Bright Before Sunrise (9 page)

“Don’t even try to deny it. I found
this
in your backseat last week.” She pulls the bright blue paper back out of her pocket and holds it like a murder weapon.

I have no clue what’s on it or why it’s made Carly psycho. I take it from her hand and hope it contains the logo from
Punk’d
. The creases are deep and smooth, like it’s been unfolded repeatedly.

She crosses her arms and watches my face expectantly. I look down—it’s a single sheet of paper. A flyer from Cross Pointe, like the hundreds of others that are hung on the school walls at neat intervals.

“So?” I’m baffled. So confused that I’m not even angry anymore.

“Are you kidding me?”

“Did you want to help put together care packages for last year’s seniors? I don’t know what the problem is. Yes,
it’s a stupid project—but who cares if some idiots wanted to mail snacks and instant coffee to a group of spoiled college freshmen?”

Carly’s face is red, her lips pressed together so tight they disappear. “Who. Is. She?” She snatches the flyer from my hands and it tears in the corner. I’m left holding a jagged scrap of blue paper. Carly points to some handwriting at the bottom of the page: ten digits and a name.

Brighton
.

10
 
 
Brighton
 
 
6:07 P.M.

The Sheas gave me a tour and left three different ways to contact them. Sophia’s already asleep and they promised to be home by ten, so the only real directions for the next four hours are: “Check the baby monitor and call if you need us. No, actually, if she wakes up at all, call us.”

It seems straightforward, and she hasn’t woken so I haven’t called. But this hasn’t stopped Mr. Shea from checking in three times already.

I reassure him, for the third time, “Everything is quiet here.”

“And the monitor is definitely working?” he asks.

“It is.” I hold it up to the phone and turn up the volume so he can hear the steady raindrop sounds of Sophia’s white-noise machine.

“Okay.” He exhales. “So, you’re all set?”

“Go enjoy your dinner,” I tell him. “Everything here is fine.”

“Great. Great, great. Thanks so much, Brighton. We’ll see you in a few hours.”

I hang up and pace from the kitchen to the living room, through the dining room and one of those never-really-used rooms with new “antique” furniture and a grandfather clock that bongs about seven minutes early. It almost looks like every other house in Cross Pointe, but there’s a hint of not-quite-there-yet—it’s apparent in the price tag still dangling from a throw pillow, and the dining room chairs, which look like they’ve never been sat on. Everything is slightly too matchy-matchy and too new. But the Sheas are still new, still trying too hard.

Not that everyone else in Cross Pointe doesn’t try; we just don’t let our efforts show.

I circle back to the kitchen. They have one of those floor plans where the rooms all connect with multiple entrances; it all flows around the staircase to the second floor where Sophia sleeps in the only room with an open door. Behind one of the other seven is all the information I’d ever need to know about Jonah.

The Sheas said I don’t even need to go upstairs—as long as she’s quiet, I should just let her sleep. I click the video button on the monitor—not awake.

On my second lap of the first floor, I check for photos of Jonah. Picking up frame after frame and trying to replace them in the exact same positions. The house is a baby shrine. There are an absurd number of photos of Sophia in every state of dress and pose—I particularly enjoy the one of her half-buried in a basket of laundry hanging above the washing machine in the mud room—but the only photo I find of Jonah is in the back corner of a bookshelf. It’s of him in a middle-school baseball uniform.

I fail at my attempts to translate the tanned, dirty-blond boy with a wide, metallic grin to the taller, darker-haired ghost who sulks in Cross Pointe’s halls. I can’t stop the comparisons. What happened to make him stop smiling so wide his eyes wrinkle in the corners? How come his broad shoulders are always creeping up and forward instead of squared and confident like his thirteen-year-old self?

I carry the picture frame to the kitchen without even realizing it. I lean against the marble countertop and tilt the photo so it’s fully illuminated by the track lighting—he was thin, didn’t quite fill out his red-and-white uniform. But even then you could see hints of the muscles he would develop. I can’t stop studying his grin—it’s confident, carefree. So open and sincere that I’m jealous of the boy he’d been.

If Jonah had attended middle school with the rest of us, he would’ve been prime crush material. If he’d stop scowling long enough to acknowledge anyone at CP High, he’d still be.

I flip the frame facedown on the countertop and check the baby monitor again—sleeping. Though I’m still curious, I make myself walk away from the photo and into the living room.

