Rosebush

  Was I that easy? That spineless?

  The phone rings again. And again.

  If it was Ollie, why didn’t I remember talking to him?

  The phone was still ringing.

  That’s when I realized it wasn’t ringing in my memory but ringing in my room.

  “Loretta,” I yelled. “My phone is ringing.”

  “Go answer it, sweetheart.”

  “Can you hear it?”

  “Sure as apples.”

  My heart pounded. This could be the time I showed everyone I’m not crazy.

  “Hello?”

  “Hi, jelly bean,” Langley said.

  Loretta had come to stand in the doorway. I waved her away.

  “Hey. How are you?”

  “I’m okay, but I don’t think I can make it there today. Popo—”

  “Is he worse?”

  “Well, he’s not any better.”

  “I’m so sorry to hear that.”

  “Thanks. How are you?”

  I stared at the balloon bouquet starting to dip slightly in the corner of my room. “Confused. David was here. He told me about Sloan.”

  Langley exhaled. “Oh.”

  “So when you blocked the door from letting me out of the bathroom—”

  “Yes?”

  “What did you hear me say again?”

  “‘I can’t take it anymore. It’s over. I’m done, it’s done. I just want to end it.’ Things like that.”

  “Are you sure it was about David?” My eyes roamed over the flower arrangements on my windowsill.

  “I thought so. Why?”

  “I—I don’t know. I don’t know anything anymore. Thanks.”

  “You sound low. I’m going to come over there.”

  “No, don’t. Stay with your grandfather.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Positive.”

  “I love you, jelly bean.”

  “Love you too.” I gave the receiver a kiss and hung up.

  The phone started to ring again immediately. I answered it saying, “Seriously, I’m fine.”

  “Are you, Jane?”

  I swallowed. It was the caller. Why hadn’t I shouted for Loretta?

  I moved the phone to the bed and stretched the cord as far as it would go. “Hi. How are you doing?”

  “It’s time.”

  “Time for what?” I asked. I held the phone away from me and leaned toward the door. “Loretta,” I whispered. Finally someone else would hear.

  “Don’t play dumb. You just knelt there. In the middle of the road. You know you wanted it as much as I did. And you know why.”

  My entire body went cold.

  Loretta rushed past me and grabbed the phone. She held it to her ear for a moment, then gently replaced it in the cradle.

  You just knelt there. Only two people would have known that. Me. And the person who ran into me.

  This wasn’t a prank. This was a killer.

  I looked at Loretta. “Why did you hang up? Why didn’t you talk to him?”

  “No one was there.”

  No. It wasn’t possible. “But there had been someone there. He was talking right up until you took the phone out of my hand.” I looked at her. “You have to believe me. He was talking.”

  Wasn’t he?

  I ran my hand over my hair, smashing it, trying to squeeze some reason out. “Somehow he must have known I’d handed the phone over.”

  “How? You said he was talking.”

  “I don’t know. We must have made a noise.” He’d been there. I heard him. I had.

  Hadn’t I? Oh God. I really was going mad.

  You just knelt there. You know you wanted it as much as I did. And you know why. I could only imagine what Dr. Tan would make of that.

  “What did he say this time, sweetheart?”

  “What did who say?” my mother asked, breezing into the room. Joe lumbered after her, carrying a bag from the supermarket, with Officer Rowley, neat as always in her uniform, after him. Annie, today wearing a green dress, green leggings, and green sneakers, none of which were the same color green, brought up the rear.

  My mother looked at me expectantly.

  “My phone-caller,” I told her. “He called again.”

  Instead of looking concerned or exasperated, my mother smiled. A warm, genuine smile. Clearly something had changed. “I don’t think we’ll need to worry about any more of those calls, will we, Officer Rowley?”

  “I hope not,” the policewoman said.

  “Why?”

  “Because the fine police of this city have apprehended the convenience store robbers,” my mother announced. “Thanks in part to Joe’s reward.”

