Broken (14 page)

Nessa lives in College Heights, one of Smithfield’s older neighborhoods filled with sprawling maples and sycamores and big colonials. Compared to our street, it’s pretty upscale. No Mercedes in the driveways, but Volvos and Audis instead of Fords and Subarus. Makes sense since her mom is a county commissioner and her dad teaches psychology at Smithfield College.

Mom pulls into the driveway of a white two-story with tall columns reaching from roof to ground in the front. The place feels different from its neighbors—yeah, the lawn is trimmed and leaves are raked, but there are no pots of mums or pansies, no wreath on the door, no signs of life.

“Is there anybody home?” Mom asks. She senses it as well. The house feels empty. Worse, it feels sad.

“Mom will be late—election in six weeks. But Dad’s home.”

When my dad comes home, the house feels bigger, brighter. He races to catch up with me and Mom, starts projects he never finishes (and forgets about by the next time he’s home), loves to mess with the yard or garden or shrubs. This house doesn’t look like a house where a dad is at home. Where anyone’s at home.

Before either of us could say anything more, Nessa bounds out of the car and is halfway down the drive, waving good-bye.

Instead of driving away, Mom gets out of the car and follows her. I don’t know what to do, so I get out as well. By the time Nessa reaches the front door, Mom is right behind her. A man is standing in the front hall when Nessa opens the door. He’s not very tall, skin darker than Nessa’s, and a little mustache that looks out of place on his moon-shaped face.

“Dr. Woodring,” Mom says, pushing her way inside despite Nessa trying to block her. “I think we should talk.”

His eyes go big then he turns to Nessa and me. “Why don’t you girls wait in the kitchen? I think there are some snacks available.” His tone is formal; his voice has a faint lilting accent to it. Nessa rolls her eyes, grabs my hand, and tugs me down the hallway.

Their kitchen is huge, twice the size of ours. Everything in their house is white: white walls, white tile floors, white countertops. The only color comes from Nessa as she tosses her crimson-colored wool coat over one of the white chairs.

“Shh,” she whispers. “This way. We can hear everything.”

“But—”

“No buts,” she tells me. “They’re talking about me. I have a right to hear what they’re saying. Why’s your mom got to be in everyone’s business all the time, anyway?”

All I can do is shrug and follow her. She leads me to a door in the far corner of the house. The house is old enough that it has high ceilings and there are glass transoms above the doors. Nessa positions herself against the door under the open transom and motions for me to join her.

“Mrs. Killian,” her dad is saying. His voice is deep, resonant, and with that lilting lullaby accent. I imagine if I was one of his patients, I’d fall asleep on his couch while he was psychoanalyzing me. “I know you have the best of intentions, but really I have everything under control.”

“Like you did with Yvonne?” my mother fires back, using her
I’m the nurse and know best
tone that makes interns scramble. “I tried to warn you—”

“I know, I know.” There’s the sound of a couch or chair scraping against the wood floor. “We should have listened to you.”

“If you had—” Mom’s tone softens.

“If we had…” His voice trails off.

Beside me, Nessa squeezes my hand. A tear slips from her left eye and she doesn’t bother to wipe it away.

“Have you told Vanessa why her sister died?”

“No. She’s still coping with the trauma.” He made Vonnie’s suicide sound so clinical. “We didn’t want to scare her.”

“She has a right to know that Yvonne was bipolar.”

Nessa jerks her hand away from mine. She pushes open the door before I can stop her, leaving me standing there as she rushes in. Her dad is sitting on a leather sofa, his face in his hands. My mom sits beside him, her hand on his arm, comforting him.

“Vonnie was not bipolar!” Nessa shouts at my mom. “You’re not a doctor. You don’t know anything.”

To my surprise, my mom just sits there and takes it as Nessa screams at her. Swear words and insults I’ve never heard before, not even while sitting in the ER waiting room on a Saturday night. Finally she winds down, weeping.

It’s not her father who gathers her in his arms. He stands and moves behind the sofa as if to barricade himself from her pain.

No. When she collapses onto her knees, it’s not her father who comforts her. Instead, it’s my mom. She gathers Nessa into her arms and rocks her like a baby. “It’s okay,” she says over and over again. “Everything is going to be okay.”

