The Opposite of Loneliness Essays and Stories(7)

For some reason I hadn’t until just then tried to think of the last time I’d seen him. But it must have been Tuesday morning when I darted out of his room and off to class. I’d forgotten my computer charger so I had to ring the doorbell again and I crawled back into bed fully clothed for a minute before I left. I wished I could remember the last thing he said to me but I couldn’t.

*

The gathering came to a close around noon when UVM’s president (whom none of us had ever seen before) stopped by to give his condolences and explain the logistics of a campus vigil scheduled for a few days later. No one wanted to be the first to leave, but eventually Susannah said she had a rehearsal and kissed Brian’s parents on the cheek before heading back into the snow. Others followed suit, and I was pulling on my peacoat when his mother came over and placed a hand on my shoulder.

“Claire,” she said, her eyes still welling. “Thank you.” I nodded, opening my mouth and then shutting it. “Brian told me about you, you know that? When I’d call him to check in, he’d tell me about you.”

I didn’t know what to say.

“He was an amazing guy.” It sounded so stupid. I wasn’t expecting it but something about speaking to her made my face squint up and I covered it with my hands because I’d started to cry. She moved her hand back to my shoulder and I thought about what Brian would think if he could see us.

“James and I were hoping you could say something at the vigil,” she said. “William and Adam will be speaking as well and it’d be nice to have you.”

“Sure,” I nodded again, instinctively.

“Good,” she said. “I think he’d like that.” There was silence for a minute as she studied me. And it struck me for the first time that she thought I was his girlfriend.

“Sure,” I said again, for no reason. Comprehending, finally, what I’d just said I’d do. What I’d just agreed to without

thinking.

*

That night it sleeted. Thick waves of ice rain pelted down on our pines and the Burlington streets were once again reduced to dark slush. Charlotte and our gay friend Kyle sat around my apartment and tried to watch The Royal Tenenbaums but abandoned it halfway because the whole thing felt stupid and we felt bad for laughing. Personally, I was trying not to think about the fact that I had to stand up in front of the university in two days and say something about Brian. Stand stupidly with a piece of printed paper as Lauren and the rest of them silently sobbed. I’d probably try to get choked up and fail under pressure.

“Who’s she?” a girl would ask.

“Apparently they were hooking up?” her friend would answer. They’d look at each other, wax dripping off their candles and onto their paper cup holders, eyebrows raised.

I had a headache and around three we finally divided off to our beds.

That’s when I got it. No subject line; just the name, Lauren Cleaver, bolded in my inbox:

Hey I have a strange favor to ask that’s kind of time sensitive. I’d appreciate if you gave me a call but understand if you don’t want to. Let me know if you don’t so I can figure out some other way to do this. 9175555837.

L

I called her immediately. It was three A.M. but the message was sent at 2:15 and I didn’t feel like waiting. It started ringing and I sat up.

“Hello?” Her voice was strained but clear, and I remembered that she was a singer.

“Hey. It’s Claire.”

“Hi.”

“Hi.” There was silence for about five seconds and I wondered if she was trying not to cry. “Do you know where Brian’s journal is?”

I didn’t know he’d had one but didn’t want to admit it. Once again I got strangely possessive, like I had something to prove.

“No,” I said. “I don’t think so.”

“Okay. Well, it should be in the third drawer of his dresser. He should still keep it there.”

“All right.” I wasn’t sure where this was going. I heard the small pop of an inhale and realized she was smoking a cigarette. It made me angry.

“Do you think you could take it?”

“Why?”

“Because he wouldn’t want his parents to read it.” I paused and we let silence hang between us again. “I’ve thought a lot about this. It meant a lot to him. His parents will clean out his room and they’ll read it and it will upset them and . . . him.”

“Why don’t you take it?”

“Because . . . I don’t have any reason to go over there.” I thought about this for a moment.

“Ask William to take it.”

“I don’t want William to read it.”

“But you want me to?” I was genuinely confused. She paused and I heard her inhale again.

“You’re not going to,” she said. It was a command, not a question, and I didn’t like the way she was talking to me. I’d always thought she was shyer, soft. “Call William and tell him you left some clothes there you want to pick up . . . you did sleep there, right?”

I didn’t say anything. Neither did she. I kept the phone pressed to my ear but it sounded like she’d moved it away from her face and I wondered again if she was trying not to cry.

“Listen,” she said finally. “Just. He wouldn’t want his parents to read it, okay? They wouldn’t want to read it. There’s shit in there about them and him and—if you can’t do it I’ll just figure something else out.” I imagined for a second the way I’d first seen her: singing in that basement with the ukulele and red-pepper lights. She’d seemed so cool, so nonchalant. I wondered if she’d hooked up with someone after that show. Not Brian, obviously, but some other boy with an unshaven face. I wondered if he was in her life now. If she had some guy whose bed she looked forward to when everything was boring. If he knew where she’d been that morning and how he’d felt about it.