Wing Jones(21)

Tonight is no different. I wake up drenched in sweat. Every beat of my pounding heart is a command.

Run. Run. Run.





CHAPTER 12


I hope no one at school notices I’m back. I hope no one says anything to me. I hope I can fade into the walls and be invisible for today and tomorrow and all the days left.

It doesn’t happen like that.

No one talks to me, but everyone notices me. They talk around me, they talk about me. I hear the whispers, the jeers, and I try to tune them out. I’ve had a lot of experience, so it shouldn’t be so hard, but this is different. I never realized how much it could hurt to hear hateful things about someone else.

I wonder if Marcus has felt like this his whole life, hearing hisses and whispers about me. I wonder how he managed it. Because hearing people saying such horrible things about him, things I know are true, hurts me more than all the taunts and insults tossed at me ever did.

I keep my head down, don’t make eye contact, and head for my locker. Someone is staring at me. People have been staring at me all morning. But this feels different. This feels like a laser going into me. I try to ignore it and focus on opening my locker.

“You aren’t even going to pay your respects?” someone spits. It’s Alicia Howard, the girl who wouldn’t let me sit at her table. Her brother is friends with Marcus. Was friends with him. She’s scowling at me. “After what your brother did?”

What your brother did. Like because he’s my brother I’m somehow to blame.

I guess I never got to share in his glory, but now I can share in his shame.

“Wh-what?” I stammer. She’s leaning so close to me that a few of her long dark braids brush against my arm.

“You just walked right by it. Pretended you didn’t see it. Show a little respect.”

“Show respect to what?”

“His memorial!” She points over my shoulder and I turn, slowly turn, and I don’t know how I missed it.

There must be hundreds of carnations, white ones, in a pile on the floor. Michael’s picture has been taped to his locker, and all around it are Post-it notes with messages on them. “Michael’s dead,” Alicia says, real slow, like I’m stupid. Like I hadn’t realized it.

“I … I know,” I say.

“Your fool brother killed him and you can’t even take the time to show him some respect.”

“I’m sorry,” I whisper. I take a few steps toward Michael’s locker, toward the mound of flowers and his smiling face. I can feel Alicia’s eyes boring into me. Other people are slowing down to see what I’m going to do.

I tentatively reach out, when someone smacks my hand down. A girl I don’t know.

“You can’t touch that! Get out of here!”

I stare at her for a moment, her words piercing through my shocked daze. I’m not allowed to touch the picture, not allowed to show my sympathy, because my brother did this. Marcus isn’t here, but I am. And all these people, they’re mad at me just because Marcus is my brother. I’m filled with an unfamiliar fury, a boiling anger I’ve never felt before.

Not toward the people in the hall.

Toward my brother. He did this. To Michael. To everyone. To me.

“What? Are you stupid? I said get out of here!” The girl shoves me, hard, away from the locker.

I turn and I go as fast as I can down the hall, careful not to step on any of the white flowers, and I’m walking faster and faster and people are moving out of my way and shouting at me as I go and I move faster and then I’m jogging and then I’m running.

I’m running.

I’m running like I do in my dreams. My legs are pumping and I don’t think my feet are even touching the floor and I see the exit and the bell is ringing for class but I can’t stop and I keep going… I think I see a dragon tail whipping around the corner and I go faster, trying to catch it. Wait for me! I want to cry out, but I stay silent and keep running, my books clasped to my chest.

I keep going, past the cafeteria, away from the memorial, away from Alicia, away from everything. I chase after the dragon’s tail and I end up at the race track. No dragon and no lioness in sight. Only thing down there is someone sprinting around the track. Whoever it is, they’re fast. Like nothing can catch them. I lean against a tree and try to calm my breathing.

“Wing? Is that you?” someone shouts behind me. I tear my eyes from the runner and see Aaron jogging toward me and his face is scrunched up in confusion and concern. I haven’t seen him since the night of the accident.

“Wing? Where are you going? Alicia Howard is hollering that you were disrespecting Michael’s memorial…”

Aaron is close enough now that I can see he hasn’t shaved recently and his eyes are bloodshot.

The bell rings and Aaron looks at his watch. He glances over his shoulder at the school and then back at me. He sighs. “I’m already late to chemistry, so I guess it doesn’t matter if I’m a little later. Here, sit down,” he says, and sits under the tree where I’ve dropped my books and pats the ground next to him.

I hesitate. I’m also late, for English, but I wasn’t there all last week, and right now the last thing I want to do is go back into that building. I sit down next to Aaron, but not in the space he indicated because that spot is way too close to him.