Catalyst

  Teri failed to mention the part where she planned to accompany me to my classes. Ms. Cummings’s eyebrow arches up when we walk into chem, but she doesn’t say a word. Teri takes a seat at the empty lab table by the fume hood. When she lays her head down, my necklace slips out from the collar of her shirt and the gold heart pings once on the table. She falls asleep instantly.

  My friends, enemies, and competitors whisper the expected questions and toss me notes, but I am a rock; I say nothing. In fact, I don’t do anything, either. Ms. Cummings gets it. She calls Diana up to her desk to make excuses for me and gives her instructions on how she can get through today’s lab single-handed. Diana comes back and tells me she’s sorry about everything. “Everything” is a very big word.

  The class gets to work. They are studying the rate of reaction influenced by the presence of catalysts and inhibitors and a bunch of other stuff. My brain refuses to tune in to the Chemistry Channel this morning. I should have taken a shower. I tilt my chair back (flagrant rule-breaking) and study the holes left in the ceiling by a generation of pencil points. Nasty little thoughts ping-pong inside me.

  I wonder where Mikey’s body is.

  I wonder what Teri is thinking. She must be thinking, even if she’s asleep. I bet her mind is in hyper-drive. Or maybe she jettisoned her warp core and is adrift.

  I wonder what she’s going to do now. Everything has changed, right? If it hasn’t, that would be even more awful.

  I wonder if they washed Mikey’s feet. He had the dirtiest feet of any kid I’ve ever known.

  I wonder why MIT rejected me.

  I am so sick. I am scum. That’s why MIT rejected me. I failed the sick scum test.

  I have no future. I’m going to live at home, care for my aging father, and sell condoms at the pharmacy. If they don’t fire me because I am sick scum. Maybe I can get a job at Superfresh, working for Ed.

  God, I’m cold.

  What is Teri going to do? What was she going to do before everything happened? College? The army?

  What about her mother—can she live alone?

  Teri will join the army, rise through the ranks, and command the U.S. troops in the Pacific. She’ll live in Hawaii. I will live at home, care for my aging father and her aging, blind, diabetic mother, and sell day-old bread at the Superfresh.

  Sick, pathetic, overwrought scum. And my quads hurt. And my Achilles tendon, and that stupid pec muscle is bothering me again, probably from carrying around . . .

  Suddenly the class is empty, except for Ms. Cummings at her desk, watching Teri, who is standing next to me. Class is over.

  “Wake up,” Teri says. “Where do we go next?”

  “We eat.”

  10.1 Titanium

  We have to walk past the football team in the cafeteria. The guys don’t say anything to Teri, even though she glares at each one, straight in the eyes, daring them, egging them on. They must have seen it on the news. Everybody knows. Everything. Every stinking little thing.

  Once we are past them, Teri’s shoulders sag as if the air has been let out of her. I can’t believe she’s standing, much less has the energy to walk or dare the team to fight her again. She is made of titanium. Titanium doesn’t tarnish easily. It doesn’t conduct electricity so well either, considering it’s a metal.

  Sara and Travis are waiting with four coffee cups and a greasy bag of doughnuts. Like Ms. Cummings, they’re surprised to see Teri, but they cover it with a polite “Hey” and “What’s up?”

  “Where’s Pangborn?” I ask.

  “He’s not here,” Sara says. “Teri, you want some coffee?”

  Teri lifts her head. “Yeah. Thanks.”

  Sara gets up and jogs to the lunch line. Teri stares at the swirl of yellow paint on Travis’s forehead.

  “We finished painting the playroom,” I explain. “The other night after . . . after you left. It’s a little sloppy. We’ll go back and paint it over. When you want. If you want.”

  She closes her eyes. Shut up, Malone. Just leave her alone.

  Sara comes back with an extra cup. She carefully pours coffee from each of our cups into Teri’s until we all have the same amount. Then she pushes the cup across the table and says quietly, “We have glazed doughnuts.”

  Teri takes a shaky breath and opens her eyes. “I like glazed.”

