Authors: Jen Nadol
He tried to wiggle free. “Cass! What are you doing?”
“Hurry!” I said. “This way.”
“Where are you going?”
I didn’t answer, nearly dragging him around the corner where she’d gone. I did a visual sweep, seeing the glow just as she disappeared down an escalator.
I yanked him that way. “C’mon!”
He didn’t budge. “What’s going on?”
I could tell by his expression that he knew. “I saw one, Lucas. Come with me now or we’re going to miss her.”
“Cassie …” But I wasn’t listening. Nothing mattered but keeping up with her so I could show him.
“Come on!” I ran toward the escalator, not turning to see if he followed.
She was waiting on the train platform. It should have been next to impossible to find one girl among the throngs of people, but the mark made her easy to pick out. Lucas caught up to me, panting a little. “Cassandra …”
“Shh. There she is.” I led him through the turnstile, onto the platform, keeping her close.
She was young, somewhere around Lucas’s age, slightly overweight, and dressed in slouchy, nondescript black.
The lights of the train crept ominously along the tunnel wall, coming into view shockingly bright and fast. I saw her inch forward and, for a second, was sure she was going to jump, but then the cars pounded into the station, stopped, and their doors slid open to dump one wave of people and usher another aboard.
“Let’s go.” I pulled Lucas with me.
We sat on the opposite side of the car from her. When I was sure she was fully in my sight, I turned to him. He was angry. No matter, I thought. As soon as he saw how this ended, he’d understand. Still, I didn’t want to fight him the whole way.
“I know you’re upset, Lucas,” I said, “but this is a chance to see …” He wasn’t listening, couldn’t hear me past his anger. I tried to find something that would resonate with him. “Think of it as testing a hypothesis. Right now, you think I’m off my rocker. Humor me. Test your theory to see if you’re right or if, maybe, there’s actually something to what I’m telling you.”
“This isn’t how I thought we were going to spend our day,” he said petulantly.
“Me either,” I lied.
The train swayed bumpily, jostling passengers, forcing us to dance to the same beat while it clattered through the tight dark tunnels. I studied the girl, trying to read her, to see if she had any inkling that today was somehow different. I always wonder that. Do they realize that this is the last day they will buy a newspaper at that stand, pay cab fare, kiss their wife or kids? They seem as harried and haggard and unappreciative of each action—though it will be their last—as everyone else. In contrast, I’ve started to feel everything acutely, overaware of stepping off the curb, turning a page, drinking my coffee, savoring every sensation, not knowing whether, if it were my last day, I would see the light framing my reflected image.
I think about death more than most people, I’m sure, the mark never letting me forget how unexpectedly it can happen. Like the girl whose day is today. Her skin is slack and pasty, so maybe she’s sick. But if she were terminal, it’s hard to imagine she could be out, walking around. Most likely, it will be an accident.
The train rumbled into another stop and she stood.
I nudged Lucas. “Let’s go.”
She trudged through the dirty station, past the tiled sign that read BOWERY, and up the stairs to the dirtier street outside. The buildings were smaller here and I winced at the sunlight, sharp and startling after the subway’s dimness. I kept us about a block behind, trailing her safely across three intersections. Midway down the last block, she stopped at a door, rummaged in her bag for a key, and disappeared inside. I tried the knob when we got there, but it was locked tight.
“Now what?” Lucas demanded, hands on his hips.
I scanned the names by the buzzer, about ten in all, trying to figure out which might be hers and whether I could somehow get her to invite us in. Even in Bering, though, you wouldn’t spend a day with total strangers. Here, you didn’t even look at them.
“I guess we wait.”
“For what?”
“For her to come back out.”
“That’s ridiculous, Cassandra. This whole thing is ridiculous.” Lucas exhaled through pursed lips.
“We could get some lunch, maybe,” I suggested, pointing across the street. “Look. There’s a café right there.”
Lucas glanced over, studying the people lounging at the metal tables packed tightly on the sidewalk out front. “Listen,” he said, and I could already read his answer in that one disappointed word. “I came to New York to see the city, not to follow some hapless girl around. I’m going to the Statue of Liberty. If you want to come, I’d love to have you, but I’m tired of this, Cass. I really don’t want to hear anything else about this … whatever it is you think you can do or see …”
He kept talking, but I noticed the people at the café, couple by couple, had paused to look our way. Not at us, exactly, but up. I turned to see what they were looking at.
