Aftercare Instructions Page 5

  “Is your mom home?”

  “No, I’m alone.” He swings the door wide again. “Seriously!”

  “Where is your mom?”

  I feel like a private investigator or something, and I’m trying to break this poor kid down who obviously doesn’t want to be involved.

  “She’s, you know, working.”

  Working. Busy Mrs. Sage with her community outreach and her church groups and her fund-raisers and luncheons. Work. Peter always told me my view on her was narrow. That really, she was doing a lot of good for the community, and that I was too hard on her. Me, hard on her? That’s funny.

  “What is it today?”

  “Volunteering.”

  “Where?”

  “Asbury Park.” He breathes in deeply, and looks down hard into the floor. “I’m going to miss you, Gen.”

  “Miss me?”

  I know what this means, and I don’t know if I can bear to hear it from Jimmy Sage of all people. I steel myself, though.

  “I’m sorry he’s doing this.”

  I want to press him for answers. Press him for what he could have picked up from overheard conversations or maybe even what Peter has told him directly. But I just ask, “Can you please tell me where he is?”

  “I don’t know where he is, but…” He draws this last word out like he’s falling off a cliff. Buuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu …

  Maybe we’re falling together.

  “But what?”

  I may appear calm to the innocent bystander, but I assure you, as I lose altitude from jumping off this cliff, the pressure builds and builds in my chest.

  “I know he’s with Vanessa.”

  And I splatter on the cold, hard dirt.

  Jimmy swings his arms around me into a loose, awkward hug. I don’t want to admit that it wasn’t a good idea to come here. I had a body before I came to this door. Now I am a mess of broken bones.

  I start to walk away and he grabs at my arm, so I turn back around.

  “Genesis?”

  “Yes?”

  He takes another deep inhale and then says, “Is Ally ever coming home?”

  “I don’t think so, Jimmy.”

  He shakes off the answer like it’s obvious he knew I would say that, and then stands a little straighter.

  “I miss her.”

  I remember the two of them being the weird science kids who would collect bugs and study them. They were so excited when they found an American oil beetle. They both got blisters from some kind of chemical they emit when irritated.

  “She’s pretty happy in the city with my grandparents.”

  He nods. “I guess I’d be too.”

  “Lots of cockroaches to look at.”

  “You know cockroaches can live for weeks without their heads?” he says, smiling at me, all teeth.

  “That’s disgusting.”

  “Well, maybe next time my mom takes me to the Museum of Natural History, I can see her.”

  “Maybe.”

  I miss Ally. I miss how she thought powdered doughnuts smelled like ants, and how she never wanted to brush her teeth, and how she always wanted to watch old detective movies instead of cartoons.

  “I’ll let you know when she visits next, okay?”

  He nods. “Do you want me to tell Peter you stopped by?”

  I shrug because I really don’t know. Peter feels like a ghost.

  “Hey, Jimmy.”

  “Yeah?”

  Taking a cue from Will Fontaine, I say, “Don’t take any shit from the army, kid.”

  He smiles again, and I walk away.

  Rose sits in her car at the edge of the driveway. She followed me here.

  “You’re going to get pneumonia if you walk. Please stop being so stubborn and let me drive you home.”

  Then I feel the wave again like I’m going to cry, but I fight it. I fight hard. I have to stop feeling sorry for myself. We sit in her car for a second. Catching our breath. My breath? Building my bones back up after the fall, when a car pulls into the driveway in front of us.

  I duck for cover.

  With my head between my knees, I say, “Who is it? Is it him? Does he see us?”

  “It’s not him.”

  Why would I hide from him, anyway? I came here to talk to him. I raise my head, but too soon. The car hasn’t moved. It’s perched at the bottom of the driveway like a hawk scanning for prey. Or: investigating which stalkers are parked in front of the house. It’s definitely not Peter’s truck.

  “Drive! Drive!”

