Authors: Sarah Aronson
SIX
I settled on a navy blue dress with white collar and cuffs that I made last year for a Social Studies presentation. It had an empire waist. It wasn't too tight. I could wear it with flats. “Your hamsa is really pretty,” Miriam said. She stood back to look at me. She thought the dress made me look “mature.”
“Is that another word for fat?”
“It's another word for let's go.” She held on to the rail as she walked one half-step at a time down the stairs toward her car.
“Sorry about the mess,” Miriam said, like her car wasn't always scattered with junk.
There was a science journal and four weeks' worth of
The Economist
. The
New York Times
crossword puzzleâcompleted in pen. The floor was covered with crunched-up brown bags and a lot of dirt, courtesy of an old pair of rubber boots, two shovels, and a dozen green containers. Miriam liked to say that during the growing season, she lived out of her car. “The other day, I planted beets and carrots and I didn't have time to straighten up.” Abe added,
“Tomorrow after school we're going to put in some turnips and onions. You want to help?”
I said, “If I have time,” but I knew neither one of them expected to see me there. I blamed my portfolioâthe ruined brown dressâbut the truth was, this was their issue, not mine. Philosophically, I agreed with their mission, but that didn't mean I wanted to play on my knees in the mud.
Miriam pulled out of the driveway, and Abe cranked up the music. I slumped as low as possible so no one outside could see me. “Could you turn it down?” I asked. “You're practically begging for attention.”
Just to get on my nerves, he played a very enthusiastic air guitar until the chorus was over. “Do you honestly think anyone's going to bother you at the cemetery?”
After yesterday, I couldn't believe he had the nerve to ask me if there was a chance there might be reporters at the cemetery. Reporters came to my house. They showed up at the school. They wrote retrospectives about me. Why wouldn't they show up there? If there was a story my mother wanted, she'd have had no problem crashing a funeral to get it.
That was the job.
As Miriam parked the car, I knew they could be waiting in the parking lot. Or on the sidewalk. Or near the mausoleum at the center of the cemetery. They could be photographing me right now.
We walked down the path, and I kept my eyes open. I checked out the couple by the bridge and the woman with the stroller. I pointed out an old man and lady who looked at me a second too long. I asked Miriam, “Do they look familiar to you?”
“Not really,” she said not-so-sympathetically. When I looked again, I knew she was right. I didn't know them. They didn't know me. They had their own problems. Their own dead person to visit. When I looked closer, I could see they were crying. Now I felt even worse.
I never cried. Not for my parents. Not for myself. Not for anything.
Lo thought this was abnormal. To get me to cry, she took me to therapists; we tried every kind of yoga there was, meditation, and even hypnosisâbut nothing worked. One expert said, “If she could cry, she would feel better.” Another one blamed anxiety. “If you would take your medication, you might relax.” The last guy I saw told me that I was repressing my memories, maybe for a good reason.
That made me laugh. “You think?”
Dave Armstrong and his posse would say that I should pray for tears, that the absence of saltwater proved that I needed to get in touch with God. Of course, he would also say that my parents died for a reasonâthat tragedies like mine did not occur in a vacuumâand that we should trust in the Lord because bad things happened to good people every day. He probably believed they were happy in heaven, like it was some kind of party we all got to go to.
On every anniversary, Dave Armstrong had a lot of things to say about how I should be feeling. He had a whole lot of opinions about memories that were supposed to be mine.
Now my dry eyes stared at my parents' epitaphs. My father's, in small block letters: “Beloved husband, father, and son. Blessed are the pure of heart.” The letters on my mother's
gravestone said “Wife and Mother.” Some Hebrew at the bottom. I also counted twenty-eight tiny stones on the top of my dad's marker, thirty-two on my mom's, which meant that three people visited since I came here last.
“You think Armstrong showed up?” I didn't want him coming to this place, standing where I was standing now, marking his visit with a rock and a televised statement.
Neither Abe nor Miriam thought he'd have the nerve. Lo didn't care. She just wanted to go through her rituals. She reached into her bag and handed us each a five-by-seven laminated card, the one with Hebrew on the top and transliteration on the bottom. Every year, we recited the Jewish prayer for the dead, because Lo couldn't imagine not saying it. The explanation at the bottom said that reciting Kaddish allowed a soul to climb to the next level or world.
