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  KELLY: Eva, it’s not his fault that she died.

  EVA: Shut the fuck up.

  CHRISTOPHER: We’re just trying to help.

  EVA: None of you have any idea what you’re talking about. None of you know what it’s like to lose your mother.

  JASON: Maybe you don’t know what it’s like to lose your wife.

  EVA: What?

  SHIRLEY: Jason, how nice of you to join us.

  JASON: No problem.

  SHIRLEY: Care to elaborate?

  JASON: She’s sitting here complaining about how her father let her down and how she was going through all this pain, but did she ever stop to think what he must have been going through? Eva wasn’t the only one who lost someone. I mean, he just lost the person he thought he was going to spend the rest of his life with, and you expect him to be all strong and take care of this kid by himself? Cut the man a little slack.

  EVA: Fuck you, Jason.

  KELLY: He does have a point.

  EVA: Fuck you, too.

  KELLY: He could have probably said it a little nicer, but you have to admit it’s true. Your dad had his own shit to go through.

  EVA: Fuck you. Fuck all of you. Why are you on his side all of a sudden? What about me? Why doesn’t anyone care about me?

  CHRISTOPHER: It’s okay, Eva.

  EVA: No, it’s not.

  SHIRLEY: Take a tissue.

  EVA: I don’t want your fucking tissues, Shirley.

  OLIVIA: Can I say something?

  JASON: Behold, she speaks.

  KELLY: Shut up, Jason.

  SHIRLEY: Eva, is it okay if Olivia says something?

  EVA: Sure, whatever. Knock yourself out.

  OLIVIA: I know how everyone thinks I’m a snob, and you’re probably right. And I know this is going to sound really harsh, but I don’t know how else to say it. Just take it from someone who knows—Eva, you’re kind of acting like a spoiled brat.

  EVA: Excuse me?

  OLIVIA: It sucks that your mom died, and I feel for you. But I’ve just been sitting here this whole time listening to you and thinking what I wouldn’t give to have a mother like yours for just a second, and you had her for what—fourteen, fifteen years? She’s gone, but at least you knew what it felt like for her to love you. Believe me, I’d trade with you in a second. I’d much rather have a dead mother who loved me than a live one who doesn’t.

  CHRISTOPHER: You don’t think your mother loves you?

  OLIVIA: I know she doesn’t.

  CHRISTOPHER: Not even a little bit?

  OLIVIA: No.

  CHRISTOPHER: That can’t be true. It just can’t. How can a mother not love her own kid?

  OLIVIA: I’ve been wondering that my whole life.

  SHIRLEY: Eva, how do you feel about what Olivia just said?

  CHRISTOPHER: Eva?

  KELLY: Eva, are you okay?

  EVA: I just want her back.

  SHIRLEY: I know.

  EVA: I just really want her back.

  CHRISTOPHER: Oh, Eva.

  SHIRLEY: Just let it out, sweetie.

  KELLY: It’s okay, Eva. We’re all here for you.

  SHIRLEY: Here, honey, take a tissue.

  EVA: Fine.

  PERSONAL ESSAY

  CHRISTOPHER

  You’re probably wondering how I ended up here if I’m such a sheltered homeschooled kid. I’m still wondering the same thing. I mean, I never even knew places like this existed. Up until a year ago, I hardly even knew drugs existed.

  EVA

  This was no longer the neighborhood with the crayon-drawn houses, the smiley-face windows so inviting. No more sunshine or whispering grass. No more sandboxes. No more little girl stick figure. No more little girl. Where there once was a heart, there was now an almost-life plucked out, the size of a pecan. There was now a tiny, little death. A gaping nowhere. Another wasteland to be filled. Just desert. Tundra. Lifeless and windburned. Just the pieces of a life that needed refitting.

