Fracture Read online

  “I’m fine. Tara just hugged too hard.” I nodded to myself, extra justification in my aversion to hugs.

  I grabbed a spare shirt, brushed my teeth, and gargled mouthwash before joining the group downstairs. Tara was rubbing the bottom of her hair with my bathroom towel. “Here, Tara.” I tossed her the gray sweatshirt.

  She half-smiled, half-giggled. “Oh, Delaney,” she said, looking me over slowly, “we’re not the same size.” I wasn’t sure if she meant her chest was bigger (true) or her waist was smaller (also true), but after averaging everything out, we probably wore the exact same size.

  She curled her half-naked self into Decker’s side as he downed Mom’s macadamia nut cookies. “This,” he said, holding out a half-eaten cookie, “is what I missed about you the most.”

  They were all joking and eating my food; the only one feeling uneasy was me. “So,” I said. “I’m feeling sick.”

  Only Janna got the hint. “Right. No problem. Guys? Up.” She swatted at them each until they stood up. “We’ll see you around. And seriously. Call me.”

  * * *

  Decker stayed on the couch after everyone left, one eyebrow raised at me.

  “Don’t look at me like that. I tried nice. Nice made me puke.”

  “You didn’t seem to mind being nice to Carson.”

  I stuffed half a cookie in my mouth so I wouldn’t have to talk. That whole thing with Carson wasn’t something I did often. Actually, it’s something I did never. Seriously. Never. And it wasn’t a big deal. Because as Decker pointed out so aptly when he walked in on us making out on his living room couch, Carson Levine would hook up with anyone.

  My parents didn’t let me go to parties, but it was my seventeenth birthday. That was Decker’s gift to me. A party. Just a small one—a few kids from school, including the guys from the lake and Janna. But there was alcohol and people and my parents wouldn’t have approved, which seemed like the perfect way to celebrate turning seventeen.

  At some point during my second drink, Carson pulled me into the living room. I was lying underneath him on the couch, his hands up my shirt, when the sound of Decker clearing his throat interrupted us.

  “Sorry, dude,” Carson had said. He hopped up, flashed me his wild grin, said, “See ya, Delaney,” and went into the kitchen where everyone else was hanging out.

  I’d pulled my shirt back down but couldn’t quite make eye contact with Decker. He let out a throaty laugh. “Well, that was bound to happen. You are the only girl here who’s not related to him.” I shot him a look and went home. I never went to parties with Decker, but I imagined he had no right to talk.

  And now, Decker was staring at me, like he was waiting for some explanation. I kept chewing.

  “Are you staying for dinner tonight, Decker?” Mom had carpet spray in one hand and deodorizer in the other.

  “Not tonight. My parents claim they don’t remember what I look like anymore.” And he left without another word to me. I choked on the cookie and waved at the swinging door.

  I woke to the feeling of a leash tugging on my insides and an itch spreading down my arms. The light from my alarm clock glowed red, but the numbers were all fuzzy. I rolled over and put my face close to the clock until the numbers settled into focus: 2:03. I stumbled out of bed and pressed my cheek to the cold window. Ice crystals framed the window on the outside and my unsteady breath fogged the inside. I placed the palms of my hands against the glass and took deep breaths, trying to undo the itch and the pull. But it kept spreading. And then my fingers started vibrating against the glass, like gentle rain falling against the window.

  I pulled my hands back and stared out at the Merkowitz house at the end of the block. The single-story home sat on the corner at the bottom of a hill. When we were younger, Decker and I used to sled down that hill, landing in the middle of the Merkowitzes’ backyard. We’d yell louder and louder until we heard the back door swing open, and then we’d smile. Mr. Merkowitz would pretend to shoo us away, swatting at us with a rolled-up newspaper. Mrs. Merkowitz would smack her husband on the side of the head, much to our delight, and hand us plastic bowls to pile high with fresh snow.

  Decker and I filled those bowls, week after week, year after year, and returned them to Mrs. Merkowitz. She’d coat the snow with vanilla and sugar and invite us in for a winter feast. I always tried to swallow the snow before it melted, but the only thing that ever reached the back of my throat was a cool vanilla liquid. Mrs. Merkowitz stopped inviting us in when her husband died of a heart attack five years ago. Not long after that, Decker and I stopped sledding altogether.

