Before I Fall

Kent folds his hands in his lap, staring at me expectantly, his mouth just curved into a smile. “So let’s hear it.”

I reach across Kent and pull the keys out of the ignition, cutting the lights. In the resulting darkness the sound of the rain seems much louder, washing all around us.

“Hey,” Kent says softly, his voice making my heart soar again, making my whole body light. “Now I can’t see you.”

His face and body are all shadow, darkness on darkness. I can just make out the lines of him, and, of course, feel the warmth from his skin. I lean forward, catching my chin on the roughness of his corduroy jacket, finding his ear, accidentally bumping it with my mouth. He inhales sharply and his whole body tenses. My heart is fluid, soaring. There’s no longer any space between heartbeats.

“The secret is,” I say, whispering right into his ear, “that yours was the best kiss I’ve ever had in my life.”

He pulls back a little so that he can look at me, but our lips are still just inches away. I can’t make out his expression in the dark, but I can tell that his eyes are searching my face again.

“But I’ve never kissed you,” he whispers back. Around us the rain sounds like falling glass. “Not since third grade, anyway.”

I smile, but I’m not sure if he can see it. “Better get started, then,” I say, “because I don’t have much time.”

He pauses for only a fraction of a second. Then he leans forward and presses his lips to mine, and the whole world powers off, the moon and the rain and the sky and the streets, and it’s just the two of us in the dark, alive, alive, alive.

I don’t know how long we’re kissing. It seems like hours, but somehow when he pulls away, breathing hard, both hands holding my face, the clock glowing dully on the dashboard has only inched forward a few minutes.

“Wow,” he says. I can feel his chest rising and falling quickly. We’re both out of breath. “What was that for?”

I force myself to pull away, find the handle in the dark and pop the door open. The cold air and the rain whooshes in, helping me think. I suck in a deep breath. “For the ride and everything.”

Even in the dark I can see his eyes sparkling like a cat’s. I can hardly bring myself to look away. “You really saved my life tonight,” I say, my little joke, and then before he can stop me, and even though he calls my name, I jump out of the car and jog along the driveway toward the house, for the very last party of my life.

“You made it!” Lindsay squeals when I find her in the back room. As always the music and heat and smoke is impassable, a wall of people, perfume, and sound. “I totally thought you would flake.”

“I knew you’d show,” Ally says, reaching out and squeezing one of my hands. She drops her voice, which at this volume means she screams a little quieter. “Did you see Rob?”

“I think he’s avoiding me,” I say, which is true. Thank God.

Lindsay twists around, calling for Elody—“Look who decided to grace us with her presence!” she screams, and Elody scans our faces before registering that I haven’t been at the party the whole time—and then turns to me, slipping her arm around my shoulders. “Now it’s officially a party. Al, give Sam a shot.”

“No, thanks.” I wave away the bottle she offers me. I flip open my cell phone. Eleven thirty. “Actually, um, I think I’m going to go downstairs for a bit. Maybe outside. It’s really hot up here.”

Lindsay and Ally exchange a glance.

“You just came from outside,” Lindsay says. “You just got here. Like five seconds ago.”

“I was looking around for you guys for a while.” I know I sound lame, but I also know that I can’t explain.

Lindsay crosses her arms. “Uh-uh, no way. Something’s going on with you, and you’re going to tell us what it is.”

“You’ve been acting weird all day.” Ally bobbles her head.

“Did Lindsay tell you to say that?” I ask.

“Who’s been acting weird?” Elody’s just made her way over to us.

“Me, apparently,” I say.

“Oh, yeah.” Elody nods. “Definitely.”

“Lindsay didn’t tell me to say anything.” Ally puffs up her chest, getting offended. “It’s obvious.”

“We’re your best friends,” Lindsay says. “We know you.”

I press my fingers against my temples, trying to block out the throbbing sounds of the music, and close my eyes. When I open them again, Elody, Ally, and Lindsay are all staring at me suspiciously.

“I’m fine, okay?” I’m desperate to prevent a long conversation—or worse, a fight. “Trust me. It’s just been a weird week.” Understatement of the year.

“We’re worried about you, Sam,” Lindsay says. “You’re not acting like yourself.”

“Maybe that’s a good thing,” I say, and when they stare at me blankly, I sigh, leaning forward to wrestle them all into a group hug.

Elody squeals and giggles, “PDA much?” and Lindsay and Ally seem to relax too.

“I promise nothing’s the matter,” I say, which isn’t exactly true, but I figure it’s the best thing to say. “Best friends forever, right?”

“And no secrets.” Lindsay stares pointedly at me.

“And no bullshit,” Elody trumpets, which isn’t part of our little routine, but whatever. She’s supposed to say, “and no lies,” but I guess one works as well as the other.