  OLIVIA

  It’s not like I was fat. I was just a regular girl, really. I know this because I’ve spent my life comparing myself to everyone around me. I’ve made it an art form. I’ve developed detailed systems to calculate where I stand, based on GPA, body mass index, fashion, popularity, family income, etc. Based on this criteria, I have always fared somewhere in the safe middle. What I lack in popularity, I make up for in family income. What I lack in BMI, I make up for with designer clothes.

  KELLY

  I was not always like this. I remember how excited I was when the twins were born. I remember going to sleep every night thinking about what a great sister I’d be, how much I’d teach them and take care of them, how we’d be best friends. And it was like that for a while. I remember when they came home from the hospital. I was constantly asking Mom if I could help, if I could hold them, feed them, change their diapers. When there was nothing for me to do, I’d make up chores just so I could be around them.

  JASON

  Oh, this is a good one. You’re going to like this one, Shirley. When I was twelve, on my birthday, Dad took me to this fancy hotel room. There was a lady in the bedroom, lying on the bed in her underwear. I remember her saying, “Happy Birthday, Jason. Your father’s told me so much about you.” And I remember wanting to get out of there so bad, wanting to get away from this woman my dad knew well enough to tell about me, this practically naked woman that was talking to me like a teacher would, except she was naked and sexy.

  OLIVIA

  You must understand that there are calculations for everything. Even the most abstract concept can be rated on a scale of one to ten. For instance:

  Kelly—Beauty: 8.5

  Jason—Class: 2

  Christopher—Confidence: 3

  Eva—Bitchiness: 7

  Me—Perfection: a big fat 0

  You may think this is weird, but really—what’s so strange about trying to make sense of the world?

  CHRISTOPHER

  Part of me still thinks I’m the good kid I’ve always been, that I’ve never really done drugs, not really, like this is a nightmare and I’ll wake up soon and be just like I was before—before Todd started climbing into my bedroom, before his coke and his meth and all the secrets that came with him.

  JASON

  I knew my dad had fucked her. I knew it as he stood there so proudly, like there was nothing weird about any of this. And he said, “Son, I’ll be in the other room. Happy birthday.” Then he winked. He fucking winked. Then he closed the door behind him and I was alone in a hotel room with a woman my father had fucked.

  EVA

  You’d expect something like a green sprout, perhaps a leaf unfurling in stop-motion photography. Something reaching to the sun. Something hopeful with its timid chlorophyll. But the girl’s rebirth was more like a fungus. Something flat and spreading and sinister. Without color. Without much need for light. Something meant to live in caves. Under rotting wood. Hidden. And someone said, “Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair.” So the girl cut it off. And the rain said, “Look what happens when you are seen.” So the girl dressed herself in rags.

  KELLY

  I’d look at my sisters sleeping, run my finger across the soft down on their heads, wedge my finger inside their tiny little fists and pretend they were holding tight and knew it was me.

  OLIVIA

  There are scales and numbers and grades and categories. Then there is plain old organization: checklists, to-do lists, files, systems, and on and on. When eveything’s in its place, the world seems a little less crazy. When my books are alphabetized and perfectly straight on my bookshelf, I can breathe easier. When my sheets are bound tight to my bed, the pillows all set up according to their invisible grid, my alarm clock and lamp balanced on my bedside table—only then can I leave my room in the morning. Mother says I should let the maid do the tidying, but she doesn’t get it. She doesn’t get anything. She’s too immersed in her social theatrics. She’s too distracted by her pills and martini co
cktails.

  CHRISTOPHER

  Part of me thinks I’ll wake up and still be that same sheltered homeschooled kid, and life will be uncomplicated, and there will be no more need for secrets. But once something like this happens, there’s no going back to the way things used to be. I may be naive, but I know that much.

  JASON

  It’s not like I was inexperienced. I was twelve, but I’d had Loraine McClellan suck my cock a few times. It’s not like I wasn’t ready for sex or anything. I don’t know what it was—my dad in the other room, the fact that she was a whore, the fact that he had fucked her—it could have been anything. But I couldn’t get it up. There she was with her black lace lingerie and big tits and everything, but I didn’t want to fuck her. I wanted to run out of that room and never come back. And she was all, “Oh, honey, what’s wrong? Oh, I guess you’re not quite a man yet,” and I wanted to kill her. I seriously wanted to hurt her, but I felt so fucking small. Do you have any idea how that feels? To be a man and feel inferior to a fucking whore?

