Ghost Time (4 page)

I mean, yes, it was my phone, but I’m telling you, my ringtone is the Cramps’ “Goo Goo Muck.” I just changed it last weekend—it’s another inside joke—it’s this shirt of Cam’s, see. Cam has this old shirt, and because it’s so shrunk now, he’s been letting me wear his dad’s old Cramps
Bad Music For Bad People
T-shirt: so fucking cool. Before that ringtone, I had the Ting Tings’ “That’s Not My Name”—still love that song. And before that, it was “Black Balloon” by the Kills: love. And before the Kills, I had Bowie’s “Life on Mars?” for ages, because it was my theme song, but anyhow.

I spaced out for a few seconds, thinking about that, and then Jenssen goes, Miss Denny, give it to me: here, holding out his hand, so I gave him my phone, and he turned it off before he put it in his desk drawer and went back to the board. I heard one of the guys in the back of the room make some sort of joke, and I was so embarrassed. And a minute later, there was this guitar riff, coming from the front of the room. Jenssen turns around with this look, like, not again, and says, What is that? And Ricky Meyers—he’s such a goof, he goes, I think it’s Bauhaus, and everyone starts laughing. No, Ricky’s not a goof. What I mean is goofs are the kids who try to be class clowns or whatever, and doofs, they don’t try. Ricky doesn’t have to try, that’s what I’m saying.

Anyhow, Jenssen goes, Who now?, and his neck started turning red, so I said, I think it’s my phone. In your desk. We all watched him, too—everyone saw Jenssen turn it on and turn it off. So he took my phone out of his desk and turned it on, waiting, then he turned it off and went back to the board. A minute later, it happened again: Bauhaus. But this time, it was loud, like, really loud. Maybe it’s broken? one of the guys said. I think it was Josh Bolton. I don’t know who said it, but then Mr. Jenssen curled his finger at me, saying, Thea, please take your phone to the office.

So I grabbed my bag and took my phone and I walked out. I started heading for the office, down the main hall. It’s this long
hall with a glass case that runs the whole length, with all the statues the school has ever won. It’s crazy, because the school was built in the fifties, the main building, at least, so there are photos that go back to the days of black-and-white, like ghosts of teenagers past. I was looking at some of their faces, and all of sudden, I heard this… it was a chorus of cell phones. Rounds—that’s what it’s called, like when you sing, “Row, Row, Row Your Boat” in rounds. Except that every face I passed in the glass case, a phone went off with the exact same ringtone, all playing “Bela Lugosi’s Dead.” You know how the bass line goes,
Doo… doo… dooooooo
, right? Like how it sounds all sinister, with that Goth snare echoing, and I was just like,
What the fuck is going on?
By the time I got halfway down the hall, it was so loud, I felt like if I turned around, it would pull me under, like an avalanche coming straight for me.

I don’t know why, but I broke out laughing, giggling, thinking,
Ohmygod, it’s going to get me! Bela Lugosi’s going to get me!
And then I just took off, running for the principal’s office, like I was running for my life. I couldn’t even hear my footsteps on the linoleum, that’s how loud it was, and I don’t know why, but I started screaming—I’m running and laughing and screaming, and even then, you couldn’t hear my voice over the music. I got to the office, I had to stop and lean over to catch my breath, and before I opened the door, I turned around, and I swear—I swear, this gust of wind blew my hair, and I stumbled, getting knocked over by it, like a wave. I know it sounds crazy, because it was, but after the wave passed, a second later, every cell phone stopped. Dead silence for five seconds, and then the fire alarms
went off, and then you could hear people going crazy, every room in the entire school, everyone just lost it.

On the bright side, I didn’t get in any trouble, because of that. Because it wasn’t just my phone, and then everyone was talking about it for the rest of the day. Like as soon as the bell rang, the halls were
insane
: people shouting, and all the teachers had to come out, telling everybody to get to class, because everyone was freaking out. I knew then—I knew it was a sign from Cam. I mean, I have no idea how he did it, but that was the first time. The moment after that wave hit, I turned around and I thought,
What if Cam wasn’t kidding? What if he was actually telling the truth?