“Lucas,” was all I said.
“What?”
But I didn’t answer, couldn’t, because I knew this was it. He followed my gaze to the top of the six-story brown building in front of us. I could just see her as she stood at the edge of the roof. Instinctively, I stepped back, pulling Lucas with me.
Her fall was a horrible, silent drop.
The first thing Lucas did was throw up. Around us, people were screaming. There was pandemonium just like Mr. McKenzie’s accident, people running out of the restaurant, to the scene or away, some just standing there stunned. I had turned my head just before she hit, knowing already how a sight like that can linger in your memory for … well, forever. The sound was bad enough, repeating in my brain over and over as I dragged Lucas, ashen and shaking, around the corner, out of sight.
Slowly I led him to a stoop about halfway down the block. He was still heaving as we sat. “The police are coming,” he said as the wail of sirens came closer.
“Probably. Or it might be an ambulance.”
“She couldn’t have survived, could she?”
I shook my head.
“The police will want to talk to us,” he said shakily. “We’re witnesses.”
“There were plenty of witnesses there, Lucas. We didn’t see anything more than they did. Nothing we can talk about, at least.” I felt eerily calm. Was I becoming numb to death? But then I remembered the sound, that awful crunching thud. I wasn’t shaken up the way Lucas was, but I’d known what was coming and maybe having him with me—someone else who’d seen, who’d understand—was making it easier or more bearable, though it really wasn’t either. I felt helpless and horribly, horribly sad. It was impossible to imagine things being bad enough to do what she had just done.
Lucas looked at me sideways, from the corners of his eyes, as if afraid to face me full-on. “How did you know?” he whispered.
“I told you. She had the mark.”
He nodded, looking away, down the busy street, where cars streamed by, passengers giggling, talking, unaware that someone had just taken her own life steps away.
“Let’s get out of here,” I suggested.
I hailed a cab. “Central Park,” I told the driver. I’d never been there, but I hoped it was as tranquil as the green spaces in Bering.
We were silent on the ride past more buildings, streets, stores, people. I closed my eyes, not wanting to see another. The driver dropped us at a corner with horse-drawn carriages. “Can’t go in,” he said shortly. “Roads are closed on the weekend.”
I paid him and we entered the park, walking a curved lane until we came to a field. We sat somewhere in the middle, the sun full on us for the first time that day. Neither of us spoke. I studied the buildings rising like giants above the trees beyond.
“You really can … see something …” Lucas finally said.
“Yes, I can.”
“I didn’t believe you.”
“I know.”
“I mean …” He shook his head. “I can’t believe what we just saw. I don’t think I’ll ever get that out of my mind. The way she fell …”
He wouldn’t, but I didn’t want to tell him that.
“You’ve seen that … that kind of thing before?” he asked.
“Not exactly, but something like it. I saw a man hit by a car.”
He winced. “That must have been awful.”
“It was.”
“How can you …”
“It’s not always like that, Lucas. Most of the time, I don’t actually see them die. I just see the mark.”
“What is it? What does it look like?”
I described it the best I could, none of my images exactly right.
“How long has this been happening?”
“Forever.” I told him about the schoolkids, random people I’d seen. “I didn’t really figure it out until my grandmother was in the hospital and I saw it on her roommate. When I went back to visit the next day, the roommate was gone. Passed away. I started thinking about it, putting the pieces together. The next time I saw it, I did what we just did. Followed a man until … it ended. That was the car accident.”
Lucas was calmer, the color back in his cheeks and, with each question, he sounded steadier. In front of us, a trio of guys threw a football. Their shirts were off and, unlike the girl we’d followed, they seemed the picture of health, toned and laughing. I watched them for a while, until Lucas said softly, “You really saw it on me?”
I glanced over and, for the first time today, saw him actually looking at me. Not annoyed, not dismissive, a penetrating stare. “I did.”
“And then it went away?”