  EVA

  There were caves with welcome signs. There were creatures that did not mind the girl’s cavity full of fungus, or the rags, or the mealy white scalp, or the newly gray tint of her skin. They were huddled around a fire. They were dressed in black. They said, “Join us.” They said, “We are as lost as you are.” The fire remembered. It said, “Let me cleanse you.” It said, “Let me take away everything you have collected.”

  KELLY

  I remember feeling a warmth inside my chest, a pressure like wet sand. And I was such a dumb kid that I was convinced it was God holding my heart.

  CHRISTOPHER

  Sometimes this place

  isn’t too bad. Like today, everybody who’s been on their best behavior and doesn’t have any demerits gets special activity privileges to be released into the real world. It’s exciting when we get to go anywhere, but usually it’s just to a meeting in a church basement full of people just like us except older. Either that or it’s the abandoned playground across the street, which is kind of depressing, in my opinion. But today they’re actually letting us out in public. I’m so excited I can hardly think straight, because guess where they’re taking us? Bowling! We’re going to an actual bowling alley where we’re going to be around normal people and rent shoes and everything.

  Eva’s been freaking out because this New Guy arrived a couple days ago and she thinks she’s in love with him. She looked at me all serious at breakfast and was like “I thought my heart was cold, Christopher. I thought I’d never love again,” and I swear it took all my strength to not laugh in her face. I know that’s mean, but really, who says stuff like that besides people in the cheesy Lifetime movies my mom watches?

  The New Guy is a heroin addict, but he’s not scary like the old one. He actually seems like a pretty nice guy, even though he wears an army jacket that’s too big for him, even indoors, and he’s always talking about how he wants to join the army as soon as he turns eighteen. It is totally out of character for Eva to like a guy like this, but she says they have a bond because they’re both opiate addicts and have to take the same medicine so they don’t get sick. He was in some other place before this one, and because of his good behavior there they’re letting him have all the activity privileges here right away, which isn’t fair at all, if you ask me. I’ve had good behavior my whole life, but I had to wait a whole week like everyone else before they let me go anywhere. He and Eva had some kind of special appointment yesterday with the doctor that only opiate addicts were invited to, but the doctor was late, so they spent a whole hour waiting in his office, just the two of them. Eva got all googly-eyed when she told me about his rough life and how strong and brave he’s been to survive it, and I wonder what makes him so much more special than the rest of us. Does being a heroin addict automatically put him on the top of the drug addict pyramid? He’s just a skinny guy in an army jacket, as far as I’m concerned. The fact that he has track marks and was homeless for a few weeks doesn’t impress me one bit.

  They’re supposed to be on my bowling team, but they’re all lovey-dovey and totally ignoring me so I’m just going to talk to Olivia and Kelly, who are on the lane next to us. Jason’s on the farthest lane away, and I have to admit I kind of miss him hanging around and making fun of everyone. I guess Eva and the New Guy are the new rehab It Couple now, which is just bizarre.

  Everyone in the bowling alley seems totally afraid of us, which is pretty funny. I was on my way to the bathroom and this lady whipped her arm out to shield her daughter when I walked by, like I was going to attack her or something. It doesn’t help that everyone’s being overly obnoxious on purpose. One guy stood on top of a chair and announced where we’re from, so please don’t give us any drugs or alcohol, thank you very much. Another guy started scratching himself all over and bugging his eyes out and moaning about needing a fix. The Pregnant Girl stuck her belly out and started talking real loud about needing to get a paternity test to see which one of her five boyfriends is the babydaddy. Seriously, you can’t take us anywhere.

