Death of a Kleptomaniac (18 page)

My moment is over. I'm back in my bedroom. Henry is gone. Maybe forever. So many times I woke up and looked at my ceiling and wanted to go back to sleep. Or I woke up and wished I didn't have to go to school or help do yard work or some other undesirable chore. A lot of my life slipped away while I wasn't doing anything.

When I hear my mother's voice, I'm pulled into a heightened state of awareness. “Of course you can see her room.”

This is great news! Sadie is here. She's really going to help me. She's come to my room to get all the things I stole so my family won't find out that I'm a thief. It only takes a second for me to realize what this means. Henry is here, too. Because Sadie told Tate that Henry had agreed to help. Henry Shaw may be standing outside my window right now! I hurry to see if he really is there.

He is! This is the happiest I've felt in a long time. Look at him! Uh-oh. Henry may be an outstanding saxophone player, but he's terrible at crouching. I watch as he tumbles into the small boxwood hedge beneath my window. I wish I could tell him how I feel. I wish I could say something. Do something. He reaches up and pulls off the screen covering my window. Is he going to try to climb inside my room? He can't do that. It's impossible. Because I bent something structurally important last spring and now my window only opens halfway. Oh my god. If Henry misjudges something and gets stuck in my window, my parents are going to think he's a stalker. What if they're so disoriented by their grief that they call the police on him? Could that damage my future connection with him? Is it normal to have these issues after you die?

I lean out the window. “My window is broken!” I yell. “Stay in the bushes!”

If I'd studied with Hilda I'd know how to fix this. I try to keep my commands simple. Why did she bother showing me that it's possible to make syrup bottles drip? I need to be able to communicate with the living. That's the first thing they should teach dead people.

“Bushes are safe!” I try hard to use my energy to rustle the boxwood or make a wood chip fly at him to frighten him off, but nothing works. “Window equals police.” I don't know if that's true, but sometimes people respond to dramatic statements.

“This is one of the stupidest things I've ever done in my life,” Henry says.

“True!” I say. “Leave! My room is no place for you!”

I look around to ascertain the state of my belongings. Whoa. People have just entered my room. Grandma and Aunt Claire. And they're taking my things. That seems premature. I know I don't need them anymore, but it feels inappropriate to swoop in and snatch them right before my funeral. I watch as they set out all of my makeup on my dresser and sort through it. Oh. I remember. They're gathering my makeup so they can prepare my body. I look at the unmade bed and the discarded clothes on the floor. It's embarrassing to count five pairs of dirty underwear draped around my laundry basket. Alive, I didn't feel like I was a slob, but looking at things now, I realize I should have treated my room like a sanctuary instead of a locker room equipped with a television.

My grandmother picks up some hideous purple nail polish that I bought as a joke to decorate my toenails in eighth grade.

“Should we paint her fingernails?” Aunt Claire asks.

“Don't bury me with purple fingernails!” I plead.

This is so stressful. If I could just tell them—if I could just let them know what I want—death would be so much easier. I should have kept an in-case-I-die journal. And in it I should have left detailed instructions. And I should have kept a current photo of myself with it. And a list of all the makeup I use, which isn't much. This entire postdeath catastrophe could have been avoided.

“I think she only painted her nails for Halloween,” Grandma says.

That's not entirely true, but close enough. “Nice call, Grandma.”

“What about perfume?” Aunt Claire asks.

I can't look at this anymore. Where Aunt Claire found the bottle she's holding, I'm not quite sure. I never wore perfume. And even if I did, you don't put that stuff on dead teenagers. What's wrong with her? Sadie needs to hurry up. I can hear her voice. She's talking to my mother in the living room. Just get in here. She doesn't need to talk to my mother. They're not
that
close. And why is Henry still in my boxwood? He's smart; he should be able to sense danger. Now I hear something else. The doorbell. I leave my room to see who it is. It's Tate. He agreed to help after all.

My mother lets him inside, and I watch them hug. He looks sad. She looks miserable. And Sadie is anxious beyond belief. She has a backpack slung over her shoulder.

“So you don't mind if I visit her room?” she asks.

That my room has become the most popular destination on the block creeps me out.

My mother tilts her head back, and I watch tears form at the corners of her eyes and slip down her face. “Spend as much time as you need.”

They hug, and I feel a strong twinge of jealousy. I wish I could be the one hugging my mother. Sadie turns toward my bedroom, and my mother stops her. “Wait. Doesn't she have some of your things?”

Sadie flips back around. She looks startled. “I, uh, don't know what she has in her room.” She stumbles when she talks. She's afraid that my mother already knows.

“She's got your shoes. Remember?” my mother says. “You should probably take those now.”

Sadie nods, and I watch her face relax in relief. “Right,” she says.

“I haven't gone through her things yet,” my mother says. “I'll need to do that. Soon.”

Sadie returns to my mother's side and hugs her again. “I think that can wait. You should take as long as you want. And if you want me to help, I will.”

My mother sniffles. “I should just put a day on the calendar and commit to it. Otherwise, I'm going to let it turn into a shrine. I'll never touch it. It will stay the way Molly left it. Forever.”

That actually sounds good, I think. Because If I don't cross, I'll be able to surround myself with my stuff. It will be a lot like being alive. Except different. I feel a slight urge to return to my bedroom. Panic shoots through me. What if Grandma has spotted Henry in the bushes?

When I get there I see that nobody has discovered Henry. They're finalizing my makeup. “This is her blush,” my grandma says. “Remember the photo I showed you?”

