Untethered (17 page)

I wonder if she’ll snap now. “Dad’s serving you with divorce papers. Tomorrow.”

Mom stares at me until goose bumps form on my arms and a chill shimmies down the back of my neck. Then she excuses herself from the table and takes the cordless from its cradle. She goes upstairs, leaving a mess in the kitchen, something she never, ever does. I sigh and look at Sam, who is practically eating his whole hand.

“Sam,” I say.

Sam immediately takes his fingers out of his mouth. “You said not to say anything. Why’d you tell her?”

“She knew something was up. I couldn’t pretend.”

Sam nods and brings his hand back to his mouth. This time I say nothing. Let him have his comfort. He looks so worried and sad, like the time when he was four and he lost two of the polyester peas in his stuffed pea pod. He slept in Mom and Dad’s bed for almost a month after that.

It feels like I’ve swallowed barbed wire. I stand up. “We should do the dishes.”

I wash and he dries. Then I wipe down the table. Muffled yelling comes from upstairs. Sam pulls his iPod out of his pocket and sticks the phones into his ears.

That’s when I see Cassie through the lace curtains of her kitchen window. She’s home. Finally. I rinse out my dishrag, then move to the living room and draw the blinds.

Twenty-One

October: There Is No Santa Claus (It’s your parents lying to you. Again)

Monday morning, Mom serves us our breakfast and gives us our lunch money like some sort of zombie. Apart from ‘good morning’ she says nothing. She moves like she’s on rails.

Sam and I get out fast, and on the ride to school with Cassie I think about the butterfly and the zoo and I say, “So, what’d you do yesterday?” I know I can forgive her if she tells me the truth.

Cassie glances at me and shakes her head.

“Go ahead.”

Her eyes flick up to the rearview mirror, to see if Sam’s listening. But Sam makes a point to shove his earbuds further into his ears.

“I had a really fun weekend, Sylvie,” she starts.

I swallow a raspy feeling in my throat.
I had a really fun weekend
. The unsaid is
without you
.

But it’s even more than that. “Part of that fun was talking to Kevin.” Cassie doesn’t look at me, just keeps her eyes straight forward.

I feel like I did when Cassie told me at age seven there was no Santa (“It’s your parents lying to you,” she’d said then). Everything in my life felt like a farce. Including Cassie’s friendship.

“So,” I say now. “What happened this weekend? I need you to tell me the truth.”

But she doesn’t. She’s quiet so long, I can’t take it anymore. We pull into the school parking lot, and I get out before she’s even fully stopped the car.

“Nothing happened!” Cassie yells to me before I slam the door.

“I’m not stupid,” I shout back and sprint to my first class, hoping to outrun my tears.

At lunchtime, Sam announces the big news: Bryce told him he could sit at their table. Sam doesn’t hesitate.

“Sorry to leave you all hanging.” He makes a show of apologizing to us as we walk through the line in the cafeteria.

“Don’t sweat it, Sam,” I say, holding up a ladleful of mashed potatoes, wondering whether or not to whip it at him. “We were trying to figure out how to get rid of you, anyways.” I shake the mashed potatoes onto my plate. This is nuts. I thought Sam would end up with the pale-faced weirdos who eat boogers and make up math equations for fun, not the guys I want to be with.

I get to the cash register at the same time as Cassie, wondering if she’s got any intention of telling me the truth. We’ve been stiff around each other all morning. But something’s got to give.

Sam sits down at Kevin’s table between Bryce and Tori-the-table-hopper -Thompson.

Cassie, Michelle, Sarah, and I sit down at our usual table and begin to eat. We talk about Mr. Crawford’s Geography test, but everything feels strange. Like we’re in some parallel universe.

“Can you believe Sam’s at that table?” Michelle is having a hard time keeping food in her mouth it’s hanging open so wide. “What’s the deal with that?”

“He’s their mascot,” Cassie says. “A little frosh to carry the flag for the group. They’re having fun and they like him.”

“He
is
more fun than he looks. But still. Why him and not us?” Michelle shrugs her shoulders and adds unconvincingly, “Not that I care.”

“Me neither,” Sarah agrees quickly, not fooling anyone. “What about you, Cassie? I would think after the weekend, they’d have asked you to sit at that table.” Sarah’s eyes narrow to straight lines.

“Well, they ...” Now Cassie’s glance flicks over to me.

