Wake Page 0,6

Carrie’s dream. Janie reaches for the door frames—first her mother’s bedroom (hush, don’t bump the door), then the bathroom, and then her room. She makes it inside, turns, and closes the door just as Carrie and Janie approach the riverbank.

The connection is lost.

Janie breathes a sigh of relief. She looks around, blinks in the dark as her eyesight returns, crawls into bed, and sleeps.

9:06 a.m.

When she wakes, both her mother and Carrie are in the kitchen. The living room is cleared of bottles. Carrie is drying a sink full of dishes, and Janie’s mother is fixing her homemade morning drink: vodka and orange juice on ice. On the stove is a skillet covered by a paper plate. Two pieces of buttered toast, two eggs over easy, and a small fortune of crisp bacon rest on a second paper plate, next to the skillet. Janie’s mother picks up a piece of bacon, takes her drink, and disappears back into her bedroom without a word.

“Thanks Carrie—you didn’t have to do this. I was planning on cleaning today.”

Carrie is cheerful. “It’s the least I can do. Did you sleep well? When did you go to bed?”

Janie peeks in the skillet, thinking, discovering hash browns. “Wow! Um…not long ago. It was close to daylight. But I was so tired.”

“You’ve been working ridiculous hours.”

Janie. “Yeah, well. College. One day. How did you sleep?”

“Pretty good…” She hesitates, like she might say something else, but doesn’t.

Janie takes a bite of food. She’s famished. “Did you have sweet dreams?”

Carrie glances at Janie, then picks up another dish and wipes it with the towel. “Not really.”

Janie concentrates on the food, but her stomach flips. She waits, until the silence grows awkward. “You want to talk about it?”

Carrie is silent for a long time. “Not really. No,” she says finally.

AND PICKS UP SPEED

August 30, 2004

It is the first day of school. Janie and Carrie are juniors. They wait for the bus on the corner of their street. A handful of other high school kids stand with them. Some are anxious. Some are terribly short. Janie and Carrie ignore the freshmen.

The bus is late. Luckily for Cabel Strumheller, the bus is later than he is. Janie and Carrie know Cabel—he’s been trouble in school since ninth grade. Janie doesn’t remember him much before that—word was that he flunked down into their grade. He was often late. Always looked stoned. Now, he looks about six inches taller than he did in the spring. His blue-black hair hangs in greasy ringlets in front of his eyes, and he walks with shoulders curved, as if he were more comfortable being short. He stands away from everyone and smokes a cigarette.

Janie catches his eye by accident, so she nods hello. He looks down at the ground quickly. Blows smoke from his lips. Tosses the cigarette down and grinds it into the gravel.

Carrie pokes Janie in the ribs. “Lookie, it’s your boyfriend.”

Janie rolls her eyes. “Be nice.”

Carrie observes him carefully while he’s not looking. “Well. His pox-face cleared up over the summer. Or maybe the new fancy ’do hides it.”

“Stop,” hisses Janie. She’s giggling, and feeling bad about it. But she’s looking at him. He’s got to be about as dirt poor as Janie, judging by his clothes. “He’s just a loner. And quiet.”

“A stoner, maybe, who has a boner for you.”

Janie narrows her eyes, and her face grows sober.

“Carrie, stop it. I’m serious. You’re turning mean like Melinda.” Janie glances at Cabel. His jeans are too short. She knows what it’s like to be teased for not having cool clothes and stuff. She feels herself wanting to defend him.

“He probably has shitty welfare parents, like me.”

Carrie is quiet. “I’m not like Melinda.”

“So why do you hang with her?”

She shrugs and thinks about it for a minute. “I dunno. ’Cause she’s rich.”

Finally the bus comes. The ride is forty-five minutes to school, even though the school is less than five miles away, because of all the stops. Juniors like Janie and Carrie are considered by the unwritten bus rules to be upperclassmen. So they sit near the back. Cabel passes by and falls into the seat behind them. Janie can feel him push his knees up against her back. She peers through the crack between her seat back and the window. Cabel’s chin is propped up by his hand. His eyes are closed, nearly hidden beneath his greasy curls.

“Fuck,” Janie mutters under her breath.

Thankfully, Cabel Strumheller doesn’t dream.

Not on the bus, anyway.

Not in chemistry class, either.

Or