Something Like Gravity Read online

  My left foot was all pins and needles. I shifted my leg, and the branch beneath me winced and swayed gently, shedding a few stray scales of bark. They fell to the ground soundlessly, unnoticed. But I’d lost my balance. I had to think fast. I reached for the branch above me to steady myself, but it cracked, then snapped.

  My hands grabbed for anything to hold on to, getting scraped as the branches slid right through them, leaves slicing my palms, like paper cuts. I caught myself before falling all the way down, but in the commotion I’d been spotted.

  “Hey, who’s up there?” someone yelled.

  I could see the shadows of several people on the ground, coming closer, heard someone else saying, “What the hell?”

  One of them shined a flashlight on me. “I see you,” he said, and there was no mistaking that voice, no getting out of this now. Clumsily, I used my arms and legs to maneuver from branch to branch—the rough, jagged tree bark opening up my knees and elbows along the way.

  When I jumped down, I stumbled, unsteady on my feet, and was face-to-face with Neil. He turned the light off and just stared at me, silently. But somehow I still heard those words echoing through my head as if he was saying them again, right now: It’s what Mallory would’ve wanted, what Mallory would’ve wanted, Mallory would’ve wanted.

  As more and more people crowded around us, I was transported back to that moment again, standing up in the middle of Neil’s cousin’s living room, shouting over the music, gesturing wildly with my drink. It had all been too absurd, all the pretending, all the tears and solemn words, the sham of mourning. If anyone had had a right to be sad, it was me. If anyone was going to proclaim what it was Mallory would’ve wanted in the case of her dropping dead in the middle of gym class at the age of seventeen, shouldn’t I have been the one telling them, and not the other way around? People were gathering—their faces were serious, I remember that—and I thought, Wow, maybe people really want to hear what I have to say.

  And with my first-ever audience, I had told Neil exactly how stupid and pathetic he was for loving Mallory. “Because everyone knows she was only ever using you, Neil,” I had said, looking around at all the faces with their eyes glued to me. “She was just stringing you along. Don’t you know, even if she’d lived a hundred years, she’d never have loved you back?”

  I don’t know what I thought would happen. In my mind I was expecting people to cheer me on, realize how wise I was, commend me for telling such hard truths.

  “Mallory wasn’t some angel,” I continued. “She was the most utterly self-centered, self-involved person on the planet. She cared more about her precious art than people!” I shouted, laughing, crying, spilling my drink.

  Not that I actually remember much of what I said, but I was able to watch it later when someone posted a video of it online. It was titled “DRUNK GIRL LOOOSES HER SHIIIIT AT PARTY.”

  I thought I had been so eloquent, but I was just screaming, barely intelligible. I stuttered and slurred through the words. And in the final seconds of the video it showed me taking a few steps toward Neil. I said something as I stumbled into him.

  You can’t hear what it was because I was talking too low, but I remember that part. I said: “There are no more photos—I burned them. They’re all gone, okay?”

  I still don’t know why I lied. In the video, Neil’s face went blank and pale—he looked like I had just told him Mallory died all over again. But then his face changed quickly, turning red and hard and clenched in places you wouldn’t think a face could clench. A part of me wanted to immediately backpedal, to tell him it was just a bad, mean, drunken joke. But I knew right away, there was no taking it back. The video ended then, and I don’t know what happened next. I don’t remember how I got home, how I ended up in my bed that night.

  That look on Neil’s face, the hard, angry, clenched one from the video, that was exactly the way he was looking at me right now.

  “What the fuck is that?” he said, not looking at my face but at the camera around my neck. “Give it to me,” he demanded, reaching toward me with both hands.

  I backed away from him, and I tried to sound strong when I said “No!” but my voice was shaking.

  “Give it to me before you destroy that too!”

  People were already surrounding us, just like they had that night all those months ago. Except this time, Neil was the one who was wasted—likely a combination of weed and alcohol and grief. This time he was the one who stepped in close to me and said, so low that no one else could hear:

  “Mallory hated you. Did you know that?”