“They what?” Sarah pushes.

“They don’t want ... well, Tori and Ashley said ...”

“You’re talking to Tori now?” My voice sounds like I’ve swallowed glass.

“Well, it was Ashley, really. Tori was just there and agreed.”

“But I thought you hated her.”

“I do. She was at Kevin’s, though. Can’t avoid —”

Sarah breaks in. “But what did she
say
, Cassie? About the lunch table.”

“She said ...” Cassie’s gaze points to me, then she purses her lips and shakes her head. “Doesn’t matter. I’d rather be here.”

Sarah and Michelle look at me now like I have some rare disease. Which, I suppose in a way, I do.
Freakitis
. “It’s you?” Michelle asks me.

“It’s no big deal,” Cassie says.

No big deal?

I hate her sometimes. Really hate her. “I have to use the bathroom.” I push my chair back and leave the cafeteria. It’s all I can do not to run.

I lock the stall door and push my fists into my eyes.
Don’t cry. Don’t cry
. Now Cassie’s sticking by me at lunch out of pity? Because she feels sorry for me? Because no one else wants to be around me?

She’s supposed to be my best friend.

My chest shudders as the first sob escapes me. I grab onto the toilet paper dispenser and rest my head on the wall of the stall, right where someone has scraped into the paint:
Keri Nielsen is a slut
. I can’t stop the sobbing now. All I can do is hope no one will come in.

But that’s too much to ask for.

“Sylvie?” It’s Cassie. Alone. At least it’s not Tori.

I stifle another sob.

“Look. I don’t know why you’re upset. I choose to sit with you at lunch, don’t I? We share lockers and everything.”

“I’m not forcing you to.” The words come out a wail.

“I know. I want to ... but you need to know that doing things on my own sometimes, not as the Cassie and Sylvie team, it’s ... interesting.”

“
Interesting?
What the hell does that mean?!”

“People like me for me.”

“
I
like you for you.” Then it hits me: “What are you saying? That people don’t like me?” Not that this is news. But Kevin ... he said I was okay.

“Sylvie, you don’t like
yourself
.” Cassie’s voice is hard. “So you don’t let others see how great you can be — you act different around everyone else. You say things ... Like at Bryce’s party. You offended Ashley by ignoring her. You ... you jump to conclusions.”

Anger sparks a fire inside me. I throw open the stall door and glare at her. “Like I’m jumping to conclusions about you and Kevin?”

She flinches. “Don’t even go there, Sylvie.”

“No, you’re the one who said you wouldn’t go there.”

Cassie’s eyes flick away from mine and land somewhere over my left shoulder. “I’d just like a little credit for sticking by your side, that’s all.”

“I’m not a charity case.”

“I didn’t say you were.”

“Why are you even friends with me? So you can tell everyone else how I hold you back? So everyone will feel sorry for you? The martyr Cassie stuck with Psycho Sylvie Sydell as a friend.”

“Stop it. Now you’re being stupid.”

“No, you stop it. Admit that you want to get rid of me. You want to be with Kevin and Bryce and Ashley. You don’t want to be friends with some loser who shucks off her body like she shucks off dirty clothes.”

The bell signaling the end of lunch rings. We have three minutes to get to class.

Cassie slowly shakes her head. “You need help, Sylvie. You’ve got a real problem, you know that?”

“Yeah, Cass. You’re my problem.”

She doesn’t say anything to that. She just walks out the door without looking back.

It’s a difficult task to ignore your locker partner. But I manage pretty well all afternoon. I wait until she grabs her books from her shelf before even attempting to get mine. I sit far from her in Morality and let my insides boil every time I think of all she’s said. I go from anger to self-pity to bitterness and back around again in the course of the next couple hours.

By the time I get to Art, I’m back to anger, laced with the desire to inflict pain. Preferably on Cassie, but unfortunately, she’s not available.

Nelson sets up his canvas next to mine.

“Hey, Sylvie. Everything okay? You look like you could use some cheering up.” He dips his brush into some red paint and dots it onto his nose. “How about a clown? I’ve got the hair for it.”

Any other day I would laugh, maybe paint his cheeks, too. But not today. He waggles his eyebrows at me and it reminds me of Cassie and her one eyebrow-trick. That pisses me off. “Nelson,” I say, my voice harsh. “Leave me alone. For once, just leave me alone.”

