Gravestone (38 page)

90. Oh Man

“Oh, yeah, sure.”

That’s how I answer Poe Monday morning when she asks me if we’re still going to prom.

That should show how into it I am, how much I’ve thought about it.

I haven’t stopped thinking about the connection between Uncle Robert and Iris and my place in this.

How in the world can I think of prom when I’m thinking of bigger things? Like life and death and dead animals and gravestones and French guys with ironic last names and Triumph motorcycles I need to start riding.

How can my answer be anything other than
Oh, yeah, sure?

But the problem isn’t what Poe says next. She only smiles and nods and walks away. She knew I was going to say yes anyway. She kissed me, and I didn’t run away to the nearby hills. She knew that there was something on the other side of that kiss, though I couldn’t really say
what
exactly, because I don’t know myself.

It’s a big adjustment from thinking someone hates you to realizing they’ve liked you all along. I’m not just seeing Poe in a different light. It’s a whole different room. No, make that a new house in a new town on a planet far, far away.

No, my problem comes when I get to art class.

Oh man.

Kelsey greets me, and I see how excited she is to see me and I instantly know I’m in trouble. Not now, of course. But once I’m found out. Once my predicament is known.

“How was your weekend?” she asks.

“Great.”

At least I have a motorcycle now. One that can take me far away from all of this. Once I learn how to drive the thing.

91. As If Eventually

April belly flops into May, and I soon find myself drowning.

Something happens, and I can’t say exactly what. It’s like a full moon rises in the sky and then just hangs there, daring everybody to keep going, taunting us all with its cold color and craziness.

The craziness starts, of course, with Mom.

It started when she got the idea to come back to this crazy town and it continued once we actually arrived.

She’s been working more and coming home later and acting more strange, though part of me has been too preoccupied to really notice. But when I get home one evening after practice, Ray having given me a lift, I find her in a state of panic.

Make that terror.

I get to the door and find it locked. It’s never locked when Mom’s home. I unlock it and hear someone bark out at me and see a shotgun pointed at me.

“Chris! What are you doing?” Mom is standing behind the couch, in front of the island in the kitchen, pointing a shotgun.

At me.

“What are
you
doing?”

I guess most kids would be calling 9-1-1 by now and saying “Yes, sir, I’ve got a bat in my house but it’s actually in my mom’s head ’cause she’s gone totally batty.”

She lowers the shotgun but doesn’t apologize or even act like it’s weird to be pointing it at me.

“Mom?”

“I thought you were someone else.”

“I usually get home around this time.”

“What time is it?”

I know she’s been drinking. I can hear it in her voice. Her pitch is slightly higher, and even when she can say the words without slurring, they sound as if they’ve been coated in wine.

“It’s around seven.”

“Lock the door.”

“What’s going on?”

“Just do it!”

I lock it and put down my bag and look around the room. There’s only one light on in the whole house. I don’t even need to bother to look to see if dinner is ready.

“Mom?”

“I’m in trouble.”

“With who?”

“You be nice to the wrong people and they’ll just want to wreck your soul, that’s all I can say.”

For a split second I wonder if this has anything to do with Dad.

She’s still holding the shotgun.

“Where’d you get that?” I ask.

“It was here.”

“Where?”

“None of your business.”

“Mom?”

“Promise me, Chris. Promise me that when you grow up you’ll not be like ninety-nine percent of the guys out there. Promise me that.”

“Why don’t you put that down?”

“I’m not giving this to you.”

Yeah, because I can’t handle it, but you sure can.

“Just put it down.”

She sets it on the island.

“Should I call the police?”

“We’re not calling anybody. But if someone comes through that door, he’ll get an answer. I told him if he sets foot on this property, I’ll shoot him. I don’t care.”

“Who?”

“Chris—it’s not your—”

“Who are you talking about? Tell me!”

I think my voice might wake the dead, or at least the dead in the tunnels underneath our house.

“Mom?”

“A guy I met at work.”

“What’s his name?”

“Why?”

“Well, in case you pass out like you usually do every single night, and he knocks at the door. A name might be good. Or if he shows up at school like everybody does and pops out of my locker.”

“Mike.”

“What’d he do?”

“Nothing,” Mom says.

“Really?”

She sees me glancing at the shotgun.

“He’s a guy I met at work who I thought was one thing but was really something else. Just like every other guy I’ve ever met.”

“Did he—?”

“Just drop it.”

“Is he coming over? Seriously?”

Mom leans against the couch and looks like someone who’s just finished a marathon.

“I don’t know.”

That’s all she says. That’s all I get.

Mike.

Mike who might be coming over.

Mike who was going to be welcomed with a nice shotgun blast.