Finally Nessa looks up over my mom’s shoulder at her dad. “Is it true? Vonnie was sick?” He nods. Slowly. “Why didn’t you get her help? You’re a doctor; you should have helped her.”

“We tried. She started meds just a few days before—” His voice breaks and he swallows hard.

“Then you should’ve tried harder,” Nessa says, climbing to her feet, fists on her hips. She turns to my mom. “You knew, you saw she was sick—”

“And I told your parents. Right away. I’m sorry, sweetie. But you need to tell your dad about what you’re doing. Before it’s too late.”

Nessa steps away from my mom like Mom’s dangerous. “I just wanted to feel better—normal—again. That’s all.”

Her dad comes from around the sofa. “Vanessa. What have you done?”

Mom speaks for her. “She’s been taking antidepressants. Her moods have been up and down; they might be making her manic.”

I remember what Jordan told my mom yesterday. I should have put the pieces together myself—instead I let myself enjoy Nessa’s jubilance, never questioning it or trying to help her. Shame makes me look away and I accidentally catch Dr. Woodring’s gaze. His face flushes and I’m not sure if it’s with anger or embarrassment. After all, it sounds like my mom has better diagnostic skills than he does. And twice now she’s tried to save his daughters.

“You know better than to take medicine not prescribed—” her dad thunders at Nessa.

Nessa doesn’t back down. “All that talking crap of yours wasn’t doing a damn bit of good. It hurt; it still hurts. Every. Single. Day. Besides, they weren’t even prescription. Just over the counter. Herbal. All natural. Supposed to be safe.”

Dr. Woodring gathers his breath and instead of yelling at Nessa again, he grabs her into a bear hug that lifts her off her feet. Tears rush down his cheeks. “Oh, baby, my baby. I’m sorry, so very sorry.”

She grabs hold of him like he’s the last lifeline on the Titanic and starts to cry as well. Pride floods over me as I watch the scene, trying to stay out of the way. Sure, Mom can be a pain in my butt. But she’s damned good at what she does.

Mom finally notices me and nods for us to leave.

“Are they going to be okay?” I whisper as we let ourselves out.

She closes the door behind us and stops to look at the house for a moment. “Yes. I think so. Come on, you must be starving.”

We head back to the car.

“We should invite Vanessa over to dinner some Friday,” Mom says as she backs out and turns us toward home. “Give her folks the night off, get her out of that lonely house. Your dad can make his lasagna.”

“Everyone loves Dad’s lasagna.” His ancient “family” recipe involves Prego, four kinds of cheese, and a secret ingredient: fennel. I relax. Everything is going to be just fine. Nessa will get the help she needs, I have friends I can invite over to dinner, and we’ll figure out some way to help Celina.

“Why were you and Nessa with those boys behind the gym?” Mom asks, breaking into my good mood.

I exhale. I’ve been waiting for her to ask about the fight, but it seems like she’s more worried about me hanging out with boys. That’s something new. Part of me likes it. That I could be the kind of girl a mom worries about. It’s almost, well, normal.

“Nothing,” I answer, striving for a combo of ennui and mystery. “Just hanging out.”

Mom makes a poof noise as she exhales. Like she’s resigned herself that, just like any other girl my age, I’ll have secrets from her. “If you say so.”

And that’s it. No grilling, no lecture, nothing.

I turn away in the darkness of the car and smile at my reflection in the mirror. Excitement simmers through my blood and I can’t wait to get home and call Nessa or Celina or Tony or Jordan—someone, anyone to share this feeling with.

I’ve done it. I’m a normal girl despite my broken heart.

My triumph is short-lived. As soon as Mom gets out of the car and doesn’t wait for me as she heads into the house, her posture rigid, I realize she’s upset. Not just mad or annoyed. Upset, capital U. I rush after her, Phil bouncing against my leg.

Then I draw up short. What am I supposed to apologize for? Having friends? Standing up to bullies? Trying to be normal?

I hang up my coat while I try to figure out the answer. I’ve worked so hard to get here, to take control of some small part of my life. Why should that upset her so much?

We end up barely talking during dinner. She says she has a headache and is going to bed early.

