• A shot like thunder erupted from the gun. I couldn’t move. I don’t know if I saw it coming. Maybe I just didn’t want to.

    When Cat came to me asking if I had seen her, Bailey, I didn’t think much of it. We were all in the high school marching band, and were playing pep songs at a home game. It was basketball season; Cougars versus Wardens, and we were losing.

    “She probably just went to the bathroom.” I answered, shrugging. At the moment the score was 24-17, and if the boys worked extra in the third quarter, we’d have a chance at making a comeback. Cat was staring at me.

    “I don’t know, She left somewhere around second quarter and has been gone all of halftime. Do you think she’s okay?” Cat was what you could call ‘well named’. She came off as pretty and fun, but had a vicious and apathetic side that I never wanted to get on. Bailey and she had been tight since 9th grade, with a few bumps, and Cat had always been furtively protective of her. I guess we all were. That’s how it is in band, the weirder and more gregarious they act, the more fragile they are. Bailey was no exception.

    “Look, we have a break for most of third.” I didn’t want to, but the accommodating part of me began to take interest, “How about I help you check around for her?” I said this hoping that
    a) With two people Bailey could be found more quickly, and I would miss less of the potential comeback
    And
    b) I would feel like a terrible person by making Cat look for the girl all by herself.

    Thus, Cat and I split up and scoured the halls for our missing Bandie, calling out her name, checking six different bathrooms, four classrooms, and several hallways; But alas, no dice. Finally, when we met up again, we ended up rounding a corner and aha, there she stood facing a vending machine, her hands in her too-big sweatshirt pocket and staring down the soda dispenser.

    “Bailey!” I hollered, aggravated because Cat’s concern had gotten me hyped up, and I was actually worried. “Where have you been? We need to head back to the gym, third is almost over.” Cat and I approached as I said this, Bailey turning to greet us with a smile. Now that I look back, it seemed strained.

    “Hey Margie, Cat. I just was getting a soda. This damn machined ate my money.” Her voice was annoyed and light, normal. She had been like this all day, during lunch she didn’t eat, but cracked jokes and comments that made me almost piss my pants. How was I ever worried?

    Cat sighed in irritation, pinching her lips to the side in her usual ‘not happy’ face, and shook her head. “Bae, you had me freaked. Why didn’t you just come get me for another dollar?” She cocked her head in a motion that meant ‘we should jet’ and turned, walking coolly back down the hall. I watched Bailey lower her head slightly, and glance down.

    “Sorry, I just didn’t want to ask you for money again.” She followed, walking behind both me and Cat, but keeping up well. “I feel so bad about always asking.”

    Cat let out another exasperated sigh, and looked over her shoulder. “Bailey. It’s stupid to feel bad about that. Stop it.” I kept my eyes forward, not wanting to be a part of this. Cat wasn’t trying to be mean; she just has a hard time showing how much she cares, just like me. It seems like out of the three of us, Bailey was the only one with enough grasp on her feeling to be able to express them freely and lovingly.

    “Sorry guys. I didn’t mean to make you worry.” Her voice was still light, still sunny, but it was different. The sun was artificial. Out of my peripheral vision I saw her slow down. “I’m sorry. I’m just so tired. I can’t keep up with you.” She had stopped. It was then I noticed the bulge in her pocket that wasn’t just her hands. “I’m so sorry.” She repeated, and the apologies began to lose meaning. They were just words, no feeling; no thought—just a reflexive statement that was supposed to make it all better. Cat and I turned as she pulled the thick weighty metal out of her sweatshirt, its shape glistening in the light with objectified malice. I opened my mouth to say something, anything, while Bailey held the gun to her head, the nozzle pressed firmly against her throat and angled to go straight through, all the way to her crown. There were no words—Cat was caught about as off guard as me—there was only Bailey.

    Bailey pulling the trigger.
    Bailey’s head blown apart.
    Bailey falling.
    Bailey on the floor.
    Bailey’s blood.

    I felt wetness on my face, but I knew I wasn’t crying. I never cry. It was Bailey. Parts of her were on my face, in my hair, staining my cloths. I could taste copper on my lip, and see red all over Cat’s front. Bailey.

