The Last to Let Go

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  For anyone who has ever been caught between wanting to hold on and needing to let go

  SUMMER

  SHADOWS

  IT’S THE END OF JUNE. A Friday. Like any other day, except hotter. I take my usual shortcut home from school through the alley, where the air is dense and unbreathable, saturated with the raw smell of overheated dumpster garbage. I can taste it in the back of my throat like an illness coming on.

  But this is the last time I’ll ever need to take this route, I remind myself. Almost instantly that invisible yet ever-present straitjacket begins to loosen its grip just enough for me to breathe a little easier. I’ve been counting down the days for years. Not that school itself was ever the problem. It’s all the people in the school who are the problem. Or maybe, as I sometimes think, the problem might have been me all along. Occam’s razor, and everything. Isn’t it simpler that the problem should be one person versus hundreds, rather than the other way around? Logically, maybe. But then, if I’m really going to think about it—which, I’ve decided, I’m not—me being the problem is the opposite of simple.

  As I step out of the shaded alley and onto the sidewalk, the sun blasts down in a cascade of heat and light. I stop and roll my jeans up to my knees, while my shadow pools at my feet like a small gray puddle. When my brother, Aaron, and I were little, we always kept a vigilant watch over our shadows, convinced that one day they’d splinter off like in Peter Pan and run amok, committing all sorts of treacherous deeds without our consent.

  But that was a lifetime ago. I doubt he even remembers.

  As I stand up, my forehead is instantly beaded with sweat, the back of my shirt dampened under the weight of my backpack. Usually I can’t stand the heat, but today it doesn’t bother me. Nothing can right now. Because I just aced my AP Bio final. I’m officially done with Riverside High. And I’ll be starting my junior year, the most important year, at Jefferson—the special charter school that’s had me wait-listed since eighth grade—with all new people. Where no one knows me. Where I can focus, get ahead, and start my life already. I’ve wanted to go there ever since I found out about all the AP classes they offer.

  I’ve thought about it for roughly a million hours. I worked out a plan and now it’s finally happening: I’ll graduate from Jefferson, get in to an amazing college somewhere far away, and then get out of this hellhole for good. I feel a hitch in my step. I involuntarily skip ahead on my toes. This feels like a moment I should be celebrating with my friends, if I had any. Because I’m free, almost.

  A siren chirps once.

  Twice.

  I look up just as the red and blue lights begin spinning, in time to watch the patrol car go from parked to sixty in a matter of seconds, the noise shifting the heavy air around me. The heat radiates from the pavement through the rubber soles of my flip-flops as I skip over the crumbling blacktop, sidestepping the potholes I’ve practically memorized over the years. The sirens fade into the distance, but within seconds that patrol car is followed by five more, then a fire truck, then an ambulance, leaving the air too still in their wake.

  I follow the procession of emergency vehicles, systematically reviewing my answers on DNA and RNA and the endocrine system, and cell division: prophase, metaphase, anaphase. For six blocks of brick and cement and glass-window storefronts, the sun beats down on my hair and face, my shadow following along behind me the whole way. I only wish I could’ve known that these were the last relatively carefree moments of my life, because as my heel turns ninety degrees on that last corner to our apartment, nothing will ever be the same again.

  The six police cars and the fire truck and the ambulance are all jammed into the narrow alley next to our building. Although there are seven other apartments in our building, I can feel it in my bones and skin and blood, this is not about any of the other people behind any of those seven other doors.

  This is about us.

  I try to run but it feels like I’m moving through water, my feet sinking into wet sand, my legs getting tangled up in strands of seaweed wanting to pull me under. I don’t care that I’ve lost my flip-flops, or that the sunbaked asphalt is boiling the soles of my feet, or that somehow my backpack has shuffled off me and is now lying in the middle of the road like a dead animal, with all those precious study materials inside. I race through the door and up the stairs, calling her name over and over again.

  Mom.

  I make it up only to the first landing before I’m caught by the waist, a voice shouting in my ear to “calm down, calm down.” I try to fight him, but it’s no use. “Brooke,” he says firmly, calling me by my name. “Hold still, all right—wait!” I know exactly who it is without even having to look. Tony. He told me I could call him that when I was in fourth grade and one of our neighbors had called the cops on us. It was the time Dad broke Mom’s collarbone and Mom convinced the police she had fallen down the stairs. That was one of the few times I’d ever seen him cry about what he’d done; he melted into a puddle, and swore—swore to all of us, swore to a god I’m not sure he even believed in—never again. I didn’t know which version of him scared me more, the crazy one or the sorry one.

  We’ve been through this enough times to know that the cops don’t pull out all the stops like this for a simple noise complaint from a neighbor, especially when that neighbor is a cop himself. Which can mean only one thing: It’s finally happened. Aaron always said it was only a matter of time.

