The Chaos of Standing Still by Jessica Brody (4)

Circular References

“Do you want to talk about your parents’ divorce?” Dr. Judy asked on my very first visit. I sat on the couch fiddling with a rubber snakelike gizmo that Dr. Judy called a “busy toy.”

Do all shrinks have busy toys?

My “busy” hands itched for my phone. For the sweet relief of swiping my fingertip against the cool, smooth surface of the screen. For typing and typing and typing until there were no more questions left in my brain. But Dr. Judy had a no-phone policy in her office. There was a sign right on the door. I wondered how strict a policy that was. What would she do to me if I reached into the front pocket of my backpack and just touched it?

Just a little feel.

A quick squeeze.

Would she kick me out? Would she fire me as a client? Would she tell my mother?

Do all shrinks have no-phone policies?

I almost laughed as the question popped into my head. We’d just learned about circular references in my computer programming class at school. Basically, it says that you can’t create a formula that references itself. It results in an error.

My request to ask my phone about a no-phone policy felt like that. A circular reference. A closed loop.

I wondered if my brain would error out. Shut down.

ZAP.

At least then I wouldn’t have to be here anymore, talking to a stranger about my life. How can a stranger possibly give advice about something she knows nothing about?

My mom insisted that it would be good for me, even though she’d never been to a shrink either. She doesn’t like talking about things. At least not things that matter. Neither does my father. I suppose that’s what made them such a good couple.

Until they weren’t anymore.

“No,” I finally responded to the question. For me, it felt like an eternity since she’d asked me if I wanted to talk about my parents’ divorce, but Dr. Judy didn’t seem fazed by the time lapse.

“No?” she repeated.

“Not really.”

“Not really?”

If this was how this conversation was going to go, then my mom was wasting her money. I could sit around all day in a dimly lit room and repeat everything back in the form of a question. Would someone pay me two hundred dollars an hour?

Maybe this was just how therapists worked. Maybe this is what all those textbooks on her shelf taught her to do. To add question marks to the end of sentences.

How should I know? I’d never been to a shrink before.

My best friend had never died before.

I fidgeted with the snake in my hand. I wasn’t sure what the point of it was. Twist it. Untwist it. These seemed to be its only two features.

I placed it on the table to my left.

“You don’t like the busy toy?” she asked.

“I’d feel better if I could hold my phone,” I told her.

She tilted her head. “Why?”

“I just would.”

She nodded. “Okay.”

I dove for my bag on the floor, feeling my pulse race as I touched it. Grasped it. The plastic case digging satisfyingly into my palm. When I sat back up, Dr. Judy was writing something on her notepad.

Suddenly, the phone didn’t feel so comforting anymore.

For a moment I feared she was going to ask me about the phone. About the case. About the text message. But she seemed to be satisfied with her note and moved on.

“How long ago was the divorce?”

When I didn’t reply, she tried something else. “Was it a messy separation?”

Take three: “Do your parents still get along?”

“I didn’t think I was here to talk about the divorce.” My response was like a boomerang. It shot out of my mouth so fast, I didn’t even realize how agitated I sounded until it came flying back and slapped me across the face.

“What do you think you’re here to talk about?”

I clutched my phone with both hands and tucked them between my thighs. I squeezed until my fingers went numb.

Dr. Judy’s eyes tracked down, studying me with a relaxed interest.

“What do you do with the phone?” she asked.

“What does anyone do with a phone?” I asked back. I didn’t recognize my own voice. It wasn’t mine. It wasn’t me. Dr. Judy’s office was a magic portal that turned you into someone else. Some ugly, irritable version of yourself.

She shrugged. “I don’t know. I suppose different people use their phones for different purposes.”

“I make phone calls.”

She nods. “Is that all?”

“I search the Web.”

“What do you search the Web for?”

How does she do that? How does she know exactly which questions to ask?

I glanced over at her bookshelf once more, searching for a thick tome about mind reading.

I swallowed and kept my gaze on the books. “I ask questions.”

“What kind of questions?”

“Any kind.”

“Can you give me an example of a question you might ask?”

No.

“They’re just random questions. They don’t matter.”

“They matter to you,” she pointed out.

My head swung back toward her, and I pressed my lips together. “I don’t like unanswered questions.”

She watched me for a very long time. For some reason it felt like a challenge. For some reason I didn’t feel like backing down.

“What about Lottie?” she asked. “Is she an unanswered question?”

I looked at my lap, forfeiting the challenge.

