Beyond Vica

BEYOND VICA

Copyright © 2014 TC BOOTH

ISBN 978-1-62135-300-3

Cover Art Designed by CORA GRAPHICS

This story is dedicated to my family, friends,

and all those who have lost someone too soon.

My eyes rest on his empty desk in front of mine. Sam didn't return to school in January from winter break, so his desk has been vacant for 72 days, counting today. The cancer that had been in remission for almost six months reappeared in time for Christmas. Talk about a Christmas that sucked. Nobody deserves that, especially Sam.

“Well, Gabby? Do you?” Mr. Blackwell, aka Mr. Baldy, calls on me. He narrows his eyes above the rectangular black-framed glasses that rest on the tip of his nose. His bald head turns a light shade of pink, a sure sign he's annoyed.

I clear my throat and tuck a strand of hair behind my ear. “Sorry, what?” I sense twenty-three pairs of eyes on me and feel my cheeks burn.

“Do you have the answer?” Mr. Baldy gestures toward the problem displayed on the whiteboard.

I don't care about your math problem
, I want to say
.
Instead, I shake my head. “No.”

He sighs and looks at another student.

Emily waves her hand in the front row as if she's hailing a taxi. He calls on her, “Yes, Emily?”

She gives the answer, smirks at me over her shoulder, and flips her blond hair. She should be proud of herself. It's not often that she figures out an answer before I do.

Sam and I would make blonde jokes about her. I smile as I remember him saying, “Did you hear about the blonde who sold her car for gas money?”

The buzzer announces both the end of the period and my escape to the restroom. I gather my things and dart into the hall. I weave through the sea of bodies until I reach the girls' room. Once I'm secured in a stall, I send Sam a text telling him about Blondie and Mr. Baldy, hoping to make him laugh.

While waiting for a reply, I read the latest news etched into the ugly green paint of the stall door. Someone named
LD loves HT. Monica is a b*&#^. Brody is hot
. I roll my eyes. Of course it's Brody. The girls have drooled over him since we were in middle school.

I glance at my phone. No reply. Sam usually replies right away if he is having a good day. I hold my breath and pray that he is doing well.

I allow my eyes to drift to the mirror while washing my hands. An arm stacked with bracelets at the sink next to me catches my eye. I look up to see a girl with pink-tipped black hair. Her brown eyes are lined in purple. Jamie, the new girl. According to rumors, she'd been kicked out of her old school. She shifts her eyes in my direction and I look away.

****

My cafeteria tray brushes the back of a girl who's explaining to three other girls where she bought her sparkly black fleece-lined boots. She frowns at me over her shoulder.

“Sorry,” I mutter, even though I'm not. She shouldn't block the door of the lunchroom to discuss fashion when my stomach growls at me to feed it.

“Gabs! Over here.” Brody motions me to his table with the jocks. I slide onto the bench beside him and am instantly overpowered by the smell of popular cologne. How's a girl to breathe with ten athletic male bodies at one table, all wearing the same smell? I cough and slyly cover my nose with the back of my hand.

“Have you heard from Sam?” Brody asks.

“I texted him before lunch, but I haven't heard back.” All eyes bore into me, waiting for an update. I want to roll my eyes, but don't. Everyone is so concerned about Sam now that his cancer is back. Sam and I were never allowed at this table before he was sick.

“Me either. I texted him this morning.” Brody's gray eyes are filled with concern. I used to say in fourth grade that Brody was my second best friend and Sam was my first best friend. I glance at his dark hair and the way his mouth turns down at the corners. His dimples pop even when he's frowning. Not much has changed. Brody, Sam, and I have been best buds all of our lives. When we hit middle school, our classmates splintered into groups but the three of us stuck together, even as freshmen.

Brody
is
hot. There is no other way to put it. Well, maybe even beautiful. On the popularity scale, he's a ten. Which is why Brody can pretty much sit anywhere he wants in the lunchroom at Dublin High. By ourselves, Sam and I are fives. Smack in the middle.