(TWENTY-FOUR HOURS EARLIER)

5:04 PM

I’ve been having episodes again. I had a fever all weekend, drawing in tongues—that’s what my grandmother called it. Not Gram, my mom’s mom. No, it was my dad’s mom, Nanna. She said I used to throw fits, drawing, the way some children threw fits, kicking and screaming on the floor. She said it wasn’t normal—I heard her, telling my dad that. She said I should see a doctor, a specialist, and I heard my dad try to play it off, asking her what sort of specialist treats drawing in tongues? Really, Mother, it’s not epilepsy, he said, and she goes—I’ll never forget this—Nanna goes, Don’t be so sure.

Of course I didn’t know what epilepsy was at the time, and I could tell it wasn’t nice, what she was saying about me, but it’s one of my favorite memories about my dad, because I heard him sticking up for me. I’ll always remember him saying, Mother, Thea’s
artistic
, and Nanna didn’t say anything for a minute,
thinking about it, and I could hear ice being dropped into a glass. Then she said, She’s got a bad head, Michael, and Dad goes, Oh, please, Mother. Enough with the bad head, and I heard her lift her glass, mixing the drink, taking a sip. Then, Mark my words, she said, and I swear, it sounded like a curse. I was about four or five, and hearing that, their entire conversation, I almost blew my cover, pretending I was the CIA’s youngest girl spy ever, crouching on all fours, hiding behind the couch in Nanna’s sitting room. It took every ounce of self-control I had not to get up and march into the living room, because I was just like,
My head didn’t do anything bad, so don’t say that!

Seriously, I got so angry, because I didn’t understand what a bad head meant, and I was trying to be so well-behaved, too. Every time we visited Nanna’s house in Chicago, where she lived in this huge apartment on East Lake Shore Drive—I’m talking like twenty rooms, the place was so big. And of course my mom stayed home, in New York, making up some excuse, but she’d send me off with my dad for long weekends, always telling me to be on my best behavior. I know why, too, because this other time, I heard Nanna tell some friends of hers that my mother was very pretty, but she simply wasn’t cultured. I remember hating that word,
cultured
, because I knew it was being used against my mom, and against me, too, or at least half of me.

Also, it’s like Nanna had all sorts of wack ideas about what art was and wasn’t. Seriously, she used to love to say, Imagination is a wonderful thing—just so long as you don’t get carried away. She said that all the time, and I was about eight or nine when it finally occurred to me, and I asked her, point-blank, Then what
is the point of imagination, if you don’t get carried away? Then she told me I was
impudent
, and I didn’t know what that meant, either, but even then, I knew, deep down, she was afraid of my drawing, how I could get so lost in my own world.

After I got my first camera, I found out she didn’t consider photography art, not like painting and sculpture are art—fine art, she always said, photography is not
fine art
. She said, Thea, pay attention. Because if you paid attention, you wouldn’t need to take a picture of every last thing, now would you, dear? Nanna said people were taking pictures before they’d taken a moment to look at what was right in front of them, all these special moments they were trying to capture for all eternity. Well, how’s this for irony? After all her talk about remembering, after all her rants, Nanna lost her memory. Alzheimer’s.

That’s what I was thinking, holding my pencil in my hand, when I finally heard him: Thea? Thea… yo? I didn’t hear him before—I didn’t hear Cam saying my name, three, four times, and then I about jumped off my chair like, Oh! He’d been watching me, sitting at my desk, drawing, and he goes, You didn’t hear me, did you? I go, No. What’s up? And he goes, Can we listen to something else? I said, What’s wrong with Bauhaus? I love this song, and Cam goes, I know you do. Because you put it on repeat two hours ago, before you started drawing. Then he goes, I hate to have to tell you this, Thee, but Bela Lugosi’s dead. He’s dead, he’s dead, he’s
dead
, Cam said, standing up, walking over to my iPod.

I looked at him and made this face, like, Ha, ha, ha, but come on, two hours? I’d been out of it for two whole hours? I was just
like,
Nuh-uh
, then I looked at the clock, and it was almost eight—it really was two hours. Poor Cam, it must’ve been like Chinese water torture listening to “All We Ever Wanted Was Everything” over and over and over, not wanting to bother me while I was working.

So I told him, Sorry, I was just thinking about my grandmother, Nanna, how she used to say I had a bad head, and he said, That’s not true. And it was so sweet of him, I go, I wish she could hear you say that, and he stopped twirling the dial, picking a different playlist and hitting play. Then he walked over, and he goes, Nope. Good head, but you’ve got a… bad
ass
! Then he grabbed my arm and pulled me over on my bed, and he put me across his legs, saying, A very, very bad ass, and he was about to start spanking me, so I started screaming, Stop it, Cam! Stop! And then, out of nowhere, my mom starts knocking on the door: Thea? Thea, what’s going on?