I held the card at my side.
“Yitgadel, v'yitkadash, shemay rabah.” I memorized these sounds years ago. But that didn't mean I got it. I didn't understand how this prayer of all prayers became the one we say now.
The last line made me angry: “May God who makes peace in the heavens, bring peace upon us, and upon all Israel; and say Amen.”
Attention: God who made peaceâif you're really out thereâif you really wanted me to come to terms with thisâI was here. Waiting. Still looking for a little bit of peace. Still looking for an explanation. A justification. A reason why so many terrible things have happened.
I'm waiting for a sign. I may not cry, but I'm open to anything you've got!
Totally by coincidence, the wind picked up. We held down our dresses, and Sharon pulled me, Miriam, and Abe into a close circle.
“Don't look now,” she said, so we all looked. Near the bottom of the hill stood two men and a woman carrying a purse big enough to hold three cameras. All three of them wore khakisâit was obvious they were on the job.
Sharon ripped off her vintage red bomber jacket and pushed it in my faceâit was a pretty obvious ploy, but maybe it would work. I took Lo's umbrella, too. They told me to walk as fast as I could in the opposite direction. Sharon zipped up my jacket and tried to pose the way I stood. “If we're lucky, they'll think I'm you and you're me. You'll have time to get away.”
SEVEN
Abe thought we should run. “Just to be safe.”
I said no, we should stick to walking. Running attracted attention. It was the worst thing we could do.
Miriam didn't care what we did as long as she could take off her shoes first. She leaned against a mailbox. “I already have a blister,” she said. “Why don't we just hold our ground? If you tell them no comment, what can they do?”
I wished it were that easy. (It irritated me that she'd ask this.)
To them, “No comment” was just the first thing I said before they took my picture. “No comment” was just a line; it was part of a script or a dance. It was the challenge to get me to say more. “No comment” was pretty much the same as saying, “On your mark, get set, go. Exploit me.”
Miriam was naïve. Being the subject of a story was an invasion of privacy. It was not flattering, not fun, not exciting. It never ended with “No comment.”
For a few steps, Abe turned around and walked backward.
He stared at the street behind us.
I had a bad feeling about this. “Where are they?” I asked. “Do you see them? Tell me the truth.”
“They're two blocks back. I told you we should have run.” I turned around and looked. That was a huge mistake. I saw them, and they also saw me.
“Janine! We'd like to talk to you.”
“Janine, turn around.”
“Janine, just one moment. This isn't just about you.”
Now we ran. Abe first, then me, then Miriam. We passed storefronts and a kid on a skateboard, and Abe practically plowed into a couple of people from my history class.
We didn't stop. Miriam threw her shoes like grenades. Now four strides ahead, Abe pointed to the big white church just across the street. It wasn't our turn to walk, but he leaped into the intersection anyway. I heard him say, “Come on, J. We can make it.”
But I stopped. Because at the same time, there was a car.
In reality, the whole thing probably took three seconds. But like all disasters, it felt like it went on for hours. The problem was, there was nothing I could do to stop it.
One.
Miriam came from behind me and yanked me back. We hit the ground hard, and brakes squealed. Abe looked at me and for that one long second, we both knew what was about to happen. In the background, the church's electronic bulletin board announced the schedule.
Services are held every Saturday and Sunday. All are welcome.
That blinked in my eyes.
Two.
Glass shattered. People screamed. Abe took flight like an angel, his arms out, his legs straight. When he landed, he made one sound.
Thud.
Three.
For one moment, one endless moment, there was silence, like a vacuum. It was the same kind of silence I heard just after the bomb went off, when I wasn't sure if I was alive or dead. This kind of silence made time stop.
It made me feel like I was walking through water.
And I couldn't speak.
Just like before, I was suffocating. I was alone. My hands curled up and sent sharp pains to my neck and head. But this was not rubble, and it wasn't Jerusalem either. I was not fighting for my life.
This was Abe.
He was in the middle of the road.
Miriam called 911. “Our friend was hit by a car. In front of the white church. No I don't know if he's breathing. I don't know if he's got a pulse.”
Somehow I stood up, and my legs worked. Somehow I was able to walk into the street, and kneel at his side, and check his pulse and his breath, and even though it sounded weak, it was definitely there. I shouted, “Abe. Can you hear me?” There was blood pooling under his head. His eyes didn't look like he saw me. I knew I shouldn't move him, but his head was bleeding like crazy. Somehow I remembered to press my hands against the wet, hot wound.
