Please Don't Tell - Laura Tims Page 0,3

have the double sports bra boobs, the narrow upper lip, the stubby Morris thumbs from Dad.

“So how was the party?” she asks, throwing a spear through my chest.

“You know I went?”

“I heard you climb out your window.” A weird cold silence. “You said we shouldn’t go, and you went by yourself.”

I laugh desperately. “It doesn’t matter now, does it?”

“You didn’t have anything to do with him falling, then.”

“No.” I need her to believe I’m not capable of that. No matter what threats I’ve made, raging at my worst. “I thought I’d confront him or something. It was stupid. But I left before anything happened to him. The night’s . . . blurry.”

“You were drunk?”

Remember what happened the last time you got drunk there?

“I was scared,” I say.

Sweat dyes dark circles under her armpits, on her chest. People always say twins can read each other’s minds. I’m supposed to be able to read her mind.

“Are we still fighting?” I ask.

“I guess not.”

“Can you get off the treadmill?”

“Can’t. I ate, like, five hundred extra calories by accident.”

Which is one of the things she says these days that I don’t get.

Then she’s silent forever, except for the pound of her feet on the treadmill. Silence is the worst thing someone can give you. Your mind fills it with every possible bad thing.

He’s gone, but nothing’s changed. What if this is just the way things are now?

“Joy?” She steps off the treadmill, finally. Her makeup’s not so perfect after all, foundation-caked scabs on her forehead where she’s been squeezing blackheads, eyebrows plucked raw. But her eyes are still a little bluer than mine.

“I’m fine,” she’s saying. “I’m fine with it. I’ve always been fine. Everything will be okay now.”

TWO

October 3

I’VE NEVER THOUGHT ABOUT HOW BIG A coffin a six-foot-tall person needs. The lid’s open and I can’t see him from our spot in the back, but I can feel his ghost. Since it happened, any room he was in was on fire. This one’s barely smoking.

November slouches beside me, her earbuds twisted around her wrist. “You okay?”

I make myself smile. “I’m always okay.”

She nods. “So, Grace isn’t . . .”

“No, she’s not coming.”

She nods again.

Above us, there’s a dustless plaster Jesus on a glossy black cross, even though it’s a funeral home, not a church. There’s another service going on across the hall, smaller but with people crying louder. How many funerals does a town like Stanwick have per week? How often do people die?

I look around. Half the school’s here. Even Principal Eastman sits in front, tall and straight so people notice he came. Ms. Bell, a beaded black scarf around her neck, murmurs to Ben Stockholm, quick hands illustrating everything she says. Cassius is in the corner, hunched like something’s fighting its way out of his spine. I can’t tell if I feel bad for him or if I want to yell at him.

And Mr. Gordon—Adam’s dad—stands near the casket, fumbling to shake people’s hands as they greet him. His alcohol stink battles the smell of all the flowers, makes the hidden bottle in my pocket burn. His hair curls in gray waves under his cheekbones, skin too taut over a jawline that probably cut through hearts like butter when he was eighteen. Adam would have looked like him.

“I don’t care how famous this song is,” Nov grunts. “It’s creepy how they keep playing it on repeat.”

Abe Gordon, Adam’s grandfather, sings over the speakers: “And I’ll carry you down to the quarry, once it’s dark and there’s no point sayin’ sorry . . .”

Suddenly everyone is shuffling, taking their seats, and Mr. Gordon picks up the microphone.

“Adam was . . . my son.” Mr. Gordon strangles the mic. His voice filters through gravel. “And he was . . . his grandfather’s grandson. He’d’ve made it as far as my father, that’s the musical talent he had. . . .”

Parents have no idea how little they know about the people they gave life to.

“Adam—” And then Mr. Gordon shakes his head, takes a deep breath, and pukes. The mic broadcasts the sound, the smell hitting us all at once. He staggers. An Asian guy I’ve never seen before—his hair gelled in short spikes and a T-shirt blazing orange underneath a too-small black vest—leaps up, catching Mr. Gordon’s elbow. I can’t hear what the guy says as he quickly steers Mr. Gordon past us and out the door, but his tone’s low and comforting.

“Jeeesus,” November mutters.

“Who’s that guy?” I whisper. “Why’s Mr. Gordon his