Mom’s headaches are always stress-related, and since I’m always the stress, I make her a cup of her favorite herbal tea and take it upstairs to her as a peace offering. I figure I owe it to her after she helped Nessa. Not to mention Nessa’s dad.

She’s lying in bed, right in the middle since Dad isn’t coming home tonight, looking pale and small and dwarfed by the pillows surrounding her on the king-sized bed. She has the lights turned off except for one small reading lamp and the TV is on but muted. And she has those frown lines around her mouth that always mean trouble.

“I feel like I’ve failed you,” she surprises me by saying.

“Mom…” I trail off, unbalanced and with no idea how to respond. It’s my job to make her feel better, only fair since she spends so much of her time doing that for me, but I’m not sure what’s wrong tonight. My going to school seems to have upset every routine we have—including how we communicate.

“I try so hard.” She closes her eyes as if I’m painful to look at.

I set the cup of tea on the bedside table and hover. Suddenly I know what it must be like for her taking care of me, frustrated when she can’t make everything better or take the pain away.

“It’ll be fine.” I tell her what she always says to me when I’m the one lying sick in bed. “You’ll see. If I can make it through this week then I can make it through the month, and then—”

She flinches as if she knows something I don’t. “Honey.” Her eyes pop back open. “I can’t stand to see you getting your hopes up like this. You know you can never live a normal life, no matter how much you try.”

Is she reneging on our deal? I’m supposed to have all week to prove myself. And look at me, I’ve been doing great. “But—”

“You’ll only break your heart, dreaming of what could be. After seeing what almost happened to Vanessa because no one told her the truth, I think we need to talk.”

“Could those medicines really have hurt Nessa?” I’m changing the subject; at least I hope I am.

She nods. “Yes. But once they’re out of her system, she’ll be fine. And now her parents can get her the help she needs.”

“It was really brave of you to go in there, talk with Dr. Woodring.” I’m realizing that most people would never get involved, would never care as much as Mom does. Not here in the real world outside of the hospital.

“You’re old enough now. You need to act like an adult and face reality.” She hauls in a breath, not looking me in the eye. Something Bad is coming. “You know that even with the defibrillator surgery, odds are you won’t live long enough to graduate.”

No. I didn’t know that. No one ever said that—they just said the internal defibrillator
might
prevent a sudden cardiac event. My cheeks go cold and my hands open and shut, trying to squeeze my blood back through my veins. No one has ever given me a time frame for my death before…but, in my heart, I know she’s right. Ever since this summer and my last Set Back, I’ve been feeling like time’s running out.

“Then maybe that’s all the more reason for me to try to live like a normal girl now,” I whisper, afraid my words will scurry away and hide from her scrutiny. “I mean, if there’s no time to waste…”

Her sigh fills the room. She closes her eyes again. “We’ll see.”

Her words haunt me. I’ve never seen her so tired before, no matter how sick I was or how much was going on at the hospital.

I know she’s not lying about my heart running out of time. Just the opposite. Finally, someone is treating me like a grown-up, telling me the whole truth. No one has ever done that before. Not the doctors or nurses. Not Dad.

Know what? The truth sucks.

The next morning, Mom is back to her usual self, the poised and confident Nurse Killian. Except she’s barely speaking to me. Barely even looking at me. As if she’s already declared me dead.

Me, I’m a mess. I didn’t get any sleep last night, spent it researching the defibrillator surgery that I already spent all summer researching before I refused it. Nothing’s changed; there is no new medical miracle that will make the operation less dangerous or more effective. The only reason I have to change my mind is that it would make Mom happy.

Can I do that? Risk my life with a dangerous operation just to make her happy? Especially since we both know the ticking bomb that is my heart is running out of time, with or without the defibrillator?

She’s done so much to keep me alive. Shouldn’t I do this one thing for her?

The question haunts me all morning. Then, after homeroom, on my way to lunch, I run into Jordan heading away from the cafeteria. “Where are you going?”

“No use causing trouble with the jocks.” He pushes through the doors leading to the space outside the gym where the fight was yesterday. Today we’re the only ones here. He drops his pack and grabs a sandwich from it, eats standing up, back to the brick wall. “Want some?”