And wait.
I listened for the sirens. They seemed too far away. I looked
up at the clouds. A camera captured the moment.
Click, click, click, click, click.
I didn't care how many pictures they took. This was Abe. I begged him, “Don't die.”
Click
. “Please, Abe. I know you can make it.”
Click.
“You cannot die right here in the middle of Marsden Avenue.”
Click, click, click, click, click, click, click, click.
There were more people now, and they all shouted and cried and gave me advice at once. I focused on Abe, on his blood and his breath. I felt Miriam standing near. I told him, “We have tickets to three concerts. And I need you to help me with chem. I thought we were going to go somewhere crazy this summer.”
“Stay calm, Janine. Help is on the way.”
I wondered if I was going insane. That sounded like my motherâhereâin this crowdâtelling me all the things she said ten years ago. I looked around, but of course, she wasn't in the crowd. Only when I looked at Abe could I hear her:
“You can do this, baby.”
“You are not alone.”
“Hang on, Janine. You have a holy soul.”
I understood I was imagining this, but it was nice. It felt good. Like there was hope. For a moment, I let myself smile.
Click.
Because my mother was here, I sincerely believed that Abe was going to make it.
As the ambulance pulled up to the scene, a woman shouted, “That's Janine Collinsâthe Soul Survivor. We're witnessing a miracle. Look at him. She's healing him with her hands.”
The medics didn't care. They ran toward us and pushed me away. I fell on the ground, on my knees, onto my hands. I
listened for my mother to tell me what to do next, but she was gone. All I heard were the medics. They said, “He's in trouble.”
Click, click, click
The cameras were all around me. A Nikon D4âthe camera of choice for many photojournalistsâis capable of shooting eleven frames per second. (After having enough of them shoved in my face, I looked it up.) If these guys had held their fingers to the shutter, they'd have close to a thousand frames by now.
Of me. And Abe. He wasn't going to die. Not if I could help it. This was not his fifteen minutes, I promised myself.
I looked up at the clouds and bargained: If he gets better, I will work harder. I will be nicer. I'll help Miriam with her farm. If Abe will just get through this, I will try and be a better person, too. I will do interviews. I'll talk to Dave. I'll face every single one of my fears.
Click. Click. Click.
Click, click, click, click, click.
EIGHT
After the paramedics drove away, the policeman thanked us. (I assumed he was just trying to make us feel hopeful.) “I hope your friend makes it. You did a good job. Like a pro.”
During a disaster, average people have documented performing extraordinary acts of strength and will. Most weeks, you could read about it while waiting in the checkout line at the grocery store. A mother lifts a car to save her child. A man tackles a full-grown polar bear. It's called hysterical strength. Dave Armstrong thought that this happened to him. Right before he saw my hands, he lifted very large rocks that normally he could never have budged.
I said, “Do you think he's going to make it? Do people like himâpeople who get hit by carsâwhat are their chances?”
The policeman looked alarmed. My hands. They were shaking. “Are you okay?”
My hands were bloody, shaking, spiny, crooked. They looked like old leather gloves that someone found in the bottom of a drawer. (Even people who recognize my face are shocked when they actually get a look at my hands up close.)
“Yes. I'm sure. I'm fine.” When he offered to drive us to the hospital, I told him, “We have a car. My hands always look like this.”
After he left, we sat on the corner of the curb. We watched the police take a few pictures of the car before some guys came and towed it away. A cleaning crew came in and swept up the glass. Still, we didn't talk. We didn't move. If this had been on TV, and we'd been playing friends, we'd have rushed to the hospital. We might have even jumped into the ambulance.
But this was real.
We were left behind.
Moving and driving and thinking and talking did not seem possible.
Finally, when our legs and the street and the traffic seemed back to normal, we got up and walked. Miriam said, “You know, this isn't your fault. Those reportersâthey did this.” She had a skinned knee. There was gravel stuck in her palms. “That lady was crazy. Nobody really thinks you healed him with your hands.”
“I know.” I did not heal him. My mother wasn't there, and she wasn't talking to me. I was just hallucinating. The PTSD. Halfway to the car, I confided, “You know, when I was holding his head, I heard my mother.”