But I don't wear blush. That was just a free sample that I got at the mall. “Mom!” I call. “Can we get Grandma a more recent photo? She's going to make me look like a middle-school student, or possibly a child prostitute.” It's the last time anybody is going to see me. I want to look natural, like myself.

My mother doesn't appear. It seems insane that a couple of days ago I could call for her anywhere in the house and she'd come to me. She was my mother. Now I don't know if I'm ever going to see her again. I cannot imagine a future without my mother; I cannot lose her clock. Shouldn't Louise be keeping track of this for me? Isn't that her job?

“You still have your mother. Your father. Your grandma. Sadie. Henry. And the people who matter most,” Louise says.

If I were somebody's counselor, I wouldn't appear and disappear without any warning. I'd try my hardest to be a nurturing presence and say things like “I'm back” or “I'm leaving, and you can expect me back in an hour.”

“After this, I want to go check on them myself,” I say. I trust her, but I still want to verify what she's saying. After talking to Hilda, I'm not really sure that Louise is as invested in my outcome as I originally thought. I'm just one of many souls. It doesn't really matter to her where I end up.

“You're always free to return to the transition room,” Louise says.

“That place with the clocks and your desk has a name?” I ask. “You never told me that.”

“There's a sign on the door,” Louise says.

She still should have told me that.

“Thanks,” I say. But I'm not really thankful at all. I'm annoyed. Louise has been constantly withholding information. Watching that dumb chicken hatch was a total waste of my time. Louise isn't trying to strengthen me. Hilda was right. Louise wants to keep me in the dark so that I'll follow exactly what she says, because that's the easiest option for her.

“How many people do I have left?” I ask. “What's the exact number?”

“It hasn't been a good day for lasting eternal connections,” Louise says.

Of course this would be her answer.

“In your list of people that I have left, you didn't mention Aunt Claire,” I say. “Why not? Have I lost Aunt Claire?”

“Not yet,” Louise says. “But you might soon. I'm sorry.”

This startles
and
angers me. First, I don't think that Louise is sorry at all. Second, I like my aunt Claire. “We have a great connection!”

“Calm down,” Louise says. “It's not always about what you did. Sometimes it's about what they did. Sometimes alignment becomes unaligned.”

“But I haven't lost her yet?” I ask.

“Right,” Louise says. “But there's a crack.”

She never mentioned that the clocks cracked before they ruptured. “Are you sure you've given me all the information I need?”

I watch as Aunt Claire and my grandmother sort through my lip pencils. “I don't use those anymore,” I explain. “I bought a bunch on sale but they're too dark.”

“This looks like mauve,” my grandma says. “I don't think I've ever seen Molly wear mauve.”

“Let's just take the whole haul,” Aunt Claire says. “We might need the options.”

“This is so morbid,” I tell Louise. “Can't you help me reach them and tell them what to do? There's got to be a way.” My mind flashes to Hilda. She'd probably know.

“Have you thought about your last life moment?” Louise asks.

I cannot believe she is bringing that up right now. “I am comforting my family! And Henry Shaw, who happens to love me and is currently sitting in my boxwood hedge,” I snap.

“It's great that you visited Henry,” Louise says. She seems happy about it.

“Yeah, it is great. And you were right. He did break up with Melka. Turns out, we started to fall in love the night we kissed. Were you aware of that? And now none of that matters, because I'm dead. That's right. Everything sucks worse. Because in that life moment, I learned that I had screwed up the only important relationship I will ever have. I ruined it. Are you satisfied? Does it make you happy that I relived that life moment and got some clarity?” My anger at the situation is now redirected toward Louise.

“Your death doesn't make me happy, Molly. But we all die.”

She's already said that once, and she doesn't need to say it again. Hearing it doesn't make me feel any better.

“In your moment with Henry you sought clarity. You gained something.”

I don't feel like I
gained
anything. And the only reason I learned anything useful is that I followed Hilda's advice on how to stay in the moment. Without it, I wouldn't have known how to eavesdrop on Henry and Melka.

“For your last life moment, I really want to encourage you to confront a fear. Get as much clarity as you can while you still have the chance.”

More clarity? This advice feels cryptic and oddly manipulative, and it totally ignores my stated preoccupations. “If you think you know which life moment I should relive, why don't you just tell me?”

“I can't instruct you that way,” Louise says.

“Right,” I say. “You can only give me enough information to make me feel doomed and flawed. Thanks.”

“If being in your house with your family is too hard for you, you can always go somewhere else for a little while,” Louise says.

Just as she finishes telling me this, my grandmother bursts into tears, and Sadie enters my bedroom.

“I can't just leave them grieving like this,” I say. “They need me.”

Louise shakes her head. “As shallow as this may sound, their wounds will heal.”

I watch as Sadie hugs my grandmother. I wonder if the tables were turned I would have driven to Sadie's house and gone into her bedroom and hugged her grandmother. I'd like to think I would have done that.

“My parents will never get over me,” I say. Hilda was right. Clearly, Louise has an agenda and wants me to cross. She sees how depressed and grief-stricken we all are, and she's not even suggesting I could stay.

“Your parents will keep on living,” Louise says. “The twins won't replace you, but it will give your mom and dad new experiences. They will find new joys.”

“Stop!” I tell Louise. I try to keep my focus on what's happening in my room.

“I told Sadie she could spend a few minutes alone in Molly's room,” my mother says.

“We've got what we need,” Aunt Claire says. “We're headed to the mortuary now.” She's well stocked with random bits of makeup that I never intended to wear. But I am relieved she seems to have forgotten an entire bag. Maybe it will make her go light on my final makeover.