  I open the bag and offer it to her. She reaches in and takes one, then breaks it in two and hands the small half to me. I dunk it quickly in my coffee and take a bite. The icing melts and softens on my tongue, sweet and warm and delicate.

  Teri blows on her coffee, sips, then eats. She isn’t wearing her glasses. How come I didn’t notice that before? The last time I saw her wearing them was that night, I think. In the ambulance? Before the ambulance? The swelling around her eyes has gone down a bit. There are dried lines of salt on her face. I overdunk and slop coffee on the table. I take another bite. When was the last time I had a glazed?

  Travis yawns. He puts four packets of sugar in his coffee, stirs it with a pencil, and gulps down half of it.

  “You get any sleep?” he asks Teri.

  “Enough,” she says. “You?”

  He smiles. “Not enough.”

  “Do you want me to go home and get your glasses?” I ask.

  “I like it blurry,” Teri says.

  Travis nods. “Exactly.”

  That was good, an almost-normal conversation. She doesn’t look like she’s going postal or anything. Maybe as long as she stays in school, she can pretend it’s still a normal day, and she’ll go home, and Mikey will be there. If it hurts me to think about that, I can’t begin to imagine what it feels like for her.

  Sara pokes my hand with a coffee stirrer. “You should call Mitch.”

  “Why?”

  “Trav called his house, and his mom says he doesn’t want to talk to anyone. So you should call him.”

  Travis nods. Teri is lost in her coffee cup.

  “He’ll turn up,” I say. “You know him.” The last time Mitchell missed a day of school, he was in first grade and had the chicken pox. He’s been gunning for the district attendance record ever since.

  “His mom said he was acting strange,” Trav says. “He was cleaning.”

  “Cleaning?”

  “He was so weird . . . ” Sara swallows hard and studies her nails, “you know, when we were painting.”

  Travis licks his finger and uses it to pick up the spilled sugar on the table. “Both of you guys have been acting weird, if you ask me. Too much geek pressure.”

  “It’s like you’re having a symbiotic meltdown,” Sara says.

  “They need sex,” Travis tells her.

  Teri acts like she doesn’t hear a word of this. She reaches for what should have been Mitch’s cup of coffee and drinks from it.

  I brush the doughnut crumbs into my hand. “Stop being melodramatic. No one is having a meltdown.”

  “Call it what you want. Pangborn is changing,” Travis says. “He’s been watching that damn Golf Channel. It’s polluting his soul.”

  “And you guys have been fighting. Aren’t you worried?” Sara asks.

  “I have other things to worry about right now,” I say.

  Teri sets the empty cup on the table. She is still wearing her hospital bracelet and my watch.

  10.2 Freezing-Point Depression

  We’re trapped in a wormhole the rest of the day. My body is in slow motion, dragging through classes that look like video clips transmitted through a lousy modem connection. The memories of the weekend, they’re all piped through a DSL line. Teri walks next to me, Teri sits next to me, wordless. I reroute us through the halls to avoid going near the preschool classroom.

  English—blah, blah, blah. No Mitch. Ms. Devlin still thinks understanding Greek mythology is the key to happiness. If you ask me, Theresa Litch is a living, breathing Greek tragedy.

  AP Euro—The Balkan Wars (1912–13) helped create World War I. Why do they think we care about this? Teri spends the
class writing in my notebooks. She rips out the pages and stuffs them in her pocket. Is this how she should be reacting? Maybe I should call my father.

  Calculus—Now I know I’m trapped in an alternate universe. Calculus has become pointless. Still no Mitchell Pangborn. My antennae are wriggling.

  Gym—It’s raining. We are supposed to watch a video about the importance of stretching. Teri and I sleep on the wrestling mats.

  Study Hall—Napping, Part II.

  AP French—who gives a merde?

  I don’t take Teri to track practice, though I am dying for a long, sweaty run. I have to take her back to the real world. Plus I’m still sore.