Miriam stopped walking. She looked scared. “What do you mean, you heard your mother?”
Now I felt stupid. “I mean I thought I heard her. Like she was sitting right next to me.” I grabbed her elbow. “She said all the same things she said right before she died.” I waited for Miriam to respond the way I wanted her to. “Crazy, right?”
“Crazy.” She was my best friend. She would be the first person to tell me if I'd lost it. “But to be honest, I'm not surprised.”
“You're not?”
She looked away, resumed walking. “You're sad. It's the anniversary, and you were just standing in front of your mother's grave. You're in mourning. Then we get chased by idiots and our friend was hit by a car. It's really not that surprising that you heard her voice ⦠that you freaked out.” She pointed to the sidewalk. “Look at that. My shoes. No one stole them.” We both laughed, even though it wasn't all that funny.
At the car, someone snapped my picture then ran away. Miriam shouted, “Loser!”
I said, “Don't waste your breath. They're cowards. I think I turned away in time.” There were eleven business cards and a folded piece of paper under the windshield wiper. I gathered them up and balled them in my fist.
On every one, scrawled handwriting offered different versions of the same thing:
Call me. Let's talk. I would love to meet with you. I will be brief.
“So much for them leaving us alone on this
sensitive
day.”
Miriam took them away. “We should give these to the police, in case Abe ⦔ She didn't finish the sentence, but I knew what she meant. If Abe died. We could blame these people. They were the ones chasing us. We could get our revenge.
This was their fault. Not mine.
She turned on the ignition, and Abe's iPod flipped on. It was a song about love. She yanked it out by the cord, tossed it into the backseat, and stepped on the gas. She took a corner too hard and rolled over the curb.
“Stupid song.”
No. It was my fault.
I told her to slow down. “He is going to be okay. I'm sure of it. He was breathing when they took him to the hospital.” She accelerated through a yellow light. I reminded her, “When I held his hand ⦔
“You don't know that.” She sped past a stop sign. “I told you we shouldn't have run.”
Now it seemed so obvious. I should have held my ground and said, “No comment.” Or for once I could have listened to their questions. It's not like they ever asked questions that had actual answers. It was one of the things that made talking about faith so irritating.
There were just words. No proof.
If I had posed for pictures, Abe would be sitting where I am now. He would be singing some sappy song and getting on my nerves. Miriam would not be driving like a lunatic.
My phone beeped. There were three messages from Loâall minutes after we split up. She wanted to know where I was. “Are you okay? Please check in.” Dan called, too. His messages were always a little awkward. He asked, “How was the thing?” And then, after five seconds of dead air, “You know you can call me. Okay? Bye!”
As the first raindrops hit the windshield, I left Lo a purposefully vague message:
I'm fine. Don't worry. Will call you later.
Miriam flipped on the wipers to the fastest speed. “You're not going to tell her what happened?”
“No.” I shook my head. “You want me to tell your mom?”
“I'll call her later.” Miriam didn't have to elaborate. I understood too well. If she told her mom, it would make it real. If we talked any more, we'd need an explanation. When lightning flashed, she pumped the brakes. She drove extra slow.
As long as I'd known her, Miriam had hated driving in bad weather. Her greatest fear was being hit by lightning. She was spooked by it. I had no idea why. It wasn't like you heard about people dying from lightning strikes on a regular basis.
Two minutes and three thunderclaps later, she pulled into the parking lot and stopped the car. We were at the hospital. Abe was hurt. The water rushed over the windshield.
“What if?”
“Don't say it.”
“But what would we do?”
The rain fell harder. Neither of us moved.
(This is what it feels like to be in shock.)
Lightning flashed, two sticks at a time. I tried Lo again, but now her phone was out of service. Miriam gripped the steering wheel. I said, “We're safe in the car, right? Because of the tires. The rubber.”
She stared straight ahead. “Yeah. I think so.” We sat still and watched the rain. It was all we could do.
I heard my mother.
I was sure Miriam didn't believe me.
I said, “She did sound very real. Very alive.” At the same time, lightning flashed a split second before the thunder sounded.
Miriam looked confused. Then she looked mad. “Do you really think that's important?” Then she opened the car door, and even though she had to be terrified, she stepped determined into the storm and started running.