The Outliers

“And that’s my fault?” Jasper’s eyes are wide and bright.

“I didn’t say that.” Though I do kind of mean it. I cross my arms. “Anyway, do you really want to do this? To waste time having some kind of situation between the two of us? You don’t like me and I don’t like you. But we both care about Cassie, right? What matters is getting her out of whatever mess she’s in.”

“How can I not like you?” Jasper blinks at me. Like that was the only important part of what I just said, the part about him. “I don’t even know you.”

I’m relieved when my phone vibrates in my hand again, saving me from saying something I shouldn’t. But it’s not Cassie. It’s my dad: Be home in ten minutes.

Shit. The time for stalling is over. We have got to get going. And I have to get myself out the door.

Any sign of Cassie at her house? I write back.

Not yet. But I’m sure she’s fine. Don’t worry.

Am I really going to do this? Not tell him or Karen that I’ve heard from her? I don’t want to keep it from them, but I don’t feel like I know enough to overrule Cassie. At least not yet. Besides, it’s not like we can’t change our minds. We’ll wait for more details. Once we know exactly what kind of mess Cassie’s in and how deep it goes, then we’ll decide who needs to know.

“Listen, we have to go. My dad will be home soon.” I grab my small duffel bag and start tossing things inside: a change of clothes, sweatpants, one of my bandannas. The bandanna reminds me of my hacked hair that Jasper has still been doing a decent job of pretending not to notice.

“Does your dad or brother maybe have a sweatshirt or something I could borrow? I ran out to come here when I got Cassie’s text.” Jasper looks down at his short sleeves. “If we stop back at my place, my brother will never let me leave again with his car.”

“Sure, yeah,” I say, feeling a little guilty that I’d assumed he was showing off his bare arms on purpose. “I’ll see what I can find.”

My mom’s Doc Marten boots are still sitting in the middle of my parents’ carpet. I stand in front of them for a minute, staring down. Finally, I push my feet in and jerk the laces tight—they’re a size too big, but not terrible. I also grab my mom’s favorite sweatshirt off the back of the door. It’s not an accident that it’s been hanging there for the last four months, right where she left it. But right now, I need it more than my dad does. Besides, he was the one who didn’t care about her shoes.

The last thing I take is from my mom’s nightstand. Her Swiss army knife. A gift from my grandfather when she was sixteen, it has her initials on it. Good for everything, she always said. I turn it in my fingers, feeling its weight in my palm.

When my hands start to tremble, I jam it deep in my front pocket.

Back in my room, Jasper is walking around looking at my photographs. Black and white, they’re hanging from a string that runs around the edge of my room. It’s been so long since I’ve even noticed them, probably since the day of the accident. Once upon a time I lived with my fancy, birthday-gift digital camera in my hands, seeing more of the world through that lens than with my own eyes. My mom always said I had this way of capturing the real person hidden inside, the mark of a true photographer, she assured me. Now, I can’t imagine taking a picture of anyone ever again.

“They’re kind of—” Jasper searches for a word, his eyes on a photo of an old woman sitting on a park bench near Copley Square with a big plaid bag next to her. She’s staring straight up at the camera, not smiling, a pile of crushed saltines between her feet. “Depressing.”

I hate how naked I feel. Because they are depressing. I’m depressing. But Jasper didn’t actually have to say that to me, either. I wonder if that was him being clueless or if he was trying to be rude. With him, it’s kind of hard to tell. But either way, I want him to stop looking at my pictures. I want him out of my room.

“Come on.” I shove a long-sleeved shirt and a fleece of my dad’s at him. “We need to go.”

Amazing how confident I sound. Like this outside thing is a real, legitimate possibility. Like it hasn’t been three weeks since I’ve stepped out the door. Sure. Right. No problem.

Once we’re downstairs, I try to stay in the moment like Dr. Shepard has taught me. Not to get ahead of myself to where the dread lies. I feel the scratch of the fabric as I pull the heavy coats from the closet, the cool metal of the doorknob. Those things are real. Everything else is in my head. But the panic monster—Outside! Outside! Outside!—is still screaming. And my heart is beating so fast it feels like it’s going to explode.

“Here, take this.” I shove my dad’s parka at Jasper.

Already, he’s studying the side of my face as I turn toward the garage. Jasper has noticed there’s something wrong with me, of course he has. He’d have to be a total idiot not to. For all I know, Cassie’s told him all about my “issues” anyway. And they’ve gotten way worse than even she knows.

I suck in a mouthful of air as I pull open the door to the garage. As I step out, the air is so thin and sharp. Like we just entered outer space. And that’s with the door to the outside still closed. I put one hand on a nearby shelf for balance and catch sight of my mom’s camping gear. The stuff I will never let anyone ever give away. I’ll take some of that gear too. I need to suddenly. I grab one of the compact tents, a plastic tarp, a sleeping bag, some flares, a compass, the water purifier. I stack half on the floor; the rest I clutch against me.

When I turn, Jasper is staring at all of it.

“Um, did Cassie say something about us camping somewhere?”

We don’t need it, part of me wants to confess. I do. To get me out the door.

“You never know,” I manage, then motion for Jasper to grab up what’s left on the floor. I point to the button on the wall next to him. “Can you press that? It opens the garage door.”

I twitch when the door grinds up loudly, squeezing my supplies so tight that they cut into my ribs. The pain is weirdly reassuring, though. Before I pass out always comes the numbness and then the tunnel to blackness. And I don’t feel any of that, not yet. Just deep underwater, the pressure crushing my skull.