“Lottie is dead. You don’t get a more finite answer than that.”

The food court is a buzzing swarm of hangry people struggling to be civil to one another. As civil as a thousand lobsters swimming in a seafood restaurant tank can be.

The word “zoo” immediately comes to mind, and I picture all the people in line for the McDonald’s as hyenas waiting for their daily servings of meat. The longest line by far though, is the one for the Caribou Coffee. This is where the gang of slouchy meerkats queue up to get their pep juice.

There are only so many tables to sit at, so several small tribes of diners have set up camp on the ground, just outside the food court barrier. It’s like someone tore a seam in a giant grain sack of people and they’re spilling out onto the floor.

How am I supposed to find him in all of this anarchy?

Just then I feel a tap on my shoulder. I spin around and there he is. The same light brown skin, the same dark brown hair, the same striking blue eyes. Animal, wild-eyed and midscream, stares back at me from his T-shirt. If I were to choose a Muppet to put on my clothes, I wouldn’t choose the craziest, most schizo one of them all. I’d probably choose Kermit. He’s always so calm and composed, even when his psycho pig girlfriend is running around screaming.

Muppet Guy is brandishing my phone toward me like a game show hostess would. It takes all the strength I have left not to reach out and snatch it right from his hand.

If the hangry mob can be relatively civil, then so can I.

“Thanks,” I say, offering his phone to him.

Do we just swap?

Is it like one of those scenes in a spy movie where neither of us trusts the other, and we have to do it at lightning speed?

He casually hands me my phone, and I do the same with his. It would be the most uneventful exchange ever, if it weren’t for the fact that, for just a moment, his fingers brush against mine and I flinch. Partly because I wasn’t expecting to touch him, but mostly because I’m surprised by how warm his hands are. It’s hard to believe anyone’s hands could be that warm during the middle of a history-making blizzard. Somehow it feels unnatural.

He clears his throat. “I must say, you have excellent taste in phone cases.”

“Thank you,” I mumble.

He laughs.

Was that funny?

I didn’t intend for it to be funny.

But he’s still grinning, and I can’t help but notice how straight his teeth are. Definitely the result of some very expensive orthodontic work. No one is born with teeth like that.

“By the way,” he says, slipping his phone into a phone-size pocket on the strap of his messenger bag. “I think you have an unread text message.”

My stomach clenches like it’s trying to protect my kidneys and liver from a black-market organ thief.

“Did you read it?” The question explodes out of me. It’s not civil. It’s not polite. It’s not the least bit restrained. It’s a full-on ambush attack.

If he read it, then that’s it. That’s the end.

There’s no way to mark a text message unread once you’ve read it.

I’ve Googled it hundreds of time.

He blinks rapidly, obviously startled by the sudden hostility in my voice. I ignore his reaction and swipe on the phone, my eyes darting to the messaging app on the bottom of the home screen.

A red number 1 hovers over it like a heavenly halo.

One unread message.

I breathe out the dragon fire–tinged air that’s trapped in my lungs.

“Of course not,” he finally answers. “I just used the phone to call you. And send you that text a minute ago. I realized it wasn’t mine as soon as I turned it on.” He snickers like we share an inside joke that I don’t remember. “The folders were my first clue. That’s one organized phone you got there. How long did it take you to do all of that?”

His cheeks begin to twitch like little chipmunk cheeks. It would be endearing if he weren’t clearly making fun of me.

“I like knowing where everything is, okay?”

He holds up his hands in a defensive gesture. “Hey, I’m not knocking it. I’m just . . . impressed.”

But he doesn’t sound impressed. He sounds like he’s talking to a patient in a mental hospital after entering the kitchen to discover the patient has organized all the spices by country of origin.

“Look,” he says, hooking a thumb into the strap of his messenger bag. “I think we may have gotten off on the wrong foot.” He chuckles again. He just can’t help himself. “Actually, you got off on two wrong feet.”

He pauses, like he’s waiting for me to get it.

I get it. I’m the one who tripped on the moving walkway. I just don’t laugh. We haven’t known each other long enough to have inside jokes.

He clears his throat again. “Anyway, do you want to maybe get a bite to eat with me?”

Instinctively, I look back at the zoo. A zebra and a lion are arguing over who gets to sit at a table that just opened up. I think I know who will win.

Muppet Guy laughs. Does he do anything else but laugh? Maybe he should be standing in line at McDonald’s with the rest of the hyenas.

