Last Summer(25)

No wonder she was in a funk.

Tears welled and Ella let them fall. She dropped her head in her arms and cried.

A short time later, Damien knocked on the door trim. “Ella?”

She lifted her head off the desk and wiped her face with her sweater sleeves.

Damien’s expression transitioned from curiosity to concern. “What’s wrong?” He came into the room and knelt beside her, spinning her chair so that she faced him.

Ella plucked a tissue from the box on her desk. She dabbed her eyes and blew her nose. “It’s Grace.”

He frowned. “Who’s Grace?”

“My friend. She died.” She sniffled.

“God, Ella. I’m so sorry. When? How?” He grasped one of her hands. “Are you okay?”

She shook her head, waving her free hand. “Oh, no, she died a long time ago. I’m just sad.” Ella tossed the tissue in the trash and exhaled a long sigh. “She died on the fourteenth. I didn’t realize the date until I just saw it.”

“She sounds like someone who was very important to you.” Damien’s thumb absently stroked Ella’s hand. “Who was she?” Damien knew so much about Ella, but she’d never told him about Grace. She never told anyone about Grace. The memories hurt too much.

“My best friend. We met when Andrew and I moved in with Aunt Kathy in Los Altos after our parents died. She was our next-door neighbor. We were both six and instant besties. She died our sophomore year. She was only fifteen.”

Damien inhaled sharply. “So young. I’m sorry you lost her, Ella.”

“Me too.” Ella sniffed and Damien waited a beat before he asked, “Do you want to tell me about her?”

Ella shrugged.

“What’s something the two of you did together?”

“Oh, I don’t know. All sorts of things. Typical girl stuff, like makeup and dress up. We played house a lot when we were younger. She also liked to write. We joined the newspaper club together in high school. Umm, what else? Her dad always took us to Ghirardelli Square for ice cream sundaes. Sundaes on Sunday, he liked to say. That always made us laugh. We had fun.”

Damien squeezed her hand. “How did she die?” he asked softly.

Ella felt her mood shift, growing more sullen. Guilt crept in, casting shadows over her memories.

“Grace had problems,” she began. “I mean, we all had problems, but hers got worse after her parents divorced.”

Ella explained to Damien that after Grace’s parents divorced, Grace, who’d been close with her father, had fallen into a depression when he moved across the country. Her parents thought Grace should stay in Los Altos with her mom. Her school was there, Ella was there, and everything else that was familiar. The less upheaval Grace endured, the better. Or so her parents had thought.

Grace had difficulty coping with the changes in her family dynamics. First there were the dark shadows under Grace’s eyes that never faded. She blamed late nights up studying. Ella suspected Grace suffered from insomnia and her classes had nothing to do with those late nights. Grace wasn’t studying either. Her grades were sliding.

Next came the cuts on her best friend’s arm. Ella called her out about it when she noticed one day during class transition. Grace’s sleeve had bunched at the elbow while she juggled a load of textbooks. On the soft, white flesh inside her left forearm, Ella spied four angry, red welts, each an inch long.

She gasped at the sight of them and grasped her friend’s wrist. “What did you do?”

Grace’s eyes dodged left then right as she pushed down her sleeve. She shushed Ella.

Ella wasn’t having any of that nonsense. She pulled her friend into the handicapped stall in the girls’ bathroom. “Show me,” she ordered.

“It’s nothing. Let’s go. We’re going to be late for class.”

Ella blocked her way. “Not until you show me your arm.”

“Shush, keep your voice down. Others will hear.”

Bella Fields and her princess posse had walked into the bathroom, squawking like chickens with their gossip. Through the crack in the bathroom stall, Ella peeked at them lined up before the mirror, applying thick coats of foundation and voluminous mascara to their already made-up faces.

Ella turned back to her friend. At her prodding, Grace reluctantly revealed her arms. Ella hissed, getting a closer look. The cuts weren’t deep, and they’d already scabbed over. But the surrounding skin was pink and raised.

“The other one.” Ella gestured for Grace’s right arm.

“It’s just the left,” Grace murmured, embarrassed.

“Why?” Ella was scared for her friend.

“My therapist says I blame myself for my shitty life.”

“Your life isn’t shitty. It’s just . . . different than it used to be. Before you know it, it’ll be your new normal and just as awesome.”

“My new normal sucks.”

The bell rang.

“We have to go.” Grace, eyes glazed dark and stormy, unlocked the stall door. Ella wanted to see the sun shine in her eyes again.

“Spend the night at my house,” she suggested. “I’ll get Aunt Kathy to whip us up her mac and cheese you love so much, then we’ll binge-watch Friends. I’ve TiVo’d the whole season.”