The A-Word (23 page)

Bo was quiet for a long few beats. “I did my job and protected him,” he said. “He married. He had children. And eventually Management said I had done what I was supposed to do. They would let me know when I was needed again. Periodically, they have.” He looked at me then, long and hard. I didn’t look away. “Your brother is worthy, Jenna. You can believe me on that. And something is still coming. Big. Powerful. A force we need to deal with.”

“Casey’s gone,” I drew it out long, then longer.

“Even so.”

“Could he come back?” My heart didn’t as much beat as flutter.

A million things I couldn’t name rushed across Bo’s face. “We’re angels,” he said quietly. “We bring miracles. We believe in them. Even me.”

“Bullshit,” I said, even if I wanted to believe otherwise. “You bring what suits you for the moment.” I looked from

Bo to Amber. “Right?”

They didn’t answer. Neither glowed. They just looked like
a couple of weird grown-ups I had no business hanging out with in the middle of the night.

Across the lawn, the Gilroys’ front door opened, and Mrs. Gilroy shuffled out.

I ran to her. “You okay, Mrs. Gilroy?”

“MJ’s sick,” she said. Her eyes were watery and pale. She smelled like old lady—perfume and powder and overripe fruit. “Your brother was right. Took him over to that St. Anthony’s Emergency Center but they said he’d have to go to the real hospital. Ambulance took him to Houston Northside. Said it was his heart. He’s having bypass surgery tomorrow morning. I can’t sleep.” She wrung her hands. “You believe in miracles, Jenna?”

My heart was too tired to flounder anymore. “I don’t know,” I said, not sure if I meant it. I patted her on the arm. Her skin was dry and papery. And even though I didn’t want to, I thought again about Lanie Phelps, who possibly should have been dead now—but wasn’t.

After that, I walked by Bo and Amber, not saying a word, and went inside to lie to my mother.

H
ere is what I told Mom: Casey had flaked out about breaking up with Lanie and run off to stay with Dave, who was living with his father up near Centerville. Dave’s dad, I said, had recently taken a job running some rich doctor’s ranch.

Of course, Mom cried and got hysterical and called Dad. He got less hysterical, but they both called Casey’s cell like a million times. I chewed my lip until it bled and wondered if my brother’s cell worked wherever he was. Or maybe it was in the cupholder of the Merc, back in the school parking lot. I realized I would have to ask someone to drive it back here for me and make up another cock-and-bull story about how Dave had picked up Casey because the Merc’s engine was acting up.

At least that last part was close to true. The Merc was still a piece of crap.

I spouted lie after lie and the only thing that kept me from breaking into a thousand pieces was the thought that maybe Bo and Amber really
didn’t
know shit.

Okay, I was sure Amber didn’t. Bo was still a self-serving mystery. There was nothing I hated more than someone who made a bad choice and then whined about it while the rest of us slogged forward. I would never forgive Bo for convincing me to believe that my brother was just like him. If Casey was a bitter, mopey, unhappy bastard like Bo, then Casey would be here. Maybe he’d feel like an angel failure. But he’d be here.

Somewhere around three or so, Mom cried herself to sleep.

I shuffled to my room and flopped onto my bed. But I tossed and turned and ending up dragging blankets into Casey’s room. I curled up on his comforter. My phone stayed clutched in my hand because I wanted to believe that somehow Casey would call. Which I know is ridiculous, but I figured I was entitled to that particular fantasy.

When I still couldn’t sleep, I started nosing around Casey’s room. Once I started, it was impossible to stop. I looked at it all. His old baseball trophies from when he was little. Swimming ribbons from the couple of years we both swam summer league. Movie ticket stubs from dates he’d gone on with Lanie, wrinkled up because he wasn’t a girl and even though he kept it, it was just stuffed in his desk drawer with old Chuck E. Cheese prize tickets he’d never redeemed. My brother had been a whiz at skee-ball once upon a time.

Some framed pictures of him and me at SeaWorld once. Football group pictures with all the guys so tiny that I had to squint to pick him out. In his closet, I flipped through all his clothes: Jeans hung this way and that on hangers. Dress shirts and older stuff—basketball jerseys he’d outgrown, ancient pairs of New Balance sneakers with holes in them. Report cards from elementary school when he always made the highest grades. His old letter jacket, which I put on and then took
off because it smelled like him still—sweaty and musky and somehow like the night air. Guy stuff. My brother’s stuff.

He hadn’t lied to me: the bongs and all the weed paraphernalia were really gone. But there on his desk, shoved half behind his English textbook so I almost missed it, was that damn paper sack project for Teen Leadership. My hands shook as pried open the bag.

Inside were the following items:

And that was it. He wasn’t done, obviously. Or else he felt flummoxed, because how could he explain to the class what he really was? What he was aiming for and spending his time on? They couldn’t see all that, anyway now, could they?

I lay back on his bed. I hadn’t cried, not really, in a long, long time. But now I couldn’t stop. I cried and cried and cried, the ugly screw-up-your-face-and-send-snot-everywhere kind of cry. Casey was dead. No matter how long he’d stuck
around or even if he came back, all these things—these ideas, these hopes and plans, even the ones he hadn’t put in the stupid sack—they were nothing now. Gone.