“Not here,” he says quickly. “A buddy of mine told me about some secret, hidden burger place in Terminal B. It’s just one stop on the train. He says they have amazing burgers. You know, as amazing as airport burgers can be.”

“I’m a vegetarian.”

He nods. “That’s cool. I’m sure they have veggie burgers. And it’s probably much quieter than this place.” He unhooks his thumb and jerks it toward the food court.

For the briefest moment in the history of brief moments, I consider going. But only because my stomach is still complaining about my unplanned fast, and I’m dying to go somewhere—anywhere—quieter than this.

But then he says, “C’mon. We can talk about Doctor Who.”

The unnaturally straight teeth. And the warm hands. And the Muppet shirt.

And I can’t.

“Actually, I have to go.”

Another laugh. “Do you have somewhere to be?”

This is funny. I know this is funny. Because none of us has anywhere to be but stuck in the middle of this mayhem.

I stroke the phone case in my hand.

My phone case.

My phone.

The questions from the last twenty minutes have been piling up and they won’t answer themselves.

“I just have to go.”

His smile fades. The curtain is drawn over the sideshow of perfect teeth. “Okay. No worries. But hey, if you change your mind, the secret burger place is at B89. But don’t like tell a whole bunch of people. Then it won’t be a secret anymore.”

“B89,” I repeat with a nod. Not because I need to remember it. But because I need him to let me go.

Because I need to go.

“Thanks,” I mumble, staring down at my phone. “I guess I’ll see you around.”

I turn and leave the zoo.

I know he hasn’t moved yet. I know he’s watching me walk away. Even through the buzzing swarm, I can sense it. Like he’s standing alone.

Like he’s the only human in the room.

75. I blame the Denver airport for making moving walkways that stop too abruptly.

76. I blame boys with Muppet shirts for not recognizing their own phones on the ground.

77. I blame the factory in Taiwan for manufacturing too many Doctor Who phone cases.

After that first visit, Dr. Judy stopped asking about Lottie. I tried to psychoanalyze what that meant, but I found myself trapped in another frustrating loop—the circular reference of a patient trying to analyze her therapist trying to analyze her—and eventually gave up.

Besides, what’s that saying about looking a gift horse in the mouth?

I figured I probably shouldn’t question her decision to omit my dead best friend from the conversation. I had no interest in talking about Lottie.

“How are you fitting in at your new school?” she asked me on my second visit.

My thumb absentmindedly stroked my phone as I shrugged. “Fine, I guess.”

“Fine, you guess?”

I was starting to learn that open-ended statements were dangerous inside these walls. They usually required follow-ups. And follow-ups led down dark rabbit holes. It was best to end things with decisive periods.

“Fine.”

“Are you taking any art classes?”

I gave her a quizzical look. It seemed like such a random question.

“I assume you like to draw,” she clarified.

“Did my mother tell you that?” I asked, feeling defensive. Feeling betrayed. I didn’t like the idea of Dr. Judy talking to my mother about me behind my back. It seemed like cheating. Insider trading.

Dr. Judy nodded toward my left hand, the one holding the phone. “I noticed the ink stains.”

I surreptitiously tried to wipe away the evidence. I hadn’t realized there was any left. It had been two days since I’d last tried to draw something. Safe, innocuous things like trees and buildings and blades of grass. Two days since I stared at those crooked lines and distorted shapes and then angrily tossed them in the trash, where they belonged.

“So,” she prompted. “Do you like to draw?”

“I used to,” I admitted, intentionally omitting all the variations of the second half of that sentence.

I used to be good.

I used to impress people.

I used to be able to draw a straight fucking line.

“What happened?” Dr. Judy asked.

I remained quiet. Eventually, she got the hint and changed topics.

“Have you made any new friends at school?”

I studied the lampshade. It wasn’t a particularly interesting lampshade. But it felt safe. “It’s still early.”

“Does that mean you want to make new friends?”

“Doesn’t everyone?”

Dr. Judy smiled tenderly. “I’m not asking about everyone. I’m asking about you.”

“Yes.”

“Yes, you want to make new friends?”

I didn’t like where this conversation was heading. It felt slippery. Like I could lose control of it at any moment. One minute you’re talking about new friends, the next minute you’re talking about old ones.

I dug deep down and conjured up the bubbliest, most enthusiastic smile I could conjure. “Yes. I would like very much to make new friends.”