  After Olivia got over the initial shock of having to wear used shoes and to put her fingers into dirty bowling ball holes, she actually seems to be having a good time. She’s not laughing, or even really smiling for that matter, but the fact that she’s participating and not scowling at everyone shows real progress. Kelly even convinced her to sit with us at meals instead of by herself at the end of the table like she’d been doing. She doesn’t talk much, but at least now she’s starting to seem somewhat human. She’s on some new medicine for obsessive-compulsive disorder, and it looks like it’s working, because Kelly says she’s stopped doing so much of her crazy organizing. She still doesn’t eat, though. She gets a plate of food like she’s supposed to, but mostly what she does is push it around. Sometimes she’ll take bites, but half the time she just spits it out into her napkin. I don’t know if anyone else is paying attention or notices this kind of thing, and I know I’m supposed to tell someone, but it just doesn’t seem right somehow. It seems to me like what Olivia really needs is to learn how to trust people, and that’s never going to happen if we tattle on her.

  All Olivia’s bowled so far are gutter balls, but she seems almost proud of them. Shirley told her that bowling would be a good opportunity to practice becoming comfortable with failure, and I think Olivia’s actually enjoying it. Every gutter ball seems to take some of her anxiety with it. Surprisingly, I’m one of the best bowlers here, which I know isn’t that big a deal, but it still makes me feel kind of proud. I don’t have a whole lot of competition, that’s for sure. One of the girls accidentally ripped her fake fingernail off, and someone else dropped a ball onto his foot. But no one really seems to care that we suck, because we’re all too busy being happy to be outside and doing something normal for once. After everyone got tired of trying to scare the Normies, I think we actually started to resemble real teenagers. If you walked into the bowling alley right now, you might not even notice us. You might think we’re just here for someone’s birthday party, that any second someone’s mom is going to bring out a cake and we’re going to sing “Happy Birthday” totally out of tune, and whoever’s birthday it is will blow out the candles and make a wish for something normal like getting into a good college. We can only wish to someday make wishes like that. For now I’d say we’re doing pretty well just making it through the day without having a meltdown and running out of this place screaming.

  The New Guy has to go to the bathroom, so suddenly Eva wants to be my friend again. She comes over and hooks her arm around mine and says, “Oh my God. I am so in love,” and I try not to show how happy I am that she’s talking to me again, or how mad I am that she wasn’t. Those are already strange feelings to have at the same time, plus there’s a third one that I can’t quite explain, like there’s this thing in my stomach burning and threatening to come out, and all I can think about is me being the friend she can tell these kinds of things to but never being the one wh
o gets to tell them. Even miserable Eva gets her chance at love. But not me. Never me. I don’t get a chance to tell anyone anything like that.

  She’s pulling on my arm and explaining how the New Guy is unlike anyone she’s met before, like, “totally authentic,” which I take to imply that I am something less than totally authentic, so I’m like, “What about the army jacket? What’s so authentic about that?” She gets this look on her face like she’s glad I finally asked, and she starts talking some nonsense about a moment of clarity and a sign from God, so I tell her she’s starting to sound like the Jesus freaks I go to church with. Just then, the New Guy comes back from the bathroom, and Eva tells him to tell the story about how he got sober and why he wants to join the army. Olivia and Kelly just finished their game, so they come over too, and now all of a sudden it’s like he’s surrounded by a bunch of groupies, and I’m getting more depressed by the second.

  The girls get all sad when he talks about his mom kicking him out of the house. They’re practically crying by the time he gets to the part about getting strung out on heroin and living in a park with a bunch of junkies and being scared of getting jumped all the time. I have to admit it is a pretty impressive story, and he does seem like a sensitive guy, so it’s getting pretty hard for me to keep hating him. I look at Eva, and she’s practically glowing, she’s so happy, and I feel a little squeeze in my stomach like jealousy or sadness, but also like I know she deserves to be happy and care about somebody for once, so I decide to get over myself and just try to like this guy like everyone else does, because that’s the Christian thing to do.