  To which Rose peels out, away from the curb. A grinding, shrieking sound vibrates in my ears as I lock eyes with the person in the driver’s seat: Mrs. Sage. She squints to see who sits behind the reflection in the glass, and when our eyes catch, hers widen with recognition as we fly away, leaving sparks, no doubt.

  “Rose! Why did you do that?”

  “I didn’t think that actually happened! I thought that only happened in movies. You think I actually know how to peel out?”

  I look back, and watch Mrs. Sage’s car shrink and shrink until we turn the corner and head out onto the main boulevard.

  And then I want to shrivel up inside my mortification.

  “Where are we headed?” Rose asks me.

  “Can we go to the ocean? I need it.”

  So we go. We drive back to my neighborhood and to the beach.

  The wind picks up closer to the water. It flows over my ears like I’m running headfirst into someone’s exhale. We slide under the railing, off the boardwalk, and over a snow-covered dune. I know there’s a path and we’re not supposed to walk on the dunes, but I can only go straight ahead right now.

  Dead ahead.

  Our sneakers crunch into the snow hiding the sand. We walk to where the water slides up to the snow, and then back into itself. I stare out over the gray blue until I don’t know where the ocean ends and where sky, clouds, earth, space takes over.

  Rose wraps an arm around my waist and nestles into my side. I wonder if I feel different to her. It did change. My body. When I was pregnant. Like right away my boobs pretty much doubled. But I’m deflating now. Back into what I was. The wind picks up again, and Rose’s hair blows across her face. She withdraws from the sideways embrace and removes a long strand of hair out of the back of her throat. I close my eyes, and my own hair whips at my cheeks.

  Does Mrs. Sage know what happened? Why we broke up?

  We continue to stare forward. Out across the ocean, where everything blurs into gray.

  “Remember when we used to write boys’ names in the sand and watch the waves swallow them up and out to sea?” Rose says.

  I don’t answer her, but I do remember.

  “What happened back there, Gen?”

  “Nothing.”

  The ocean doesn’t expect anything of me. That’s what I love most about it.

  “Nothing?”

  “Do you think Mrs. Sage saw us?”

  “Uhhh, I think we woke up the entire neighborhood.”

  “Oh God.”

  “It’s not a big deal, Gen.”

  “Not a big deal? That we spazzed out so hard and ran away from the woman who already thinks I’m crazy?”

  “You’re right. That was terrible.”

  We take a second, and then both burst into laughter at the same time.

  “That shit really does only happen in movies.”

  “Welcome to my life. Though I don’t think it’s a movie. I think it’s an epically tragic stage play.”

  “Yeah, sounds more like it. What happened before the peel-out?”

  “Jimmy said he was sorry Peter is doing this to me.”

  “Doing what?”

  “Breaking up with me, I guess. He also said he’s out with Vanessa right now.”

  Rose raises her eyebrows.

  I sit down in the sand. It’s cold and wet, but I don’t care. Then something hits me. “Do you think he’s getting together with Vanessa?”

  “I honestly don’t kn
ow. I could see it, though.”

  “Really?”

  That is colder than the ground underneath me.

  “I don’t know, Gen. She’s always had ulterior motives. You know that.”

  “I didn’t put it together. Like, what if she told the story about my dad to break us up? To turn his mother against me and weaken us? So she could move in? Is that crazy?”

  “Who knows? Maybe it is and maybe it isn’t. That’s pretty Machiavellian, though.”

  It makes sense. It makes perfect sense that she would let out my darkest secret to make him choose his family and their beliefs over me. And then she’d be there to catch him? Is this paranoid psychotic bullshit? Or is it something?

  Rose picks up a shell and scoops up little piles of sand.

  I know Vanessa liked him before we started going out. I know it hurt her when we got together. But so much time has passed at this point, right?

  I stand and pull my hood tighter over my ears.

  “Maybe not, though,” Rose says. “Sometimes people aren’t so calculated. Sometimes you don’t know all the damage you’re going to cause. People don’t think.”