Dr. Judy didn’t look convinced. She scribbled something down on her yellow notepad. I was starting to despise that yellow notepad. I was starting to despise her scratchy black pen and the cryptic hieroglyphics she scrawled with it.

The whole concept of a psychologist taking notes about you felt counterintuitive. It was like inviting a group of gossipy girls to whisper behind your back. To judge you when you’re feeling the most vulnerable.

“Let’s talk about that smile.”

My face fell. “What smile?”

“The one you just gave me.”

“I’m not allowed to smile?”

Dr. Judy put her pen down. I felt my muscles relax a bit. “I just think if you’re going to fake a smile, it needs to look real.”

The surprise must have registered on my face, because Dr. Judy chuckled. “Ryn.” She said my name delicately, like I was a glass ballerina figurine whose broken leg had recently been glued back on. “I don’t expect you to walk around grinning like life is some amazing gift. I don’t expect you to be okay with this. You still have a lot of healing to do. But I’ll be honest with you. There are going to be times when you’re going to have to fake it. And you’re going to have to do a better job than that if you want to convince people.”

“You’re encouraging me to lie?”

“I’m encouraging you to survive. Out there. In here, I don’t care what you do. You can act tough, you can fall to pieces, you can pretend like you don’t feel completely betrayed by the world. This is a safe space. But out there is very different. People won’t understand. Strangers won’t automatically know what you’re dealing with. If you don’t want people to ask questions, then you’re going to have to do a better job convincing them there’s nothing to know. You have to sell yourself.”

“So, in other words, pretend to be normal so people leave me alone.”

“Well, I suppose that depends.”

“On what?”

She rested her hands atop her pen. “On whether or not you want to be left alone.”

Desperate to get away from all the people, I decide to wander. I take a random escalator up from the shopping rotunda and find myself in some kind of hidden balcony that overlooks the A gates. It’s surprisingly empty. I’m the only one here.

I find an outlet nearby, under a bench of seats, and plug in my phone. The first thing I do after I see the little charging icon is set up a passcode. I definitely learned my lesson with that one. Sure, it will create one more step between question and answer, but it’s worth it. I never want to feel that vulnerable and exposed again.

I lean on the railing and stare down at the two long rivers of people flowing on each side of the moving walkway below. Most of the people seem resigned to their fate and are sitting on the floor. Some are still trying to get to places. Imaginary destinations with imaginary deadlines.

I breathe in the emptiness of my little hideaway, and for the first time in several hours my shoulders part ways from my ears.

How long before other people discover this place?

How long before the river down there floods and pushes the excess up here?

Being this high, watching over everything, I’m reminded of the tree house that Lottie used to have in her yard. Back when she was Charlotte and I was Kathryn and neither of us could drive and the world was a safe place.

It wasn’t really her tree house. It came with the house that Lottie’s parents had bought from a family with two boys. Apparently, they had built the tree house with their father. Lottie used to joke that the only thing her father could build was hedge funds.

I never understood what that meant.

I don’t think Lottie did either.

We used to have slumber parties up there when we were kids. I would draw and Lottie would gossip or try on makeup or dance around to whatever pop song was popular at the time

Lottie always had contraband in the tree house. Stolen Double Stuf Oreos and bags of Doritos and bubble gum with sugar in it. Over the years, it continued to be Lottie’s hiding spot. Except the smuggled goods became less innocuous. Tiny airplane liquor bottles swiped from her father’s carry-on after he got home from a business trip. Adult DVDs acquired from some guy in the mall parking lot. Lipsticks shoplifted from the drugstore down the street. Lottie insisted that because they were all cheap lipsticks in shades no one should ever wear, it was okay.

When Lottie’s mother found the stash a month after the accident, I told her it was mine. The gaudy makeup. The liquor bottles. The DVDs. All of it.

Two weeks later my mother decided to move us to San Francisco.

A week after that my sessions with Dr. Judy started.

I should probably tell my mother the truth one of these days. So she doesn’t continue to think I’m an alcoholic pervert with horrible taste in lipstick.

I tear my attention away from the people below and stare at the bank of information screens on the wall to my right. I run my eyes down the long list of (allegedly) departing flights.

No estimated departure time for any of them. It’s like the whole world has been put on an indefinite pause.

I check the clock on my phone. 3:56 pm. God, I’m hungry. When was the last time I ate? I was still in Eastern Standard Time.

I sit down and riffle through my backpack until I find a crushed granola bar at the bottom. It’s less of a bar now and more just granola. I search the crumpled wrapping for an expiration date, but I can’t find one.