  “Didn’t have anything to do with it,” he muttered, pawing around in his bag of snacks.

  “Don’t be so modest,” my mother told him.

  I said, “Did the robbers confess?”

  My mother shook her head. “No, the Barney Brothers—that’s what they’re called—are refusing to speak. Lawyer’s orders. But they didn’t have to. The skid marks on the road are a good match to their tires, their car has dents on it that could be consistent with hitting a pedestrian, and they had your purse and your phone.”

  “They did? Can I get my phone back?” Any concrete link to that night would be welcome.

  “When we’re done processing it,” Officer Rowley said.

  “But don’t you see,” my mother said, beaming. “This means it’s over. It’s all over.”

  “It’s good news, kid,” Joe said.

  “Tell that to the voices in my head.”

  “What did those voices in your head say this time?” my mother asked, like she was talking to a toddler.

  “They said—” I knew if I told the truth, it would make me sound truly suicidal. “They said it was time. For it to be over.”

  “You see? We all agree. Me, you, and your subconscious.”

  I felt myself getting angry. I wanted to be alone. I looked at Loretta. “Could I take a shower? I think I could manage by myself if you’d just turn the water on for me.”

  “Of course, sweetheart.”

  “Bye, Jane,” Annie said, coming over to give me a sticky kiss on the cheek.

  “Eew,” I said, wiping it off. “What did you just eat?”

  “Jelly doughnut. And now you can have some too.”

  “Thanks but no thanks.”

  She kissed me again, laughed at my disgusted expression, and followed Joe and my mom out of the room.

  I was just rolling into the bathroom in my wheelchair when my mother came back and put her hand on the armrest. “One more thing, Jane.”

  My jaw tightened. I looked at her over my shoulder. “Yes?”

  “Dr. Malik told me he met you today. With his son, Peter.”

  “Yeah. Pete was letting me get some air.”

  “I’d rather you didn’t spend too much time with him,” she said.

  “Don’t worry, Dr. Malik didn’t really look like my type.”

  “With his son, Peter. He dropped out of high school and he has a history of drug use. His father found him with quite a large quantity of something heavy and that’s why he’s here. So he can keep an eye on him.”

  The way my mother said “something heavy,” like she was down with the peeps, yo, made me have to stifle a laugh. “Sure. Whatever you want. Can I go now?”

  “I’d also like you to be a little more gracious with Joe.”

  “Why does everyone care about Joe so much?”

  “He’s a wonderful, kind man,” my mother said.

  “That’s what I hear.”

  She pursed her lips together. “I don’t—” I heard her swallow. “I’m not trying to replace your father, Jane.”

  “Maybe that’s the problem,” I said, and I could feel the tears quivering in my eyes. “Maybe you should be.”

  “Darling—”

  “I need to go.”

  I don’t know how long I sat under the shower, not movi
ng, letting the hot water wash over me. They caught the people who did this to you, I thought. They had your phone. How else would they have gotten your phone unless they were the ones who hit you? Let your doubts, let your fears, let all the gaps in your memory wash away. Let your feelings about Joe wash away. Stop feeling stop missing stop caring stop worrying. None of that matters now. Everything is fine. Everything is safe. Your life as you knew it is intact. Just admit you’re crazy and everything will be okay.

  When I got out, the mirror was steamed up. The palm prints I’d left the day before when I was trying to block out my hair came up, leaving an empty face-sized shape in the middle.

  That was me. A blank space. Who was I? Who was Jane Freeman?

  I cleared a space across the mirror so I could see only my eyes and stared at them, but they held no answers.

  Chapter 27

  That evening Joe took my mother and Annie to Annie’s favorite pizza place for dinner while I enjoyed a selection of beige food in my bed with the TV. It was a dark rainy night and the sound outside my window reminded me of the rain the night of the party.

  Patter patter patter patter.

  The rain is falling softer now, on my arms and legs and face, and it’s colder. Each drop brings pain with it; my whole body aches. There’s something poking me everywhere, piercing my skin.

