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Chapter 2
What the hell am I doing? Riding in the car with a girl I don’t know, to get lunch with her after leaving a suicide support group meeting. I don’t know if this day could get any weirder. But on the other hand, from the moment I’d decided last night that I would make myself go to the support group, I’d been dreading this entire day, so really, this day is looking up. Or, at least it seems to be every time I look over at Jolie and she flashes that smile my way.
She’s beautiful. There’s no denying that. But it’s more than that. It’s the way she gives her smiles so easily, like she did when I peeked at her in the meeting. How her eyes crinkle in the cutest way, and my gaze can’t help but follow her hand every time it lifts to push her dark hair behind her ears. It doesn’t stay there long, but she keeps trying.
She talks. A lot. But I don’t mind because it keeps me from having to say much. I’ve always felt more comfortable being the quiet one, and she lets me stay where I’m used to being. So far, she’s talked about how she’s been going to the group for four weeks because her parents are down her throat if she doesn’t attend, even though she’s told them repeatedly how much it sucks and is completely unhelpful.
I find myself wondering why her parents are making her go at all. Although she seemed as sullen as everyone else in the meeting while we were there, she’s like a spark now, smiling, stopping in the middle of her words every now and then to hum along to the songs coming through the speakers. She seems full of the life I’ve felt has evaded me since…
No, I can’t think about that right now. I already let my emotions get the better of me in the meeting and said far too much. I’ll think about that, him, later, when there’s no one around to watch me think of him.
“So, what will it be?” she asks.
“Oh, uh. I’ll just get a burger, no cheese, and fries.”
She nods and places my order after hers. I arch my brow at her getting an extra-large sundae. I try to give her money for the meal, but she only shakes her head and pays for it herself. The bags make it into the car with only a few drops of rain getting on them and then Jolie’s pulling into a parking space in the lot.
She turns a little in her seat and takes the burger and fries I offer her from the bag. But she places them on the dashboard and goes for her sundae first.
“Wait, you’re going to eat that whole thing, and then your burger and fries?” I ask.
“I have a system. I eat something cold before something hot. It’s just this…thing I’ve done since I was little. Don’t ask why because I have no idea.”
“Oookay. To each his own.”
“Besides I need the ice cream to soothe my throat from all the talking I did on the way over here.”
A laugh bursts out of me at having thought the same thing a minute ago.
“You laugh like you talk,” she says.
Since she said she liked my voice, I’ll take that as a compliment…I think.
“You have a really…weird way with words,” I tell her.
She nods. “You’re not the first person to say that. My sister always said—”
Her words cut off, and it’s in the silence that follows that I know. She was at that group for her sister. For the first time, I see that happiness leave her face. It doesn’t quite look right without it. Like looking at a sunset and knowing one of the colors is missing. Still beautiful, but not as gorgeous as it could be.
She puts the spoon into her mouth, and I figure she’s definitely owed a time of me breaking the awkward silence for once.
“I went because I was hoping I could talk to someone,” I say. “Went to the group, I mean. At home, I can’t talk to anyone about it.”
She scoffs. “It’s all anyone in my house wants to do now. And it only makes me more angry at them.”
“They don’t believe it. That my best friend killed himself. They’re convinced it was an accident. But I know it wasn’t. I can talk to my grandma about it, but it’s not the same, you know? I don’t really want to burden her with everything I’m feeling when I know she’s already worried about how I’m handling everything.”
“They don’t believe it?”
I shake my head. “They think he got drunk and fell. I know he jumped. It…wasn’t the first time he was on that roof.”
Why does it feel like such a betrayal to admit that to her? Like, although everyone must know now that there was clearly something going on for him to end up on that roof, even if his family won’t acknowledge the truth, it feels wrong to tell someone else that he was struggling. Still feels like I’m baring his problems, his soul, when I have no right to. But, even as guilt fills me, right along with it is relief. To say the words, to reveal something only I knew, and hated knowing. Because somehow, I feel like she would understand me hating knowing how many times he’d been on that roof before the last time.
She slowly nods. “I see. Well, there’s no mistaking it with my sister. Between the pills and the note, it’s right there in their faces. Which is funny because my parents seemed to always go out of their way to remain blind to what she was going through. But like I said, now they want to talk about every feeling, check on me fifty times a day. It just all makes me so angry because why couldn’t they have done that with her?”
There’s silence again, but this time it doesn’t feel so awkward. More like we’re both reflecting on all we just revealed to each other. It’s certainly more than I’ve said to anyone about Ben’s death since it happened. Since I woke up to the call that changed everything, the sob from his sister that I will never forget.
She finishes her sundae and reaches for her fries.