  Vanessa does. She thinks. And no one suspects it with her sweet-as-pie façade. She’s just the kind of girl Mrs. Sage would approve of. From a good family. Promising future. Would that kind of plan actually work? Had she chipped away long enough that he’d just give in? Was I so much to handle that he needed to go someplace easier, safer, more conventional? Will she make him happier?

  I let it go for now. Drive it out of my mind.

  We walk back across the dune. Past the new condos by the shore to where the houses are a little bit more crumbly. Where people crumble and are just expected to carry on. Neither of us speaks. We don’t get back in Rose’s car. Rose doesn’t fight me. The walk to my house isn’t far from here. All I want to do is climb back into bed and forget about today. And yesterday. And the day before. Forget about the phone not ringing. Forget about Peter and Vanessa, wherever they are. Forget about old friends with cruel plans. Forget I have to go back to school tomorrow. I can’t imagine what the hallways of the school look like. How any of my classrooms look. Anywhere I’ve seen or been with him has been erased.

  When Peter came into my life, he patched up the places where everyone else left holes. Ally had just moved out. Mom was a zombie. And he was comfortable. Fun. Easy. Normal. Though I don’t know what that means anymore. Because I don’t think normal people do what he did yesterday when he left me.

  Now that he’s gone, I know nothing has healed under the patchwork job he did. There aren’t any instructions anywhere on what to do when your dad dies like he did and then your boyfriend leaves you at Planned Parenthood while you’re getting an abortion. Where are those instructions? How is it I still want to be with him? Who is going to tell me not to?

  Not my mom. She’s still pining for a ghost herself.

  Rose, maybe.

  Delilah, probably, when I clue her in.

  I thought I wanted normal. I thought Peter and his family had normal. I thought it could solve everything. Now I just want to figure out my own version of normal. And rewrite the directions on which way to walk, which way to turn, when everything goes to shit.

  ACT I

  SCENE 5

  (This scene takes place in a crowded high school hallway, between classes. Students trickle through, slide books from lockers, gather, gossip, goof off, and so on, continuously around the main action.

  At rise, PETER searches for something in his locker. He pulls everything out and makes a pile on the ground. It is clear he can’t find what he is looking for.

  GENESIS enters stage right, passes him, stops, does a double take, and then watches for a second. She gestures for his attention, but he is buried in the contents of his locker.

  She turns away, and this is the moment he finds what he is looking for. He stuffs everything back into his locker and closes it, turning around to lean against the wall in relief.

  Now, he sees the back of Genesis, walking away.)

  PETER

  Hey! Genesis!

  (She turns back. They smile at each other and approach cautiously.)

  PETER

  Hi.

  GENESIS

  Hey.

  PETER

  You in a rush?

  GENESIS

  Um. No. Yes.

  PETER

  Okay.

  (Beat)

  How’s your mom?

  GENESIS

  Fine. Not much different. But maybe out today. My grandparents are pushing for it.

  PETER

  Good.

  GENESIS

  I hope so.

  PETER

  (Awkward pause)

  Okay, I’m just going to say it.

  GENESIS

  What?

  PETER

  I like you.

  (Pause)

  (GENESIS doesn’t quite know how to react.)

  PETER (CONTINUED)

  I do. I don’t care what anyone thinks.

  GENESIS

  People think about this already?

  PETER

  No, not like that.

  GENESIS

  Okay.

  PETER

  You look skeptical.

  (ROSE passes and interrupts.)

  ROSE

  Gen! I was looking for you! Where were you hiding? Oh, hi, Peter.

  PETER

  Hi, Rose.

  (Yet another awkward pause)

  ROSE

  Am I … interrupting something?

  GENESIS

  PETER

  No.

  Yes, kind of.

  GENESIS

  Oh.

  ROSE

  Gen?

  GENESIS

  Go ahead. I’ll be right there.