“It did.”
“Do you think I was meant to die that day?”
“I think something would have happened if you had gone out. Something bad. That’s what the mark means.”
“You saved my life, didn’t you?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know, Lucas. That’s never happened before.”
We watched the football players a little longer. They reminded me of the picture in Lucas’s apartment of him with his high school friends. Maybe he thought so too.
“I don’t want to stay here anymore,” he said.
I nodded. “You want to go back to the hotel?”
“No. I don’t want to stay in this city. I want to go home.”
“Our flight back isn’t until tomorrow.”
He shook his head. “Let’s change it.” He stood. “Let’s pack and go to the airport.”
“Don’t you think we should call first? See if there’s anything available? Or what it’ll cost?”
“I don’t care. We can fly standby. Even if we have to sleep in the airport, it’ll be better than staying here.”
I didn’t argue with him, didn’t blame him for wanting to get away from what he’d seen.
We made it back to Bering late that night, well past midnight. Lucas dropped me at the apartment. I was disappointed. It felt like a replay of our last drive back from Wichita.
“You understand, Cassandra,” he said. “It’s been a very long day. I just need … I don’t know … some time.”
I nodded, but I didn’t understand. I had proved I wasn’t crazy, hadn’t I? “I know this is hard to absorb, Lucas,” I said. “Maybe I can help. I’ve had some experience with this—”
He cut me off with a curt shake of his head. “Thanks, but I think I need to just … work through this myself, you know?”
“Sure.”
“I’ll call you.”
“You’re back early,” Drea said. “What happened?”
“Becca got sick,” I told her.
I waited. A day passed. Then two, then three. I slept, I worked, I read three books. I watched the phone. I’d been sure I’d catch him in class Monday, but he came late and left early, avoiding my eyes the whole time.
“You and your boyfriend break up?” Doug asked.
“No, why?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t seen him around much.”
I shrugged. “He’s busy with classes, papers, you know.”
“Uh-huh.”
Finally, on Wednesday, he called. “Let’s have lunch,” he said. “I want to talk to you.”
He was already at Café Lennox when I arrived. He waved me over but didn’t stand, didn’t offer a hug or kiss. We’re on campus, I told myself. He has to be careful here.
He didn’t waste time on preliminaries. “I’ve been thinking,” he said after I returned to the table with my food, “about your gift.”
I hadn’t thought of it like that, couldn’t quite agree, but I didn’t argue.
“Tell me more about it.”
“What do you want to know?”
“You said you’ve seen it forever.”
“Right.”
“And you figured out what it meant when? Six months ago?”
“About that. A little less.”
“But you kind of already knew, right? When you followed the man who got hit by a car.”
“Kind of. Not really.”
Lucas nodded. His questions had a rhythm, like they did in class when he was leading more than exploring, taking me to a destination he had already chosen. “How often have you seen it since?”
“I don’t know. A few times. More here than I did in Ashville.”
“Have you ever told anyone? Tried to warn them?”
“Only you.”
He nodded again, leaning back and watching me closely. “Didn’t it ever occur to you to try to stop it, Cassandra? To help them?”
We had arrived and it wasn’t where I wanted to be. Not at all. I had proved I wasn’t crazy. Things were supposed to go back to normal, the way they’d been—us reading together on his couch, taking walks, sharing dinner. “No, not really,” I answered. “I … I mean, how could I think I could stop it?”
“You thought you could with me.”
“I didn’t really, Lucas. I just … I couldn’t
not
say something. I didn’t really think I could change anything.”
“You must have. Or you wouldn’t have told me to stay home. What did you think you were doing if you weren’t trying to change things?”
“Why are you attacking me?”
“I’m not attacking, Cassie. I’m just trying to understand how you could see this mark on all those people—mothers, fathers, kids, for crissake—and not try to do something about it. Why wouldn’t you?”
“Would you?”
“Of course. I’d feel it was my duty.”
“Your duty?!”
“Yes. Just like we talked about in class, at dinner. Your ‘hypothetical,’ except that it isn’t about letting someone decide how to use their remaining time; it’s about giving them more time. Saving lives. Jesus, Cassie, how could you not try to help?”