  Over the summer, an oxygen tank on wheels began accompanying Mrs. Merkowitz around town. It rested in the aisle beside her at the movie theater and rode in the cart at the grocery store. It was only a matter of time, everyone said, until she succumbed to her emphysema.

  Out my window, I saw that her path was unshoveled. Fresh snow piled up to her door. I wanted to be there. I wanted to scoop up the snow and knock on her door and ask her to make a winter feast. And before I knew what I was doing, I wrapped myself in a scarf, put on my boots, and stepped outside. I stood in the front yard, knee deep in snow, vaguely wondering what on earth I was doing. Surely Mrs. Merkowitz would be sleeping at this hour. Yet my feet moved forward in the darkness.

  The shadow of a man crossed her front porch. It hugged the front wall, paused at the edge of the porch, and disappeared around the corner. A chill ran down my spine, but still I didn’t stop. I felt the pull, distinctly in that direction. I crossed the street and walked to the end of the block.

  Here. The pull had led me right here. At the corner of the house, a shadow jutted out where no shadow should be. There were no potted plants, no forgotten packages, nothing to block the moonlight. I walked directly toward the shadow, more out of necessity than curiosity. And then it took off around the back of the house. And I, wearing snow boots, a scarf, and a flannel nightgown, chased it.

  I chased it into the backyard, nearly pitch-black, shaded by evergreens and overgrown weeds. I heard footsteps ahead of me and walked faster. I had to see what was there. What was pulling me closer. I paused to listen again but couldn’t hear anything over my pounding heartbeat. And then I heard footsteps right behind me.

  I spun around with my twitching hands held out protectively in front of me.

  “Delaney?” My father stood a few feet away. He pulled his bathrobe tight against the cold.

  “Someone’s there,” I said. I pointed to the blackness in the backyard. The empty furniture. The deserted patio.

  “There’s no one,” Dad said.

  I ignored him and clambered onto the brick patio, searching for signs of life. And still I felt the pull. Leading me right here.

  “What are you doing out here?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. I just . . . couldn’t sleep.”

  He nodded. “Dr. Logan mentioned that this could happen. Come on in.”

  “Okay,” I said, but my feet didn’t follow. He rubbed his face with both hands and took a step toward me. I turned back around and stared at the dark windows, at the empty yard, willing the shadow to return. I knew that it was weird for me to stand in the snow-covered grass in the middle of the night for no apparent reason. It was even weirder for another person to be out in the middle of the night for no apparent reason. I wondered if that’s what had woken me up. Maybe my subconscious sensed him lurking around our street. Was he a burglar? A voyeur? Or worse?

  “Someone was here,” I said again.

  He didn’t respond. Instead, he scooped me up like I was a toddler and carried me back down the street to our home. He sat me down on the living room couch, but I stood back up, still feeling the pull. “I’ll make some hot chocolate,” he said.

  I crossed the room and drew back the front curtains. The night was completely still. A vacuum seemed to exist between my house and the end of the street. I pressed my ear to the cold of the window and strained to hear footsteps. The man—there
was a man, I was sure of it—must’ve been trudging through snow at least a block away by then. I held my breath until I believed I could hear the slow and steady crunch of boots on snow. I heard it, but I knew it wasn’t real.

  I backed away from the window and let the curtains fall into place. And then I ripped them open again. Because in the house on the corner, the curtains were moving. Like someone was rushing by, pulling the curtains along and letting them drop again. Someone faster than an old woman with an oxygen tank.

  “I saw something, Dad,” I said, shivering. Still, he didn’t respond.

  He rubbed my arms until the beeping of the microwave called him back to the kitchen.

  Dad handed me a long white pill that I recognized from the hospital. “For sleep,” he said as he led me back to the couch. He held the mug of hot chocolate as I sipped from it since my hands were still trembling. Then he turned on the television and watched infomercials with me until the first rays of light colored the room a deep bronze and I started to drift away. The hot drink warmed me from the inside out, but my stomach yearned for vanilla-flavored snow. My mouth salivated for it. I drowned the urge with chocolate instead.

