The blond guy gets up now and stands behind the podium. “Most of you don’t know me. I’m Mark’s older brother, Alexander. I’ve been living in Australia for the past year. I was supposed to protect Mark, but he never needed protection. If you knew Mark, you knew he would give you the shirt off his back. He’d do anything for anyone.”
Then a loud sob from a lady in the front row. Mark’s mom. She had stiffly embraced Tabby on the way in. I know for a fact that it was the first time they’d ever met. It’s like I’m a secret, Tabby once told me. Like I only exist when he wants me to.
Alexander continues. “My parents asked me to say a few words today, and a few words is all I have. I just want everyone to remember Mark as he was. Smart and strong and good to everybody. He would have gone on to do great things, but let’s not think about what he didn’t get to do. Let’s think about what he accomplished when he was here, and live how he would have liked us to. Bold and honest and grateful.”
He goes on for a bit, shares some memories of his childhood with Mark. Beside me, Tabby yawns. She hasn’t been sleeping well. When we were little, we insisted on sharing the same bedroom, even though we each had our own in the Rochester two-story. We would fall asleep cocooned on the floor under a sleeping bag. Then Tabby grew up, and the two years between us reared its head. Tabby had her own private life, a fabric that was too slippery for me to grip on to. When we moved to Coldcliff, Tabby put caution tape on her door, the kind you see at crime scenes on TV. It was a joke, but it wasn’t. She was guarding her new life, crouching in front of it like a dragon. She still is.
Elle is a few rows behind us with her parents; Elle’s mom is watching the back of Tabby’s head. She loves Tabby, and I know she’s worried about her. My sister is the kind of person you either love or hate. Nobody ever seems to be in the middle about her. Meanwhile, everyone is in the middle about me, stuck in the center of some invisible hammock, making it sag under their collective weight. I don’t have any enemies, but I don’t have anyone professing their love either.
When the service is finally over, we all start to shuffle out of church into the hot pocket of humidity Coldcliff has turned into. I guess they’re going to bury Mark’s body now at the graveyard, but it’s just the family—they’re doing some private interment. No Tabby. I’m grateful to have her to myself. The same way I’m grateful there wasn’t an open casket. I heard rumors about his head being caved in, and no amount of funeral makeup would be able to cover that up.
Alexander approaches us when we’re almost outside. My parents have already wandered ahead, holding hands, looking all disoriented, suburban zombies. They don’t know how to act around Tabby anymore. They haven’t for a while.
“Hey,” he says to Tabby. His eyes dart to me, but it’s more like a warning. You’re not part of this conversation. I pretend to be interested in the crucifix on the wall, the too-realistic Jesus nailed to it, blood surrounding the nails in his hands.
“You shouldn’t have come here,” Alexander says to Tabby. “You’re not welcome. I don’t want to make a scene in front of my parents, but stay the hell away from us.”
“Come on,” Tabby says, all candy-sweet. “You don’t seriously believe—”
I don’t get to hear the last part, because Coach Taylor comes up to me and asks how I’m doing, as if I suffered some kind of loss.
As if this isn’t more of a win.
Don’t take that the wrong way—I’m not a psychopath. I didn’t fantasize about Mark falling off a cliff and ending up dead. But it’s really no secret that I imagined him just going away. He didn’t bring out the best in my sister. He brought out something else entirely, and I still don’t understand what it was. What exactly he woke up.
“Hey,” Tabby says, swinging her hip into mine. “Hi, Coach. Isn’t my sister such a superstar? I can’t wait to see her kick ass again this year.”
Coach smiles. “Bridget is very talented. We’re excited for cross-country season.”
“I’ll be at every race,” Tabby says. “Your own personal cheerleader.”
I bark out a laugh. I swear, Coach blushes. He’s probably not that much older than Mark was—early twenties, baby face. Tabby has a way of making people react, of making their hearts beat just a little bit faster. Maybe it’s how she says things. She meant she would be my personal cheerleader, but now Coach is probably picturing her as his.
“What did Mark’s brother say to you?” I ask when we’re walking across the parking lot toward Dad’s Toyota Camry.
“He just said thanks for coming,” Tabby says. “It meant a lot to his mom.”
But I know what I heard. She’s lying, and I don’t know what else she has lied about.
Mark is everywhere on our drive home. Someone erected a billboard with his face on it, a picture of him in the pool after one of his swim meets, those giant fists churning up the water. He looks practically feral. REMEMBER MARK FORRESTER it says. Gold wreaths ring the streetlamps that line Main Street, downtown. Gold, because that’s what he would have won at the Olympics one day. Gold, because he still holds a bunch of high school swim records and Colorado state championships, his name immortal. Gold because Mark was golden, and now he’ll never tarnish.
Tabby looks out the window and dabs at her eyes, even though I don’t think she has been crying at all.
THE COLDCLIFF TRIBUNE
September 3, 2019
New evidence in Princeton hiker’s death
By Julie Kerr
Following an autopsy, the cause of death for Mark Forrester, 20, has been named as drowning. Initial reports pointed to his fall from the Split, the lookout point on the Mayflower Trail, being the likely reason for his death, but the autopsy shows that Forrester was alive when he landed in the water, despite a severe head injury. His time of death has been recorded as approximately 9:36 p.m., several hours after he and his girlfriend, Tabitha Cousins, had been spotted by another hiker on the Mayflower Trail.
Police divers have also been spotted in Claymore Creek. At this point, the police will not verify whether foul play is suspected, although online chatter continues to swirl around Cousins and her behavior in the days leading up to the hike.
5
ELLE
I’M NOT THE GOOD FRIEND everyone thinks I am.
Tabby and I are at the Forest Glen Mall today, shopping for new school clothes, which is a normal thing we do together, except nothing is normal after Mark. She says she needs to get on with her life and not think about death. “It’s what he would have wanted,” she says.
My stomach is flat again. Tabby comments on it when I try on a crop top. “You’re so skinny. You should definitely buy that. You’re going to have the best body at school this year.”
“Yeah, right,” I say. “That’ll be you.” As usual. Tabby’s body is the stuff of locker room legend, somehow both tight and soft.
“We’ll see,” she says. “So, have you talked to him yet?”
“Who?”
“Elle,” she says, putting her thumb against my chin like my mom does. “You know who I’m talking about. Have you honestly not talked to him?”