  There is a funeral director in our kitchen, Mrs. Litch sitting by his side. He has a giant binder open on the table, a binder filled with pictures of caskets. He doesn’t look like a funeral director. He looks normal. This is a terrifying thought. You could walk past somebody like this in the mall, and you would never know he handles dead bodies all day. What other anonymous aliens are out there messing with us?

  Teri pulls out a chair. The legs screech against the floor. She sits down and reaches for the book of caskets. I am so out of here.

  Dad catches me as I am flying down the hall. He is wearing a black suit with a white shirt and the gray knit tie Mom bought him years ago. It is knotted high against his Adam’s apple.

  “Thanks for helping out with Teri,” he says.

  “I’m not helping. She just follows me. How are they going to pay for a casket? They cost thousands of—”

  He holds up his hand. “It’s taken care of. Someone called and offered to take care of the expenses. They saw what happened on the news.”

  Why do these generous mystery donors always wait until a kid dies before they show up? Where were they when Teri’s father was coming into her bedroom, and beating the crap out of her mother? I’d love to ask Dad, but all I’d get would be the Patient Look, the You Don’t Understand the Ways of the World, Little Girl Look, and if I got that now, I’d spontaneously combust into a million fragments of blonde hair and bone and skin.

  “Maybe you should go in and sit with her,” he says.

  “No way. I can’t. I can’t look at those things. I have to make a phone call, Dad. In private.”

  10.3 Transmutation

  This is perverse, but I can’t help myself. I can’t think about Mikey, not for another second. I can’t think about Teri or Mitchell or my father or anyone else. My hands seek out the phone and punch in the ten-digit number, plus one, for long distance. I have it memorized.

  “Hello? My name is Colleen Malone,” I say, invoking the name of the long dead. “Class of ’84. I’d like to speak to someone about my daughter’s application. Kate—Kathleen M. Malone.”

  “Was she rejected?” asks MIT.

  Swallow hard, old girl.

  “Yes, she was. We were wondering about an appeal, or if

  . . . if someone could tell us why you turned her down. She’s heartbroken.”

  “I understand,” purrs MIT. “It’s a hard thing to go through.”

  After a couple of minutes on hold, sharing my Social Security number and other useless information, more time on hold, they finally patch the ghost of my mother through to somebody with an answer.

  “Your daughter is very intelligent—no question about it. High grades in advanced placement classes, plays a sport, a few clubs.”

  “She won a national science competition.”

  “I see. She’ll have no problem getting into any number of schools.”

  “But she’s had her heart set on MIT since fourth grade.”

  “I am very sorry, Mrs. Malone.” The intercom buzzes.

  “No, no, no.” I shake my head like a two-year-old. MIT is slipping away from me. I can feel it. “Is it the money?” I ask. “I know, I know, we’re poorer than dirt. But she can work. I’ll . . . I’ll take another job, wash dishes, wash windows. Kate can work, too; she’s a good worker. We’ll do anything.”

  “It’s not the money, Mrs. Malone. We don’t make our decisions based on the size of the applicant’s bank account.”

  “Then what did she do wrong?”

  MIT pauses. “There’s a boy entering this fall who has already patented genetic therapy on fruit flies. We have a girl who wrote her own translation program from Chinese into Somalian. They bring that extra something, that oomph.”

  “Oomph?”

  “Oomph. Your daughter is smart, Mrs. Malone. But she is missing something, that something extra. And frankly, her essays were weak. I recommend she work on her writing skills. I know you love her very much and you want the best place for her. MIT is not the best place for her right now.”

  The intercom interrupts again.

  “She would be an asset to your campus,” I try.

  “I’m sorry. I have an appointment now.” The MIT mask slips back into place. I can hear the elastic band twang, vibrate, then go still. “Good luck, Kate. Good-bye.”

  Nobody is home at Sara’s house. I back down her driveway carefully and head for the other side of her development. I’m terrified that if I take my eyes off the road for even one second I’ll go out of control and run down an old lady or sideswipe a police car. Five blocks later I park on the street, get out, shut my door, and lock it. Then I unlock and open it and double-check that I turned off my headlights. Double-triple-check that I have the keys in my hand. Close the door. Lock the door. Keys still in hand. Check.

