Thirteen Reasons Why(9)

I tear the blades of grass out of the gutter and stand up to leave. As I start walking, I rub the blades between my fingers till they fall away.

But this tape is not about your motivation, Alex. Though that is coming up. This tape is about how people change when they see your name on a stupid list. This tape is about…

A pause in her speech. I reach into my jacket and turn the volume up. She’s uncrinkling a piece of paper. Smoothing it out.

Okay. I just looked over every name—every story—that completes these tapes. And guess what. Every single event documented here may never have happened had you, Alex, not written my name on that list. It’s that simple.

You needed a name to put down opposite Jessica’s. And since everyone at school already had a perverted image of me after Justin’s little number, I was the perfect choice, wasn’t I?

And the snowball keeps a-rollin’. Thanks, Justin.

Alex’s list was a joke. A bad one, true. But he had no idea it would affect her like this. This isn’t fair.

And what about me? What did I do? How will Hannah say that I scarred her? Because I have no idea. And after people hear about it, what are they going to think when they see me? Some of them, at least two of them, already know why I’m on here. Do they see me differently now?

No. They can’t. Because my name does not belong with theirs. I should not be on this list I’m sure of it.

I did nothing wrong!

So to back up a bit, this tape isn’t about why you did what you did, Alex. It’s about the repercussions of what you did. More specifically, it’s about the repercussions to me. It’s about those things you didn’t plan—things you couldn’t plan.

God. I don’t believe it.





The first red star. Hannah’s old house. There it is.

But I don’t believe it.

This house was my destination one other time. After a party. An elderly couple lives there now. And one night, about a month ago, the husband was driving his car a few blocks away, talking to his wife on the phone when he hit another car.

I shut my eyes and shake my head against the memory. I don’t want to see it. But I can’t help it. The man was hysterical. Crying. “I need to call her! I need to call my wife!” His phone had disappeared somewhere in the crash. We tried using mine to call her back, but his wife’s phone kept ringing. She was confused, too afraid to click over. She wanted to stay on the line, the line her husband had called her on.

She had a bad heart, he said. She needed to know he was okay.

I called the police, using my phone, and told the man I would continue trying to reach his wife. But he told me I needed to tell her. She needed to know he was okay. Their house wasn’t far.

A tiny crowd had gathered, some of them taking care of the person in the other car. He was from our school. A senior. And he was in much worse shape than the old man. I shouted for a few of them to wait with my guy till an ambulance arrived. Then I left, racing toward his house to calm his wife. But I didn’t know I was also racing toward a house Hannah once lived in.

This house.

But this time, I walk. Like Justin and Zach, I walk down the center of the road toward East Floral Canyon where two streets meet like an upside-down T, just as Hannah described it.

The curtains in the bay window are shut for the night. But the summer before our freshman year, Hannah stood there with Kat. The two of them looked out, to where I am now, and they watched two boys walk up the street. They watched them step off the road and onto the wet grass, slipping and tumbling over each other.

I keep walking till I reach the gutter, pressing the toes of my shoes against the curb. I step up onto the grass and just stand there. A simple, basic step. I don’t slip, and I can’t help wondering, had Justin and Zach made it to Hannah’s front door, would she have fallen for Zach instead of Justin a few months later? Would Justin have been wiped out of the picture? Would the rumors never have started?

Would Hannah still be alive?





The day your list came out wasn’t too traumatic. I survived. I knew it was a joke. And the people I saw standing in the halls, huddled around whoever had a copy, they knew it was a joke, too. One big, fat, happy joke.

But what happens when someone says you have the best ass in the freshman class? Let me tell you, Alex, because you’ll never know. It gives people—some people—the go-ahead to treat you like you’re nothing but that specific body part.

Need an example? Fine. B-3 on your maps. Blue Spot Liquor.

It’s nearby.

I have no idea why it’s called that, but it’s only a block or so away from my first house. I used to walk there any time I had a sweet tooth. Which means, yes, I went there every day.

Blue Spot has always looked grimy from the sidewalk, so I’ve never actually gone inside.

Ninety-five percent of the time, Blue Spot was empty. Just me and the man behind the register.

I don’t think a lot of people know it’s even there because it’s tiny and squished between two other stores, both of which have been closed since we moved here. From the sidewalk, Blue Spot looks like a posting board for cigarette and alcohol ads. And inside? Well, it looks about the same.

I walk along the sidewalk in front of Hannah’s old house. A driveway climbs up a gentle slope before disappearing beneath a weathered wooden garage door.