  Chapter 5

  When I woke up, Mom was standing over us with her hands on her hips. The infomercials had given way to local news. She looked at Dad, snoring lightly on the sofa in his flannel pants and long robe. She looked at me, still in my boots, still wearing a scarf over my pajamas, huddled on the other end. And she looked at the coffee table, two empty mugs on the bare wood. She didn’t say anything. She picked up the cups, went into the kitchen, and made eggs.

  The house transformed into a living entity. It smelled of life, fluttered with activity, absorbed sounds, and produced warmth. This was no longer the stale house with icicle teeth. I contemplated skipping breakfast for about half a second before sitting down at the kitchen table. Like I said, I had started to fill out recently. I wasn’t athletic and had no desire to work out, so I watched what I ate. Correction: I ate what I wanted and felt guilty about it later.

  I glanced at the clock over the stove and shoveled food into my mouth.

  “Slow down, honey. You’re going to make yourself sick again.”

  “I’m late,” I said.

  Mom cocked her head to the side. “Late? Oh, honey, you’re not going back today. It’s too soon.”

  I dropped my fork with an angry clatter. “Finals start Monday! I’m two weeks behind. I need to be there for the reviews.”

  “Sweetheart, I don’t care about your grades right now.”

  “Well, I certainly do. You know how many points separate me and Janna right now? None. Less than a hundredth of a point actually. I’m going.”

  “You’re not.”

  “Decker will take me.”

  “Decker’s not taking you anywhere.” As if on cue, the doorbell rang.

  I raced Mom to the door, but she was faster and her ribs weren’t broken. Dad opened his eyes at the commotion. Mom swung the front door open, and I peered around her shoulder. Decker stood on the front porch in worn jeans and a thick brown leather jacket. He ducked his head down into the collar as a strong gust blew through the yard. “Hey, Joanne.”

  He smirked at me hovering in the background. “And Delaney.” He caught a glimpse of my attire and took a step back. “My mom said you wouldn’t come today, but I wasn’t sure. I didn’t want to leave you just in case.”

  “Wait two minutes,” I said, spinning toward the steps.

  Mom gripped my shoulder. “She’s not going today, Decker. But thank you for being so thoughtful.”

  She closed the door, and I went to the front window. Decker climbed into his gold minivan, a hand-me-down from his parents. I teased him mercilessly, but at least he had a car. As he started the engine, he gave one last look toward my house. I raised my hand in the window. He smiled and moved his lips to say something, but I couldn’t tell what it was through two layers of glass and twenty feet of cold air.

  I gave in to Mom. Dad and Mom had a private discussion, and then Dad went off to work. Mom baked a lasagna for the night, humming to herself over the stove. I showered and sat in my room, watching the planets of my solar system mobile dance from the blast of heat coming from the vent in the ceiling. The sun spun and unwound itself. I breathed in and out slowly, happy that everything felt natural. No pulling. No itching. No twitching. Just a normal girl home sick from school. I dozed on and off, grateful for my own bed.

  I woke to the sound of the front door slamming shut. Then I heard voices out my window. I left the comfort of my bed and looked outside. Mom stood at the corner of the street with some other neighbors. They hovered around a police car in Mrs. Merkowitz’s driveway. And then they all turned to watch as an ambulance pulled up to the curb, its sirens off.

  If the sirens were off, it couldn’t be a big deal. No real rush.

  I watched as the paramedics took a gurney out of the back, rolled it up the driveway, and lifted it up the front steps.

  Mom huddled close with the other women. And when they wheeled the gurney back out, they gripped each other’s arms and bowed their heads. There was a lumpy mass beneath a white sheet, pulled taut over the top. They wheeled her out nice and calm and slow. Because there was nothing to be done. She was dead.

  I ambushed Mom at the door. “She’s dead?” Something was rising in the back of my throat. Grief, maybe. Or fear. Whatever it was, it tasted like eggs and orange juice.

  “Yes, I’m sorry.” Of course she’s dead.

  “When? When did she die?”