  It was like a snakebite—I was too stunned by the initial strike to feel the poison in those words at first. Maybe he could see that it didn’t quite hurt enough, so he added, “She fucking hated you.” Yes, there was the sting. I could feel the burn of the venom working through my veins. And while I stood there, incapacitated, my back up against the tree, Neil grabbed on to the strap of the camera, nearly choking me as he wrestled it from around my neck.

  CHRIS

  I DIDN’T KNOW WHAT HAPPENED at first. I heard some shouting coming from outside the circle of firelight. Then I thought I heard another voice, a girl’s voice, not quite yelling, but on edge somehow. That’s when I saw Maia standing in the shadows, surrounded by a group of people, including helmet head Neil. She was standing too still, like she was rooted to the ground. Her eyes were looking at Neil, but in this far-off way, like she wasn’t really seeing.

  I was on my feet before I knew what I was doing.

  As I approached Maia and Neil, I got the sensation that I wasn’t so much walking of my own volition as I was being pulled into their orbit. I fell into formation with the others, as more and more people took notice. It didn’t take long for me to catch up on what had transpired: Maia had been hiding in the tree, spying and taking pictures. Some of the boys were laughing at her; some of the girls were calling her names. Neil was leaning into her, way too close, saying something, threatening her, maybe—I couldn’t make it out.

  My heart was starting to beat faster, the way it did before a race, my body preparing for something. He was grabbing at her, pulling at the camera around her neck, jerking her back and forth, until he got the strap loose from her hands and pulled it over her head, sending her hair whipping across her face.

  This is bad, that old voice whispered in my ear. Run.

  Neil was holding her camera like he was daring her to try to come get it. When Maia lunged, Neil grabbed her wrist to keep her away.

  Run, I wanted to shout at her.

  But before I knew it, I had snatched the camera out of Neil’s hand.

  Somehow, I had stepped between the two of them. Everyone stopped their chattering. All eyes were on us, the whole world telescoping in, then expanding back quickly.

  “Give that to me,” Neil said, breathless.

  “Just take it easy, all right?” I said, attempting but failing to employ my dad’s even keel voice of reason.

  “Take it easy—are you kidding me?” he repeated under his breath, laughing in that scary way people do when they’re about to lose it. “Who are you, even?” he shouted. “You don’t know anything about what’s going on here, so why don’t you do yourself a favor and stay out of it!”

  “Well, I know it’s not cool to beat up on someone who’s half your size,” I said, trying way too hard to keep calm. I glanced behind me to look at Maia, who still had her eyes locked on Neil.

  “I wasn’t beating up on her—did anyone see me beating up on her?” Neil spun around to face the crowd and stumbled for a second, losing his balance. “But if you want me to be the bad guy, that’s fine,” he continued, turning toward me again. “You’re half my size too, or didn’t you notice that, tough guy?” he yelled, getting in my face, backing me up so that I was tripping over Maia’s feet.

  Then, right before I thought he’d actually hit me, someone put a hand on Neil’s shoulder.

  “Come on, just let it go,” the guy said. “This is s
upposed to be a party, right?” Then to me, “That’d be your cue to leave.”

  “Yeah, okay,” I said, but I was having trouble moving.

  “Just get her the fuck away from me, man. I’m serious,” Neil shouted, pointing at Maia over my shoulder. “Before I fucking kill her!”

  “Like, now,” the other guy told me.

  “Okay, okay,” I said. “We’re leaving. All right? Everyone relax.” I started walking, but Maia was standing still.

  “Maia, let’s go.” I was grabbing her arm, and I knew that was also not cool, but I didn’t know what else to do. “Come on!” I said, and finally her feet began to follow. I ushered us out of the woods, past the burned-out house and onto the dirt path, ignoring the taunts now being thrown at both of us.

  When we made it out to the gravel driveway, we stood there for a second, neither of us saying anything.