Do granola bars expire?

I type the search into my phone but find inconclusive results. Apparently, there’s a differing of opinion out there about the safety of consuming expired granola bars.

Normally, I wouldn’t chance it, but I’m that hungry.

I rip open the package with my teeth, shake a few trampled morsels onto my hand, and toss them into my mouth.

“Eew. You’re really going to eat that?” Lottie chimes in with her culinary expertise.

It’s not like I have a lot of options here, Lottie.

“And to think, you could have been eating a burger right now.”

Veggie burger.

“Yeah, about that. Since when are you a vegetarian?”

Since I got food poisoning from a hot dog.

She sighs, and I can almost feel her hot breath on my ear. “Yeah, that sucked big-time.”

I pop another handful of granola into my mouth. It’s crunchier than it probably should be.

“I can’t believe you didn’t go with that guy,” she continues to gripe. “Do you know what the odds are of finding a Doctor Who fan who is also cute?”

One billion to one? I guess.

“Exactly! And you let him walk away!”

Technically, I did the walking away.

“Even worse! Have I taught you nothing, Ryn?”

“No, Lottie,” I whisper aloud to the empty balcony. “You taught me everything.”

“Then what are we still doing here? Let’s GO!”

I shake my head. I need to stay here and watch the screens. There could be an update about my flight.

Lottie huffs. “Yeah, ’cause there are no other information screens in the entire Denver airport. It’s just these. Hidden way up here where no one can find them.”

And I have to charge my phone.

I pour another helping of granola into my hand and shovel it in, grimacing as I chew. Something tastes off about this mouthful. That definitely didn’t taste like granola. Oh God. It might be mold. What if it’s mold?

“So you’d eat mold just to get out of spending time with a cute guy?”

I drop the granola bar onto the seat next to me and start typing into my phone again.

Can granola grow mold?

The answer, disturbingly enough, is yes. Apparently, pretty much anything can grow mold.

Even mold.

“Doctor Who, Ryn! He likes Doctor Who!”

Yeah, and I don’t, I remind her.

“Your biggest flaw, in my opinion.”

Well, I didn’t ask your opinion, did I?

I didn’t mean for that to come out as harsh as it did, and I instantly regret it because Lottie falls quiet. You would think being that she’s a figment of my imagination I could control when and where she makes her appearances.

You would think.

I tip my head back and pour the remaining questionably moldy granola into my mouth, trying to warrant a reaction, but the chatterbox in my head is still chatterless.

I crumple the wrapper and toss it toward the nearest trash can. It misses by about two feet.

Resting my phone on my chest, I kick my feet out in front of me and lean back in my chair, trying to get comfy. It would be nice if these stupid armrests weren’t between each seat, so I could lie down, but other than that, it’s not so bad. I could stay up here until my flight takes off. No problem. I think I even saw a restroom on the other side of the escalator.

I let my heavy eyelids sag. But just before they close, my phone starts to vibrate. I know immediately—from the string of seven notifications in a row—that it’s my mother texting.

I unlock the screen and read through them one by one.

Mom: The weather channel says the storm is getting worse.

Mom: Why aren’t you texting me back?

Mom: Before I forget, do you want me to pick up anything from the supermarket?

Mom: Have you eaten anything today?

Mom: You need to eat.

Mom: The Denver airport website says there’s a bagel place in Terminal C.

Mom: But you’ll have to get on a train to get there.

I’m about to tap out a response when I notice a flicker of activity to my right. I whip my gaze toward the screens, and that’s when I notice the change.

Flight 112 to San Francisco no longer has a big fat DELAYED stamp next to it. It now says:

AT 7:41 P.M.

I look at my phone. That’s less than four hours from now.

I’m going to be getting out of here in less than four hours!

Thank God.

My stomach, obviously not satisfied with my meager offerings, lets out another low rumble, as if to say, “What else you got up there?”

I glance at the screens again, just to make sure I wasn’t imagining it.

Nope. We have liftoff at 7:41 p.m.

Which means I have nothing else to do between now and then except kill time.

Fine, I think with a huff, standing up, yanking my charger from the outlet, and flinging my backpack over my shoulder. But I’m not doing this for me, Lottie. I’m doing it for you.

I expect this to bring her back. It’s just the kind of incendiary remark that she loves to respond to. But as I ride the escalator back down into the chaos, in search of a route to gate B89, Lottie remains suspiciously silent.