  Someone says, “Yoo-hoo, Jane.”

  I’m here, I want to cry. Right here. Come find me. Rescue me. Please. I can’t fight anymore. I’m so tired. Please, please help me. But I can’t make my mouth work.

  “Yoo-hoo,” the voice says again. Then it’s right over my face; I can feel breath against my cheek and a hand on my neck. Thank God. Someone will save me. I want to reach for the hand, but I can’t.

  The voice says, “Jane Freeman, you’re a goner.”

  My eyes flipped open. I was in my hospital room alone. There was no one there, no one whispering next to my face.

  Had it been a dream? Or was it a memory? Had someone really stood over me as I lay in the rosebush and said, “Jane Freeman, you’re a goner”?

  Because if someone had, it meant that my getting hit was no random accident perpetrated by the Barney Brothers. It meant that I’d been run down by someone I knew. Someone who knew my name.

  My heart started to pound. If that was true, it meant the killer had to be one of my friends.

  I jumped at the sound of Scott’s voice.

  “You look like someone in the middle of an existential crisis,” he said. “Or they’re not giving you enough fiber.”

  It had to be one of my friends, my mind repeated. One of my friends who had been at the party. Which meant anyone but Scott.

  “I am so glad to see you,” I said. “And it’s probably both.”

  “Which existential crisis are we dealing with? The ‘Why are we here’ one? Or the ‘What should I do with my life’ one?”

  “More basic. The ‘Who am I’ one.”

  “Uh-oh, that’s a bad one. What brought it on right now at”—he squinted at the clock—“seven forty-five on a Sunday?” He slid into the chair next to my bed and leaned forward. His white shirt was rolled up at the sleeves, revealing a tantalizing glimpse of his strong forearms.

  “I got another call from the killer today.”

  “Ah.”

  “Only as much as no one believed me before, now that they have the convenience store robbers—I’m sorry, the Barney Brothers—in custody, they really don’t believe me.”

  “Oh.”

  “And this time the killer said, ‘You just knelt there. You wanted it as much as I did.’”

  His eyes crinkled and he sucked in his cheeks. “Ugh.”

  “Which means that either it’s the real killer—because how else would anyone know that? Or else I made it up and it’s a sign from my subconscious that I wanted to die.”

  Now his eyes got wide. “Uh-oh.”

  “Exactly. So I’m left with two bad options. But it doesn’t really matter because my mother would rather think I’m crazy than entertain the idea that this wasn’t the Barney Brothers.”

  He leaned back. “That’s a really bad name. I mean, it wouldn’t even make a good band name.”

  I laughed. “You’re right. At least they didn’t succeed. I wouldn’t want to have that in my obituary.”

  “I like your attitude. And I’ve got a diagnosis for your existential crisis. You’re a victim of shutter-click syndrome.”

  “What’s that?”

  “You know how on digital cameras the shutter still makes a sound when it clicks? Even though that sound was originally the mechanical noise the lens made opening and closing and on digital cameras it’s just programmed in?”

  “Yeah.”

  “It’s because people like to have markers. They like to maintain their expectations, not question things. It sounds like that’s what your mother’s doing. For some reason, it’s really important for her that this is an accident perpetrated by strangers. Even if they have an unfortunate name.”

  “Why?”

  “Why don’t you ask her?”

  “That’s a novel approach.” I thought about it. “I wish I just had one thing, one solid fact that contradicted the stranger-accident theory.”

  “To bolster your case or simply to annoy your mother?” I shot him a mean look. He shrugged. “Just asking. What about the car that hit you? There had to be damage, right?”

  “There’s damage on the convenience store getaway car that ‘could be consistent’ with what they found.”

  “But they stopped looking at other cars.” He thought for a moment. I was struck for the millionth time by how handsome he was—especially when thinking deeply, a favorite pastime of his. “Listen, do you really think it was someone at the party?” he said now.