“No, thanks.” We stand there in silence. I know my mom is waiting for me to get my lunch, will come looking if I’m late, but it’s my first chance to talk to Jordan in private. And I could really use a guy’s point of view. “Why was Tony here yesterday? It was our locker trashed and Celina’s clothes.”

We both stare at the trampled grass beside the equipment shed. He doesn’t answer right away. He chews and thinks, chews some more. Then, finally, just when I’m about to give up on him altogether, he says, “Maybe because if you hadn’t come along, it would have been him getting the treatment from the jocks.”

“Why? He seems so nice.”

The look he gives me is pitying. I think about what I’ve just said and I’m not sure which he found more pathetic: the fact that I thought nice was a good thing in a guy or the fact that I was so naive.

Then his expression softens. “You’re a lot like him, you know.”

Is that a good thing or bad? I’m not sure what to say.

“You both walk around like this place isn’t real—” He falters, takes a moment. “It’s like, like you’ve created some other school in your minds, a Smithfield High that doesn’t exist except the way you imagine it. For you, coming here is an escape from the hospital.”

More than that, it’s an escape from loneliness, but I don’t correct him. I don’t want him to stop talking. It feels so good the way he thinks and considers each word, not to see if they’re right, but weighing their impact on me, seeing if they’re right for
me
. No one has ever talked to me like this before.

“For Tony,” he continues, “it’s like, even though he’s one of the few kids who actually loves being in school—and believe me, that alone is enough to make him a target—but it’s like he’s already gone. Off to college and med school. Leaving Smithfield and the rest of us behind. He’s run ahead, so far ahead that none of us can ever catch up.”

Wow. Jordan’s a poet. The way he talks, he sees the world in ways the rest of us can’t even imagine.

He finally notices I’m staring at him. His gaze jumps up to meet my eyes, flicks back down to the ground, then bobs up again. Seems like he’s used up his quota of words for the day and all he does now is stare into my eyes.

Could he be jealous? Of me and Tony?

A sudden thrill shoots through me as the possibilities swirl through my brain. Suddenly I imagine myself dancing with Jordan—a slow dance, the kind where you have to hold your partner tight. Like we’re meant to be together. Like we will be together.

My heart skips, thudding me back down to earth.

Okay, maybe we don’t have long. But we can make what little time we have together count, really count for something.

How can I tell him any of this?

I can’t. Instead, I just stand there, letting the brick wall hold me up as he munches his bologna and mustard on white. I watch the way his jaw moves and almost swoon when he licks a dab of mustard off his thumb. Twice I open my mouth to say something—anything—but thankfully I shut myself up before I say the wrong thing.

The door beside us bangs open as Nessa storms out. “You guys ditched me!”

“We didn’t mean to,” I jump to Jordan’s defense.

“First Celina goes home early. Then
you
don’t answer any of my texts. Oh, and your mom’s looking for you. I think you’re in big trouble.” She says the last in a singsong voice.

She’s been avoiding me all morning—embarrassed, I guess, about what happened with her dad last night. Nice to see she’s still talking to me.

“I’ve got to go.” I grab my pack and Nessa slides into my spot beside Jordan.

He slants his gaze at her as if he just noticed her arrival. “Celina get home okay?”

She nods, fingers skimming her Pandora necklace. Her comfort item, the nurses would call it. “Texted me to bring her chemistry assignment.”

“Drop it by. I can do it.”

I’m surprised at his volunteering. But Mom’s waiting, so I have to leave them. As I head down to her office, I wonder about Jordan.

It doesn’t seem like him, abandoning us to our own defenses during lunch. Even if it might mean trouble with Keith Young and the rest of Mitch’s friends, wouldn’t it make more sense for him to stay with us?

Suddenly my stomach bottoms out. And it has nothing to do with being hungry. How could I be so stupid? There is no me and Jordan, no us. Except in my warped imagination.

As I hurry past the cafeteria doors, dodging the pummeling noise coming from inside, I realize Jordan knew Celina wouldn’t be at lunch. That’s what freed him from guard duty.

A normal girl might think that was a compliment, that he thought me and Nessa could take care of ourselves.

But Jordan doesn’t make me feel normal. Not at all.