    I was the first to speak, my voice a whisper, as if my very words would make the world crumble. “I’ll go get help.” Cat didn’t reply; I was two hallways away when I heard the shrill scream and quickened my pace.
    The rest was like a photo album. No noise, no movements, just snapshots.

    The principal and Greg, campus security, rushed to me as I approached; they found Bailey, Cat screaming and crying, pulling her hair and pacing near the body. Cat never touched her though, no one but the paramedics touched her—and the mortician. There wasn’t going to be a funeral, Bailey’s mom couldn’t afford one.

    I had sat in the hospital while nurses and police officers check me over, removed Bailey from my body, asked me questions that I didn’t have answers to. My mom, my dad, and Jason, my little brother, had come to see me, to pick me up and take me home. I passed Cat’s room on the way out. She was still crying.

    When I was home I didn’t think about Bailey. I did my homework and went to school; I ate lunch and talked with friends. Bailey wasn’t there, but that was okay. Bailey was dead, and I understood that. It didn’t bother me; it was like she had moved away.

    When I slept, I had dreams about school, physics exams and chemistry labs. Bailey wasn’t in them. Bailey was gone. This didn’t surprise me, though. I didn’t have a single class with her when she was alive except band and lunch; she came to visit me every day in my home room and ate there with me.

    Outside of school we didn’t see each other much either, I was busy with cheerleading and Bailey was doing volunteer services 24/7. She thought that if she could save the world she would be happy.

    Now I am in my room. The game had been two weeks ago. Two weeks, 3 days, 4 hours, 15 minutes… It’s two in the morning and I can’t sleep. I close my eyes and my heart speeds up. Two weeks of nothing and now Bailey is all I see, all I feel, her voice is all I hear. Two weeks, 3 days, 4 hours, 30 minutes… I sit up in my bed. I can’t fight it, and let my mind wander back to a conversation I held with her, month ago, before any of this.

    “Margie, you know what my problem is?” She asked sipping a cup of chai in the local Tully’s, her eyes fixed on my spoon as I stirred my mocha.

    “What is it, Bailey?” I replied, appeasing her with my interest in her latest revelation.

    “The whole world around me is laminated.” She declared, putting her glass down and meeting my eyes. I raised a brow.

    “Really?” Bailey had always been strange, her view on life a few degrees off from everyone else’s.

    “Yeah. That’s why I can’t really connect with anyone. Not even you. I don’t know if it’s the people around me or if it’s me that doing it, but it’s like there’s a clear layer of protection that covers everyone I know, though some are thicker than others.” She sat back, getting into her philosophical lecture mode, a way she had always gotten when she spoke of ‘emotions’ or any of that psychological crap she got from her therapist. “It’s like all of you have plastic wrap covering yourselves just in case I make a mess.”

    I shrugged, tasting my coffee, and then drinking it slowly. “I think you over analyze everything way too much.” I answered back, smiling at her.

    “And I think you are not fit to judge.” Bailey giggled, but her eyes said otherwise. I don’t think I heard what she was trying to say.

    Now I am in my room. The game had been two weeks ago. Two weeks, 3 days, 5 hours, 2 minutes… I am crying. I don’t cry, but I am.

    I cry when I get out of bed, and I cry when I get dressed. Tears roll down my cheeks while I put my shoes and coat on, and jog down to the grave yard, then to the bus stop. I cry when I take the Greyhound to Yreka, and sob quietly when I get off at the gas station. I cry, because Bailey was right. I covered myself with something to keep out the mess, but now I am a mess.

    Now I am in a town I know nothing about, miles away from my house and with only a couple dollars on me. The game had been two weeks ago. Two weeks, 4 days, 1 hour, 40 minutes… And I am being approached by a couple of young men in their early twenties. I don’t stare at their faces.

    “Hey, you okay?” one asks me, I don’t know which one, so I look up into their eyes.

    “Yeah.”

    “You wanna’ smoke?” the same asks, holding out a packet of cigarettes to me. I nod, and put one in my mouth, he lights it for me, and I cough. I don’t smoke, but I don’t cry either.