He hasn’t even texted.

  The alarm clock sounds for a second time and Ferdinand, who occasionally sleeps in bed with me, opens his eyes lazily. He yawns and unfurls from a ball shape.

  I roll my neck and listen to it crack. I swirl a bit of spit in my mouth to get rid of that tangy morning taste.

  Today is inevitable. It’s Tuesday and that means school.

  Mom, dressed in a slim teal cotton top and black yoga pants (obviously going to fill in for an absent instructor) tells me I can stay home another day if I’d like. I almost think she wants me to which, quite frankly, doesn’t seem like very good parenting. Isn’t she supposed to be telling me to face up to my demons, not run and hide out in my bed under a blanket?

  Jake, light-haired and graying at the edges, is sitting at the blue kitchen table in his unofficial workweek uniform of khakis and a collared short-sleeved shirt. He’s got Aaron propped on his lap. The three of them keep exchanging worried looks like it’s my first day off the psych ward and I might run naked down the street yowling profanities at the good people of the town.

  I say, “I’m fine.”

  Mom’s face puckers. “Talk to us sweetie,” she pleads gently. As if anything in my demeanor encourages an impromptu heart to heart here in the kitchen while the cereal in my bowl soaks up all the milk and goes to mush.

  “I’m fine,” I repeat the phrase, this time accentuating my words with an expressive shrug. “I’d rather if we just dropped it.”

  “Maybe later?” She looks hopeful.

  “Maybe.” I take an over-large bite of cereal so that my mouth is too full for conversation.

  She stares at me for a long time and I hang my head so that I don’t have to keep my features a mask of pretend happy. With a resigned look, Mom turns back to the counter and continues to load food into Aaron’s lime green lunchbox. “And you’re absolutely sure about school?”

  I swallow and say, “absolutely.”

  “People would understand if you need a few days. That would be alright Willow.”

  “Not alright with me.” My voice comes out sharper than I intended and mom looks hurt. Jake’s eyes widen a fraction but he smothers the awkward moment by asking Aaron to explain why he doesn’t want to see his friend Jonathan at school. Apparently they had an argument on the playground yesterday about who crossed the monkey bars the fastest. Oh, to have the problems of a four year old!

  Mom’s face is carefully blank when she asks me if I want to pack a lunch or buy.

  “Umm. I’ll just take a granola bar and get a soda at school or something.”

  She purses her lips to keep from making a comment about my poor nutritional choices and starts to go over the schedule. This is part of the daily routine. Jake has some major funding meeting that might run late so we’ll need to come up with something easy for dinner. Jake is a marine biologist and he’s been working for six months to get funding for a conservation project that will focus on a mollusk that no one’s ever heard of but really should care about because it’s a member of an ecosystem that is delicately balanced and constantly under siege. It’s grueling work.

  “Don’t forget that I’m working this afternoon so I won’t be home until after six.”

  Mom looks at me like I’ve spouted two heads. “You already worked Saturday so why don’t you ask for the day off? I’m sure that Patty will understand under the circumstances.”

  “I’m not skipping out on work because of a break-up. That’s too pathetic even for me.”

  Mom looks to Jake for support but he wisely keeps his face neutral. “Willow…”

  “I’m fine.”

  “But—”

  I say it again slowly. “I’m fiiiiiine.”

  She looks like she wants to fight me on this but she bites her bottom lip and continues to talk about the daily schedule and who is going to get Aaron from school. Good. It’s not like I’m an invalid. And I am fine.

  I’m starting to believe it myself.

  The feeling of okayness comes and goes on the way to school, sloshing around my belly like room temperature jello trying to congeal into something solid. It’s not Dustin I tell myself as I make a left into the school parking lot. It’s the knowing. The feeling of knowing where to go. Of knowing what to do. Of knowing who to be. Of knowing that I’m real. Of being connected.

  I’m fine.

  Northridge High School is a small town unto itself. About ten years ago, the county rezoned the local school districts and some of the fancier neighborhoods got zoned for Point High, which was basically a collection of rundown buildings masquerading as a school. A collective of influential citizens put up a fight and the superintendent of schools realized that he would have to readjust the district lines or forfeit his job bu
t he was afraid to come off as an elitist for sending the poorer neighborhoods back to Point High so he came up with an alternative plan. Point High was condemned and both Northridge High and Bayview High were expanded.

  Everyone to the north of Salvo Boulevard was sent to Bayview and everyone to the south of Salvo was sent to Northridge. The geographical irony of the name was not lost on the populace and there was a push at the same time as the rezoning to change the name of the school. This argument polarized the community for a second time in as many months. Yes, Northridge was located in the south end of town. But, Northridge had been Northridge for as long as anyone could remember and that apparently meant something to a lot of people. It came down to dollars in the end. The Cougar booster club did not like the sound of the “Southridge Cougars,” and the booster club traditionally bought the team jerseys so the name stayed and about four hundred and eighty transplanted students were newly minted as Northridge Cougars.

  The black and gold school logo dangles from a tag on my rearview mirror. There are still ten minutes until the bell rings but the parking lot is already packed. I have to maneuver my silver Honda between two large SUVs and park on the gravel extension that abuts the baseball field. Out of habit I scan the sea of parked cars for Dustin’s Beemer. It’s hard to miss. I catch a glimpse of it on the opposite side of the lot almost as far from my car as possible. Taylor’s sports car is parked beside it. My stomach flips, but I remind myself that I only have one class with him—something that we complained about at the beginning of the semester. If I face front in calculus and don’t let my eyes drift too much, I can go most of the day without seeing him. Except for lunch. Ugh! What am I going to do at lunch?

  I’m fine.

  Maybe he’ll come find me before school and tell me that he’s changed my mind.

  The prospect makes my heart race a bit and I pick up speed as I cross the parking lot. I concentrate all my mental energy the way my mother has showed me and I will Dustin to be waiting for me by my locker, his long body relaxed, molded to the cool, hard metal. I tumble through the glass-paned double-doors, half-expecting to see him smiling impishly, sorry for the mix-up and wanting to fix things.