Wintergirls Read Free

AIL
    “Lia? It’s me. Call me.”
    Cassie.
    Second message: “Where are you? Call me back.”
    Cassie.
    Third: “I’m not playing, Overbrook. I really need to talk to you.”
    Cassie, two days ago, Saturday.
    “Call me.”
    “Please, please, call me.”
    “Look, I’m sorry I was such a bitch. Please.”
    “I know you’re getting these messages.”

    “You can be mad at me later, okay? I really need to talk to you.”
    “You were right—it wasn’t your fault.”
    “There’s nobody else to talk to.”
    “Oh, God.”
    From 1:20 to 2:55, she hung up fifteen times.
    Next: “Please, Lia-Lia.” Her voice was slurring.
    “I’m so sad. I can’t get out.”
    “Call me. It’s a mess.”
    Two more hang-ups.
    3:20, very slurred: “I don’t know what to do.”
    3:27. “I miss you. Miss you.”
    I bury the phone at the bottom of the pile and put on a heavier sweatshirt before I head for my car. Winter comes early in New Hampshire.
    My timing is perfect, and I wind up in a traffic jam. The cars around me are driven by fat cows and bellowing bulls. We roll along, six mph. I can run faster than this.
    We brake. They chew their cud and moo into their phones until the herd shifts gears and rolls forward again.
    Fifteen miles an hour. I can’t run that fast.
    Somewhere between Martins Corner and Route 28, I begin to cry. I turn on the radio, sing at the top of my lungs, turn it off again. I beat the steering wheel with my fists until I can see the bruises, and with every mile, I cry harder. Rain pours down my face.
    . . . body found in a motel room, alone . . .
    What was she doing there? What was she thinking?
    Did it hurt?
    There’s no point in asking why, even though everybody will. I know why. The harder question is “why not?”
    I can’t believe she ran out of answers before I did.
    I need to run, to fly, beating my wings so hard I can’t hear anything over the pounding of my heart. Rain, rain, rain, drowning me.
    Was it easy?
    I do not take any shortcuts, I do not forget to turn at the deli on the corner, I do not get lost, not even on purpose. I arrive at school on autopilot; late by their stan-dards, early by mine. The last buses have just pulled up to the front door.
    I get out and lock the car.
    The unforgiving November wind blows me toward the building. Pointy snowflakes spiral down from the cake-frosting clouds overhead. The first snow. Magic.
    Everybody stops and looks up. The bus exhaust freezes, trapping all the noise in a gritty cloud. The doors to the school freeze, too.
    We tilt back our heads and open wide.

    The snow drifts into our zombie mouths crawling with grease and curses and tobacco flakes and cavities and boyfriend/girlfriend juice, the stain of lies. For one moment we are not failed tests and broken condoms and cheating on essays; we are crayons and lunch boxes and swinging so high our sneakers punch holes in the clouds.
    For one breath everything feels better.
    Then it melts.
    The bus drivers rev their engines and the ice cloud shatters. Everyone shuffles forward. They don’t know what just happened. They can’t remember.
    she called me.
    I walk back to my car, get in, turn on the heat, and wipe my face on my shirt. 7:30. Emma is done with French now and is unpacking her violin. She’ll spend too much time rosining her bow, and not enough tuning the strings. The Winter Concert is coming up in a few weeks, and she doesn’t know the songs yet. I should help her with that.
    Cassie’s at the morgue, I guess. Last night she slept there in a silver drawer, eyes getting used to the dark.
    Jennifer said they’re doing an autopsy. Who will cut off her clothes? Will they give her a bath, strangers touching her skin? Can she watch them? Will she cry?
    The late bell rings, and the last people in the parking lot sprint for the door. Just a few minutes more. I can’t go in until the halls are empty and the teachers have numbed them with boredom so they won’t notice when I slip down the