“I'll stop by his house on my way home from practice.” I look up from my tuna sandwich. No one is listening to me. The prep clique had paused at the end of our table on their way out of the cafeteria, so all four females stare at Brody with their tongues wagging.

“What about you, Brody? Do you want to hang out at my house Friday?” asks Rachel, the queen bee of the freshman class. Her perfectly manicured finger twirls a strand of her blond highlights.

Brody glances at me and back to the queen. “Gabs and I are going to spend time with Sam on Friday night,” he replies.

“Oh, that's so nice. How is he doing, Gabby?” Rachel's voice is suddenly high-pitched and irritatingly sweet.

Gag
. Sam and I would pretend to stick our fingers down our throats. I'm so over girls pretending to be my friend. It's always been to get close to Brody, ever since middle school.

“He has his days. He's tough.” My eyes stay on the wrinkled peas taking up space on my tray. I smash each one methodically with my fork and grit my teeth.

“Tell him we said hello. See ya, Brody.” The queen blows Brody a kiss as she exits with her royal followers.

Basketball practice is the best part of my day, my escape. Today we are scrimmaging a local team. I get in my zone and forget everything else. All of those years of playing with Sam and Brody in my driveway have paved the way for me to dominate the court. The more competitive and aggressive the game is the better.

My mom says I get my talent from my dad. He was sick on the basketball court. He loved it more than most things. I grip the rubbery orb in my hands. He trained me from age three on—at least until that day, the day his car crashed, wrapped around a tree. I pound the ball on the court, once, twice, three times. I dribble again, several hits in a row this time, the way Dad used to. I can't let my mind go there now.
Focus.

The thud of a ball on the court is music to my ears. Sweat drips from my forehead as I size up the defender in front of me. She's crouched in position, ready to seize the ball. It doesn't happen. I fake to the right and dribble around her to the left. I bank the shot.
That's for Sam.

After practice, the girls' locker room is a gossip-filled sauna. Steam from the showers rolls along the walls. I dry my feet with my towel, then pull on my sandals. The last thing I want is to get involved in the drama of who's dating whom, who is cheating with someone's boyfriend, or who was drinking at So-and-So's party. None of that matters. Sam's sick.

“He's such a hottie. He's not like the other freshman boys. He seems more mature,” says Kara, a junior on the team with porcelain skin and red hair. This gets my attention. I squeeze my dripping hair and pretend not to be interested.

“He is a cutie,” another junior says, pulling a shirt on over her head.

“I think I'll ask him to the spring dance,” Kara says casually, brushing her hair.

“Who are we talking about?” a sophomore chimes in with a sickeningly sweet voice.

“Brody Patterson. I'm thinking about asking him to go to the dance,” Kara answers without hesitation.

I can't listen to this anymore. I fling my towel into the laundry bin and get dressed. I work the laces through my black low-tops and tie them as the locker-room conversation brews in my head. My best friend is in the battle of his life and everyone is worried about a stupid dance. The only other close friend I have is wanted by every female on two legs. I loosen the laces to give relief to my tingling feet. The blood returns to my toes when I stand up. I slam my locker shut.

As I push the door open, I hear a girl say, “What's her problem? She's always so moody.”

“She's been in a bad mood since winter break. I think the kid that has cancer is one of her friends,” Kara says.

Her words cause heat to rise up my neck. It takes every ounce of self-control I can muster not to go back and slap the red out of her hair for referring to Sam so casually. My body trembles. I suck in my breath, then push the rest of the way through the door.

The warmth of the sun on my walk home calms me down. I toss what I heard in the locker room around in my mind. I can't be mad at the comments about my moodiness. It's true. What upset me was the way Kara referred to Sam as “the kid with cancer.” He's so much more than that. I take a deep breath and try to let it go.

The stroll along the familiar sidewalk on the way to Sam's house comforts me. The trees display evidence of new life with little green buds scattered on their limbs. It smells like spring. The air is crisp and clean. I wonder if Sam knows how nice it is today. We used to climb the big oak in his backyard on days like this. We pretended to be defenders of the imaginary constellation, Vica.