  There was music and shouting and laughter again. When I turned to look at Maia, she was staring behind us into the woods, as if she wasn’t sure how we’d gotten out here.

  “Are you okay?” I finally asked.

  She whipped around to face me, her eyes stabbing into me like daggers. Instead of answering, she held her hands out, wiggling her fingers, reaching for the camera. “Do you mind?” she snapped. I handed it to her, and she started turning it over and over, examining it like she could see invisible fingerprints Neil had left behind. She was breathing heavily as she pulled the camera strap over her head and across her chest. Then she started walking down the road.

  “Hey, where are you going?” I asked, but again she didn’t answer. She ducked back into the woods for a second, before popping back out, now wheeling her bike alongside her.

  “Look, it’s really dark out. Why don’t I just drive you? We’re going to the same place, anyway.”

  She turned away from me, swung her leg over her bike, and kicked her foot off the ground, ignoring me like she had that first day I met her. She was leaving. I stood there in the middle of the road, between the cars lined up on both sides, like I was trapped in some kind of dream where nothing was making any sense.

  “You’re welcome!” I called after her.

  She stopped abruptly. Got off her bike. Let it collapse right to the ground, and then marched up to me, until we were only inches apart from each other.

  “Oh, thank you!” she said, clasping her hands together. “Thank you for inserting yourself into something that was none of your business in the first place. Thank you, hero—there, is that good enough for you?” She bowed forward and bent her knees into something that looked like it was supposed to be a curtsy.

  “Okay, so I’m supposed to apologize for helping you?”

  “Who asked for your help?” she snapped, looking around with wild eyes.

  “You looked scared. I was just—”

  “I was not scared!” she interrupted. She started walking away, but then twisted back around immediately to face me again. “And if I somehow gave you the impression that I needed rescuing—sorry to disappoint you, but I don’t.”

  Something knotted in my stomach. I could feel the blood rushing out to my extremities, a tingling in my fingertips. I saw right through her. I’ve been her. It’s not that she didn’t know that whole situation could’ve turned very bad, very quickly. She’s a girl. She knows about all of those fucked-up, unfair rules.

  “Look, I get it,” I said, watching as she picked her bike off the ground. “But you don’t have to take it out on me.”

  “Oh, please. You don’t get anything.” She looked up at me and smiled, except I realized she was not actually smiling and she was not really looking at me; she was looking through me. “Another thing. We’re not friends, if that’s what you’re thinking, so from now on how about you just leave me alone.” Then she swung her leg over her bike and started pedaling down the road before I could even respond.

  “Whatever,” I mumbled. Except my body felt anything but whatever. It felt like taking off after her and telling her exactly what I know, exactly where I’ve been, exactly who I am. I wanted to tell her that she might think she’s being strong and tough, but she has to be careful and she should try to blend in more, not make herself such a target.

  I started running. Someone needed to tell her these things. But she shrank into the distance. I had to bend over to catch my breath, an old pain pinching in my rib cage as I coughed. Next, a stinging in my left ankle. Then my spine.

  MAIA

  I WANTED TO GO FASTER, but my arms and legs had turned to gelatin, like my bones had softened inside me and were now useless. The tree and fire, the camera and Neil, me yelling at Chris—those words still echoing through the air, still pounding through my body—had washed out all my thoughts and used up everything I had in me.

  It was almost eleven by the time I got home. Everyone was in bed, the house dark, as usual. I was hungry and tired. All I wanted was to keep my mind exactly as it was: not thinking, not feeling. I wanted to take my leftover mac and cheese up to my room and eat it in bed, and then fall asleep without even brushing my teeth.

  I trudged up the stairs, each step a chore. As I walked by Mallory’s room, Roxie lifted her head, like she did every night. I brought my microwaved container, along with a fork and a glass of water, and set it down on Mallory’s nightstand, then silently closed the door behind me.

