“Boys,” I said slowly, writing that down. “Like, the anatomy?”
She coughed. “What? No … not the anatomy. I thought we had moved on from that.”
Oh yeah … remember when I mentioned the incident about the internet? That was one.
The school librarian, Mrs. Yeltson, caught me researching the male anatomy once. I wanted to tell her I like to research everything equally, but she wasn’t on my talking list. So she just said naked men had no place in the library and put me on probation, which meant I couldn’t use the internet anymore without Ms. Hugger supervising. Mrs. Yeltson was not very friendly.
“I am sure Erin will take the lead,” Ms. Hugger said, turning back to the whiteboard. “But I think this is great. A friend your age is just what you need. Now, we were on to history—”
“Ms. Hugger?”
She glanced back, the marker halfway to the board. “Yes?”
“What do I do if a Game starts?”
Ms. Hugger walked over and put her hand on my shoulder. “Then you just take the time you need. Erin will understand. You couldn’t ask for a better friend than someone who gets you.”
I was still nervous, but I just nodded. “Okay.”
She squeezed my hand and started back for the board. I thought of something.
“If you ever want to gossip about Sven, I’m available. Just his personality. Not his—”
“Thank you,” Ms. Hugger said, biting her lip. “I will keep that in mind.”
* * *
I was lying in bed at two in the morning, still wide awake.
When I had gotten home from school, I already had six text messages from Erin.
Hey, bestie! How you doing? Can’t wait to hang tomorrow!
Ugh, my teacher is SUCH a pill.
What you up to? Lunch here. Tuna? I swear my mom wants me to eat alone.
Do you ever think that boys were created just to annoy you?
Text me back, girl!
Home finally. Can’t wait to hang! Be there at seven. What should I wear?
I just typed:
Learning, I don’t get it, eating and I like tuna, no, here I am, clothes.
I assumed that covered everything, but she was silent for a bit and then texted:
You are SO weird. I love it. See you tomorrow, bestie.
Of course, that confirmed that Erin really was coming over tomorrow night. My mom was happy about it too, maybe even more than Ms. Hugger. I had been excited too, but now I wasn’t so sure. I didn’t really know how to gossip. What kind of crafts did she like to do? What kind of crafts did I like to do?
“You can’t do normal things,” my brain reminded me. “You can’t go a day without a panic attack. You can’t go an hour without a quiet break. You can’t go a minute without being afraid.”
My thoughts started to pick up speed. It was true. What was I thinking, agreeing to this?
I stared at the shifting shapes on my ceiling—the shadows of tree branches like fingers that reached for me when the wind blew. I looked around the bedroom. Calm down. Calm down.
My room was an underwater library. It was literally designed to calm me down. The walls were blue and the trim was printed with orcas jumping out of the water. There were framed pictures of dolphins and even a great white shark beside my desk. That probably wouldn’t calm down most people, but from straight on they looked like they were smiling. One whole wall was bookshelves, with a few dusty stuffed animals beside it. There were 619 books in my room, spread across fourteen wooden shelves that my dad had built and carefully organized by category and then by last name. No dust.
Thinking about the books or the ocean sometimes helps. But it was too late today.
My thoughts were rolling together. I want to be normal I can fix this I can get better I can make a friend I can be an astronaut I can make Daddy proud I cannot breathe my stomach hurts I can be normal my throat is dry I cannot breathe am I dying am I dying I will never ever be normal. And the voice saying it got louder. Me, I guess. My brain.
I could feel the anxiety coming. I had taken my nighttime pills, of course. But they didn’t always work. If they did, I guess I would be cured. It’s part of the reason I want to stop—they aren’t a cure. Just a Band-Aid. But the main reason is that normal kids don’t take them. So if I want to be normal, I couldn’t take them either.
In fact, it’s rule number one on my list: Stop taking your pills. I hadn’t had the courage to try yet, but I would one day.
The pressure on the chest was building. Headache. Hot skin. Shallow breath.
I wanted to cry.
All I wanted was to be normal. Like the kids on TV, and at school, and in my books. That meant no pills. It meant no Games. It meant no mayonnaise, and no quiet breaks, and no cinnamon on my popcorn, and no this, and more that. All the things that everyone knew but me.
“It’s just a False Alarm,” I whispered to no one. “False Alarm. It’s not real.”
But my breathing still wasn’t working right. I tried to not have to think about breathing. That was a bad plan. I thought about it even more, and when I tried to make myself breathe normally, it seemed to stop altogether. I tried to remember that Dr. Ring said, “Your breathing can’t just stop, Sara. Humans can’t do that to themselves.” But that was easy for Dr. Ring to say. He wasn’t crazy.
Now it felt like I was breathing through a straw. I was sweating and tingling.
“Uh-oh,” I murmured.
My throat closed and went dry. My head spun and my brain cried out for help. It screamed, “Run!” and “Hide!” and “Freeze!” My stomach turned, and my heart pounded so loudly it was all I could hear, and I couldn’t shout because I had no air. So I lay there and got ready to die. And I was sad, but I was scared, too. Would dying be better than this feeling? I wondered. When the attack finally passed, it faded into a shadow, and I felt weak.
When it was done, I lay there, tired and spaced out and knowing that yes, it was just a False Alarm, and I wasn’t dead, and I shouldn’t have panicked. But yes, it would happen again.
Dad came home later. The front door opened slowly, and I listened as a bottle opened and he guzzled it. Creaking footsteps came up the stairs. He peeked in, a silhouette in the hallway.
“Hi, Daddy,” I said.
He came closer and knelt beside my bed. It was so dark I could only see his eyes.
“Hello, Princess.” He ran a hand through my hair. “You should be asleep. It’s late.”
“So should you.”
“Yeah, you’re probably right.”
There was something new in his voice.
“Are you okay?” I whispered.
“Fine.”
“You’re lying. If I could see you, I’d know. Your face, please.”
“Sara …”
“Face. We’re playing the Blind.”
The Blind was a game. You closed your eyes and felt the other person’s face to guess how they were feeling. I was a very good player. He sighed and leaned forward.
I used both hands, finding his face in the darkness. I ran my fingers over his cheeks and eyes and stubble like a sculptor, giggling when his fuzzy upper lip prickled my fingers. His eyes were the answer. They were swollen and puffy.
“You were crying,” I said.