Another Day (10 page)

I wake up and write another email.

A,

So, who are you today?

What a strange question to ask. But I guess it makes sense. If any of this makes sense.

Yesterday was a hard day. Justin’s grandmother is sick, but instead of admitting he’s upset about it, he just lashes out at the world more. I’m trying to help him, but it’s hard.

I don’t know if you want to hear this or not. I know how you feel about Justin. If you want me to keep that part of my life hidden from you, I can. But I don’t think that’s what you want.

Tell me how your day is going.

Rhiannon

This one I do send. I try to act like it’s a normal email that I’d send to a normal friend. Then I try to have a normal day, partly to figure out what a normal day really is. At first it works. I go to school. I go to classes. I go to lunch and sit next to Justin. He won’t commit to any emotion.

When lunch is over, I check my email.

Rhiannon,

Today is a hard day for me, too. The girl whose body I’m in is in a bad place. Hates the world. Hates herself. Is up against a lot, mostly from the inside. That’s really hard.

When it comes to you and Justin, or anything, I want you to be honest with me. Even if it hurts. Although I would prefer for it not to hurt.

Love,

A

I try to return to normal. I try not to imagine where A is, what that body looks like. Justin has work, so I’m on my own after school. I check my email again and find a cry for help.

I really need to speak to you right now. The girl whose body I’m in wants to kill herself. This is not a joke.

There’s a phone number. I call it right away.

I know it’s not a joke. I’m sure there are people who could joke about a thing like this, but I know A isn’t one of them.

I just know.

The voice that answers is a girl’s. “Hello?” She sounds a little like me.

“Is that you?” I ask.

“Yeah. It’s me.”

“I got your email. Wow.”

“Yeah, wow.”

“How do you know?”

“It’s all in her journal—all these ways to kill herself. It’s really…graphic. And methodical. I can’t even get into it—there are just so many ways to die, and it’s like she’s researched each and every one. And she’s set herself a deadline. In six days.”

I feel the dredging inside me. I feel the girl I once was reaching out to connect with that. I try to focus on the present.

“That poor girl,” I tell A. “What are you going to do?”

“I have no idea.”

She sounds so lost. So overwhelmed.

“Don’t you have to tell someone?” I suggest.

“There was no training for this, Rhiannon. I really don’t know.”

I’ve been there,
I want to tell her. But it’s too scary.

“Where are you?” I ask.

A tells me where she is, and it’s not that far. I tell her I can be there in a little while.

“Are you alone?” I ask.

“Yeah. Her father doesn’t get home until around seven.”

“Give me the address,” I say. After she does, I say, “I’ll be right there.”

I don’t know this girl. A hasn’t told me much. But maybe that’s why it’s easier to fill in the blanks with myself.

I shouldn’t think it, but I think it anyway:
This is the girl I’d be if I hadn’t met Justin.

That’s how bad it was. Or maybe that’s just how bad it seemed. I don’t know now. I can’t tell the difference. All I know is I was convinced that nobody would care if I died. I had elaborate fantasies about my very simple funeral—no one but my relatives there. No boy in tears in the front row. No one who could get up and talk about me as if they really knew me.

I knew I wasn’t going to do it. But I also knew I could. I treasured that thought. That I could.

Most of the time when we think we’re looking for death, we’re really looking for love.

That was definitely the case with me. Because Justin came in and gave me the meaning I was looking for. Justin became the mourner I wanted, and that led to other friends, other mourners. I populated my funeral until I didn’t want one anymore.

But I realize that’s not always the case.

I realize there are girls who don’t have that.

I realize I am driving toward one of them right now. Not because of what A told me, but because of the sound of her voice. The fear.

I recognize that.

It’s a short drive, but I try to come up with a plan.

I’m not really thinking about A at all. I am not wondering why A, who’s lived in so many bodies, doesn’t know what to do. I am not amazed that I know more than A does.

I’m just driving and thinking as fast as I can.

I find the house. It’s a normal house. I ring the doorbell. It sounds like a normal doorbell.