  “I remember someone saying, ‘You’re a goner, Jane Freeman,’ when I was in the rosebush. So if we assume that was true, it would have to be someone who knew me, and the only people on the Jersey shore who knew me were at the party. Why?”

  “I did a story for the school paper about auto-repair places—a lot of our ‘graduates’ end up working in that field. I could ask around at some of the places and see if any Livingston High kids have brought in cars for work this weekend. It might be a stretch, but—”

  Here was someone who believed in me. Someone who would stand by me. Or, at this moment, sit by me.

  In the chair next to my bed, his head was at the same level as mine. I pulled his mouth toward me and kissed him.

  “Was that just to say thank you?” His confidence seemed to have evaporated and suddenly he was shy. Even timid.

  “I don’t know. Do you want it to be just thank you?” Somewhere in my mind a warning bell went off. But how did I know that wasn’t the same part of my mind that was going crazy?

  He gazed at me. “You’d have to be a fool not to know how I feel about you, Jane. How I—how much I like you.”

  “Tell me.” At that moment, I needed all the reassurance I could get.

  “Let’s just say I think you’re neat.”

  “That’s it?”

  “I’m holding my A material. I want you to be sure.”

  “Sure of what?”

  “Sure that you want to be with me because it’s your thing, not because it will make me happy.”

  “I’m not like that.”

  “Jane Freeman, you are the biggest people pleaser I know. You’d order popcorn at the movies even though you like peanut M&M’s better if you think the person you’re with would rather have popcorn and might want to share yours.”

  I stared at him. “Are you a mind reader? Peanut M&M’s are my favorite.”

  “I know a few thousand things about you,” he said teasingly.

  “Then you’ll know that this will make me happy.” I kissed him again.

  He kissed me back. Then he really kissed me back. His lips were warm. He smelled like sandalwood and baby powder. He kissed me long and soft and expertly with his hands crad
ling my head in a way that made my toes wriggle.

  I pulled away, panting. “My toes wriggled! You made my toes wriggle.”

  It took a moment for his eyes to focus, but then he grinned. “Really? Or do you say that to all the guys?”

  “No, really. Look.” We both watched as first the toes of my left foot and then the toes of my right foot wriggled. “Kiss me again, let’s see if I can’t get all the way up to my knees back.”

  “Are you just using me for my medicinal lips?”

  “Yes.” I nodded, trying to keep my face serious.

  “As long as we’re straight on that,” he said. This time his kiss was slower, deeper, and more detailed. It was clear that Scott had a lot of practice kissing and, like everything he undertook, he did it masterfully and with control.

  “Anything in the calves?” he asked, forehead leaned against mine.

  “Not yet. We’ll have to keep trying.” I ran my hands down his chest, enjoying the feel of his muscles under my fingertips.

  He looked at me like I was something precious, valuable. “Do you know how long I’ve wanted to do that?”

  The question made something in my chest a little tight so I just smiled at him.

  “I wish we could have a little more privacy,” he said.

  “Me too.” There was the warning bell again. Quiet, you! God, his abs were nice. “I would love to see you without your shirt on.”

  He swallowed hard. “Um, let me see what I can do for tomorrow.”

  “What do you mean? I know you’re magic, you made my toes wriggle, but how could we have more privacy?”

  “I have my ways.”

  Looking into his eyes was like the opposite of the eyes in my memory. No hate, no mockery. They were all openness and adoration. I might not know who I was, but I knew how I wanted to be seen.

  We were about to embark on another round of physical therapy when the sound of Annie’s voice reciting “Peter Piper Put a Peck of Pickled Peppers on His Pocket” echoed from the hallway. Evidently Pete had been teaching her a new version of the tongue twister.

  Scott leaped up and was an appropriate and innocent distance away by the time Annie led my mother and Joe into the room.

  “Oh hello, Scott,” my mother said, and patted her hair. Like all women, she got a bit preeny in his presence.

  “Hi, Mrs. Freeman. Annie. Hello, sir.” He shook Joe’s hand. “I was just, um, checking on Jane.”