“Liar,” I breathe. I notice movement out of the corner of my eye. Ash stands at one end of the casket. I don’t know if he heard me, and I don’t want to find out.
I am a bad friend. Maybe the worst friend in the world.
I find a seat near the back, and hold Alissa’s gift in my lap. I can feel ridges along one side that might be book spines. My leg jumps four hundred beats a minute. My attention narrowsin on the comic-strip wrapping paper. Garfield. Only one panel shows, the rest hidden beneath a fold. Garfield’s eating lasagna. The thought of lasagna makes my stomach churn, even though I love lasagna. My throat clenches, my lungs seize. The walls of the funeral home squeeze in on me.
It seems like it has been years when voices finally cut through my thoughts and my tunnel vision widens enough for me to notice several classmates taking the seats in front of me. One is Taylor, the boy with the greasy ponytail. Bethany and Kylie, two of the girls on the track team. Aiden Marx, who runs hurdles and went to the same church as Alissa.
“They’re doing a big memorial for her during service this week,” Aiden says in a hushed voice. “I hope her parents don’t expect it to be comforting. Pastor Mitchell has definitely said out loud suicide is a sin. He’s going to have all of us praying for her eternal soul.”
“That’s messed up,” Kylie says.
“You can’t be serious,” says Bethany. “That’s, like, barbaric.”
Aiden shrugs. “They just added a new building to the church, so I guess people agree with him.”
“Do you think they’re going to make us do that counseling stuff at school?” Taylor asks. “I’m not up for group therapy.”
Bethany waves her hand. “They’re not going to do that. It’s too invasive. Someone’s parents will bitch about it.”
“I think I’d like it,” says Kylie. “I dunno. It’d be nice.”
“They’ll at least have the big school meeting in the gym.” Aiden laughs a little, too softly for anyone else to notice. I guess I should be grateful he isn’t pretending, but I could stand him taking this alittlemore seriously. He mimes straightening a tie, the way our principal does whenever he addresses the student body. “‘Hey kids, don’t kill yourselves, it’s bad for you, and it’ll make your parents sad.’”
They all go quiet and look toward the casket, toward Alissa’s parents. It won’t just make them sad; it will devastate them. They will never be the same again.
“How do you think she did it?” Bethany says this so softly I almost miss it. “No one has said, have they?”
Kylie shakes her head, but Aiden jumps in right away, a little too loud, like he was waiting for someone to ask this exact question. “Everyone says she OD’d, but I think it was more violent than that. The river just hid the evidence.”
“What the hell, Aiden,” Kylie says.
“Drugs is more likely,” says Taylor, as if he hadn’t heard Kylie’s protest. “Wouldn’t someone have said something if there were more injuries?”
My stomach twists. I have a good imagination, but I can’t imagine a world where Alissa would hurt herself in that way. But I guess that’s just a limitation of mine, not of hers.
“Nah,” Aiden says. “Everyone would get triggered if they said exactly what happened. They don’t want more kids offingthemselves because of her. Keep it vague, that way the news and the police and whoever else won’t be responsible for more of them.” There’s an upturn to his lips and a bounce to his voice. My hands curl into fists.
He starts to say something else, but I can’t hear him. Suddenly it’s all too much. The way they’re talking about her. Theorizing. Thesmileon Aiden’s face. I stand so fast my chair screeches backward. Everyone looks at me. Mom, heading my way from the windows, stops and stares. Ash scowls from the far side of the room. Taylor, Bethany, Kylie, and Aiden all look up, and when they see who has been behind them this whole time, their expressions twist into surprise and shame.
At least they aren’t pretending, I guess.
I stare back at them. I don’t know what to say. I don’t have any words. Alissa was the one who was good at talking. She always had a smart comeback, or the self-awareness to be righteously indignant. She knew how to knock people down a peg or two when they deserved it.
I just want to scream.
I shove the gift under my arm and walk out of the parlor, my steps measured,one two three four five, every fiber of my being hyperaware of the attention on me. I leave the funeral home behind for the blustery March day. Mom drove us here, so all I can do is sit on the cold curb and wait for her. This is fine; I prefer being alone.
When I’m alone, the only person who can lie to me is me.
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