The World Without Us Read online

  “I don’t know,” he says. “I just know I was saved for a reason.”

  I shake my head, feeling tears welling in my eyes. I feel like I’m losing him, like he’s slipped away somehow to some other place where I can’t follow him. “School’s going to suck without you,” I say.

  Crazy Is Normal

  By the weekend, Jeremy is out of hospital and back at home. He’s recovered from the surgery and, medically, there’s not much more the doctors can do. Apparently broken ribs take a long time to heal, like a couple of months, but all you can do is rest and take painkillers, and you don’t need a hospital bed for that. I visit him on Saturday and we sit on his bed and watch a couple of movies on Netflix, but we don’t talk about anything much. As long as we don’t talk, I can pretend he’s still the same Jeremy.

  His mom hovers around, tidying and putting away laundry and basically finding excuses to come up to his room and check on us every other minute.

  “Um, what’s up with your mother?” I ask at last.

  “Yeah, get used to that. She’s taking some time off work,” Jeremy says. He pauses the movie. “She’s being kind of crazy, actually.”

  “Well, I’m sure she’s worried.”

  “She thinks the hospital shouldn’t have let me come home.” He shrugs. “But the psychiatrist doesn’t think I’m a risk to myself or others, so here I am.”

  “Are you still seeing him? I mean, is there…you know, some kind of follow-up?”

  “Yeah, yeah. Mom’s dragging me to various appointments.” He looks at me. “I’m not going to do it again. I mean, I’m not, like, suicidal or anything. You know that, right?”

  “I guess.” Then again, I didn’t ever think he’d do it in the first place.

  “Do you still think about it?” he asks.

  “No.” I flash back to that moment on the bridge, watching his body drop like a stone into the darkness, and I shiver. “I couldn’t do that to my parents,” I say. “Even if things were really bad, I don’t think I could do that to them.”

  “Good,” he says. “It’s the most selfish thing I’ve ever done.” He reaches out and puts a hand on my arm. “I’m going to make up for it somehow. I know there’s a reason that I’m still here.”

  Here we go again. “Let’s watch the movie,” I say.

  When I get home that evening, Vicky is at her computer in the living room, banging away on the keys like it’s an old-fashioned typewriter, and Bill is in the kitchen, cooking fish.

  I wrinkle my nose. “Can we open some windows?”

  “Be my guest.” He chops red onion on a wooden cutting board. “How’s Jeremy?”

  “Fine. He says he’s not going back to school though.” I pick up a sliver of onion and smell it, trying to block out the fishy stink. “Which sucks.”

  “Mmm, yes.” He nods toward Vicky. “Your mother just got some bad news. Appeal denied for one of the men on death row. Young guy—still in his thirties.”

  “Last appeal?”

  “Yeah. Out of options. Execution date set a month from now.”

  “That sucks.” I realize that this is what I just said about Jeremy not coming back to school. “I mean, more than sucks.” I hesitate, and then the words rush out. “I don’t know how she does it. Getting all involved in people’s lives and then seeing them die.” Again, I’m back on the bridge, the cool wind in my face, feeling Jeremy’s hand slip from mine, seeing his fall in slow motion, the white oval of his face looking up at me. I catch my breath and grab on to the edge of the counter. Bill doesn’t notice.

  “She’s something special, all right,” he says. He reaches out and gives me a little push. “Go tell her dinner’s ready in five, okay?”

  It’s stupid. Jeremy’s home, safe, but I’m a mess. I keep thinking about those moments on the bridge, keep seeing him fall, keep replaying in my mind all the conversations we had in the months leading up to that night. Like I’m trying to make sense of it, but I’m not getting anywhere, I’m just going round in the same fucked-up circles, and it still doesn’t make any sense at all. I feel like my thoughts are wearing grooves into my brain, like they’re carving their tracks a little deeper every time they trace the circle back around.

