Untethered (16 page)

I think I’m going to lose it, but then we finally arrive at the hospital.

The smell of antiseptic bites at my nostrils the second we pass through the sliding doors, reminding me of all the time I’ve spent taking some sort of medical test. I wish now that those tests had shown something. Anything. So I wouldn’t be here. Like this.

The hospital is busy for the middle of the night. There are people standing in clumps everywhere. We follow a nurse’s directions. My parents and Sam are in one of those hallway sitting areas, holding paper cups and looking shocked. I’m not surprised to see Mom and Sam, but I can’t believe my dad’s already here, too. He’s sitting next to Mom like they’ve never been apart.

The sight of them makes me stop in my tracks. The three of them look so much like a family.

“Any news?” Mr. Sanders asks.

“She’s not waking up,” my mom says. “They’re ... they’re ... I don’t know what they’re doing. They’re trying to wake her up.” Mom looks pale. And scared. “This is all my fault. Dr. Hong told me to keep an eye on her.”

“It’s not your fault.” Mr. Sanders shakes his head. “Don’t think that way.” The rest of the group stays silent. My mom must have said the same thing at least twenty times already.

I stand stiff, watching my parents look lost and my brother chew his thumbnail into oblivion. Panic strangles me. Being in this body is like wearing a cheap Halloween mask: I can see and breathe just fine, but I still feel half-blind and near suffocation.

I want to ask where my body is but can’t open my mouth. I kind of squeak without meaning to.

“What are you doing here?” Dad points his chin at me.

My family’s eyes are on me. I look down at myself and see the men’s tennis shoes. The dirty jeans.

The low pitch of my voice startles me. “Uh ... I’m ... Cassie’s friend.”

Dad looks at Cassie. “They’ll be testing for narcotics ...” He trails off, rubbing his hands over his face.

“I told them she doesn’t do drugs,” Cassie whines. “That’s not it!”

“They’ve got to cover everything in order to help her. In order to find out what happened.”

But I know they can’t help me. They’ll never find out what happened. Because they’ll never believe it.

I can barely believe it myself.

Twenty

September: Something’s Rotten in the State of Wisconsin

Sunday my face is almost back to normal, apart from the dark circles the shadows left behind, so Dad thinks we should enjoy the fall weather and take a hike outdoors.

“A hike?” Sam isn’t the physical type.

“Well, a walk. In the woods. It’ll do you both some good.” Dad drives out to Petrifying Springs Park in Kenosha, parking the car near the edge of the lot. The colors of the leaves on the hundreds of trees are already starting to change. In a week or two I’ll need to come out here with my sketchbook and some paints.

The sky is clear and the air warm. I take off my itchy wool sweater and tie it around my waist. Sticks crackle under our feet as we walk away from the lot. Somewhere, someone is having a barbecue; we get whiffs of the smoke on the wind.

Dad is extra happy, downright cheerful, almost forced. Sam and I exchange glances: something has to be up. But once we’re in the woods a while, Dad’s cheerfulness doesn’t seem so odd. He talks about the different trees and the origins of the park. He almost catches a chipmunk. He gathers chestnuts and gives them to us like we’re five, but it’s kind of fun. We sit at a picnic table among the squirrels and have summer sausage sandwiches and Coke. The texture of squishy white bread against firm slices of summer sausage is something I love. I chew with gusto and give Dad a smile. This is probably the best time I’ve had with him in years.

Of course, he has to go and ruin it.

“I wanted to tell you two, so you would be in the loop right away: I’m serving your mom with divorce papers.” He tries to say it nonchalantly, like you would tell someone to pass the salt.

I let my sandwich drop to the ground. What’s left in my mouth I swallow with difficulty.

“I wanted you to know, because your mom will probably be ... upset about it.”

“Oh? You think?” I say, my voice hard. “So, she doesn’t know yet?”

“She knows it’s what I want. She’ll find out tomorrow I meant it.”

“You didn’t tell her the papers are coming?” Sam’s voice quavers.

Dad looks embarrassed. “She wouldn’t have let me get a word in edgewise. But this way ...” He sighs and runs his long fingers down his face. “You kids can’t understand.”