As the door rattles the rest of the way up, maybe Jasper says something, maybe he doesn’t. Because I can’t hear anything but the roar of that door. Can’t feel anything but the thumping of my own heart.

There’s a rush of cold air on my face as the night sky finally rises before my eyes. I can see the house across the street, the front yard I played in so many times as a little kid. The side yard that was once my shortcut to school. Memories now from someone else’s life. The air smells good, too, like wood smoke and snow. Safe. And yet all I feel is more afraid.

Jasper is already out on the driveway, marching toward his car like the totally normal person he is. Loading up his trunk with the rest of my useless supplies. A second later he’s back, standing next to me, staring. But even with the shame of Jasper’s eyes boring into me, the pain of knowing that I could be wasting Cassie’s time, my feet still will not move.

There’s only one way out of this garage: to believe that I can. You can do it. You can do it. I hear my mom’s voice in my head. I can feel her fingers crossed as I inch my way for hours up the side of that stone. It got me up that stone. It’s what will get me out that door.

“Give me your arm,” I say to Jasper without looking at him. He hesitates, then holds a bicep out toward me. I wrap a couple of fingers around his bare elbow, which was supposed to feel less weird than actually holding his muscular arm. But does not. “I just need you to walk me to your car. Don’t ask why, please. I’m not going to tell you anyway.”

And then I close my eyes. Because pretending I’m not actually doing this couldn’t hurt either.

“Okay,” Jasper says, almost like a question.

My eyes are still closed tight as we walk forward through the garage. Still, I can feel the darkness rush in around me when we finally step outside. Breathe, I tell myself as we make our way down what I’m guessing is the driveway. I don’t open my eyes until I feel the cool metal of the car in front of us. Finally, I suck in some air, dropping Jasper’s elbow and opening my eyes only long enough to dump everything inside the open back of his old Jeep. I squeeze my eyes shut as I feel my way over to the passenger door. Behind me, I hear Jasper close the trunk.

I climb into the car, heart pounding. But for the first time it’s a rush of something good: I made it. I almost don’t believe it, looking down at myself sitting in the Jeep. I brace myself for all the questions Jasper will have when he finally slides into the car next to me. The ones I told him not to ask. And I can feel him staring at the side of my face again for a long minute, like he’s considering.

“Okay, then,” is all he says when he turns the key. Like maybe he thinks I’m a little crazy, but has decided to be polite and keep it to himself. And I can accept that. I’ll have to.

Instead of starting, Jasper’s car makes a loud coughing sound. “Don’t worry. It does this. It’ll catch eventually.”

And I’m so relieved when it finally does turn over. Because if I have to go back inside, there’s zero chance I’m ever coming back out. And then a second later we’re pulling out of the driveway, and another second more and we’re already halfway up the street. We’re really going. I’m really going. And I am almost starting to—well, not relax. No, that would be a huge overstatement. But nothing is getting worse. I haven’t passed out, haven’t thrown up, which in this case—in my case—just might count as better. That is, until I see headlights at the top of our street: my dad coming home.

I feel an unexpected stab of guilt. He’s going to be so worried when I’m not there. He wanted me to lock all the doors, and instead, I leave? And my note: Be back soon? It’s not like it explains anything. He’s going to freak.

It’s true my dad isn’t my mom and he never will be. He doesn’t get me. And sometimes I feel like he doesn’t miss my mom enough. Like maybe they had fallen apart for good before the night she died. But he is trying his best now. I have no doubt about that.

Still, I duck down as we roll past my dad’s car, moving fast in the opposite direction. I again choose protecting Cassie’s secret—whatever it is—over waving him down and telling him everything. Right now, I am Cassie’s friend first, a daughter second. And I could pretend that’s about me doing what’s right for her, but the dark truth is it feels a whole lot more selfish. Like it’s a lot more about proving her wrong about me.

On cue, my phone vibrates in my hand, and I brace myself for a text from my dad, begging me to come home. But the text isn’t from him. It’s from Cassie. And it says so very little. But also way more than I want it to.

Hurry.

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We do as Cassie has told us. Jasper and I drive briefly north on 95, then to Route 3 and onward north on 93 for almost an hour. The lights of Boston fade out behind us quickly and soon we pass out of Massachusetts and into New Hampshire. The highway is still wide, but pitch black on either side. Jasper and I each text Cassie again, more than once, hoping she’ll tell us something. How far north on 93? What next after that? What town are you in? Anything that might get a response. Are you okay? Please, answer us. But Cassie hasn’t. Not a single time.

The only person I have heard from is my dad. He’s already sent half a dozen texts, all of which sound pretty much exactly the same as the one that just came through: Please, Wylie, tell me where you are. Please come home. I’m worried. He’s called a couple of times, too. Left a message once, though I haven’t been able to bring myself to listen to it.

Not surprisingly, my dad found the Be back soon note I left in our kitchen lacking. But he’s trying so hard not to freak out. To even act like he’s also kind of proud of me for making it outside. To be honest, I felt pretty good about it, too. For a whole twenty minutes after we pulled away from the house, I was on an actual I’m-cured high.

Now, that prison-break rush is gone, but I still feel better than I have in months. Like being in the middle of this actual emergency is exactly the cure I’ve been searching for. Or maybe it’s just harder to hear all the alarms sounding in my head now that they match reality. Because there I am, hurtling north to an unknown destination for an unknown reason to save a friend whom I love, but whom I also know cannot be trusted—and I feel calmer than I have in months.