“Forever,” Ally finishes, “and till death do us part.”

The last part falls on me to say, “And even then.”

“And even then,” the three of them echo.

“All right, enough mushy crap.” Lindsay breaks away. “I, for one, came to get drunk.”

“I thought you didn’t get drunk,” Ally says.

“Figure of speech.”

Ally and Lindsay start going back and forth, Ally dancing away with the vodka bottle (“If you don’t get drunk, I don’t see the point of drinking and wasting it”) as Elody wanders back over to Muffin. At least the attention is off me.

“See you later,” I say loudly to all of them in general, and Elody glances over her shoulder at me, but she may be looking at someone else. Lindsay flaps a hand in my direction, and Ally doesn’t hear me at all. It reminds me of leaving my house for the last time this morning, how in the end it’s impossible to understand the finality of certain things, certain words, certain moments. As I turn away my vision gets blurry, and I’m surprised to find that I’m crying. The tears come without any warning. I blink repeatedly until the world sharpens again, rubbing the wetness off my cheeks. I check my cell phone. Eleven forty-five.

Downstairs I stand just inside the door, waiting for Juliet, which is a bit like trying to stay on your feet in the middle of a riptide. People swarm around me, but hardly anybody looks my way. Maybe they’re getting a weird vibe off me, too, or they can tell I’m focused elsewhere. Or maybe—and this makes me sad as soon as I think it—they can sense, somehow, that I’m already gone. I push the thought away.

Finally I see her slip through the front door, white sweater tied loosely around her, head stooped. Instantly I jump forward and put a hand on her arm. She starts, staring at me, and though she must have imagined coming face-to-face with me tonight, the fact that I’ve found her, and not the other way around, throws her off guard.

“Hey,” I say. “Can I talk to you for a minute?”

She opens her mouth, shuts it, then opens it again. “Actually, I, um, kind of have somewhere to be.”

“No, you don’t.” In one movement I draw her away from the crowded entrance and toward a little recessed area in the hall. It’s a little easier to hear each other here, though it’s so squished we have to stand nearly pressed chest-to-chest. “Weren’t you looking for me, anyway? Weren’t you looking for us?”

“How did you—?” She breaks off, sucks in a breath, and shakes her head. “I’m not here for you.”

“I know.” I stare at her, willing her to look at me, but she doesn’t. I want to tell her that I get it, that I understand, but she’s examining the tiling on the floors. “I know it’s bigger than that.”

“You don’t know anything,” she says dully.

“I know what you have planned for tonight,” I say, very quietly.

Then she looks up. For a second our eyes meet, and I see fear flashing there, and something else—hope, maybe?—but she quickly drops her eyes again.

“You can’t know,” she says simply. “Nobody knows.”

“I know that you have something to tell me,” I say. “I know that you have something you wanted to say to all of us—to me, to Lindsay, to Elody, and Ally, too.”

Again she looks up, but this time she holds my gaze, eyes wide, and we stare at each other. Now I know what the look on her face is, behind the fear: wonder.

“You’re a bitch,” she whispers, so quietly I’m not sure I even hear the words or am just remembering them, imagining them in her voice. She says it like she is reciting the lines to an old play, some long-neglected script she can’t manage to forget.

I nod. “I know,” I say. “I know I am. I know I have been—we all have been. And I’m sorry.”

She takes a quick step back, but there’s nowhere to go, so she ends up bumping up against the wall. She flattens herself, hands braced against the plaster, breathing hard, like I’m some kind of a wild animal that might attack her at any second. She’s shaking her head quickly from side to side. I don’t even think she knows she’s doing it.

“Juliet.” I reach out, but she shrinks an extra half inch into the wall, and I drop my hand. “I’m serious. I’m trying to tell you how sorry I am.”

“I have to go.”

She seems to break away from the wall with effort, like she’s not sure she’ll be able to stand without it. She tries to squeeze past me, but I shuffle around so we’re face-to-face again.

“I’m sorry,” I say.

“You said that.” Now she’s getting angry. I’m glad. I think it’s a good sign.

“No, I mean…” I take a deep breath, willing her to understand. This is how it’s supposed to be. “I have to come with you.”

“Please,” she says. “Just leave me alone.”

“That’s what I’m telling you. I can’t.” As we’re standing there I realize we’re almost exactly the same height. We must look like the dark and light sides of an Oreo cookie, and I think how just as easily it could have been the other way around. She could be blocking my path; I could be trying to slip around her into the dark.

“You don’t—” she starts, but I don’t ever hear what she’s about to say. At that second someone yells, “Sam!” from the stairs, and as I turn around to look up at Kent, Juliet darts past me.