She answers, and from the moment I see her, I know that she’s another disappearing girl, that she’s desperately trying to disappear. The signs of it tattoo her body—the wear and tear. It is hard for unhealthy people to masquerade as healthy ones, especially once they’ve stopped caring if other people notice.

The only difference is her eyes. Her eyes are still alive.

I know that’s not her.

I know for sure now that this is actually happening. No trick. Just truth. Plenty of feeling, but at the center of it—fact.

“Thank you for coming,” A says.

She leads me up to the girl’s room. It’s a pit, like she lashed out against it and left herself the wreckage to live in. Her clothes are all over the place, and there’s no way of telling the difference between the clean and the dirty. She’s broken her mirror. Everything on the walls is on its way to being torn down. She might as well cut her wrist and rub FUCK YOU across the walls.

It’s not a mess. It’s anger.

There’s a notebook on the bed. I open it. I know what I’m going to find, but still it hits me in the gut.

This is how to stab yourself.

This is how to bleed.

This is how to choke.

This is how to fall.

This is how to burn.

This is how to poison.

This is how to die.

These aren’t hypotheticals. This isn’t her being dramatic. This is her finding the facts to match the feelings. To end the feelings.

It is all so wrong. I want to shake her. I want to tell her to step away from the funeral.

And there’s the deadline at the end. Practically tomorrow.

A’s been quiet as I’ve been reading. Now I look up at her.

“This is serious,” I say. “I’ve had…thoughts. But nothing like this.”

I’ve been standing this whole time, the notebook in my hand. Now I put it down. And then I put myself down, too. I need to sit down. I place myself on the edge of the bed. A sits down next to me.

“You have to stop her,” I say. I, who am certain of so few things, am certain of this.

“But how can I?” A asks. “And is that really my right? Shouldn’t she decide that for herself?”

This is not what I am expecting A to say. It’s so ridiculous. Offensive.

“So, what?” I say, not bothering to keep the anger out of my voice. “You just let her die? Because you didn’t want to get involved?”

She takes my hand. Tries to calm me down.

“We don’t know for sure that the deadline’s real. This could just be her way of getting rid of the thoughts. Putting them on paper so she doesn’t do them.”

No. That’s an excuse. This is not the time for excuses. I throw it back at her: “But you don’t believe that, do you? You wouldn’t have called me if you believed that.”

She’s silent in response, so I know I’m right.

I look down and see her hand in mine. I let myself feel it, let it mean more than just support.

“This is weird,” I say.

“What?”

I squeeze once, then pull my hand away. “This.”

She doesn’t get it. “What do you mean?”

Even though it’s a different situation, even though we’re in an emergency situation right now, she’s still looking at me that way. I can feel her feeling things for me. I am receiving that.

I try to explain. “It’s not like the other day. I mean, it’s a different hand. You’re different.”

“But I’m not.”

I wish I could believe that was true. “You can’t say that,” I tell her. “Yes, you’re the same person inside. But the outside matters, too.”

“You look the same, no matter what eyes I’m seeing you through. I feel the same.”

If this is possible, what else is possible?

I can’t imagine what it must be like to live like that.

A is asking me to imagine it. I know she (he?) is. But it’s hard.

I go back to her argument about this girl, about not interfering. “You never get involved in the people’s lives?” I ask. “The ones you’re inhabiting.”

She shakes her head.

But there’s a contradiction here, isn’t there? “You try to leave the lives the way you found them,” I say.

“Yeah.”

“But what about Justin? What made that so different?”

“You.”

I cannot wear that answer. It can’t possibly fit.

“That makes no sense,” I say.

Then, as if to answer my thoughts, she leans in and kisses me. I am not expecting it. I am not expecting the feel of her lips, the chapped roughness. I am not expecting her fingers light against my neck.

I am not sure who I’m kissing.

I’m really not sure.