  On Monday, I start crying in math class and can’t stop. I mean, I really can’t stop. I feel like I’m outside myself, just watching what a complete fool I am being, sitting at my desk with my nose running, gasping for breath. I end up down in Mrs. Paulsen’s office, sniffling and snuffling and trying to calm down. She’s sitting across from me in her armchair, muttering the occasional “there there” and “deep breaths.” I stare past her at the inspirational kitten posters. There’s one of a soaking-wet kitten climbing out of a toilet, with the caption It could be worse!

  “Just tell me what you are thinking,” Mrs. Paulsen says. “Whatever is going through your mind right now.”

  “I hope they didn’t actually drop a cat in a toilet to get that picture,” I choke out.

  “Pardon?”

  I shake my head, exhale a long, slow breath, clench my fists so tight I can feel my short nails digging into my palms. “Nothing. Sorry. I just…I’m fine. Really.”

  “You’ve been through a very traumatic event,” Mrs. Paulsen says. “It’s entirely normal to be affected by that. It would be more surprising if you weren’t.”

  “I guess so.” I hope everyone isn’t talking about me, but I bet they are. Probably wondering if I’m going to do something crazy. Jump off a bridge. Overdose. Crazy Death Wish.

  “How are you sleeping?”

  “Okay.”

  “Eating?”

  “Yeah. Fine.” I can’t look at her. “Um, just thinking about it a lot, mostly. Like, it’s hard to stop sometimes, or it just comes into my head for no reason.”

  She nods. “Very normal, Melody. It can make you feel like you’re going crazy, but it is absolutely normal.” She leans to one side, opens a drawer in her filing cabinet and rummages around for a few minutes. “Here, take this.”

  I take a single page from her. Pale pink. Reactions to Trauma it says at the top.

  She points a maroon fingernail at the list of bullet points on the page. “See? Intrusive thoughts, re-experiencing the traumatic event.” She smiles at me. “Normal reactions, Melody. You’re not going crazy.”

  “Good.” I rub my eyes so hard I see tiny spots of color. Crazy is normal; good to know.

  “How is Jeremy? Have you seen him?”

  I nod. “He’s okay. Back at home now.”

  “And are you worried about him?”

  “You mean, that he’ll do it again?” I shake my head. “No. I don’t think so.”

  Mrs. Paulsen doesn’t say anything for a moment, just sits and waits to see if I will say more. I can’t think of anything else to say though.

  “I guess I’d better go back to class,” I say. I’m already dreading the stares and the whispers.

  She uncrosses her legs and nods a few times. “If there’s anything you want to talk about, you can come and see me. Anytime.”

  Krishna Consciousness

  After school, I text Jeremy and tell him I can’t come over, that I have too much homework.

  Do it here, he says.

  Can’t. 60% of socials grade on this paper.

  Tomorrow?

  Yes. See you then.

  But I don’t actually have a paper due. I just need to be alone.

  Vicky is at her computer as usual, phone in one hand. She breaks off when she sees me come in. “Mel? Nina called,” she says, putting her hand over her phone. “Give her a call back; she’s hoping you can spend some time with Suzy soon.”

  “Fine,” I say, but my heart sinks a little. I don’t have the energy for Suzy right now. I don’t even have the energy to talk to Nina. Up in my room, I open my laptop, intending to check email and Twitter.

  My phone buzzes: Jeremy, texting me. Are you sure you can’t come over?

  Yes. Busy.

  Thirty seconds l
ater my phone rings. It’s Jeremy. “Please come over? Pretty please?”

  “I can’t,” I say, feeling guilty. “Listen, I can’t really talk right now. I have to call Suzy’s mom.”

  “Are you babysitting? Maybe I could come with you sometime. I liked that kid.”

  “Maybe,” I say. “She doesn’t know, um, about what happened.”

  “Duh,” he says. “I’m not stupid. It’s not like I’d tell her.”

  “I know, I know.” Suzy’s not stupid either though: I’d have to make up a story to explain his injuries, and I hate the thought of lying to her. “Jeremy, I really have to go,” I say.

  “Okay,” he says. He sounds pretty down, but I push aside my worry and phone Nina.

  She sounds relieved to hear from me. “Mel! I’m so glad you called. Suzy’s having an awful time at school.”