  Mrs. Pangborn opens her front door while talking into a telephone headset. “They have to remove it, it’s in the contract. I don’t care how much it costs. My client refuses to take possession while there is a two-ton statue of copulating Greek gods on the patio. Would you want to eat breakfast next to that thing?”

  She waves her fingers at me and smiles. “Hang on, Anne, I’ve got another call.”

  She presses the hold button at her waist and gives me a quick hug that smells like Victoria’s Secret lotion. “Kate. I heard all about it. You poor thing.”

  “I’m okay.”

  “Do you want to stay for dinner? I won’t pester you with questions, I promise.”

  This is the first time I’ve seen Mrs. Pangborn with my contacts in. With my glasses on, it was always easy to see what it would be like to cook Christmas dinner with her, to invite her to my college graduation, thank her for my bridal shower, drop off the grandkids, and other assorted nonsense. With the contacts in, I can’t see any of it.

  “We’re having salmon,” she says. “I can make a dill sauce.”

  I blink. “Thanks, but I can’t. There is a lot going on at home. Is Mitch around?”

  She rolls her eyes. “In his room. I don’t know how you finally did it, but thank you. He told us last night.”

  “He told you what?”

  “He’s finally going to be practical about college. He wants to study international economics, then go to business school. Thank God!”

  The red light by her hold button blinks.

  “I’ve got to finish this call, honey. Go on upstairs. You’re welcome to stay if you change your mind. We’re eating in half an hour.” She clicks the hold button again. “Anne? I’m back. Yeah, another settlement nightmare. Do they ever end?”

  The Pangborns have always assumed that because Mitchell is a straight-A student and major Eagle Scout, he doesn’t have hormones. They just can’t imagine their Precious Baby having a lustful moment. Or fast hands. Or a wet tongue.

  I walk up the stairs, head down the hall, and knock on the door with the Harvard banner. He grunts. I enter.

  Mitchell’s room is usually like Toby’s, a breeding ground for bacteria and nasty ideas. Hence my shock. The curtains are tied back, and the windows are shiny clean. I can see his floor. (It’s covered in dark blue carpet—who knew?) His bed is made up with a quilt and pillows on it. The only things on his desk, his dusted desk, are his computer monitor and keyboard. The bookcase is actually filled with books, upright and spines out. Soccer trop
hies shine in parade formation on the top of the bookcase.

  Mitch is wearing a T-shirt and sweats, sitting in the middle of his floor sorting through a mountain of papers. Some are placed in file folders, but it looks like most have been chucked in the black garbage bag next to him. He’s got his earphones on and is bobbing back and forth, humming off-key. I have to move into his line of sight to get his attention.

  He takes off the earphones and stands up. “What’s wrong? You look terrible.”

  I kick off my sneakers, pull back the covers, and get into his bed.

  “Kate? Are you okay?”

  I close my eyes and shake my head. “I’m losing it, Pangborn.”

  “Define ‘losing it.’”

  I pull the sheet up around my neck. “I called MIT and pretended to be my mom.”

  He turns off the CD player. “Why?”

  “I thought they made a mistake, let in the wrong Kate Malone.”

  “And?”

  I look up at him, shielding my eyes with my hand. Black spots dance in the air. He is standing with his back to the windows. The sunlight flares around his edges like a corona. It puts his face in shadow. “I can’t see you.”

  He locks the door and crawls under the covers with me. I lift my head so he can lay one arm under it, and he pulls me close. He smells like boy. I close my eyes again. The spots are still there, red now instead of black.

  “Do you think I’m freaking out?” I whisper. “I think I’m lost. Somebody switched the road signs and I’m stuck with an old map.”

  Mitch places his finger on my lips. “Shh . . . Be quiet.”

  I can feel his pulse under the skin of his neck. Slower, Malone. Stop running. My heart trips over itself again, then settles into a soft, steady rhythm. I could fall asleep here, melt into his chest. He’d keep the world on the other side of that door if I asked him, he’d cradle my head and keep me warm.