  Tony opens his mouth, the words to explain escaping him. Mrs. Allister, in 2B, inches her door open, the chain-link lock pulled taut in front of her face. She stares out at me with her wide, red-rimmed eyes, her chin quivering, her mouth turning downward as she whimpers my name. “I didn’t know what to do,” she pleads in her own defense. “I didn’t know what else to do.” Mrs. Allister was always the one to call the cops, until the one time when I was in seventh grade and I barged into her apartment, yelling about how even though she thought she was helping, she was only making things worse. Calling the police never did any good, I tried to make her understand, because he was one of them. Mrs. Allister cried then, too. As far I know, she never called again. Until now.

  “Ma’am, back inside right now!” Tony demands. And Mrs. Allister retreats like a turtle back into its shell. The door clicks shut, the dead bolt sliding into place.

  Then suddenly a whole swarm of cops in bulletproof vests barrel down the stairs toward us, shouting, “Outta the way, move, outta the way, get her outta here.” I think they mean me at first, but before I even know what’s happening next, Tony has my back pinned against Mrs. Allister’s door, shielding me as they pass by us like a hurricane of bodies.

  That’s when I see her, my little sister, like a ghost encircled by these gray uniforms, each one with a hand on her. Her hair swings forward over her shoulders as the cops jerk her body down the stairs. She’s still wearing her baby-blue T-shirt and her favorite cutoff jean shorts, which she isn’t allowed to wear to school, just like she was when I left this morning. I remember because she kicked her feet up and sprawled out on the couch, grinning in that stupid, goofy way of hers, taunting me because she was already finished with her exams. “Summer starts now, sucker!” she said as she flipped on the TV. But now her eyes stare ahead, wide and empty, unfocuse
d.

  “Callie?” I call after her. “Callie!” I shout her name as loud as my voice will let me. She doesn’t even look back. I struggle to get out from under Tony’s arms, but he holds me in place.

  “What did he do?” I want to scream it, but the words drown in my throat. I search Tony’s eyes for an explanation, but I can’t force myself to ask the real question: Is she dead? But I need the answer. I need it now. Because even though I know she has to be dead, there’s this hope still chiseling away at my heart. His arms envelop me, and for maybe the billionth time in my life I wish that he were my father, that he were taking me out of here. For good. Away from all of this. I feel myself slinking down against the wall and melting into the floor, my legs twisting under me, suddenly unable to support the weight of my body.

  Tony crouches down next to me, instructing, calmly somehow, “Breathe, Brooke. Breathe.” Over his head a figure has emerged. I blink hard. There, on the landing at the top of the stairs—alive. She’s alive, and life can continue, and we’ll be fine, we’ll be fine because she’s there and alive, and that’s all that matters. “Mom,” I whisper, scrambling to my feet. “Mom!” I yell.

  She lifts her head as I call out to her. Her face is tear-and-mascara streaked. I break away from Tony, my flimsy arms and legs struggling to crawl up each step. I reach out to her, but she doesn’t reach back. I watch as she unfolds in bits and pieces, like my brain is suddenly working in slow motion to understand, unable to take it in all at once.

  There’s a legion of cops surrounding her, holding her arms behind her back as they walk down the stairs in rigid, jerky movements. Her eyes hold mine as she comes closer, mouthing the words, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” as if she no longer has a voice. And I’m shoved out of the way like I’m not even there. As she passes, I see her arms twisted behind her back, the shiny silver handcuffs locked around her wrists. Her hands look like she dipped them in red food coloring and didn’t wash it off before it stained, the way our fingertips used to look after coloring Easter eggs when we were little.

  I think my heart actually stops beating. I swear, I die. A temporary little death. Because that’s when the whole picture shifts into focus, the puzzle pieces fitting together, yet the picture they form making no sense at all.

  “No,” I breathe, trying to shout the word. But no one’s listening. No one understands.

  UNDERWATER

  UNDERWATER THE WORLD IS SOFT. Life is gentle, easy. The smell of chlorine, the burn of sunscreen in my eyes, muffled splashing, and rippled lines of refracted light—that’s what summer is supposed to be.

  We were planning on going to the community pool after I got home—I had promised her. Even though it’s not particularly nice or updated in any way, it’s still our favorite place, mine and Callie’s. Last year we went nearly every single day. The three-block trek was torture, especially in the afternoon with the sun at its peak, but as Callie always insisted, it only made her first cannonball into the cool blue water all the more worth it.

  There was a day last summer when something changed between us and it felt like we were friends, rather than a big sister babysitting her little sister. On the walk there she was talking nonstop, as usual. And I was humoring her weird, random questions, which would often begin with “If there was a zombie apocalypse . . .” And, like every day, even though I warned her not to, the second we walked through the gates, handing our passes over to the attendant, she’d run ahead of me alongside the pool, causing the lifeguard to blow on his whistle and shout, “No running!” But it only made her run faster, screaming at the top of her lungs as she leaped into the air. Her goal was to make waves, always.

  Before I could set our things down and lay our towels out, Callie was splashing me. “Stop it, Callie!” I scolded, though I didn’t care about the splashing so much as the attention she was drawing.

  “Dive in,” she said. “Please?”

  I ignored her as I set our bag down and tried to maneuver out of my shorts and baggy T-shirt.

  “Do it!”