“And what are we supposed to do? Keep this a secret? Break it to her?” I yell, the loudness of my voice out of place in the quiet of the park. Dad opens his mouth to answer, but I don’t let him. Instead, I let my emotions take over: “You’re so pathetic! I hate you! Both you and Mom are pathetic!” Hatred boils inside me, bubbling over. But it’s not really Dad I hate. Mom, either.

Dad stands up and stretches a long leg over the bench of the picnic table, smashing his lunch bag into a ball as he does so. I can hear him talk. I can see the anger in his face. But it’s from a distance. Because I’ve slipped out of my body so fast, even I don’t notice at first.

“I am your father, Sylvie. I do not need to answer to you, nor do I need to listen to you when you talk like that. You are to show me some respect.” Dad’s voice is hard and authoritative. And then my body falls from the bench and makes a dull thud on the ground.

“Sylvie!” Both Dad and Sam shake me until I come back into my body. When I stiffen up, Dad searches my eyes. “How do you feel?”

The back of my head aches where it hit the ground and Sam’s grabbing my arm too tightly, but all I say is, “Don’t tell Mom this happened. She’s got enough to worry about right now.”

No one says a word in the car, and I can tell Dad hasn’t decided what to do yet. We’re not angry with each other anymore, because the sense of despair fills the car so fully there’s no room left for anything else.

Even though it’s early, Dad pulls into our driveway. “I’ll keep quiet just this once,” he says. “But I might call Dr. Hong myself.”

I nod silently and he hands me a paper bag full of candy bars.

When we’re inside, Mom pokes her head out of her work room. “You two are home early! I’ve got another massage here today, okay?”

That’s Mom Code for: “I’m working! Don’t interrupt me.” We don’t need to answer. Thank God, because neither Sam nor I would know what to say.

I feel sick to my stomach and lock myself in my room, holding my trash can in my arms, just in case I puke.

I look at my Salvador Dali posters, at the paintings I’ve made over the years hanging on my walls. At my stereo, at the pile of blankets in a heap at the bottom of my bed. At my art supplies spread all over my desk. Nothing gives me any comfort whatsoever.

I want to get away. Just leave. Be somewhere else. And despite my bad experience visiting Kevin’s party, I think of astral projection again. It’s the only way I know how to escape.

You’re such an idiot, Sylvie.

But I do it anyways.

I set the trash can on the floor and lie back. I take several deep breaths, and imagine my body loose as jelly.

Eventually, I’m able to leave it.

I go through the wall and outside the house. Where do I want to go?

I should go to China, or Iceland, or Morocco.

But the shadows are with me, and they whisper his name, so instead I go to Kevin. Again.

Okay, Sylvie. Can you say
stalker
??

I can’t help it. I want to be wherever he is. And even though I don’t know where to find him, in a matter of seconds I’m next to him.

He’s in his Camaro, across from Lakeview Park. On his lap is a Cool Whip container with holes poked in the top. He stares out the window to the park. I get as close to him as I dare, amazed that he doesn’t feel me there. He squints over his shoulder and runs a hand through his hair. It’s getting darker now that he’s no longer at the beach all the time, but it suits him. I wish so much that I could touch it.

I look at what he’s staring at and feel a jolt of surprise: Cassie’s on a swing, her shoes kicked off. She swings slowly, dragging her toes in the sand.

Kevin gets out of the car quietly, then leans through the open window and takes whatever is in the Cool Whip container out, cupping his hands around it. He crosses the street and stands behind Cassie. “Hi.”

She nearly falls off the swing, then starts giggling. “Hi. You scared me,” she says.

They look at each other. Then she turns away, her cheeks pink. “I wasn’t gonna come.”

Kevin nods and bites his bottom lip.

They planned this meeting?
Rage fires through me.

Cassie’s voice wavers. “The only reason I came was because you said you had something to show me. And I’m still not sure I should be here. It better not be lame.”

“It’s not.” He kneels down before her in the sand and for a second I think he’s going to propose. But instead, he moves his cupped hands right in front of her at chest level and opens them. A Monarch butterfly sits in the palm of his left hand, its orange and black wings spreading tentatively.

“Oh! Gorgeous!” Cassie breathes, her eyes bright. “It’s almost October, though, it should have migrated already. Where did you find it?”

Apart from opening its wings, the butterfly hasn’t moved. Kevin looks down at it, then up at Cassie. “My secret.”

