A World Without You(35)
After eating, the adults flood the living room, so Rosemarie, Peter, and I escape to Rosemarie’s bedroom. Peter lets us paint his toenails black, but when he smears the polish on Rosemarie’s polyester comforter, we kick him out of the room. We then spend an hour or so Facebook-stalking Joey Albertus, doing an online quiz to see which character on Rosemarie’s show we are most like, and making plans to go to a concert in Boston that neither of us will ever really be able to go to.
An hour after dinner, my phone buzzes. “I’ve gotta go,” I say, reading the text from Mom.
Rosie grabs the phone out of my hand. “She’s just asking if you’re okay and when you’re coming home. Tell her that you’re fine and will be home later . . . like a normal person.”
I grab my phone back. “Nah,” I say. “I gotta go.” I know what Mom really means.
When I get back to the house, Mom’s in the kitchen doing the dishes. She always rinses them with hot water and soap before putting them in the dishwasher, a move everyone in the family tries to convince her is unnecessary. Dad’s already back in his office, and Bo has hung a sheet where his door used to be. I pause by his room, wondering if I should see if he’s up, ask how he’s been, just talk or something. I think about the easy way Peter and Rosemarie live together. Rosemarie would have no problem going into Peter’s room. She’d just walk right in. He’d smile at her and say, “What’s up?” and she’d suggest they do something together, maybe get some ice cream and watch a movie. She’d say . . . No. That doesn’t matter. There’s no point pretending Bo and I could be like Peter and Rosemarie. But if it were me, if it were Bo, I’d say, “Hey, how’s that school? Do you like Dr. Franklin? He seemed nice.” And then I’d say, “I heard a girl in your class died. Are you okay?” And maybe he’d tell me and maybe he wouldn’t, but it’d be something.
My toe stubs against the new gouge in the hardwood floor where Dad dropped or threw down the drill.
I walk past Bo’s bedroom and into my own, putting my earbuds in, cranking up the music, and staring at the ceiling until I fall asleep.
CHAPTER 21
When I wake up in the morning, it takes me a second to remember where I am. That I’m in the bedroom where I spent most of my life.
That’s the weird thing about being at home. Because this is still, technically, my home. If someone asks where I live, I give this address, not Berkshire’s—even though I spend more time at the Berk. The toothbrush I like best is at the academy. I have another one here, but it’s stiff and tastes gross. I have the same shampoo brand in this bathroom as the one in Berkshire, but it’s fuller here, and older, and there’s a crusty rim around the opening where the shampoo comes out.
And I actually have a door at the Berk.
How can this be my home when I’m treated like some sort of criminal here?
I pick the pants I wore yesterday up off the floor and pull them on. Something hard and sharp in the pocket pokes my leg, and I withdraw the smashed USB drive. I start to toss it into the trash can, but I hesitate.
Only the plastic casing was destroyed; the actual drive looks intact, which means I could watch the videos if I wanted to.
It’s just footage of our sessions with the Doctor. No big deal.
Except . . .
It’s footage of Sofía too.
Seeing her on-screen won’t be the same as seeing her in person, but it’s better than nothing. I open my laptop and jam the rectangular end of the drive into the port. Just as I’d hoped, it still works. Folders, each labeled by month, pop up on my screen. All our sessions with the Doc. All those days sitting beside Sofía.
I select one of the early ones at random, and the video starts playing immediately. At first, there’s nothing but an empty room on the screen. No—not empty. The Doctor’s at his desk, so still that for a moment I don’t notice him at all. His brow is furrowed and his eyes downcast. His hands are clasped in front of his face, his knuckles ashy. He looks as if he’s contemplating something . . . dark. He seems almost . . . afraid.
The door opens, and the students stream in—Ryan and Gwen first, then Harold, his eyes darting. I watch myself stroll into the room, cocky.
Then she walks in.
Her footsteps are graceful, like a dancer’s, toe first and fluidity up her legs. But there’s a bashful nature to her movements as well, a hesitating grace, as if she doesn’t believe anyone would ever look at her even when she’s visible. The me on the video screen looks back and smiles at her, and she almost fades away, barely holding on to her opaqueness.
Dr. Franklin has, as usual, set up the chairs in a semicircle around his desk. Harold sits between Ryan and me, and Gwen and Sofía sit next to each other, Gwen pulling her seat closer to Sofía and away from the Doctor. The arrangement has Sofía and me together, as I had hoped we would be.
The session I’m watching wasn’t long before our first date. We were still trying to figure out what we meant to one another. I knew exactly how I felt about Sofía, but I also knew that she was . . . scared.
Not that I understood it then. I was so busy looking at her that I never really saw her. At the time, I had just thought Sofía was shy. But now, through my laptop screen, I can see something else, something beyond the surface, something wrong.