Then, when she opened my door and stuck her head in, ohmygod… the look on her face, seeing me, spread across Cam’s lap, and Cam’s hand in the air, and she looked at us, and we both looked at her, no one saying a word. Then, finally, Cam goes—his hand still in the air, right—he goes, S’up, Renee? I had no idea what was about to happen, and my mom goes, Just checking, and then closed the door! I couldn’t even believe it—I go, Mom, come back! Mom, help!

(TWO DAYS LATER)

12:03 PM

No word. No call, no text, no e-mail, nothing. For twenty-four hours, I kept checking every ten seconds. Couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep, and then, finally, Wednesday morning, Karen called before I left for school to let me to know she was calling the police. And I knew—of course she had to call the police, it’d been two days. But somehow, I couldn’t believe she’d actually make the call, because that would mean Cam was really missing. Until then—even then, after she called—I kept expecting him to walk in the door any second. But all I could do was nod, and tell her I was here if she needed me, and then I hung up the phone. Sitting on my bed, I was just like—numb. I kept staring at the ground, thinking,
This isn’t happening, this isn’t really happening
….

When my cell rang again, ten seconds later, I was sure it was her, but instead it was an e-mail from Cam. I was so relieved, ohmygod, I didn’t know if I was going to scream or cry, and I
checked the message, but it didn’t say anything. It was a link—there wasn’t any message from him, nothing, so I just stared at the phone, thinking,
What are you doing? What is this?
And I was furious, you know. I was so worried about him, it’s no time for fun and games, but that’s all I had. So I went to my computer, and I clicked the e-mail, and it was a YouTube link. So I clicked and it started, and at first, it was so fuzzy and grainy, I couldn’t make out what was happening. I mean, it looked all night-vision
Blair Witch
herky-jerky motion, green crotches and… penis—ohmygod, it was a guy’s penis—and I looked up and my mouth fell open. Because it wasn’t just some guy, it was
us
. Only it wasn’t us—me and Cam—it was a sex video someone made of us. All I could do was cover my mouth.

Because it was a video of the two of us from Monday afternoon… having sex. It was only fifteen seconds, but I couldn’t shut my mouth, so I just got up, off my chair, and I stepped away from the desk, shaking my head no. No, no, no… denying it—I don’t even know who I was denying it to. I mean, yes. Yes, yes, it was my face, my body, my—my pussy. God, what word do you use to talk about your own sex? I don’t know, especially since it’s not true. I mean, even if it was real—yes, that really happened; yes, we really had sex, but it still wasn’t true. What I mean is that there are things that cannot be shared, no matter what you see, but watching, I felt tingly all over, then numb, and then my mouth started watering like I was about to heave.
That’s not us
, I thought, swallowing back.

Then my phone rang again, and I almost jumped out of my skin, checking. It was Karen again, so I didn’t know if I should
answer or not, because all I could think was that she was about to tell me she was watching the video, too. So my hands were totally shaking when I answered, and then Karen said, It’s me, Thea. Just wanted to let you know that I spoke with the police and I’m filing a missing person report. Okay, I said, still staring at my computer screen, and Karen said, They’d like to talk to you, as well. Is that all right? My stomach let out this huge gurgle, but I said, Yes, of course. I waited, holding my breath, but she didn’t say anything about the video, and then I asked her if she wanted me to go to the police station with her, and she said no, they’d be in touch.

So after we hung up, like two seconds later, I turned back to my computer, and the video was gone. No, seriously, it was gone. There was an error message, and I tried checking the history, but it wasn’t in the history. So right way, I reached for my phone, but then Cam’s e-mail was gone, too—both the video and his e-mail were gone. Honestly, I clicked and clicked, looking for it, like,
What the fuck?
Nothing. I must have been dreaming—a waking dream, delirious, I—I don’t know. Too little sleep, too much stress—I don’t know what. But I swear, it was real: I saw it. So I sat down again, and I sat there, until my mom knocked, telling me to get a move on or I’d miss the bus. I mean, seriously, I felt like I was losing my mind, and I was this close to shouting, Mom, there’s a video of me and Cam having sex on YouTube, you think I care about
the bus
? But I didn’t say a word.