  I didn’t turn on the light as I sat down on her bed. The moon shone through the window, offering just enough light to see. Roxie sniffed at the air and watched closely as I speared the individual noodles with the tines of my fork and proceeded to eat them four parallel noodles at a time. As the food settled into my stomach, the blankness in my mind began populating with thoughts again. I looked down at the palms of my hands, scraped and stinging.

  Mallory hated me—she fucking hated me.

  I had the urge to call Hayden. I wanted to tell her everything, but I wasn’t sure where to start. I didn’t know how to explain the handful of tiny things that had happened in the few days she’d been gone. I didn’t know how to explain the way those things had changed everything. She was probably busy having fun, and besides, she wasn’t going to be able to tell me what I wanted to hear. I wanted her to tell me I’d done nothing wrong, that everything was okay and things would go back to normal soon, that I was a good person, that my sister didn’t really hate me.

  I leaned back onto Mallory’s bed, let myself sink into her pillows. Roxie rested her chin on my foot, and sighed.

  So, I had yelled at Chris.

  I’d yelled at him for being the kind of guy who thinks he’s the answer to some girl’s problems, a girl he doesn’t know the first thing about. I knew I’d been harsh with him, but what was more important was this insipid, nagging thought in the back of my mind. If Mallory truly hated me, nothing I could do now would ever be able to change that.

  CHRIS

  I SLAMMED THE DOOR BEHIND me. I didn’t mean to.

  “Chris?” Isobel called from the living room. I tossed my keys onto the kitchen table, just as she came into the room. “You’re home early.”

  “Yeah,” was all I could say, my voice tight and strained. I’d driven around for at least an hour, trying to calm myself down, but I still had all of this adrenaline racing through my body and my brain. I felt like I’d have to run a damn marathon to get it all out of me.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “Did someone do something to you?”

  “No, god!” I was pacing, but the kitchen was too small for pacing so it felt more like I was trapped in a cage, so I tried to stand still. “I just—I don’t know why I even bothered. People are assholes everywhere.”

  I started pacing again, but no, that was worse. “Forget it. I’m just—I’m going upstairs.”

  “Wait, wait, wait,” she said, and she was holding her arms out toward me. “Come on, talk to me.”

  I backed away from her and held my hands up so she wouldn’t try to touch me. I could no
t handle being touched right now, and I hated myself for that.

  “I really, really just want to be alone, Aunt Isobel. Okay? Please.”

  “Okay,” she relented. “But I’m here. All right?”

  I nodded and started walking away.

  “I love you, kid,” she said to my back. I couldn’t bring myself to respond.

  I made it up to my bedroom, and even though I wanted to slam that door too, I didn’t. I toed my sneakers off and kicked them across the room. I threw my jacket on the floor. Didn’t even bother unbuttoning my shirt, just tore it over my head, balled it up, and chucked it into the corner—my undershirt is always the last article of clothing to go. I was taking off my jeans when my phone vibrated in my pocket—it was Coleton.

  How’s the party going?

  I regretted telling him about the party, regretted getting excited about it in the first place. I regretted all the extra time I took getting ready, all that stupid optimism. I regretted how proud I was for a minute when I thought about how I no longer had to double and triple up on sports bras and spandex tops because Dad had willingly—no, happily—let me use his credit card to buy real binders. I regretted how confident I felt as I looked in the mirror and smoothed my hands over my chest. But the thing I really fucking regretted was thinking that maybe I’d actually made a couple of friends here, or that life really could be different, that I could just feel normal for once, whatever the hell “normal” even meant.

  I looked at the screen for a moment, considering a response, but set my phone facedown on the nightstand. Later, I told myself, I’ll talk to him later.

  I tried to go outside to the deck, but the clouds were thick, the moon bright and hazy, drowning out the stars. I went back inside and turned off all the lights before I finished undressing. I had to fumble through the dark for my pajamas. I couldn’t risk catching a glimpse of my body in the mirror—not tonight, not when I was already hating everyone and everything, not when Coleton was clueless and the stars were hiding and Aunt Isobel was not the one person I really wished I could talk to, though sometimes, at the right angles, she looks a lot like her.