The Memory Jar (22 page)

Then
(Joey)

The sheriff met us at the boat landing, and the first responders were there within a minute. You were warming up by then, even asking him questions about the accident investigation, but they put you in the ambulance and ran some warm fluids through your IV. I rode with you and made sure you stayed awake, even though nothing you said made sense. Like that stuff about your mom talking to you on the phone, which didn't happen. Your mom hasn't left your side since you got to the hospital, but you didn't even have your phone anymore by the time you got to me.

Scott hasn't been awake since we saw him. Since we heard him speak. I know, I
know
. Don't worry about that. My mom printed out all of Tom's research and got a restraining order on Kendall, but then Terence called us to say that the police found some weird software on Scott's phone and computer, like parents might use to spy on their kids. There was also a stuffed animal that had a recording device in it? Some kind of wireless nanny-cam thing. Creepy as hell, but somehow it's starting to make sense to me. Scott always thought he could fix everyone else's problems without getting hurt by them himself.

It's not good, Tay. His temperature spiked up super high, an infection in his brain or around it. I guess it's pretty common with a skull fracture. My mom said they knew he was sick, that they've been watching him closely for a few days now. They're giving him hardcore antibiotics, but it's not working. When he woke up, do you remember how his face was kind of flushed? Right after we left the hospital, he had some kind of seizure, and it wouldn't stop. They've had to put him on some pretty strong medications, just to keep the seizures down.

Anyway, it's been a rough night, and I'm just glad you're okay. You scared me, Tay. I didn't mean to overstep, but I want you to know that a lot of people love you. I mean that, as a brother. As a friend. And I want you to know that's something that stays the same no matter what happens to Scott or what you decide. You've got me on your side.

Now and Then
(collision)

There are moments that are missing and moments I'm not sure I remember right. The sheriff, for one, what he said right before they put me in the ambulance.

“You get yourself together, young lady,” he said, or at least that's how I heard it. “No sense letting one freak accident set the course of your life.”

“Accident?”

“You and that Janson kid. We just closed the investigation. Cause of the crash was a stuck throttle, happens sometimes when it's icy and damp. You couldn't have stopped it without turning off the engine.” He cleared his throat, and the whole sky full of stars spun behind his head while he waited to say more. The stuck throttle? So it wasn't my fault.
It isn't my fault.

“You kids think you're invincible, that you have this grand life stretching out ahead of you like an empty page. A book you'll fill in later, when you have time to slow down. Your life is
now
, kid. Your life is here, and it can change on a dime.”

Now

My mom won't let go of my hand. “He's not doing well,” she says, and I know she's talking about Scott. “We can't lose you both.”

I'm not lost. I'm warm and alive, probably still pregnant, and my mom is holding my hand. “I thought it was my fault,” I say. My voice is shaky and new. “He gave me a ring, but I can't get married. I can't have a baby.”

She squeezes my hand. “I was looking for a stamp. I opened the junk drawer in the kitchen, and I saw how you'd ripped up those awful pictures. I knew, then. It all fell into place.”

“I'm scared.”

She sniffles, and her other hand comes up over her face. “Listen. I know I'm not perfect. I know I would be a better mom all around if I'd had you like six or eight years later, when I'd figured out some things about being a person. But it's not the end of the world, and this is not the end of your life, by any means.”

I take a slow breath and turn my attention to the ceiling tiles. “Dani made me an appointment,” I say. I've made my decision about Madison and my pretend aunt, but somehow it's important to know what my mother says about this, whether she can still love me if I chose myself over my potential kid. “I couldn't figure out how to tell you.”

She takes a long time to respond, but she doesn't stop holding my hand. Finally she takes a breath and whispers, “I love you, Taylor, and I understand why you didn't want to tell me. I'm not sure I would have told me either. But I won't let you go to Wisconsin with Dani and a person pretending to be your family.”

She always does this to me. I pull my hand away, and I want to roll over and face the wall until she leaves. I want to get an abortion to spite her, to prove that I'm not always going to be under her thumb. That's stupid. I glare at the ceiling, but the anger rises.

“I mean, I'll go with you. Taylor.
I'll be there
,” she says, and she puts her hand on my shoulder. “God, honey, if you only knew how much being a grown-up is made up of screwing up, and how hard it is to admit this to your headstrong daughter who already thinks of your life as a flat line, static and set.”

She reaches for my chin, pulls my face around to hers, and I see in her eyes how much she means this. “This thing with my job, the office closing, everything falling apart—it may seem like a terrible thing, but it opens up some options. It's not going to be easy, but we can rethink a path that will let you have this baby, if that's what you want. I'm here for you.”

It's everyone's favorite thing to say. They're all here for me. I look at my mother's face—a face I've grown used to studying, looking for cues—but there's nothing there but love. I think about Scott's mom, sitting vigil by her son's bed, watching him slip away.