  “Kids picking on her?”

  “Yeah. Still. I met with the principal last week. Lots of talk. Zero tolerance for bullying and all that, but the bottom line is that kids are just cruel. Only so much the teachers can do.”

  “Poor Suzy.”

  “Yes.”

  I wait, wondering what she wants.

  “We’re thinking about taking her out of her after-school care program,” she says. “It seems like that’s where the worst of the bullying happens.”

  “What about your work?” I say. Jim’s an engineer of some kind, and Nina is an attorney for a nonprofit agency. They’re both pretty into their jobs. “I mean, she can’t be home alone, right?”

  “Mmm. That’s the difficult part,” she says. “Actually, that’s why I was calling.”

  “You want me to look after her?”

  “I know it’s a lot to ask, but do you think there’s any way you could do a regular couple of hours every day? I’m home by six, so if you could come from three to six…” She clears her throat. “I’d pay you the same as we usually do.”

  “Can I think about it?” I love Suzy, but I’m not sure I want to see her every day, or have that much of my time tied up. On the other hand, it’s hard to say no when someone needs your help.

  “Of course. And Melody, you don’t have to entertain her. Feel free to bring your homework. She’s pretty self-sufficient.”

  “Would I pick her up from school?” I’m trying to think how that would work, since I can’t exactly double her on my bike.

  “One of my neighbors has offered to do that. She picks up her son every day, so she’s making the drive anyway. Her name’s Diane; she’ll wait here for you. But if you could just come here straight from school, you’d get here around the same time, I think.”

  Nina’s got this all figured out. I can feel my resistance slipping away. “You think school will go better if she gets to leave at three?” I ask.

  “I hope so. If it doesn’t, I don’t know what else to do,” she says. “I had to take today off work because she just refused to go to school at all. Third time this month.”

  “Maybe you could homeschool,” I say.

  “I don’t know.” She sighs. “We’ll take it one step at a time.”

  “Yeah.” I blow out a long breath. “Okay,” I say. “I can do it.”

  After a week at home, Jeremy is up and walking around, moving slowly and cautiously but definitely closer to recovered. Physically, at least. He’s well enough to drive his mom’s car and come over to my place.

  “Are you really not ever going to come back to school?” I ask him. It’s Saturday night and we’re sitting on the couch in my room, drinking strawberry milkshakes Bill made. He puts all kinds of healthy stuff in them—wheat germ and soy milk as well as the ice cream and berries—but you’d never know from the taste.

  Jeremy shakes his head. “I’m done.”

  “Suzy too,” I tell him. “She doesn’t want to go to school anymore either.”

  “Yeah?” He doesn’t sound all that interested. “Listen, you feel like a road trip this weekend?”

  “You’re kidding, right? You just got out of the hospital.”

  “I’m fine, Mel. Don’t fuss; I get enough of that at home.” He flicks his hands, brushing me off. “And I was talking to someone online and she invited me to this thing in Gainesville on Sunday night.”

  “What thing? Who?” He’s talking to some girl online? I push down a surge of something that might be jealousy.

  “She’s a student at the university,” he says. “Anyway, I wondered if you wanted to come with me.”

  “Wouldn’t that be kind of awkward?”

  “Huh?” He frowns at me.

  “If she asked you out…um, she’d probably rather you didn’t bring me along.”

  He laughs and then winces, hand to his ribs. “It’s not like that. She’s invited me to a Hare Krishna temple.”

  “A Hare Krishna temple,” I repeat, almost laughing. Then I see the defensiveness slide over his face like a mask, and I stop smiling. “You’re serious.”

  “Yeah. Absolutely. I’ve been reading a lot about it.”

  “Isn’t that sort of a cult?”

  “No more than anything else. Actually, less than Christianity. Hare Krishnas don’t reject anything or anyone. They draw on Hindu traditions, but it’s as much a philosophy as a religion.” He takes a sip of his milkshake through a straw. “Mmm. These are good.”