  “I’m not sure. Her son calls every morning to check in. When she didn’t pick up the phone on his third try, he called the police to check on her.”

  I thought of the shadow from last night. “How did she die?”

  “Emphysema, naturally. And . . . exposure.”

  “Exposure?”

  “Yes, it looks like she forgot to close the windows. Look, nobody expected her to make it through the winter, honey. That’s why her son called every day.”

  “I’ve never seen a son.” Maybe that was him in her yard last night. Maybe he was itching for his inheritance. And the curtains. Nobody was moving them from the inside. It was the wind, the cold air, billowing in from the outside, killing her.

  “Do the police want to talk to me?”

  She scrunched up her mouth like she’d eaten a lemon. “Why would the police want to do that?” Maybe Dad hadn’t told her.

  “Because of what I saw. Last night. In her yard.”

  “No. I don’t think that’s a good idea.” And then she gave me her end-of-discussion look and started scrubbing the already clean countertops. And as she scrubbed at a particularly elusive but nearly invisible spot, her scrubbing slowed. The circles grew smaller. She looked out the back window and seemed to be thinking of something unrelated to water spots.

  She dropped her cloth and turned slowly to face me as I rummaged through the pantry. “Delaney?”

  “Hmm?” I responded, mouth full of pretzel.

  “Don’t tell anyone about last night.”

  “Why?” I said, spewing crumbs, but Mom didn’t seem to notice.

  “Just . . . don’t.” And then she left her rag on the counter and the crumbs on the floor and stood at the front window, watching the scene unfold down the street.

  Dad came home way before dinner in a very un-Dad-like move. There was a lot of whispering and slamming of cabinets while I attempted to teach myself the last two weeks of precalculus. It wasn’t going well.

  There was a knock at my door and both my parents came in and sat on my bed. I spun my desk chair around. “We want to talk about last night, honey.” Mom looked to Dad for reinforcement.

  “Okay.”

  “What were you doing at Mrs. Merkowitz’s house?”

  “Nothing. I just saw something, so I went to see what it was.” And my brain itched and my fingers twitched and I just had to be there.

  Mom and Dad exchanged a bit of me
ntal telepathy. I could guess what they were saying. At two in the morning? In her pajamas?

  “Your father says . . .” Mom cleared her throat. “Your father says you were staring at the house. At the windows.”

  “I don’t . . . I wasn’t . . .”

  “Is there something you want to tell us, Delaney?” Dad ran his fingers through his hair, but it didn’t move. It was solidified in gel. “It’s okay. You can tell us anything. We won’t be mad.”

  “I saw something. I already told you.” I didn’t know what else they were trying to get me to say.

  “Look.” Mom threw her hands in the air. “Did you open her windows?”

  “Did I what?”

  “Her windows. They were open. They were all unlocked, but only her bedroom windows were open. And you were there. So did you do it?”

  “No!” I pushed my chair back, grinding it into the wood of my desk. “Why would I do that?”

  “Maybe she doesn’t remember,” Dad whispered.

  “I’m not deaf.”

  He turned to me. “Maybe you don’t remember. And that’s okay. We don’t blame you. It’s not your fault. You’ve been having hallucinations.”

  “And really,” Mom interjected, “she was going to die anyway.” Like that made killing her acceptable.

  “I didn’t do it,” I repeated.

  “Okay, honey, okay. You’re going to be okay. You’re safe. We’ll make sure of it.”

  When they left my room, the tears came. From anger. From frustration. From rage. I didn’t do it. I would’ve remembered opening the windows. I would’ve remembered killing someone. I would know. I would.

  And then I remembered the last time someone tried to keep me safe. They bound my wrists to the bed. I felt nauseous. I stumbled down the steps with one arm over my stomach and ran out the front door without grabbing my coat. “Delaney, wait,” Dad called, but I was already gone.

  My head was down so I didn’t see what I ran into three feet out the door. “Nice to see you, too.” I winced from the blast of cold air. “Hey, you okay?” I looked up at Decker. “Oh, shit, not okay.” He pulled me across our yards into his house, which had the same layout as mine but was all hardwoods and exposure instead of carpeting and warmth.