His blue eyes get big and he wipes the red paint from his nose. He gathers his stuff together and moves to the other side of the room without a word.

I hate myself sometimes.

When I get to the community center, I’m so worked up I’m not sure I’ll be able to teach the kids. My dad’s deserting the family was hard enough. But Cassie deserting me? It puts me over the edge.

My eyes sting. And I keep breathing in those damn hiccupping sobs that come on after I’ve cried too hard. Angie drops what she’s doing and comes over to me. “Sylvie Sweetheart, what’s wrong?”

And that’s when it hits me. I will never get Kevin. I’ll never be pretty like Cassie. I’ll never be normal. And my family will never be whole. And my knowing how to control astral projection can’t change any of that.

Thick and tricky as quicksand, a sense of despair settles over me, pulling me under. It gets into my lungs, it blurs my vision and it paralyzes me. Numbness trickles through me and I feel a tug. Then I’m out, the shadows wrapping their long fingers around my astral self, like ice on a wound.

Angie screams as my body crumples before her, collapsing into her arms. The kids in the room run towards us, eyes and mouths wide open. Fear circles the room like a vortex, pulling everyone in.

I want to go back to my body, reassure Angie and the kids. But the shadows feel so ... nice. They suck my depression away and replace it with something stronger. Anger. Hatred. Selfishness.

I stay in their arms only forcing myself back to my body when I see Angie pull out her cell phone, ready to dial 911.

Once I’m in, the taste lining my mouth is so rotten, I almost retch. “It’s okay,” I manage to say to Angie. “Don’t call anyone! Please!”

“I have to.”

“Please, Angie. Please,” I sob. The last thing I need is more tests and more questions from Dr. Hong. More worry for Mom.

She hesitates, but puts down her phone. I see her eyes and the eyes of a dozen little kids looking at me. But not the way they usually do. Not with admiration, or joy, or pride. They look at me with unease. They look at me like I scare them.

A thread of pain winds its way around my heart. This is the one place I’ve always felt welcome.

I know I won’t come back.

When I get home, I expect Mom to be giving massages late, as she does every Monday. I don’t expect for her to be in the kitchen. And I really don’t expect her to be surrounded by three gallons of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream.

She holds up a spoonful of Cherry Garcia as I walk in. “Want to join me? Misery loves company.”

“But, Mom! You’re lactose intolerant!”

She holds up a business sized envelope. “Your dad sent it. The bastard.” Taking a wad of Kleenex out of her pocket, she blows her nose.

“Oh, no.” I slide into a chair, still feeling a bit wobbly from my OBE. I grab the carton of Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough.

Mom finishes the Cherry Garcia and reaches for the Mint Chocolate Chunk. “You know, your dad was crazy about me in college. Every time I turned a corner, he’d be there with his goofy grin. Even after we got married, we adored each other. We’d spend hours just cuddling each other. And when you and Sam were young, too. It’s crazy. One day we were happy and the next we barely crossed paths. I can’t even remember the last time we kissed. I don’t know what happened.”

But I know exactly what happened. I started leaving my body. And taking up all her time. My stomach hurts, a sharp crampy pain, yet I keep eating the ice cream. “You still love him?”

“Yes. But I guess not enough to have done things right.” She sets the ice cream container on the table. “Some people say that you can’t be in love with one person your entire life. That we’re not made that way.”

I’m not so sure. I wonder if I’ll ever stop loving Kevin. It’s been six years already.

We eat in silence for a while. I think about Cassie and our fight, my stomach aching even more. Cassie The Perfect. So perfect she pushes away the only friend she’s had for more than ten years so she won’t have to be seen with her and her imperfections.

Cassie wouldn’t lose her shit in front of a bunch of grade school kids.

Cassie wouldn’t come home to see her mom torturing herself with milk products.

Cassie wouldn’t ... just wouldn’t.

“Mom?” It’s almost a whisper. “Do you ever wish you were someone else?”

She gives a bitter laugh. “Sylvie, that’s all I’ve been doing lately.” Then she thinks for a moment and reaches across the table to grab my hand. “Not that I would ever, ever give up you and Sam.”

I hear a faint humming then Sam opens the door. He’s been smiling, holding himself in that self-assured way again. But it all collapses when he sees Mom, the ice cream and the envelope. “Oh, no.”