  I’m thinking about Jeremy’s obsession with lucid dreams and how messed up that made him, convinced his brother was out there somewhere waiting for him. This sounds like more of the same to me. “So you want to go to this temple thing?” I say, stalling for time. If it really is a cult, maybe I should go with him, just to keep him out of trouble. Not that I have a great track record in that department.

  “Yeah. It sounds cool,” he says. “They do meditation, you know? Prayer, dancing. And there’s going to be some kind of vegetarian feast that sounds amazing.”

  “Right.”

  “And this girl—her name is Kamala—she volunteers with this group at the university, serving vegan lunches for next to nothing.”

  “You sure it’s not a cult?”

  He rolls his eyes. “I’ll show you the website, okay? It’s all totally legit. These are good people. People who want to make a difference.”

  “By meditating?”

  “By developing their consciousness. Krishna consciousness.” He looks at me earnestly. “I’ve been reading a lot about it, and it makes so much sense. Actually, I’ve been feeling really good—happy. And Kamala says that’s actually one of the first signs of developing Krishna consciousness.”

  “I’ve noticed that you’re happier,” I say. “But Jeremy, nothing’s changed. I don’t see how this is going to fix anything.” What I want to say is, how come you’re the one that jumped off a bridge and now you’re all happy and I’m the one who’s having crazy crying jags in class? How come you kissed me and now it’s like that never happened?

  “Come with me,” he says.

  “I think I’m going to pass,” I say. There’s a lump in my throat, and I feel like I’m abandoning him, but I just can’t see myself going to some temple to meditate and talk about Krishna. With a girl called Kamala. Not happening. “Listen,” I say. “I was thinking about what you told me once, about being picked on in school when you were a kid.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Suzy’s going through a rough time with that now,” I say. “And she thinks you’re pretty cool. If you could talk to her—encourage her, you know? That might help.”

  “Sure. I could do that. When are you seeing her?”

  “Every day after school for the next while,” I say. “What day suits you? Sooner the better.”

  “How about Monday?”

  I smile at him. “Perfect. I’ll call and tell her. It’ll give her something to look forward to.”

  I spend Sunday in my room, thinking about Jeremy, who is off in Gainesville, without me. I watch Hare Krishnas chanting on YouTube—Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare; Hare Rama, Hare Rama
, Rama Rama, Hare Hare—and picture Jeremy doing the same thing. With a girl called Kamala.

  The people in the videos look happy. Ecstatic, even. And the thing is, I do kind of understand where Jeremy’s coming from. I mean, we all want to believe we’re here for a reason, right? It’s why we have religions. It’s in our nature to want to make sense of our lives somehow. And Jeremy’s had a lot to make sense of. His brother’s death, his dad leaving. Like my dad said, maybe it’s helpful to believe he was saved for a reason.

  But then don’t you have to believe that everything happens for a reason? That Lucas died for a reason? Or that Jeremy’s dad left for a reason? Don’t you just start accepting everything, including obviously fucked-up things like Ramon being executed?

  I stare at the young men chanting on my laptop screen, with their shaved heads and wide smiles and half-closed eyes. Maybe if it makes Jeremy happy, if it helps him find some kind of peace, that should be enough. But I can’t see how chanting Hare Krishna is going to help make the world a better place.

  I can’t see how Jeremy could convince himself that this is what he was saved for.

  There’s a knock on my door. “Mel?”

  “Hey.” It’s Vicky. I turn away from my computer and swivel my chair around to face her.

  “Homework?”

  “No.” I gesture at the screen. “Jeremy’s off at some Hare Krishna thing. I was just looking it up.”

  She raises her eyebrows. “Really?”

  “In Gainesville.” And then I add, “With a girl called Kamala.”

  “Oh.” She crosses the room and perches on the arm of my couch, right behind where I am sitting. “Which part are you upset about?”

  “Who said I was upset?”

  She tilts her head. “Honey. You’re crying.”

  I touch my cheek and my fingers come away wet.

  Her hand is on my shoulder, squeezing. “Sometimes I miss the days when you were small enough to sit on my lap. When I could tell you it would be okay and you’d believe me.”