Thirteen Reasons Why(51)

I would love to see his face right now. His eyes shut tight. Jaw clenched. Fists pulling out his hair.

And to him I say, Deny it! Go on, deny that I was ever in that room. Deny that I know what you did. Or not what you did, but what you didn’t do. What you allowed to happen. Rationalize why this isn’t the tape you’re making a return appearance on. It must be a later tape. It has to be a later tape.

Oh, really? And you’d like that? A later tape would make things better?

Don’t bet on it.

God. What else could’ve gone wrong that night?

I know she wasn’t your girlfriend, that you hardly ever talked to her and barely even knew her, but is that your best excuse for what happened next? Or is that your only excuse?

Either way, there is no excuse.

I stood up, stabilizing myself with one hand on the bed.

Your shoes—the shadow of your shoes—were still visible in the light coming under the door. Because when you left that room, you took up post right outside. And I let go of the bed and started walking toward that sliver of light, not sure what I’d say to you when I opened the door.

But halfway there, two more shoes came into view…and I stopped.

When I left the party, I just walked. Several blocks. Not wanting to go home. Not wanting to go back.

The door opened, but you pulled it back and said, “No. Let her rest.”

In that tiny burst of light, I saw a closet—its accordion doors halfway open. Meanwhile, your friend was convincing you to let him in that room.

I waited, heart pounding, trapped in the middle of the floor.

The bedroom door opened again. But again, you pulled it shut. And you tried to make a joke of it. “Trust me,” you said, “she won’t move. She’ll just lay there.”

And what was his response? What was it? What was his reasoning for you to step aside and let him in that room? Do you remember? Because I do.

It was the night shift.

He told you he was working the night shift and had to leave in a few minutes.

A few minutes, that’s all he needed with her. So just relax and step aside.

And that’s all it took for you to let him open the door.

God.

Pathetic.

I couldn’t believe it. And your friend couldn’t believe it, either, because when he grabbed the doorknob again, he didn’t rush right in. He waited for you to protest.

In that brief moment—the moment you said nothing—I fell on my knees, sick, covering my mouth with both hands. I stumbled toward the closet, tears blurring the light from the hall. And when I collapsed into the closet, a pile of jackets on the floor caught me.

When the bedroom door opened, I pulled the closet doors shut. And I shut my eyes tight. Blood pounded in my ears. I rocked back and forth, back and forth, beating my forehead into the pile of jackets. But with the bass pumping throughout the house, no one heard me.

“Just relax.” Those words, he’s said it before. It’s what he always says to the people he’s taking advantage of. Girlfriends. Guys. Whoever.

It’s Bryce. It has to be. Bryce Walker was in that room.

And with the bass thumping, no one heard him walking across the room. Walking across the room. Getting on the bed. The bedsprings screaming under his weight. No one heard a thing.

And I could have stopped it. If I could have talked. If I could have seen. If I could have thought about anything, I would have opened those doors and stopped it.

But I didn’t. And it doesn’t matter what my excuse was. That my mind was in a meltdown is no excuse. I have no excuse. I could have stopped it—end of story. But to stop it, I felt like I’d have to stop the entire world from spinning. Like things had been out of control for so long that whatever I did hardly mattered anymore.

And I couldn’t stand all the emotions anymore. I wanted the world to stop…to end.

For Hannah, the world did end. But for Jessica, it didn’t. It went on. And then, Hannah hit her with these tapes.

I don’t know how many songs went by with my face buried in those jackets. The beats kept sliding from one song into another. After a while, my throat felt so scratched. So raw and burning. Had I been screaming?

With my knees on the floor, I felt vibrations whenever anyone walked down the hall. And when footsteps fell within the room—several songs after he entered the room—I pressed my back against the closet wall…waiting. Waiting for the closet doors to be torn open. To be yanked out of my hiding place.

And then? What would he do to me then?

Tony’s car pulls over. The front tire scrapes the curb. I don’t know how we got here, but the house is right outside my window now. The same front door where I entered the party. The same front porch where I left. And to the left of the porch, a window. Behind that window, a bedroom and a closet with accordion doors where Hannah, on the night I kissed her, disappeared.

But light from the hallway seeped into the room, into the closet, and his footsteps walked away. It was over.

After all, he couldn’t be late for work, could he?

So what happened next? Well, I ran out of the room and straight down the hall. And that’s where I saw you. Sitting in a room all by yourself. The person this whole tape revolves around…Justin Foley.

My stomach lurches and I fling open the car door.

Sitting on the edge of a bed, with the lights turned off, there you were.