I can’t believe it.
A freakin’ butterfly!
She told him? Him?
I’m the only one who knows about her butterfly fetish!

Cassie’s voice is soft. “I hate for it to be all alone. And we definitely can’t keep holding it. What if we sneak it into the butterfly exhibit at the zoo?”

The zoo entrance is across from the park, just steps from where Kevin’s car is parked. Kevin makes a strangled noise between a cough and a laugh. “Great idea.”

That’s how he got the thing, I’m sure of it. He just snuck it
out
of the exhibit.

I follow them. Kevin, hands cupped, but looking like he’s itching to drop the butterfly and put his arm around Cassie, and Cassie all quick steps and excitement. Kevin tells Cassie to take his wallet and pay, so she does, while he stands to the side, his back to the cashier. They hurry past the kangaroos, go around the pyramid covered with mountain goats and monkeys and make it to the building in the middle of the zoo where the butterfly exhibit was just inaugurated a few months ago.

First one set of sliding doors, then another, open before them as they step forward. Even without my body, I can sense the change in temperature. Not feel it so much, but know it. It’s hot, mostly humid. Tropical flowers create a jungle around Kevin and Cassie, and a waterfall splashes in the background. All different colors of butterflies flit inside the greenhouse, stopping on a flower or a rock before moving on. Cassie has been here plenty of times, but I can see she’s still enchanted.

“Should I let it go?” Kevin holds his hands out, and at Cassie’s nod opens them. The Monarch stays put until Kevin wiggles his fingers. Then it flies up and out of sight.

Cassie smiles at him and touches his arm. “That was worth coming out for.”

I shouldn’t have trusted her.

They walk the exhibit and the rest of the zoo. When they stop in front of an orangutan that has gotten a hold of some gum and is blowing large, pink bubbles, Kevin leans over, lifts Cassie’s mass of auburn hair and drags his lips across her neck.

My astral body suddenly goes numb.

Cassie closes her eyes as Kevin’s lips move along her hairline. She gently pushes him away and starts to walk, smiling back at him as she does so.

I begin to follow them, but I hear someone calling my name. It’s faint at first, a question, “Sylvie?” then louder and louder almost to the point of a scream, “Sylvie!”

My mom.
No.
I don’t want to, but I have to go.

I speed back into my body. Mom is banging like crazy on my bedroom door. I take a moment to reorient myself, then unlock it.

Mom’s eyes are wild and her hair messed up. “Good Lord, Sylvie! When I tell you to open that door, you open it! No locking it! You scared me!”

“I was asleep.”

“I’ve been out here screaming for you. I was ready to go out to the garage and get a ladder so I could climb in through the window!”

“You’re serious?”

The look on her face tells me she is. “Dinner,” she says. I walk past her and go downstairs. The kitchen table is set. Sam’s in his spot.

“Do we say something?” he whispers.

Say something?
It takes me a second to realize he’s talking about the divorce papers. That was today? Spending the afternoon following Kevin around has made everything else seem far away. But the whole deal with Dad comes back like a hammer to my chest.

“Are you kidding? Don’t say a word,” I whisper before Mom comes in the room.

All throughout dinner, Sam and I avoid talking about Dad or anything, really. We’ve never downed our food so fast or with so little complaint. I can’t look Mom in the eyes, so I keep my gaze on the table. Every once in a while, though, I sneak a peek at Cassie’s house to see if she’s home yet.

“So Mrs. Cabrini told him, ‘If that’s what you want.’” Mom lifts her fork into the air and gives a light laugh. Then she eyes me and Sam. “You two aren’t even listening to me.”

Of course we aren’t. “Sure we are, Mom,” I say. “Mrs. Cabrini.”

Mom puts her fork down and wipes her mouth with her napkin. “Did something happen at Dad’s?”

Both Sam and I burst out, “No!” at the same time. Total confirmation that something did happen.

“Well?” Mom says, waiting.

I’ve been going back and forth between hating Mom and hating Dad. Hating myself. Hating the world. Right at this moment, though, Dad takes the cake. I thought Mom was the weak one because she cries all the time, but at least she has the courage to say things to Dad herself. And yet ... and yet there’s a reason Dad never says anything to her. You can’t say anything to Mom. She’s a know-it-all dictator in lots of ways. She’s stiffer than a rod of uncooked spaghetti; she doesn’t bend. She only snaps.