Because if it’s A, the person who kissed me on the beach, it’s one thing. But if it’s this girl, that’s another. This girl doesn’t want to be kissed by me. This girl isn’t a fairy-tale character who can be cured by a kiss. This girl needs much more help than that. I know.

After a minute of letting it happen, I pull back, even more confused than before.

“This is definitely weird,” I say.

“Why?”

I feel it should be obvious. “Because you’re a girl? Because I still have a boyfriend? Because we’re talking about someone else’s suicide?”

“In your heart, does any of that matter?”

I know the answer she wants. But it’s not the truth.

“Yes,” I tell her. “It does.”

“Which part?”

“All of it. When I kiss you, I’m not actually kissing you, you know. You’re inside there somewhere. But I’m kissing the outside part. And right now, although I can feel you underneath, all I’m getting is the sadness. I’m kissing her, and I want to cry.”

“That’s not what I want.”

“I know. But that’s what there is.”

I can’t stay on the bed. I can’t stay in this conversation. I didn’t come here to talk about us. I came here because we need to save this girl’s life.

I stand up and try to push us back on course.

“If she were bleeding in the street, what would you do?” I ask.

A seems disappointed. I can’t tell whether it’s because I’ve changed the conversation back, or because she knows she has to make the call.

“That’s not the same situation,” she says.

Not good enough. “If she were going to kill someone else?” I challenge.

“I would turn her in.”

Aha. “So how is this different?”

“It’s her own life. Not anyone else’s.”

“But it’s still killing.”

“If she really wants to do it, there’s nothing I can do to stop it.”

If A weren’t in someone else’s body, I might try to slap some sense into her, this logic is so damaged. You can’t cry for help, then claim to be a bystander.

“Okay,” she says before I can go on, “putting up obstacles can help. Getting other people involved can help. Getting her to the proper doctors can help.”

“Just like if she had cancer, or were bleeding in the street.”

I see it’s all sinking in. It’s still amazing to me that she’s never had to deal with this before.

“So who do I tell?” she asks.

“A guidance counselor, maybe?” I offer.

She looks at the clock. “School’s closed. And we only have until midnight, remember.”

“Who’s her best friend?” I ask.

But that’s the problem, isn’t it? It’s what A confirms—there’s no one.

“Boyfriend? Girlfriend?” I try.

“No.”

“A suicide hotline?”

“If we call one, they’d only be giving me advice, not her. We have no way of knowing if she’ll remember it tomorrow, or if it will have any effect. Believe me, I’ve thought about these options.”

“So it has to be her father. Right?”

“I think he checked out a while ago.”

I’ve always felt like the expert on checked-out parents. What’s interesting is that now I discover another truth underneath: Even if they seem that far gone, they’re rarely all the way gone. If they were already gone, they would’ve left.

“Well,” I say, “you need to get him to check back in.”

Because that has to be possible. Maybe not easy. But possible.

“What do I say?” A asks.

“You say, ‘Dad, I want to kill myself.’ Just come right out and say it.”

That would wake my parents up. I know it would.

“And if he asks me why?”

“You tell him you don’t know why. Don’t commit to anything. She’ll have to work that out starting tomorrow.”

“You’ve thought this through, haven’t you?”

“It was a busy drive over,” I tell her, even though the truth is that most of it is just appearing to me now.

“What if he doesn’t care? What if he doesn’t believe her?”

“Then you grab his keys and drive to the nearest hospital. Bring the journal with you.”

I know it’s asking a lot.

But I also know she’s going to do it.

She’s still there on the bed. Looking lost. Looking worried.

“Come here,” I say, sitting back down next to her. I give her the biggest hug I can. To look at her, you’d think her body would break from the embrace. But it’s stronger than it seems.

“I don’t know if I can do this,” she whispers.

“You can,” I tell her. “Of course you can.”

We go through it one more time. Then we both know it’s time for me to go. If her father comes home while I’m there, it will only make things more confusing.

It’s hard to leave. It’s hard to be a part of this girl’s story and then walk away from it.

I realize as I’m leaving that I don’t even know her name. So I ask A.