It isn’t even curiosity, really, just restless energy. I thought tonight would be different. I thought it would be nightmarish, like the night before Dad’s funeral—tidal waves of Evy’s tears. Mom’s grief, which demands and judges and suffocates and needs an audience. And me—helpless and guilty because I couldn’t cry, couldn’t stop their tears, and couldn’t fix anything.

I spent today preparing for
that
, and in the end I wasn’t
needed. I could be at Jeremy’s party with everyone, making Amelia ridiculously happy by giving him a chance. I could be catching up with Evy. I could be home right now, sleeping. Or watching mindless TV and eating popcorn. So how did I end up in some stranger’s house watching Sophia sleep on the video screen of her baby monitor?

I didn’t have to agree to babysit. Really, it’s just a plaque—Mr. Donnelly won’t be too disappointed if we wait until next year to order it. I don’t need it as filler for my college apps. Dad would hate that I’m stressing over this. I need to let it go.

And who cares why Jonah doesn’t want to volunteer?

Or why there’s no trace of him in this house besides a photo that’s four years old? Not even a hat or a sweatshirt or a backpack on the first floor. Nothing of his written between the playdates and Zumba classes on the calendar on the fridge. No magazines with his name in the rack by the couch.

I’ve scoured the whole first floor, and there’s nothing here to teach me anything more about him. But it’s not like I’m going to go snoop in his room. That would be ridiculous.

I turn up the volume on the baby monitor until it’s slightly staticky and I can hear the soft splashes of the rainfall setting on her white-noise machine. Instead of soothing me, the rhythm makes me feel useless. I need a distraction, a purpose, an outlet.

There are four remotes aligned with military precision on the coffee table. These are framed by a neat stack of parenting magazines and a pink basket of teething rings, bibs, pacifiers, and burp cloths. I pick up the remote on the left and study it. Pick up the next one and compare them. I press
the power button on the third one and the stereo blares to life with, “My teddy loves me. He’s got a big red bow—” I jab at the button again and hold my breath. The music dies instantly and the sound isn’t replaced by crying. Returning the remotes to the coffee table, I double-check the baby monitor. Sophia’s still sleeping and I still have nothing to do.

I cross to the bookshelves. Since I don’t want to read
What to Expect When You’re Expecting
or during the
First Year
or any portion of a child’s life, I hope there’s something tolerable and diaper free in their library.

On the top shelf is a book I recognize too well. It’s stuck between a battered copy of the
Mayo Clinic Guide to a Healthy Pregnancy
and a hardcover bio-thriller. I pull it out and sit on the floor with it cradled in my lap, tracing the cover lettering like I did when I was seven and Mom would bring me to visit Dad at his office. This cover is different—a newer edition. What new criteria have they added to
Teens in Flux: Adolescent Psychology
by Ethan Waterford, Ph.D. And who is Roberta Schell?

Why does the cover advertise that she’s written a brand-new introduction to my father’s book? I flip the pages—turning past highlighted passages and pencil notes in the margins—wondering how a book like this would assess
me
. What would Dad think about how I’ve turned out?

If Dad were still here, would he be able to explain how to make
Teflon
work in my favor? How to let that barrier down occasionally and who to let in?

If Dad were still here, everything would be different. Tomorrow we’d be making pancakes and going golfing. Maybe I’d even finally figure out how to play. I used to tag
along just so I could ride in the cart, hand him clubs, and have four hours of his attention. If Dad were still here, tomorrow I wouldn’t be putting on black and dueling with my grief.

I don’t want to go to the memorial tomorrow. I’m not ready to say good-bye again. I want to shut the door on those feelings—the ones that might consume me if I ever allow myself to acknowledge them—and run away. I thumb through the index of Dad’s book, knowing there’s probably a section on “repressed emotions”—and that’s the closest I’ll be able to get to
him
helping me deal with his death.

I shut the book’s cover. I should have told Mom “no” when she asked for my help with planning. Instead, I chose caterers and florists; picked out hors d’oeuvres and flowers. Called all our relatives to invite them, which meant listening to all of their reminiscing and tears. And I made sure we were stocked up on tissues, because every time I had to ask Mom a question, she would cry and I’d feel guilty for not being able to answer it myself.

There’s a quiet sneeze over the monitor—it isn’t followed by any other sounds, but I click on the video. Sophia’s in the same position as the last fifty times I checked.

I wish I had something to do—anything. Anything but sitting here thinking about Dad … or Jonah.

Which is just pathetic, because I’m sure I haven’t crossed his mind once since he walked away and left me standing at his locker.

11
 
 
Jonah
 
 
6:20 P.M.