And here I’d thought we might have one of those nice scenes where a kid talks to his parent about prom, kinda like in those cute eighties flicks.

But this isn’t one of those films. I’m not a girl, and I’m never going to be pretty in pink.

Later that night, after Mom eventually falls into a coma on the couch with the television still on, I’m in my bed with my eyes wide open, waiting to hear anything.

I really can’t remember what it’s like to go to bed without worrying or wondering or waiting. I remember that I used to go to bed wondering what my friends would say tomorrow about my Facebook comment. Now I go to bed wondering if some creepy face is going to pop up by my window.

Eventually I turn the light back on and decide to read. That doesn’t work, so I put on some music at a decent volume that only the conscious can hear. I decide to skip the heavy, dark, sad stuff that fills most of the record collection. Instead I put on a Duran Duran album that is bouncy and peppy at first, yet soon turns sad and reflective. Of course.

I find the leather band I no longer wear but still have. For a long time I hold it and think of Jocelyn.

If heaven does exist, is she looking down at me?

If heaven does exist, she’s surely doing far more important things.

I want to cut this leather band up into a hundred little pieces.

I put it back on my desk and then see the picture, that crazy picture I found sometime ago.

It’s even more blurry and faded than I remember, like a snapshot accidentally taken pointing at the sun.

I want to cut the picture up, too, yet for some reason I keep it.

The same reason I keep listening to music like this.

The same reason I keep waiting.

As if eventually, it’ll all make sense.

As if eventually, it’ll all be okay.

92. A Change in Seasons

Maybe ten or twenty years from now, I’ll look back on this with fond memories. Fond memories that I got
out
of this nightmare. Fond memories that I left this school and this town in the dust. But at the moment I’m just wondering how to make it to tomorrow.

I really want to talk to Kelsey about the whole prom thing, but then one day at lunch I see her talking to an upperclassman.

His name is Sam, I think. He’s not a jock, but he runs in the same circles as Ray Spencer. I think he might be competition for Ray, to be honest. Another good-looking, well-to-do guy who dates a lot of girls at this school.

Kelsey is laughing at him and bringing her head close to her shoulder in a way a cat might as it’s purring.

I bump into someone, who curses at me, and I stop staring and find my seat next to Newt.

“That’s crazy,” I say, talking more to myself than anything else.

“There are two times when people get really crazy around here. May and December.”

I look at Newt and wonder how he knows what I’m even talking about, then realize I’m lucky to have a friend like him. Before I can start picking at my lunch, Georgia strolls by and stops in front of us.

“You had your chance, but look who got her instead.”

This girl really just needs a mop in her mouth.

“What did I do wrong today?”

“Oh, nothing,” Georgia says with contempt. “Nothing at all. The news about prom wasn’t hard on her at all. But she’s still going.”

“With Sam over there?”

Georgia nods.

“So are you going with the man of your dreams? Dan? Planning on eloping?”

“No. In fact, Ray asked me. Might’ve been a nice group if you had been smarter.”

I thought Ray was going to ask someone else to prom. I’m going to say something, but she walks away. Newt is eating Cheetos and just staring at me.

“What?”

“Like I said,” he says, shaking his head. “May and December.”

Things do feel different, but it’s the end of the school year and everyone is ready for summer. Poe still doesn’t talk much with me at school, yet she wants to go to prom with me. Kelsey acts like a stranger, not even painting by me in art any longer.

Mom is a mess, drinking more than ever. She’s no longer hiding it, which is not good since I’m no longer hiding my growing contempt at having to watch her self-destruct. This is one of those cycles that can only end badly.

I don’t hear from Jared, nor do I hear from Sheriff Wells.

It’s nothing except a vibe I get. Things
are
different.

All I know is that summer is coming, and maybe with it will come a change. Or at least a change of scenery.

Maybe if I could look into the future, I’d feel a little more at ease.

But something tells me otherwise. Something dark and oppressive is coming, something that’s going to change everything, something that is even worse than what happened with Jocelyn.

Nothing could be worse than that.

Nothing.

93. Miss You

The night before prom, and I’m not thinking about Poe.

I’m thinking about you.

I miss you. I miss your smile and your spirit and your sweet touch.

I miss knowing there could have been more. Knowing there
should
have been more.

I miss the days and weeks and months we could have spent together. I miss the future we could have looked forward to and the past we could have looked back on. I miss the memories we could have built.

I miss feeling missed, feeling wanted, feeling anything.

I miss everything that we had in that blink of time. Everything that got buried and blacked out and blown into the wind.

I miss knowing there’s something to fight for. Something for
us
to fight for.

I miss everything that could have been and should have been.

I miss you, Jocelyn.

No amount of time changes that. It only cements it even more.