“Gabby, are you in position?” Sam called down to me from high in the oak.

“Almost!” I shimmied along a low branch. I crossed the fence of Sam's yard and settled on a limb above a doghouse in the yard next door. A black Rottweiler strained against a chain attached to the doghouse. He growled and snarled, baring his teeth. “I'm in position. I see the alien.”

“Don't let him cross the barrier. If he gets through to Vica, he could destroy the universe,” Sam yelled. “I see an invader above. I'll get it with my laser.” Sam shot at a bird in the tree with his water gun. The bird chirped disapproval in its flight to get away.

“Are you okay down there?” I called to Brody, standing guard at the base of the tree. He was armed with a super-sized water gun. He glanced up at me and gave a thumbs-up.

I bounce up the front steps to the little white Cape Cod that I consider my second home and ring the doorbell. A three-foot wooden angel forgotten from Christmas stands against the house. I am sure it was overlooked amid the shock of learning that not only had Sam's Hodgkin Lymphoma returned, it was now a Stage 3 cancer. Considering Stage 4 is the last stage, the news was devastating.

“Hello, Gabby. Come in, honey.” Sam's mom steps aside to let me through the door. Her blue eyes are heavy with fatigue and sadness. Her caramel hair is pulled into a ponytail and the lines on her face have grown deeper, a story of the ups and downs of the past year. Her T-shirt hangs over her slender frame.

“Bad day?” I ask while taking off my backpack and placing it on the wooden bench by the door.

“Chemo was rough on him today. He's been throwing up a lot. The doctors are hopeful that we can get the cancer into remission, though. Hopefully we can get him in shape to be back in May to finish out the school year.” Sam's mom puts a painted smile on her face in an attempt to be positive.

I nod. My insides fill with the all-too-familiar ache that has made its home in my body.

“Gabby!” Sam's little sister, Sarah, leaps into my arms. I lift her up and swing her around. Her eyes are the same chestnut color as Sam's. Light brown curls frame her pink cheeks. “Bubby is sick today.”

The sad look on her face breaks my heart. “I know what will make him feel better.” I bend my knees so that I'm face to face with her.

“What?” Her face brightens. She places her hands on each side of my face, waiting for my answer.

“Why don't you color him a picture? He likes your coloring. You've gotten so good at staying inside the lines. Use his favorite colors. That will cheer him up.” I tuck a curl behind her ear.

“I have lots of new crayons. He likes blue the best.” She bounces off to get her coloring book.

The staircase creaks and groans with each step I take. I make my way to the second-floor hallway and stop outside Sam's bedroom door. I use our “secret knock,” three raps, so he will know it is me. I ease the door open and peek in.

Black wooden letters spelling “SAM” are displayed on the wall above his metal headboard. He's cocooned in a gray comforter in the middle of his bed.

“What's up, Nerd?” The words croak from the cocooned figure.

I allow myself to smile for the first time today. It's good to hear him teasing. I ease onto the edge of the bed. “Not much, Nerdier Than Me. I am sorry you had a bad day.”

“So am I. This sucks.” Sam emerges from his cocoon. He works his way to a semi-seated position. His eyes are outlined with dark circles against his pale skin. A stocking cap snuggly covers his hairless head. “How was your day?”

I want to pull him in my arms. Tell him that I wish I could take all of this away. “It was okay. Brody asked about you. If you're up to it, we're still planning to hang out on Friday,” I say and shift my legs carefully so I don't shake the bed too much.

“Yep. This usually doesn't last more than a day or two.” Sam's voice was beginning to sound weaker. “I should be good to go on Friday.”

“Do you want me to get you something before I take off?” I ease myself off the bed and onto my feet.

“Nah. I'm going to lay back down. See ya on Friday.” Sam buries himself in the comforter and gives a little wave with his fingers.

“See ya then.” I return the wave and leave. My eyes fill with tears and threaten to spill over during my block-and-a-half walk home. I fight them back and shove the hurt growing inside me down into the pit where it belongs. I need to be brave for Sam.