I Was Here(26)
Author: Gayle Forman

I don’t mean anything by it, but he leans back in the booth, and I can tell he’s pissed.

“Cowgirl Cody rides alone, huh?” he says with that growl.

“Didn’t used to,” I say. I push away my plate. My appetite has vanished again. “That’s why I’m doing this.”

He’s silent for a moment. “I’m sorry. I know.”

I press my fingers against my eyes until everything goes black. “So, look. Meg talked about confiding in someone who told her to go to her campus health center and get antidepressants. I thought maybe she was talking about you.”

He snorts. “Yeah, right.”

“What do you mean, ‘Yeah, right’? She sent you all those emails.”

“There was nothing about antidepressants in them.” He pops open another can of beer. “You read them. They were like stream of consciousness. She wasn’t writing to me so much as at me.”

“Yeah, I guess. . . .”

“And I told her to piss off, Cody. Remember?” He fiddles with his pack of cigarettes. “It wasn’t me. It was probably one of her housemates.”

“It wasn’t Alice or Richard, and according to them, not any of the people from Cascades. Though maybe it was, I don’t know who she knew. But Richard thought it was more likely one of her friends in Seattle.”

Ben shrugs. “Could be. Not me, though. But why does any of this matter now?”

Because if she confided in someone about the meds, maybe she also confided about All_BS and the boards. But I don’t tell Ben about Final Solution. I’m worried he’ll get angry again, even though he doesn’t have any right to.

“I need answers,” I say, keeping it vague.

“Can’t you just ask at the health center?”

I shake my head. “Can’t. There’s a patient-confidentiality thing.”

“Yeah, but the patient’s dead.” Ben stops, as if this is news to me.

“They still won’t tell. I tried.”

“Maybe her parents could try.”

I shake my head.

“Why not?”

“Because they don’t know about this.”

“You haven’t told them?”

No. I haven’t told them about any of this. The secret feels larger than before, almost tumorous. There is no way I can tell the Garcias now. It would devastate them. But I keep thinking that maybe if I find out more about All_BS, enough to do something to actually help, then I can tell them. Then I can face them. I haven’t been around their house in a few weeks. Sue keeps leaving me voice mails, asking me for dinner, but the thought of being in a room with them . . .

“I just can’t,” I say, laying my head on the table.

Ben reaches out to touch my hand, a gesture that is both surprising and surprisingly comforting. “Okay,” he says. “We can hit the clubs in Seattle. Find out if she talked to anybody.”

“We?” The word is a relief.

Ben nods. “We head home tomorrow morning. You ride back with us. We can go around to the clubs. It’s Saturday night, so everyone will be out. We’ll ask around. We can go through her emails again. We’ll find some answers.”

x x x

That night at the show, I watch Ben carefully. The band is good—not great, but good. And Ben does his growly, throaty, thrusty trick, and I can see his charisma. I can see the girls in the crowd responding to him, and I forgive Meg a little bit for this. He would’ve been hard to resist.

At one point, Ben shields his eyes and peers out into the floodlights, just like he did the first time I saw him play. Only this time, I get the distinct impression he really is looking for me.

19

After the show, we crash at someone’s house. I share a room with a very pierced college student named Lorraine, who’s pretty nice, even if she won’t shut up about the guys in the band. Ben and the rest of the Scarps camp out on the couch or in the basement in sleeping bags. The next morning, we all eat Dumpster-dived bagels and then load up.

“Prepare yourself,” Ben says.

“For what?”

“The reek. Eight nights of travel. You’ll get a case of jock itch just sitting in the van.”

The rest of the band eye me suspiciously. Do they know I’m the dead one-night-stand’s friend?

I sit down on a makeshift bench of two-by-fours stacked on top of a couple of amps. Ben sits next to me. We get onto I-90, and the guys bicker about what they should listen to. No one says a word to me. When we stop for gas and the guys go load up on junk food, I ask Ben what the deal is.

“I’m breaking the code.”

“What code?”

“No girls in the van.”

“Oh.”

“But you’re not a girl.” He looks embarrassed. “Not that kind anyway.”

“What kind am I?”

Ben shakes his head. “I’m not sure yet. A previously undiscovered species.”

I fall asleep somewhere outside of Moses Lake and wake up with a start, leaning against Ben, my ears popping as we come down the Snoqualmie Pass.

“God, sorry.”

“That’s okay.” He’s smiling a little.

“Did I drool?”

“I’ll never tell.”

He keeps grinning.

“What’s so funny?”

“It’s just, you broke your promise, about never sleeping in my vicinity.”

I jerk away from him. “Technically, I broke it last night, when I slept under the same roof as you. Score yourself a point, Ben. It’s the only one you’re going to get off me.”

His eyes flash, and for a second there’s that Ben, the asshole. I’m kind of glad to have him back. But then he scoots a little away, muttering something.

“What was that?”

“You don’t have to bite my head off.”

“I’m sorry. Did I hurt your feelings?” My voice is laced with sarcasm, and I’m not sure why I’m so pissed off all of a sudden.

Ben scoots farther away, and I’m surprised to realize that maybe I did hurt his feelings.

“Look, I’m sorry . . .” I begin. “I’m tired and kind of keyed up about all this.”

“It’s okay.”

“I don’t mean to be a dick.”

He smiles again.

“Now what?”

“Most girls wouldn’t describe themselves as dicks.”

“Would you prefer I call myself a cu—”

“Don’t,” Ben interrupts. “I fucking hate that word.”