Chapter 25
“Okay, okay, let’s be rational, here,” says Matt.
He has set Nora up in the living room, introduced her to the bottom row of books on the shelves, where Babe always kept the kids’ books. He put on an old Ella Fitzgerald record to cover up our conversation.
Since, you know, you really shouldn’t talk about things like the world’s natural order completely shattering in front of a kid.
“What are our options?” Matt plants a hand on the table on the outside deck, where we’re all sitting.
“We’ve all suffered a psychotic break,” I suggest. “Or more likely, each of us assumes that we ourselves are the insane one.”
“Okay, that’s option one.” He scribbles on a legal pad from his bag, with a pen that glides across the yellow page. “What else?”
“Group hallucination,” Sammie says. “Did you ever hear about those people who danced uncontrollably in the streets for days? And some of them actually danced to death?”
“Strasbourg, 1518,” supplies Austin, unexpectedly. We all look at him. “They think it might have been ergot poisoning.”
“What is ergot?” asks Sammie.
“Okay, I know this one!” I say. “It grows on grains. Rye specifically. Did anyone eat a bunch of rotten rye?”
Austin nods. “A chemist made LSD out of it in the thirties.”
“We should really start a trivia team,” Matt quips. “But in the meantime, what else do we have?”
There’s silence, and then Sammie sighs. Then says, “Mom did something,” at nearly the same time as I predict what she’s going to say and argue, “What could she have done, Sam?”
“I don’t know. But she had a habit of making things happen, didn’t she? Remember how she used to say something was going to happen, and then it did? Like, she would say something good was coming. And the next thing you know, it would.”
I want to argue with her, but I know it’s true. We’ve all heard Babe’s stories. We all saw it. It was as small as finding a ten-dollar bill on the ground somewhere or as big as … well, the night of the bonfire when I met Austin. Babe said she had a good feeling about that night.
That being said, it was also the night Sammie met Johnny, so how good was it, really?
Come to think of it, Austin has been nothing but a disaster too. So maybe Babe’s instincts were completely full of shit.
“Sure,” I concede. “But she never stopped time.”
Sammie gasps. “Time stands still at Birdsong.”
“Too bad she couldn’t have just stuck with the classic live, laugh, love,” Austin says, dryly, stirring the melting ice into his coffee. “That’s simple enough, at least.”
“Guys, I’m really freaking out,” says Sammie.
“It’s okay, Sam, we’ll figure it out.” My words are ostensibly comforting, but I can hear that my tone is not.
“Okay, any other ideas?” Matt taps the end of his pen on the table in front of him.
“Everyone in town is playing along,” I suggest.
Austin points at my hand.
“Okay, well … maybe … I don’t know, maybe I just … maybe it was—”
“Didion, you could practically see bone,” Austin says.
Sammie recoils and then shakes her head, eyes shut. “I can’t think about it.”
“This is so absurd, we can’t possibly be actually trying to wrap our heads around something this ridiculous,” I say. “Are we? Are we really doing that?”
Sammie lifts her hands and lets them fall again. “I just went back into town, it’s all the very same as yesterday! Saturday, everywhere. Same people. The red truck. And also, I did something yesterday.”
“What?” I ask.
“I took a knife into the bathroom stall at Dusty’s and carved a big X into the wood. On top of all that old graffiti on the wooden doors, you know? I went back today and it was gone. Not as dramatic as your hand, but still.”
We’re all quiet.
Matt is the first to speak, his voice low. “You know, I think the part that troubles me the most is that I do believe it. I don’t think I’ve been truly shocked by anything since 2016.”
Austin hoots a laugh and says, “Amen to that.”
“I know,” agrees Sammie. “After everything that’s happened in the last few years, I seriously feel like if a T. rex started stomping through the suburbs with a bunch of Avengers flying around its head I would barely bat an eye.”
“Remember when the government essentially confirmed the likelihood of aliens and UFOs and everyone seemed to collectively decide they didn’t have time to worry about it?” asked Matt with a laugh.
“Right.” Sammie leans back, looking resigned. “So I kinda feel like … okay, let’s move past the part where we struggle to accept that’s something’s up. Because … it is. We’ve all lived thousands of days and nothing like this has ever happened, right?”
My ears are ringing and my skin is suddenly very hot. My breaths are coming shallow and fast. I feel like I’m about to burst.
“I need to get off this island.” I bolt out of my seat. “I’m sorry.”