I think about all the things we leave unsaid, all the ways we make ourselves unknowable even to the ones we love. “I'm going to be a doctor,” I say. “A cardiologist
and
a poet. I'm going to work my ass off to get scholarships, and I'm sorry for not telling you sooner.” I look away so I'm not tempted to read too much into my mom's response, but I can't believe how happy it makes me to have finally told her.

My IV bag is empty, and a nurse with a stern face nods crisply at my mother and goes about taking out the needle and taping my hand up with a cotton ball. She's all business, silent and efficient, and she doesn't even warn me that she's activating the automatic blood pressure cuff, which feels like it will slice my arm in two. She frowns, taps a few numbers into the computer and turns to go.

“Excuse me,” Mom says. “Now that she's not connected to the IV pole, can Taylor leave the room for a bit? She needs to see her boyfriend.”

“Doctor Forrest wants to try a Doppler,” the nurse says, without looking at me.

“What's that?” I want to make her speak to me, but she continues to address my mother.

“Check for fetal heartbeat,” she says. “May or may not work at this stage, but he wants a listen. He'll do an ultrasound if we can't get something from the outside.”

“Wait.” I need her to look at me. “Are you saying we're going to hear a heartbeat?”

“Hear it or see it, if it's there.” She nods. “What your body has been through tonight—plenty of folks don't ever see the other side of a hypothermic event like this.” She finally makes eye contact. Her eyes, I'm surprised to see, are welled and shiny. “You're very lucky.”

Celeste is at the door, her face serene. “I wanted to check if there was anything you need,” she says, and her eyes slide briefly in my mom's direction. She says a lot of things without speaking, and I remember how I told her she was good at empathy. Is there anything I need? Is there?

“They're checking for a heartbeat,” I say. “Can you … can you make it so I don't have to hear it?” My mother squeezes my hand.

Then and Now

Nobody blames me. We murmur farewells like a lullaby chorus, singing him down somewhere deeper than sleep. Into our stories—our past and our future.

“I'm keeping the appointment,” I say, over the body of his brother draped in plastic tubing and medical tape. Joey's eyes slide shut, but not fast enough. I reach for him, for those narrow shoulders in need of a hug. “Hey,” I say, and I run my thumbs across the tears on his face. “Joey. It's intense right now, but we'll heal.”

I can't explain the relief that comes with remembering, the way it feels when the gaps are filled—even if there are things I can never know, no matter how much I want it. I want to believe it was Kendall who twisted everything, and I'm glad that thanks to all of this, her family is working with social workers and such to get her the help she needs. But there's something to what Joey said, too, about Scott wanting to fix people. I wonder what he was fixing about me.

I can't forget him saying her name when he woke. I can't forget him yelling at me on the phone, and the crunch in the snow.

“This is not a story like that,” I say, and I take the hand in mine—the hand that no longer feels like a couch cushion but something less than that, even. “It's not about a girl and her sad ending, or about a boy and his sad ending either. It has some good parts—the parts we told to call the boy back—and it has some secret parts that remain unwritten. This story is not about an ending at all, even though it has endings inside it.” I look up at Joey, and what we share is complicated. I'm not sure what the future holds, but I'm glad Joey didn't die in a dirt bike stunt, and I'm glad I stepped away from the edge of the mine pit, too. “This is a story that keeps moving forward.”

Joey doesn't reach for me, but his presence there feels more solid, less like a pillar and more like an arch that's helping me hold this. We both look at Scott, whose chest no longer rises and falls beneath the sheet. The two of us can share our loss and our hope. I'm glad to know the crash wasn't entirely my fault, but blame no longer feels like the most important thread binding me to this tragedy. I hold the memory jar in my lap. It feels lighter now than it has for days, without all those words which this afternoon I shredded into a fine confetti. Joey watches as I twist open the top and pull out a small cellophane packet. My vision swims. I slip the ring on Scott's little finger.

“I loved you,” I say, releasing his hand. “I'm sorry I was about to break up with you.”

Joey shrugs into his jacket, no more secrets between us. His hands settle on my wheelchair, and together we leave this room behind us for good.

Now

We keep moving forward. My hand reaches into the jar, churning through the fragile casings of our memories, and I imagine how wonderful it will feel, flinging these words away from me in a strong wind, a bloom of black and purple penmanship, spreading like a bruise and then healing all in a breath.

The doors to the brain injury ward slide open ahead of us, and Joey pauses beside the bank of elevators. The air seems to hum with questions, and I know there's more than one kind of moment that changes everything. “Where are we headed?” I say.

“You choose,” he says, “but you don't have to make the decision alone.” He pulls my chair carefully into a descending elevator—backward, so that when the doors slide open to the world outside, I will be ready to face anything.

About the Author

Elissa Janine Hoole has lived most of her life in northern Minnesota but has never driven a snowmobile. She prefers to cross frozen lakes on skis, especially if the outdoor adventure is followed by a steaming mug of coffee and a well-built fire. Elissa also teaches middle school writing and started this book with a purple pen on a magic note card during her creative writing club. She is the author of the YA novels
Sometimes Never, Sometimes Always
and
Kiss the Morning Star
. You can visit her online at ElissaJHoole.com.