"I don"t know."
She looks at me funny. Other girls crowd around now, pushing to see. While we"re watching, Derek sways and pitches forward. He"d be flat on his face if the two guys next to him didn"t have quick reflexes.
I make a weird startled sound.
The camera cuts away to the director. Mr. Tall Wispy Beard keeps going like the guy I love didn"t just turn white as death and keel over. When the camera goes back to them, the boys are singing as if nothing happened, except Derek and his two rescuers aren"t in the picture.
The whole choir stares at me. I"m frozen. I"ve got to move. I"ve got to get up there. Now. How far is it? Will Jeannette get me all the way to Toronto? Of course. She"s solid, but how will I find him?
I don"t care. I don"t care. I don"t care.
I thaw enough to hold out my hands. "I need cash."
Girls in long shimmering red run to purses, shove fives and tens in my hand. Meadow"s got a stack of twenties.
I grab my purse and jacket and head to the back door. "Tell Terri I"m sorry. You guys can do it without me."
"Your gown! " Leah calls. I"m not supposed to go outside in it, but to h.e.l.l with that. I"ll try not to drag it through the snow and mud in the parking lot.
I push through the door and plow smack into Scott.
He catches me by both elbows. "How did you know I was out here?"
"Let me go, Scott." I try to wrench away. "I have to leave."
"Are you okay?"
I can"t answer him.
He still doesn"t let go. "Listen, Beth. I"m just going to say this one more time. I"m here. Look around."
"Let me go! " I flail my arms and break his hold. "I don"t have time for you, Scott." I turn and rush away, cringe at how cruel those words echo in Scott"s stunned silence behind me.
He shouldn"t have gotten in my way.
He shouldn"t have gotten in my way.
He shouldn"t have gotten in my way.
If I say it enough, I"ll believe it. Maybe even he will, too. As much as my heart is racing for Derek, I don"t want to hurt Scott. I care for him-more than I should. And I owe him. He"ll never know it, but he rescued me again and again during this impossible blank time.
As I speed up I-94, the numb shock that got me out of the concert and onto this freeway pushing Jeannette to her max speed warps into absolute terror. What ravaged Derek like that? What"s taking him away from me? He said it would get better. I believed and believed and believed. c.r.a.p. He just fainted on TV, and they all kept on singing.
I"m going to find him and force him to tell me everything. No more nice, purring Beth making believe everything"s fine, waiting and waiting and waiting. The Beast is loose, and she"s not going back in her cage.
My cell rings as I"m pa.s.sing that dumb giant tire marking the outskirts of Detroit.
"What in the world-"
"I don"t even know, Mom. It"s Derek. I"ll probably stay up there."
"Where?"
"I"ll call back when I know."
I get all the way to the border before I realize I don"t have a clue where I"m going. There"s a line of cars way backed up, so I start dialing Blake"s cell. Over and over and over. He finally picks up.
I yell, "Where did they take him?"
"Beth?"
"I"m on my way. What hospital?"
"They"re going back to London." Blake"s voice is maddeningly calm.
I pound on the steering wheel with my free hand. "All the way to London? Are they crazy?"
"The bleeding stopped. He"s okay."
"Bleeding?" Oh, my gosh. "Are you in the ambulance with him?"
"What ambulance?"
A car honks behind me. "Stop confusing me." I pull Jeannette forward.
"His parents took him back down to the lockup in London."
"c.r.a.p-he"s in jail?" Is it drugs after all?
"Geesh. You"re stunned." Blake laughs. The creep laughs. "You know that"s what he calls the hospital."
"The lockup?"
"We sprung him for this weekend. He refused to miss it."
I"m pressing the phone so hard into my ear it hurts. "He was in the hospital! " I yell into the phone.
"How can you not know that?" Blake yells back at me. "He practically lives there."
I pull forward again as a sleek black sedan rolls through the border crossing.
Blake is still ranting at me. "What kind of a c.r.a.p girlfriend are you?" His vicious tone rips me apart. "You should have been there with him every second you can. He needs the motivation to hang in there. Look at today."
"It"s not my fault." I bang the steering wheel with my hand. "You can"t blame me. He doesn"t tell me anything."
"Oh, sheesh." Blake doesn"t say anything for a long moment. "You don"t know."
The cell slips in my sweaty hand. I grapple with it, get it back jammed to my ear. "Tell me what he has, Blake." My voice cracks. "I"m going crazy." I"m trembling, trying to control myself from breaking down with the shock that"s starting to register.
"Forget I said anything." The jerk hangs up on me.
I throw my phone into the pa.s.senger seat and pull forward. Three more cars to go. Two more. One more. My turn. I pull up to the Canadian border booth thing and roll down my window.
A friendly looking guy in his twenties puts his hand on my roof and leans over to speak through the window. "Pa.s.sport, please."
"Pa.s.sport?" The Canadians up at our crossing at Port rarely want ID.
"You locals need to learn."
I fumble in my purse and grab my wallet. "Please." I shove my license at him. "My boyfriend"s in the hospital."
"You"re in love with a Canadian?" Oh my gosh-is he flirting?
I just nod.
He gives me back my license. "I hope he"s okay. G.o.dspeed."
I get a lump in my throat as I drive off. I sniff and rub my eyes. Pull it together, girl. You"ve got to drive. I glance down at my gas gauge. Shoot. All I"ve got are American dollars. I pull off at one of the gas stations in Windsor past the border crossing. They"re happy to take my dollars-rip me off on the exchange. I buy a big bottle of water and some gum. I should eat, but the smell of stale chips, cookies, and jerky blended with diesel churns my tense guts into knots.
