As for Celeste’s bruises, though, I didn’t feel any clearer about whether or not to believe it was a medical condition. And I worried all the time that she had decided to make good on her threat to tell David about me. But whenever David visited or wrote or called, everything seemed fine. In fact, he made a point of visiting twice a day, and bringing me little things he thought would cheer me up—the apartments-for-rent section of the New York Times, Life Savers, the miniature metal wrench from an abandoned Clue game. “It made me think of you,” he said. “Miss Fix-it.”
And, best of all, one of his spoons. He said it was a special, chicken-soup spoon. I slept with it under my pillow.
The day they finally deemed me strong enough to go home, I walked back to Frost House slowly and carefully, still getting my sea legs. It was the middle of a class period; campus was eerily still. And even though I’d only been in the infirmary for a few days, the season seemed to have jumped forward. So many more trees were bare than I remembered. Silver trunks stretched up to skinny, naked branches.
Then I saw Frost House. Waiting for me. The evergreen bushes surrounding her made sure she wasn’t too exposed. She looked just as cozy as she had the day I’d moved in. Just as welcoming as the first day I’d seen her, when I knew I had to live there. And, like that day, I could almost hear her calling out to me.
The door to my room was unlocked, not surprisingly. I’d hardly been in a state to lock it when I left. I opened it and for a moment felt as if I was coming upon the room as a stranger. Look at how beautiful it was! Full of light and color and warmth. Not very neat, but still … God, I’d missed it.
My plants didn’t seem to be thirsty. Pressing a finger into the soil confirmed they’d been watered recently. And—wait. They’d gotten sun, too. The window shades were all rolled up. My pulse quickened. I’d kept the shades down when I was sick, to block the painful light. Someone had been in here. Someone had been in my room.
What else? What else had been touched?
Cubby. She wasn’t on the windowsill. Where was she? I went into the closet. Shelf—no. Floor—no. Wait. Yes. In the corner. I grabbed her and brought her to me, noticing her lightness, and how nothing inside her shifted with the movement.
Then I remembered.
My hand searched in the crack between mattress and wall. Only when I felt the plastic bag did I release my breath. I brought the pills out into the light of the bedroom to make sure they were all there. As far as I could tell they were. But the paper … my sheet of paper was gone.
I knelt down again, feeling all the way around the mattress. Nothing.
I’d look insane if anyone saw that page of notes. Celeste knew about it—she’d seen it that time she’d discovered I kept my meds there. Maybe she took it to show David? He’d seemed fine when he visited. Maybe she was holding on to it. For now. Biding her time.
I sat on the bed and tried to remember the afternoon when I’d gotten sick, but it was all scrambled. My mind had been so messed up. I glanced around the room for clues. A pile of clothes sat on my dresser. Red sweater. Right—the clothes I’d thrown up on that first day. But they were all folded and clean, now.
I was still staring at them when my phone rang. David, wanting to know if I was up to dinner in Commons. His voice sounded normal, happy I was home.
“Not really,” I said. “Could you bring something by when you’re done?”
“I wish I could,” he said. “But I have to rush to a movie screening for English. Do you want me to come visit later? Like nine or so?”
“Thanks,” I said. “I think I’ll be too tired, though.”
“Do you think you’ll be well enough to come on Sunday?”
“Sunday?”
“My mom’s party. Did you forget?”
“Oh, right,” I said, and then after a pause, “Will Celeste be there?”
“Of course. She and I are going home on Saturday. My mom really wants to meet you.”
“I want to meet her, too,” I said. “I’m sure I’ll be able to go.”
A knock on the door startled me awake. How long had I been asleep? I put on my glasses and saw it was a couple of hours later. My stomach grumbled. The knock came again.
“Come in.”
The open door revealed Viv, standing with a red-and-white-checked cardboard take-out box from Commons in her hands.
“I ran into David at dinner,” she said. “He thought you might appreciate this.” She extended her arms.
“Oh, thanks, Viv.” I sat up straighter in bed.
She crossed the room and handed it to me, along with a fork and napkins. “I wasn’t sure what would agree with your stomach.”
I rested the heavy box on my lap; warmth spread through my thighs. Inside was probably everything Commons had offered tonight: spaghetti, chicken, potatoes, sautéed veggies, bread, cake.
“This is great,” I said. “I’m starving. I just wasn’t up to trekking over there.”
Viv sat down next to me. “I don’t blame you. I can’t believe how sick you were. I was really scared when I found you.”
“Thanks again for helping me.” I tasted a bite of buttery mashed potatoes. So much better than the infirmary food. Actual flavor.
“Viv?” I said. “Not to sound all second grade, or anything, but does this mean we’re okay? Because you know, I’m really, really sorry about Cameron. About the whole thing. More sorry than I could ever say. I feel as awful about it as I have about anything, ever.”
Viv stared at her lap. “I love you, Leen,” she finally said. “And it’s so not Buddhist of me to stay angry. But … the thing is, I can’t help getting mad, still, whenever I miss Cam. Not to mention getting mad about what this has done to him. But at the same time, I also miss you.”
“I miss you, too,” I said. “So much. And Abby.”
“Abby’s a different story,” she said. “That’s another reason it’ll be hard for us to really be friends, like before. At least for now.”
“Oh.” I took another bite; the chicken tasted like dust.
“But we can try, a bit,” she said. “You know, start slow?”
I nodded.
“So …” Viv smoothed out the wrinkles on the quilt next to her. “I watered your plants. And opened the blinds, to give them sun. And washed the puke out of your clothes.”
“It was you? Thanks, Viv. That was so sweet.”
She kept her eyes on the bed, pressed her lips together, and smoothed the quilt over and over as if she’d developed OCD while
I’d been gone. “I, uh, I saw something while I was in here,” she said. “I … wanted to ask you about it.”
Oh, God. “It’s not as weird as it seems, Viv.” How wasn’t a piece of paper with info about ten or so psychotropic meds not as weird as it seems? Maybe I was studying for a test, in psych? About medications?
“Really?” she said. “What do you do in there?”
“In there?”
“The closet. I saw that whole mattress thing you have set up, the pillows. Do you, like, sleep in there or something?”
The closet. She knew about the closet. My chest tightened. But, then again, she didn’t know about my conversations.
“No, I don’t sleep in there.” I drew crisscrosses in my potatoes and searched my brain for a plausible explanation.
“So, you … ?”
“I … I meditate.”
Viv raised her eyebrows. “You? Meditate? How come I didn’t know this?”
“Well, it’s not like we’ve been close enough recently for you to notice.” As I spoke, I realized that the dreamlike state I went into in the closet was kind of what I imagined meditation to be like. An alternate consciousness. “It’s helped me be less stressed.”