I thought about that one white feather that had fluttered to the ground after he disappeared. The one that now sat in my underwear drawer, where you put all the things you don’t know where else to hide. And decided it would be just one more useless thing to put in this sack.

DAWN WAS BREAKING when my phone vibrated. I leapt up, not even checking the caller ID.

“Jenna?” It was Maggie. I could tell from her voice that Bo’s damage control hand to her shoulder had worn off. “Do I need to come over there? You are definitely not okay, are you? Never mind that. I’m on my way. You’re home, right. Stay put. I’ll be right there.”

“No!” I bellowed at her. “No … I …”

“This is me walking out of my house,” Mags said. And you know what she did then? Because unlike my family, Maggie’s parents are COMPLETELY AWARE of their daughter’s comings and goings, so it’s not like she could actually leave and they wouldn’t notice. But Maggie took something—probably her lace-up knee-high Converse—and thumped them on her floor so I would think she was walking.

At least that’s what it sounded like.

I didn’t plan on laughing ever again. But there I was, cracking up until my stomach hurt. I guess that’s why the real story—shortened so that I could get it out before Christmas break—came pouring out of me. That Casey had died in that car accident last year. That he was sent back as my guardian angel. That Amber and Bo were angels, too. That yes, he had really flown tonight; did she remember this? That he’d saved
stupid Lanie Phelps. That he had saved me, too, last year. We were not skydivers. I talked fast, barely pausing, the words escaping in a mad rush.

“But now he’s gone,” I finished. “And I don’t know if he’ll ever come back.”

I sucked in a long breath. I could hear Maggie breathing, too, over the cell.

I guess even for someone like Maggie Boland, who believes that the universe has a plan and that it is her job to figure it out, some things are too much to accept.

“I’m your best friend, Jenna,” Mags said finally. “Do you really think you have to make up a crazy story? Your brother’s a flake. Even if he’s cute. You know I already know this. I’ve been asking and asking you if something’s wrong. I can’t believe you wouldn’t trust me with the truth. God, Jenna. Your brother. An angel. Seriously?”

Well then. I had nothing else to say. My heart sank to my toes. I figured that’s where it would stay.

We breathed at each other for a while, and then we hung up.

I curled into the tiniest ball I could and closed my eyes.

I don’t remember falling asleep, only that I was thinking that I probably should just shower and get dressed and figure out how I was getting to school.

Like that other dream I’d had, this one felt real.

Casey was sitting on the side of his bed. “I washed that comforter,” he told me, grinning. “You know, in case you were worried about hygiene.”

“Liar,” I said, sitting up.

He socked me on the arm, not hard. But I felt his warm hand on my skin. My heart lifted from my toes and danced through my body. He was back! It would be okay. He was still an angel. But he was here. Guarding me like he was supposed to.

“Jenna,” Casey said. His voice vibrated in my chest, making me nervous all of a sudden because for some reason it reminded me of Bo. And I hated Bo. “You know more than you think you do. You can figure this out. You have to figure it out. I love you. I’ll always love you. Just take it step by step and you’ll know what to do. The pissant will help you, maybe. I think he will. And you may get in trouble, but hey, that’s the Samuels way, isn’t it?”

He was glowing golden, but fading in a way that made me feel cold.

“I know you think I screwed up, Jenna. But it was for the right reason. The big stuff always is. I know … Jenna you need to trust me. You need to trust yourself. That whole Spidey sense thing? And you? Well—”

“What about Bo?” I hated saying his name, but I did. “Is he for real with that story? His wife getting killed and all the rest of it? But it doesn’t excuse what he didn’t tell you. Casey, I need to know—”

He was going to tell me. I was sure of it. I could see it in his face. Which was when I woke up.

Alone.

M
om was still in bed when I walked out the front door. I almost smacked into Amber Velasco.

“You need a ride to school,” she said, telling, not asking. She was wearing her EMT outfit. The Camaro was parked out front. I was wearing the jeans she’d given me because they were sitting on my desk chair—and even though I was feeling highly conflicted about the entire A-word community of which she was a card-carrying member, I refused to take that out on a pair of pants that made my ass look spectacular.

But I tossed the white shirt. I had to draw my line in the sand.

I’d also swiped on a healthy bunch of makeup. This was for two reasons: 1. I looked pasty and exhausted and I was not about to face my former best friend and my soon-to-be former boyfriend looking like shit. Also, 2. My brother had given me the Sephora kit. I would use every last drop of it.

“Gold glitter shadow is for night,” Amber said. “And there
is
such a thing as too much eyeliner.”

I sashayed past her, pretending I hadn’t heard. Of course then I realized I didn’t even know where the bus stop was for the Spring Creek bus. I hadn’t ridden a school bus yet this year.

“Let me drive you.” Amber’s work boots slapped the pavement behind me.

“I’m fine,” I said, although we both knew that wasn’t true. What was true: I did not want to talk to her. I did not want her to help me.
My
guardian angel was gone. The reality of this was sinking in as the sun rose higher in the sky.

I ran, mostly because I had so much inside me with nowhere to go. A yellow bus rumbled past as I reached the cross street. I waved my arms. It stopped. I climbed aboard and headed straight toward the back.