The Outliers. Kimberly McCreight

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СКАЧАТЬ might have told me. Now I’ll never know for sure.

      I look down at my plate, avoiding my dad’s stare as I push some perfectly cooked asparagus into a sculpted mound of couscous. In a rough patch, my appetite is always the first to go. And since the accident, life is basically one long rough patch. But it’s too bad I’m not hungry. My dad’s cooking is one of the few things we’ve had going for us—he’s always been the family chef.

      “You said I could decide when I was ready to go back to school,” I say finally, even though I’m already sure that I will never be ready, willing, or able to return to Newton Regional High School. But there is no reason to break that to my dad, at least not yet.

      “When you go back to school is up to you.” He’s trying to sound laid-back, but he hasn’t touched his food either. And that little vein in his forehead is standing out. “But I don’t love you bumping around alone in this house day after day. It makes me feel—it’s not good for you to be by yourself so much of the time.”

      “I enjoy my own company.” I shrug. “That’s healthy, isn’t it? Come on, you’re the psychologist. High self-esteem and all that.”

      It’s crazy how much less convincing my smile feels each time I force it. There is even a part of me that knows it would be better if I finally lost this argument. If I was forced, kicking and screaming, back inside Newton Regional High School. Because one thing is for sure: being home isn’t making me any better.

      “Come on, Wylie.” My dad eyeballs me, crosses his arms. “Just because you like yourself doesn’t mean that—”

      There’s a loud knock at our front door then. It makes us both jump. Please, not Gideon—that’s what I think, instantly. Because the last time an unexpected knock came, one of us was ripped away. And Gideon—my opposite twin, my mom used to joke, for how insanely different we are, including that Gideon is a science and history whiz and I’m all about math and English—is the only one of us left who’s not at home.

      “Who’s that?” I ask, trying to ignore the wild beating of my heart.

      “Nothing to worry about, I’m sure,” my dad says. But he has no idea who’s at the door, or what there might be to worry about. That’s obvious. “Someone probably selling something.”

      “No one sells things door-to-door anymore, Dad.” But he’s already tossed his napkin on the table and started through the living room toward the front door.

      He’s got the door open by the time I round the corner.

      “Karen.” He sounds relieved. But only for a second. “What are you—what’s wrong?”

      When I can finally see past him, there’s Cassie’s mom, Karen, standing on our porch. Despite the sickly yellow glow of our energy-efficient outdoor bulbs, Karen looks as coiffed as always—her brown, shoulder-length hair perfectly smooth, a bright-green scarf knotted neatly above her tailored white wool coat. It’s the beginning of May, but we’re locked deep in one of those mean Boston cold snaps.

      “I’m sorry to just show up like this.” Karen’s voice is all high and squeaky. And she’s panting a little, her breath puffing out in a cloud. “But I called a couple times and no one answered, and then I was driving around looking for her when I saw your light on and I guess—God, I’ve looked everywhere.” When she crosses her arms and takes a step closer, I notice her feet. They’re completely bare.

      “Looked everywhere for who—” My dad has caught sight of them, too. “Karen, what happened to your shoes? Come inside.” When she doesn’t move, he reaches out and tugs her forward, gently. “You must be freezing. Come, come.”

      “I can’t find Cassie.” Karen’s voice cracks hard as she steps inside. “Can you—I hate to ask, Ben. But can you help?”

      

      In the living room, my dad guides Karen to a nearby chair. She drops down, body stiff, face frozen. Nothing at all like I’ve ever seen her. Because it’s more than Karen’s clothes that are always perfect. She is always perfect, too. “The Plague of Perfect,” Cassie actually calls her—so thin and so pretty, always with a smile and never a hair out of place. And thin. It’s worth saying that twice. Because according to Cassie, someone’s weight matters to Karen twice as much as anything else. And that could be true. Karen’s never been anything but nice to me, but there is something about the way she talks to Cassie, a sharp edge buried inside her smooth voice. Like she loves her daughter, but maybe doesn’t like her very much.

      “Wylie, can you get Karen a glass of water?”

      My dad is staring at me. He’s worried about this—whatever it is—upsetting me. The last thing I need is to be more upset; it’s not a totally unfair point. So he’s dismissing me for my own good. As if keeping me from the room could ever keep me from worrying about Cassie now. I’ve already heard enough.

      “Water would be great,” Karen says, but like she couldn’t want anything less. She’s just following my dad’s lead. “Thank you.”

      “Wylie,” my dad presses when I stay put, staring at the carpet.

      But I have to be careful. If I seem like I’m losing it, he’ll make me go upstairs for good. He might even tell Karen to leave before I find out what’s going on. And I need to know. Even after everything that’s happened between us, even though this isn’t exactly my first-ever Cassie-related emergency, I still care about what happens to her. I always will.

      I can tell by the look on my dad’s face. He wants to wrap this up ASAP and send Karen on her way. He’ll do that, too, no matter how much he likes Karen and Cassie. Since the accident, he’s drawn a lot of new lines in the sand—with my grandparents, teachers, doctors, neighbors. Anything to protect Gideon and me. More me, it’s true. Gideon has always been the “more resilient” one. That’s what people say when they think I’m not listening. And if they’re my grandmother—my dad’s mom—they even say it to my face. She cornered me at the house right after my mom’s funeral and told me all about how I should really try to be more like Gideon. That was right before my dad asked her to never visit again.

      The truth is, my grandmother never liked me. I remind her too much of my mom, who she also never liked. But she was right about Gideon. He does bounce back more easily than me. He always has. Feelings, especially the bad ones, roll right off him—probably something having to do with that huge computer brain of his—while on me they get stuck, forever trapped in my gooey, inescapable mess. Don’t get me wrong, Gideon’s definitely been sad. He misses our mom, but he’s mostly stoic like my dad. I’m more like our mom. Except if her feelings were always cranked up to full volume, mine have blown out the speakers.

      “Okay, water, fine,” I say to my dad, who’s still eyeballing me. “I’m going.”

      Cassie and I became friends in a bathroom. Hiding in the bathroom of Samuel F. Smith Memorial Middle School, to be exact. It was December of sixth grade and I’d headed to the bathroom, planning to crouch up on a toilet through all of homeroom if I had to. It didn’t occur to me that someone else might have the same idea when I banged hard on the door in the last stall.

      “Ow!” СКАЧАТЬ