  (ROSE looks suspicious, but turns to leave anyway.)

  GENESIS (CONTINUED)

  (Calling to Rose)

  Save me a seat.

  (Back to Peter)

  So.

  PETER

  So.

  GENESIS

  I don’t get this. It’s so out of the blue.

  PETER

  You really think it’s out of the blue?

  GENESIS

  Uhhhh … yeah. I’m not your usual type.

  PETER

  What do you know about my type?

  (Pause)

  GENESIS

  Nothing. But I’d guess less complicated.

  PETER

  Give yourself some credit.

  GENESIS

  Spoken like the prophet counselor extraordinaire, Ms. Karen.

  PETER

  She must read the same fashion magazines I do in waiting rooms. I just … well, I … I had a lot of fun yesterday.

  (GENESIS tries to hide that she is very much enjoying what he’s saying to her.)

  PETER (CONTINUED)

  If we were in elementary school, I’d ask you to be my girlfriend.

  GENESIS

  I don’t …

  PETER

  But I’m not going to. Another thing the magazines said was to try to hang out again to see if we like each other. Not only was our date fun, it was also educational.

  GENESIS

  I have to get my mom settled back in today.

  PETER

  Whenever you’re ready.

  GENESIS

  I can’t do this.

  PETER

  Can’t now? Or can’t ever?

  GENESIS

  I don’t know.

  PETER

  Okay.

  GENESIS

  This is a really bad time.

  PETER

  I know. But I’m here. I’m waiting for you when you’re ready.

  (Lights fade to blackout.)

  AVOID STRENUOUS ACTIVITY

  School today.

  Somehow I kept myself from calling Peter last night.

  Somehow he didn’t call me either.

  Som
ehow that was so much easier.

  Why can’t I glide through the halls today like normal? We could glide back to each other and never talk about these past few days, before everything atomized into little particles and started reshaping into pictures of things we don’t know how to recognize.

  I want to retrace back to when he was wrapped tightly around me, and everything felt safe. When the world shook up, and he held me still.

  I slip into Advisory first period with my head tucked, and make a beeline for a seat in the back corner of the classroom. McDonald’s Wendy is there, and she smiles at me. I think I smile back, but I can’t tell exactly what my face is doing. I focus on Slaughterhouse-Five, my go-to book when I don’t want to engage. Sometimes the firebombing of Dresden is easier to face than high school.

  As I move through the morning classes, no one really says anything to me, but the looks are back. Those looks that feel like spotlights. You’re blinded, while the onlooker sees you perfectly clear, illuminated. What do they see? What do they know? I keep my head down.

  And then I run into Rose. Literally straight into her.

  “Gen! Uh? In a hurry?”

  It takes me a minute to focus and realize I can see everything clearly again.

  “I haven’t seen you all day, crazy lady. You avoiding me?”

  “No.”

  She grabs my hand and ushers me into the cafeteria. It’s pizza today. Rose usually brings her lunch, but pizza day at school is like a holiday feast for her. A break from the brown rice wraps and raw vegetables her mother usually makes her pack. Apparently others feel the same way, because the line is twice as long as usual.

  Just missing one particular pizza lover.

  “Is he in here?” I ask under my breath. It’s only freshmen in line around us, so I’m not really worried about anyone overhearing, but just to be safe I have to ask. Rose gazes sort of spaced-out-like into the room.

  “Who?”

  “Don’t be stupid.”

  She snaps back and faces me.

  “Who are you looking for, Rose?” I ask.

  “No one,” she says, a little too quickly.

  “Can you just tell me if you’ve spotted anyone I’d rather not see, please?”

  “Coast is clear.”

  As I continue to scan, Will Fontaine enters the cafeteria. He lifts his head in my direction, then saunters toward us. He carries a skateboard with the word Bones on the bottom of it. I really don’t want to deal with Rose and her bitchiness toward him right now. I wish some of his friends were here so he could glob on to them instead of me.