Kaitlin Ward - Lie to Me

To the town of Monroe:

You will always be home.

GIRL DROWNS IN PASSUMPSIC RIVER.

When I see the headline, I almost drop my phone. Its a link someone posted on Facebook from the local news.

I tap the screen with shaking fingers and read the article in a rush. A twenty-year-old college sophomore, Maria Lugen. Survived by both parents and a younger brother, Steve, who goes to my high school. Maria had been missing for a month. Her death is currently believed to be an accident. No additional information at this time.

I set down the phone carefully on my bed and go stand in front of the mirror hanging on my closed door. I stare at my reflection until my features start to feel distorted and unreal, like a word youve repeated too many times in a row.

Because what happened to that girlit cant have been an accident. Its too much of a coincidence. I move closer to the mirror, stare at myself from only an inch away. My skin is bruised in places, and theres a cast on my wrist. My head spins if I stand up too fast. Because I hit my head and fell down an embankment, almost into a river. Unlike Maria, I survived.

But I dont think I was meant to.

* * *

This seems like a terrible idea, Amelia. My best friend Skylars hands are white-knuckle fists around the steering wheel of her Corolla. Isnt it too soon? Wont it upset you to go back to the spot where you nearly died?

I dont think theres a too soon for this type of thing.

Maybe not, I guess, but remind me again how this is going to help? I still think all this is going to do is upset you, and we should spend our time finding a new spot instead.

I dont want a new spot. I want to have not almost died at the old spot.

She flinches, and I feel bad. Before returning to school this week, I spent four days recovering at home after three days in the hospital with bruises and breaks and a concussion. That last one is what worried everyone the most, and its the thing my family and friends all still worry about. The concussion kept me from remembering exactly what happened when I fell, and its left headaches and occasional vertigo in its wake. Sky wants me to focus on letting myself rest and feel better. Shes not wrong, but she doesnt know everything.

No one knows that I suspect Im in danger from a source other than my own brain. Not even my best friend.

I glance sidelong at Sky. Shes supermodel tall, and thin as a spike. Her naturally blond hair is dyed a shade of pink that edges just close enough to the natural spectrum that our school doesnt make her change it, and its cut into a short, layered bob. Her heart-shaped face is littered with freckles, and right now her jaw is clenched tight enough that I can practically feel her teeth grinding.

I just need to see it, okay? I say softly as the river comes into view at the bottom of the long winding drive down to the dam. No one else is here. Late September is not a super popular time for beachgoers. I want to see if I, like, feel anything. I know how that sounds, but just bear with me.

Sky parks her car and cuts the ignition. You know I will. She opens the door, then pauses with a small smile. But the second you start using essential oils Im ordering an intervention.

I laugh. Deal.

We follow the portage trail that winds behind the dam. Its a collision of natural and unnatural beauty back here: The stark cliff of cement, and the rushing water at its base. The trees and the rocks around its edges, and the mountains in the background. Its a place Ive always loved, and I hate that its tainted now. I stop walking, press my shins right up against the guardrail. This side of the rail is a paved path, and the other side is a few feet of grass and then a long, steep slope to the water below. The brush is marred with heavy lines of dirt. Bushes have been hacked away, and tree branches have been broken. Some from my fall, some from my rescue.

This is where Sky found me. The last thing I remember is sitting on this guardrail, waiting for her to arrive. She had something to tell me, shed said. Something important. And this was our spot. The place where wed always come to swap secrets. My mind is pretty much a blank space after that. I remember the feeling of something pushing my shoulder, but I dont remember anyone else being near me. Doctors say I must have lost my balance after standing up on the wrong side of the guardrail. Then I fell, tumbling partway down the rocky hill and by sheer, unfathomable luck, I got hung up in a tree and didnt drop the rest of the way to my death.

My neurologist told me that I probably wont remember anything new and that the reason I dont remember my fall isnt because Ive buried a traumatic memory but because my concussion means the memory doesnt even exist. I hate that. The idea that something can happen to you and can be completely ignored by your own brain. I want my neurologist to be wrong, and thats the main reason Im here.

Peering down into the abyss below me, I get such an intense wave of vertigo that I have to sit down on the path. I pull off my new lime-green glasses and press one palm into my forehead between my eyebrows until the dizziness passes. Im on the right side of the guardrail, I remind myself. The safe side.

You okay? Sky asks. She crouches beside me, rests a hand on my back.

Im fine. I swallow nausea, unwilling to admit that maybe she was right and this was a bad idea. Its just a place . I shouldnt have to feel this way about it. I replace my glasses and stand up, stretching my arms. My left one is heavy, thanks to the cast surrounding my broken wrist. It makes stretching a lot less satisfying.

And then I feel something. A shadow of a past sensation, like somethings tugging at my throat. My hand flits there, to where my favorite necklace normally would bea rectangle made out of wood scraps on a thin chain that my dad and brother made together and gave me for Christmas a few years agobut its missing. Along with my glasses, I lost the necklace when I fell. Suddenly, I can recall a tightness against my throat, and then the sensation of absence. I shut my eyes and try to expand that feeling, remember something else. Something real . Nothing else comes, but still, I feel hopeful. Maybe the doctor was wrong, after all. Maybe I will remember what happened.

You sure youre all right? Sky persists.

I open my eyes. Yeah. Im just thinking.

She perches cautiously on the road side of the guardrail, fingers curled around the metal. Its really not that close to the edge, I notice. Not close enough for me to have stood up, stumbled, and fallen halfway down the slope, in my opinion.

Thinking about what? she asks.

What was the important thing you were going to tell me that day? Its not the first time Ive asked. She doesnt seem to want to tell me anymore, but Im hoping maybe here, shell change her mindits the other reason I wanted to come back, and its the reason I wanted Sky to come with me. With the water crashing out the back of the dam, sometimes it feels like the sound swallows up your secrets and keeps them safe. Thats why its always been our meeting place.

It seemed important at the time, she says. But now A shrug. I dont want to talk about it.