After school on Friday, I head home and change clothes for work. It feels weird not going to soccer practice, but it’s even weirder that none of the guys on the team even talked to me today. It’s like I’m being shunned, which makes sense, I guess. I’m not on the team anymore.
Before I go to work, I text TJ.
Me: What the fuck
TJ: come again?
Me: Somehow you had an alibi and I didn’t?
TJ: Shit luck, dude.
Me: Are you fucking serious?
My phone rings after that. Before I can say a word, TJ says, “You’re gonna keep your mouth shut, okay?”
“Is that a threat?”
“I’m just telling you to play it smart. You should have thought of an alibi, man. They were coming around asking everyone. It’s your fault, bro. I mean, it sucks, but you know you can’t say anything now.”
“How could I have come up with an alibi when I didn’t know they were questioning everyone?” I say, my teeth gritting together.
“No one told you?” He sounds confused, but the fucker is probably lying.
“No, TJ. No one told me. I found out when I was called to the principal’s office and kicked off the team. He said every other player had an alibi, but I seem you recall you being with me that night, so how is that possible?”
“I was at my grandma’s,” he says. “Yep. I brought her Chinese food and did some chores around her house. She remembers.”
TJ’s grandma has dementia and half the time she doesn’t even know who you are when you visit her.
“You’re a piece of shit.”
“I’m smart,” he counters. “Sorry you’re off the team, man, but you should have figured this out yourself. Had someone lie for you or something.”
He just doesn’t seem very sorry. I think of the principal saying they had three anonymous messages that all claimed I was the one who did it. I wonder if they were all written by the same person?
“Enjoy getting off scot free for something you talked me into doing, you fucking dick.”
He snorts. “See you around.” And then he hangs up.
I’m so furious I almost throw my phone through the wall. Luckily, part of my brain still functions enough over all of this anger to know that phones are expensive and I can’t afford a replacement.
Dad is on the phone with Mom, from the sounds of it. Yelling about money again. Funny how I can just drown out these yelling matches most of the time.
“We’ll just stop wasting money,” Dad says into the phone. “No more dumb shit like organic vegetables. Just live more frugally and we’ll be fine.”
I don’t know what mom says on the other end, but I definitely know what she’s thinking. If he didn’t waste so much money on beer we could buy all the organic food we wanted.
I grab my keys, head to work, and put on a smiling face. Friendly pizza delivery guys get the best tips.
*
On Monday, I’m actually nervous as I get to school. I’ve sent Clarissa one text a day since Friday, and all have gone ignored. I wanted to call her, text her more. Hell, I wanted to show up at her house and beg for forgiveness, but I’m not an idiot. I need to let her know I still care and want to make amends, but I need to do it in a way that won’t drive her further away.
Now’s my chance to see her again.
I walk into the school alone. All of my closest friends are on the team and they’ve all somehow magically disappeared from the place we usually hang out at each morning. Whatever. Assholes.
I head straight for homeroom, and I slink down in my chair. TJ and Beau come in a few minutes later.
“Sup,” Beau says as he sits down. TJ ignores me.
“Just making do, I guess,” I say to Beau, even though I’m not sure his question wanted an answer.
“Sorry, man,” he says, giving me this pitying look. But beneath his eyes is exactly the kind of emotion I’d have if I were in his position. You can’t exactly feel sorry for someone who got in trouble for doing something wrong.
That’s not the whole truth, I want to yell. TJ was there too. It was his idea.
But I did it too. I participated. Hell, I had a blast destroying that greenhouse. Admitting that makes me feel the worst kind of shame. Had I known that greenhouse was being used, and that it belonged to the daycare instead of the school, and that it was hers, I wouldn’t have touched it.
I wish I could make Clarissa believe me.
She slips into the classroom just seconds before the bell rings, which is a first for the girl who is normally here early and ready to take notes.
She doesn’t make eye contact with me as she walks down the aisle and toward her desk. Just before she sits down, she slaps a paper on my desk.
“Morning,” I say, but as I expect, I don’t get a reply.
She sits down, leaving a wake of strawberry goodness behind her. I breathe it in slowly, remembering how it felt to be next to her at the beach. To have her in my lap. To have her lips next to mine.
I look down at the paper.
Greenhouse Supplies is written on top, followed by a list of supplies and quantities. At the bottom she’s written, Estimated total: $450
Damn.
I have the money, which is good, but that’s nearly all of my savings. I lean forward and say, “I’ll get right on this.”
She doesn’t reply. Doesn’t shake her head or even acknowledge that she heard me.
Clarissa Vale is back to being that cold girl she was on the first day of school.
*
Coach calls my name as I’m walking to my truck at the end of the day. I stop and turn around, almost wondering if I was hearing things. Coach has no reason to talk to me now. He’s standing there at the end of the gym, hands on his hips. He motions for me.
I walk over there, totally not in the mood to be reamed by yet another person. My friends have shut me out, Clarissa has shut me out, and my parents are in some battle with each other that I want no part of.
“Yes, Coach?” I say, wondering what you’re supposed to call a coach who isn’t your coach anymore.
“I’m disappointed, Voss.”
His lips press together into a thin line as he looks me over, disbelief and regret all over his face. I know he’s probably thinking that I’m the only straight A student on the team. That I’m the only good one. Well, not anymore.
“Me too, sir.” I sigh. “I don’t even know what got into me. I don’t know why. It was reckless and stupid.”
“I know you weren’t alone.” He looks me in the eyes, giving me that same look he gives us right before we start a game against our rival team. “If you tell us who helped you, I can talk to the principal. I can try to get you reinstated.”
“And kick the other guy off the team?” I say with a snort. “No thanks. I can’t be a snitch.”
“So it was another member of the team?” Coach says. I cringe. I’ve already said too much. “Someone’s alibi was faked. Good to know that I have two liars on my team”
“Coach…it’s shitty, I know. And I know it doesn’t even matter anymore, but I was the one trying to stop it at first. The other guy deserves the worst punishment. Or at least equal,” I say with a grimace. “But trust me. I’ve learned my lesson.”
“Tell me who it is,” he says. “I’ll work with you. Try to get you back on.”
I shake my head. TJ would kill me. He’s not even a good friend, so I have no idea why I’ve got his back. Or maybe I do know. It’s because we’re a team. If I betray one of them, I betray all of them. And right now, they’re all I’ve got.
Even though I’m pretty sure I’ve lost them, too.
“Sorry, Coach. I can’t ruin my life more than I have.”
I leave and he doesn’t stop me. I get in my truck and head straight home, grab my cash out from under my carpet, and then go to the nearest Home Depot. I buy everything on Clarissa’s list and get one of the workers to help me load it up in my truck.
While my old team is still having soccer practice, I drive my truck to the place where the greenhouse used to be. I back in, parking on the grass, and then one by one, I take out all of the green paneling, wooden beams, latches, screws, and nails. I take out the door hinges and the clay pots and I set it all down neatly.
Then, although I’m sweating my ass off, I load up all of the wreckage of what used to be the greenhouse. I see now, in the bright light of day, that these are new panels, too. Some even have the price stickers still on them. The wood is clean, the nails shiny, not rusted. This wasn’t some old shack like I thought it was when I was here in the middle of the night.
Clarissa put time into making this, and I ruined it.
I haul the broken parts to the dump on my way to work. And even though I know she won’t reply back, I take a photo of the materials and send it to her.
Me: I got everything on the list.