  “You do it,” I countered.

  “You know I don’t know how. Show me again,” she demanded in that annoyingly adamant eleven-year-old way of hers. “Last time, I promise.” That’s what she said every time.

  I looked around; there were hardly any other people there, and no one was watching. I hated when people stared at me any time, but while wearing a bathing suit, I might as well have been naked. “Fine,” I relented. “This is the last time.”

  I tiptoed my way over to the deep end, set my toes along the edge of the pool, testing my feet and knees and ankles with a couple of practice bounces. Then, springing off the balls of my feet, I threw my arms over my head and transferred my weight forward, airborne for a split second. My body cut through the cold water, gliding in a smooth, straight line, making me feel so light and sleek and nimble I could almost forget about the rest of my life waiting for me on dry land.

  When I came back up to the surface, Callie was holding both of her hands up high out of the water, all five fingers on each hand spread wide. “Ten!” she shouted, then, “Race you to the shallow end.”

  Before I could even respond, she was gone. She always pretended to be a mermaid, swimming right along the bottom, waving her body while keeping her legs and feet suctioned together like a tail. She made it all the way across the whole pool like that and was waiting for me on the other side. When I reached her, she said, “Go under, I gotta tell you something.”

  I rolled my eyes but did it anyway. Underwater her voice was high pitched and garbled, bubbles flowing out of her mouth, up to the surface. We came back up, and I said, “Birthday card inside out?”

  She wailed, “No!” and we went under again.

  “Same thing,” I told her. “Birthday card. Inside out.”

  “You’re terrible at this!” She splashed me again. “Lifeguard. Checking. You. Out.”

  “No he isn’t!” I said, without even bothering to see whether it was true or not. I didn’t want to know either way. How many times had I told her that I didn’t care, wasn’t interested in looks, didn’t want guys being interested in me, and how many times would she try to convince me otherwise, tease me, try to make me feel uncomfortable?

  “He so is!” she giggled, her eyes already turning red from the pool chemicals.

  “No,” I said. “He’s not.”

  I dunked my head underwater then and kicked my feet against the side of the pool, darting away from her, away from her games and her words, away from the way they made me feel. Or not feel. I wasn’t interested in some random lifeguard, or any other guy for that matter, and that was not something I was ready to think about in too much depth. I swam until I lost count of the laps. Until my arms and legs refused to go any farther. Until I could almost forget who I was. Then I turned over onto my back and opened my eyes; I gazed up at the clouds floating in the blue sky just as I was floating on the blue water. My thoughts had finally slowed to a crawl. This was around the time I’d expect Callie to stealth-mermaid her way beneath me, grab my leg, and pull me under—I’d flail and spring back up to the surface with a gallon of water up my nose—but that’s not what happened that day.

  She was already out of the pool, lying down on her towel, my too-big sunglasses shielding her eyes. I climbed up the ladder, my body heavy out of the water. My wet footsteps slapped against the concrete as I made my way over to our spot. I spread my towel out and lowered myself down onto my stomach next to Callie, resting my head on top of my folded arms. She lifted my wet hair and flopped it over my shoulder. A cool breeze flowed over my bare back as her finger pressed against my skin, drawing a hook shape, like the beginning of a question mark, on one side, then its mirror image on the other: a heart.

  We used to do this all the time when we shared a room. She’d often wind up in my bed, scared, with our mom crying and our dad yelling on the other side of the door. I’d write out silly invisible messages on her back until she fell asleep.

&nb
sp; I smiled and whispered, “Sorry I got mad.”

  Then she drew a circle followed by three sharp lines: OK. Then two dots and a curved line: smiley face.

  She lay back down next to me, and although we didn’t say anything to each other, it felt right. Like we didn’t need to say anything, like maybe she finally got something about me that I wasn’t even quite sure of myself yet. I closed my eyes and let my body soften against the hot, hard cement, that good ache in my lungs, the gentle strain of muscles after swimming as strong and hard and long as I could, the slow fog settling over my thoughts again.

  THE REAL WORLD

  TIME SKIPS FORWARD SOMEHOW, and when I snap out of it, I can’t tell if it’s been seconds or hours or years. I push through the front door, and the sun blinds me in one giant flash. I can feel tears burning behind my eyes. Then time drops back again, drawing everything sharply into focus: all these flashing lights, the pop and buzz and static of two-way radios wafting out from open police car doors, emitting a sequence of cryptic numbers and letters, and people running all over the place, the heat a physical presence that stands like a million invisible walls between me and the real world.

  My head pounds like there’s a small hammer tapping against the inside of my skull. The water from my eyes shakes loose, drawing a kaleidoscope of prisms across all that I see. Then the minutes jump ahead again and I’m suddenly standing next to Callie, who’s sitting on the back of the ambulance, her legs dangling off the edge lifelessly. Two paramedics are patting her down, touching her everywhere; they shield her eyes from the sun with their hands and then shine a small flashlight into each eye. It takes a second longer than usual for my brain to realize that there’s something not quite right about her. She’s not moving, not making a sound, not actually looking at anything.