Thirteen Reasons Why(57)

But I keep facing forward, refusing to see it as more than it is. It’s a sign. A stop sign on a street corner. Nothing more.

I turned corner after corner with no idea where I was going.

We walked those streets together, Hannah. Different routes, but at the same time. On the same night. We walked the streets to get away. Me, from you. And you, from the party. But not just from the party. From yourself.

And then I heard tires squeal, and I turned, and I watched two cars collide.

Eventually, I made it to a gas station. C-7 on your map. And I used a payphone to call the police. As it rang, I found myself hugging the receiver, part of me hoping that no one would answer.

I wanted to wait. I wanted the phone to just keep ringing. I wanted life to stay right there…on pause.

I can’t follow her map anymore. I am not going to the gas station.

When someone finally did answer, I sucked in the tears that wet my lips and told them that on the corner of Tanglewood and South…

But she cut me off. She told me to calm down. And that’s when I realized how hard I had been crying. How much I was struggling to catch one good breath.

I cross the street and move further away from the party house.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve walked out of my way so many times to avoid that house. To avoid the reminder, the pain, of my one night with Hannah Baker. I have no desire to see it twice in one night.

She told me the cops had already been called and were on their way.

I swing my backpack in front of me and pull out the map.

I was shocked. I couldn’t believe you actually called the police, Jenny.

I unfold the map to give it one last look.

But I shouldn’t have been shocked. Because as it turns out, you didn’t call them.

Then I crumple it up, crushing the map into a ball the size of my fist.

At school the next day, when everyone replayed the events of what happened the previous night, that’s when I found out who had called. And it wasn’t to report a fallen sign.

I stuff the map deep into a bush and walk away.

It was to report an accident. An accident caused by a fallen sign. An accident I was never aware of…until then.

But that night, after hanging up the phone, I wandered the streets some more. Because I had to stop crying. Before I went home, I needed to calm down. If my parents caught me sneaking back in with tears in my eyes, they’d ask way too many questions. Unanswerable questions.

That’s what I’m doing now. Staying away. I wasn’t crying the night of the party, but I can barely hold it back now.

And I can’t go home.

So I walked without thinking about which roads to take. And it felt good. The cold. The mist. That’s what the rain had turned into by then. A light mist.

And I walked for hours, imagining the mist growing thick and swallowing me whole. The thought of disappearing like that—so simply—made me so happy.

But that, as you know, never happened.





I pop open the Walkman to flip the tape. I’m almost at the end.

God. I let out a quivering breath and close my eyes. The end.





CASSETTE 6: SIDE B





Just two more to go. Don’t give up on me now.

I’m sorry. I guess that’s an odd thing to say. Because isn’t that what I’m doing? Giving up?

Yes. As a matter of fact, I am. And that, more than anything else, is what this all comes down to. Me…giving up…on me.

No matter what I’ve said so far, no matter who I’ve spoken of, it all comes back to—it all ends with—me.

Her voice sounds calm. Content with what she’s saying.

Before that party, I’d thought about giving up so many times. I don’t know, maybe some people are just preconditioned to think about it more than others. Because every time something bad happened, I thought about it.

It? Okay, I’ll say it. I thought about suicide.

The anger, the blame, it’s all gone. Her mind is made up. The word is not a struggle for her anymore.

After everything I’ve talked about on these tapes, everything that occurred, I thought about suicide. Usually, it was just a passing thought.

I wish I would die.

I’ve thought those words many times. But it’s a hard thing to say out loud. It’s even scarier to feel you might mean it.

But sometimes I took things further and wondered how I would do it. I would tuck myself into bed and wonder if there was anything in the house I could use.

A gun? No. We never owned one. And I wouldn’t know where to get one.

What about hanging? Well, what would I use? Where would I do it? And even if I knew what and where, I could never get beyond the visual of someone finding me—swinging—inches from the floor.

I couldn’t do that to Mom and Dad.

So how did they find you? I’ve heard so many rumors.

It became a sick sort of game, imagining ways to kill myself. And there are some pretty weird and creative ways.

You took pills. That, we all know. Some say you passed out and drowned in a bathtub full of water.

It came down to two lines of thinking. If I wanted people to think it was an accident, I’d drive my car off the road. Someplace where there’s no chance of survival. And there are so many places to do that on the outskirts of town. I’ve probably driven by each of them a dozen times in the past couple weeks.