As I head up the 401 in the deep cold of a black night, I try to stay calm, but the border guy undid me. Tears attack. Burn my eyes and face. It starts to snow. Dumb s...o...b..lt. Stupid Great Lakes. Stupid winter. I so don"t need this tonight. I follow the signs to London, push Jeannette up to seventy-five, as the snow falls thick and fast, deadening the sound of our pa.s.sage, but it doesn"t m.u.f.fle the way I"m crying. Snot runs down the back of my throat and then over my lips. I catch it before it drips off my chin and stains my blood-red gown.
I have to stop this. I"ll scare Derek looking like this. I don"t want him to know- But I do.
He needs to know.
He should see the destruction. I"ve felt like a ball of hot tears and snot inside all this time. Why not let it out? Let him see. No more pretenses. No more faking it. He has to let me in.
If he loves me at all, he needs to see this. This mess I"ve become.
I curse and cry and yell stupid things at him. He"s sick, and I"m flipping out livid at him. I hit a drift that throws a sheen of snow into my headlight"s beam. Jeannette gets pulled hard to the side of the road, but I crank the wheel, get my old girl straightened out and back up to speed.
Jeannette and I fight through drift after drift, me sobbing, her engine throbbing, the two solid hours it takes to get to London from the border. My voice is wrecked by the time I flick on my signal and take the Wonderland Road exit.
I plan to stop at a gas station and raid the yellow pages for hospitals, but I see it before I even spot a pay phone. Red brick sprawling giant off to the right. I slow down and turn in, follow the maze into a visitors" parking lot, and shut off the car. I pull my pink choir T-shirt out of my bag and wipe my face with it. I catch a glimpse in the rearview mirror. All the makeup"s rubbed off. I reach for at least a cover stick. Stare at it. A bitter laugh erupts from my throat. I toss the magic wand aside.
I bang through the gla.s.s doors, into the florescent-lit lobby, and march over to a chubby middle-aged guy with a red face under an INFORMATION sign. "Derek Collins, please."
"Derek, huh?" He types in the name. "Only family allowed up." He notices my dress, and his eyebrows shoot up. "It"s late for a hospital visit."
"I"m his sister."
"Another one? My old buddy, Derek, has got to tell me how he does it." He hands me a map with a room starred on it. Then he notices my face, my ski jacket thrown over a shimmering gown, and compa.s.sion fills his eyes. "I"m sorry. You head right upstairs and cheer him up."
Am I the only girl on earth who"s never been here?
"Tell that boy he owes me three chocolate bars for this."
I run away from his friendly voice. Get on an elevator. Stare at the map. c.r.a.p. This can"t be right. I ask a young red-haired guy who pushes a cart of pills onto the elevator at the next floor for help. I show him the room number, helplessly.
"That"s Derek"s room."
"Why does everyone here know him so well?"
"We have our favorites. And that kid-the way he comes back and sings to everyone, brings his friends. We"re all pulling for him."
My eyes are blurring up again. The guy reads my gross red-blotched, puffed-fat face and how I have to bite my lips to keep them still. "Here. I"ll take you."
He puts his freckled arm out for me to grab onto and leads me down a long corridor, up another, through a bunch of doors into another elevator. He hustles me past the nurses" station.
I want to hug him by the time we"re standing in front of the door that matches the room number written on my map. He opens the door and pushes me inside and pulls the door closed behind me.
Derek"s there, lying in a hospital bed, with a mask strapped on his face. He has to fight to get each breath in. His face looks blue against the stark-white hospital sheets. His damp hair stands out dark against his pale skin. His eyes are closed. The eyelids are purple, and he"s got dark shadows under his eyes. His long black lashes look wet. There"s a bag of clear liquid hanging on an IV pole. My eyes follow the narrow tube out the bottom of it to where it turns into a syringe sticking into his chest. There"s another pole holding up a bag of yellowish murky stuff. It has a tube, too. A bit fatter. That tube disappears under the sheets. Oh, gross. I think it"s going into his stomach-where that Band-Aid was. I peer at his face. Tiny clear tubes run into each nostril.
I must have made a noise-a sharp intake of my breath. Maybe I sniffed.
His eyes open, and they focus on me. "No, Beth." He closes his eyes again.
"No ?" I say it too loud, too harsh.
"Not you."
"Who else?" I"m losing control.
He pulls down the mask he was breathing into so he can talk better. "You"re not supposed to see this." His voice is thick and raspy. "Go away."
"Look at me." I move to the foot of his bed. "Open your eyes, d.a.m.n you." It"s my turn to curse. My turn to scream.
He won"t open his eyes.
I go around to the side of his bed and pry an eyelid open. His skin is hot and slick, but I persist.
He sees me well enough. He turns his face away.
My fingers slip into his dark, damp hair. I lean down and speak in his ear. "This is what you"re doing to me."
"Go away."
"It"s not that easy."
He turns to face me, brushes my face with his fingers. He holds me there with the love deep in his feverish eyes until I can"t bear it anymore.
I turn away this time, stumble over to a chair by the door, and break down.
"Oh, Beth." He struggles to speak. "Please, Beth. Don"t cry like that."
I jump to my feet, fear fueling that anger I uncovered in the car. "What am I supposed to do?" I screech in his face. "Tell me, Derek. Whatever it is-I have to know."
"I didn"t want this to happen."