I don’t know where I’m going. I just go until I open the fridge, and then stand there, letting the cold air wash over me.
I hate, hate, hate losing control. It troubles me way more than it seems to scare most people. I can’t smoke weed without having a panic attack. I can’t drink around people I don’t trust, or I get nervous. I hate roller coasters.
It’s not like I’m afraid of everything. I’m not always an anxious wreck. I don’t have trouble speaking in front of big crowds or meeting important people.
I’m a control freak. I’m exacting, I take over tasks when other people take too long.
I have a habit of finishing people’s sentences—though I’m pretty good at keeping it in my head.
I can’t think too much about the Big Scary Indifferent Universe or I start to feel untethered, which is one of the reasons I hated college, where that was 90 percent of every conversation.
The idea of disconnecting so thoroughly from reality like this, drifting off into the vast isolation of insanity will kill me. Like that guy in 2001: A Space Odyssey when HAL severed his lifeline and sent him spinning silently out into space.
It’s then that I look down at the counter next to the fridge. The MoonPie. It’s been left out to warm up for Matt.
I shut the fridge and run to the front hall, grab the first keys I see, which are Austin’s. I don’t hesitate, walking straight across the sharp gravel and climbing into his truck, revving it to life, and throwing it into reverse almost without looking.
I’m looking behind me, and jump out of my skin when I hear a bang.
“What the hell,” I mutter to myself, hand on my chest.
I’m afraid I ran over a rabbit or something, but then turn to see Austin, wrenching open the door and flinging himself into the passenger seat.
I gape at him. “What the hell are you doing?”
He shrugs. “Where we going?”
“Austin—”
“I want to go with you. Whatever you’re doing, it’s better if we do it together. Buddy system, remember?”
“I’m good, I don’t need—”
“Yeah, yeah, you don’t need help, we all get it. But you also don’t do great when things are out of your control, so why don’t we work together. For the sake of the group.”
I hesitate. “It’s not about not being able to accept help, it’s—ugh.
Goddammit, Austin.” I shake my head, and then my hair trigger goes off.
“Listen to me, I am still pissed as hell at you from Texas. I am not cool with you. I don’t want to act like everything is fine, or act like nothing happened, because it did, and I’m angry, and you don’t get to just—to just—”
“Good, so we’re finally talking about this?”
“We are not talking about this!” I reach across him and open his door. Gently but firmly, he grabs my wrist and stops me, shutting the door. “You said we could talk if it was Saturday again.”
“We don’t know if—” I make another angry sound and cover my face, letting my forehead fall to the wheel, my foot still heavy on the brake.
“For someone who prefers order, you sure are sexy when you let go a little. Even if it’s to have a tantrum.”
I look at him with wide, furious eyes. “You have some nerve, Killjoy.”
Austin laughs at my use of his athletic alias. I don’t know how he feels about it now, but he used to hate it. I always thought it was kind of hot.
He moves the car into park and says, “I don’t know what’s happening. I’m not the first guy to believe in all this woo-woo shit. But I’ve read enough books. I’ve seen enough movies. If something like this is going on, it’s usually because of unfinished business, right?”
“We’re not ghosts, Austin.” It comes out more like a plea than anything else.
“Hey, we don’t know that for sure, though.”
I look at him in horror and see the smirk.
“Stop trying to be funny!”
I am acting like a child. Isn’t this what everyone out there is craving? Especially women who date men—don’t they wish their men wanted to communicate?
Any buzzy internet psychology account or superqualified actual therapist would undoubtedly say that he’s doing the right thing, and I’m doing the wrong thing. I know that.
The problem is, I’ve kind of made grudge-holding my secondary full-time job for years now, even when I wanted to call all of them, to fix things, to apologize, to tell them how I was hurt. But then I never did, so it’s pretty hard to suddenly let that go.
But he’s right.
“Fine, you want to talk, let’s talk.” I lean back and cross my arms.
He points past me. I turn to look and see Gladys coming up the driveway, holding her heavy basket. I see now that when she arrives, she comes in a Barbie-pink golf cart.
“Ha. Wow. Good for her.”
She spots us and waves. We wave back.
“Okay, though, let’s go,” I say. “I can’t do that again.”
“Where to?” he asks.
The familiar words send a chill through me, softening everything that’s so rigid there.
I can’t help but say the other half of the inside joke. “I don’t know, but let’s just go until we hit water.”