Losing Faith (13 page)

When I go to log in, Faith’s username comes up. Has it really been that long since I’ve been on here? Well, I guess I haven’t had too many people to keep up with. Nor do I want to display any new pictures of myself at the moment.

I’ve really let myself go over the last couple of weeks and now that I think about my Facebook page, it hits me how much. I run a hand through my stringy hair. When was
the last time I washed it? It gnaws at me that maybe this is the reason that Dustin and Amy got together. Not only was I avoiding being alone with him, but I’m not exactly enticing at the moment. The thought hits me with a wave of nausea. My looks had always been my one thing to hang on to.

I gnaw on my lip, willing my mind not to go there. Not to doubt myself.

Still, Dustin or Amy should have had the decency to tell me.

My mouse hovers on the login screen. I click on Faith’s username. I’m sure her page is still up and untouched. Even if Mom was in a place where she could get rid of some of Faith’s stuff, she wouldn’t have a clue how to deal with her web presence.

In the password box I type “G-O-D-I-S-G-O-O-D.” It was Faith’s password for everything.

Her news feed comes up and since I don’t really care about the church activities her friends are going on about, I click to her profile page instead. Her photo makes my heart stop. She looks so alive, her eyes glinting back at me. I reach out to touch her face, running my forefinger over her smile, then when it becomes too much, I pull my eyes away to scan the rest of the screen. A handful of friends’ pictures run along the side. She’d sent me a friend request about six months ago. When I click to see them all, I don’t see my photo, so I likely never responded. “Bitch,” I say to myself.

No new messages or condolences decorate her wall, which surprises me. The last post is from September twentieth—the week before she died—and shows more photos that include Faith. The post is from a girl named Reena M. Black, who has dirty blond, shoulder-length hair with a slight kink at the ends. Her close-up photo stares through the screen with these huge blue eyes, the kind you have trouble looking away from. But they’re kind and compassionate, and her teeth are super-white. She looks a little older than Faith, though still the type of caring person Faith would have been drawn to.

But I’ve never seen her before. I’m sure I’d remember those eyes. I click on her link, and seconds later the screen fills with her profile. More pictures of her and Faith display and I click through them. Celeste’s in some, and her smile hasn’t changed since kindergarten. Really, except for the boobs, she looks like the exact same girl who came over and played Barbies when I still wore diapers. I make a note beside the computer to e-mail Celeste when I’m done to see if she’s back yet, since I can’t imagine how she’d handle it if a message from Faith’s Facebook turned up in her inbox.

The longer I browse around the pages, the less I feel like an intruder. Four or five other girls fill out the rest of the pictures. Just one boy with spiky white-blond hair and a couple of those stupid advertising buttons from the supermarket
pinned to his shirt. This must be her home group, whoever they are and wherever they meet.

Another rod of guilt stabs at me. I should at least know who these people are.

I run my mouse over the photos, considering checking out Celeste’s page, but none of the people are tagged. Under each one is a comment from Reena M. Black with a reference for a verse from the Bible. It looks so odd to have Bible verses splattered among pictures on a Facebook page. I jot down a couple of them out of curiosity. I’d always brushed off my sister’s allegiance to her Bibles and everything in them but now that she’s gone, I do want to know. What verses did she like best? And why?

Nothing much else to look at in Reena’s pictures. A group of kids laughing and having fun. A few of them are so tightly crammed together, I wonder if they were taken in one of those photo booths at the mall. There’s something charismatic about Reena though, her electric blue eyes pulling my attention in every single photo.

But since I don’t know the girl, I click back to Faith’s page. Her “alive” picture comes up again, and I know I can’t mess with this part of her. Not yet. Instead, I send another friend request from her page to my sorry ass.

This time I’ll answer it.

Plan O: Track down Celeste.

The next day, I haven’t heard back from my e-mail to Celeste and she still hasn’t returned my call, so I leave for school early and detour over to her house. I’ve decided I don’t even care about the Grass Roots youth group. I just want to talk to her about Faith. Let her jabber on about the things she knew so well until I stumble across the things I knew too.

Their van is in the driveway and Mrs. Schwartz answers the door only seconds after I ring the bell.

“Brie, honey, how are you?” She tilts her head the same way everyone does when they ask that. Her two-year-old boy squirms against her ample hip. I couldn’t imagine having a sibling so much younger, but then I wonder how long it’ll be before I can’t imagine having a sibling. “We were so sorry we didn’t make it to the service. We didn’t hear—”

“Oh, that’s okay.” I wave a casual hand in front of my face. “Is everything okay with …” I’m not sure if it’s her mom or her husband’s mom who was sick. “… um, the rest of the family?”

“Oh, yes.” She stares at me, studying my face as though she’s not quite sure why I would ask. “Celeste’s been having a hard time, of course.”

I figure maybe Mrs. Schwartz doesn’t want to talk about it if it’s one of her parents, and I, of all people, can understand that.

“Is Celeste here?” I ask.

She pulls her hair out of her
toddler’s hand. “I’m sorry, she isn’t. She left for school a few minutes ago.”

After thanking Mrs. Schwartz, I rush toward the bus stop, so excited that Celeste is finally back at school. I’m determined to catch her before first class.

I get into the school five minutes early and wait it out in the Senior Wing.

The first bell sounds, and I catch a glimpse of Celeste down the hall. I’m not sure if she sees me, but suddenly she turns the opposite direction heading toward the school offices. Maybe she has to check in after her long absence.

I race through the crowded hallway, getting bumped and prodded, but when I get to the foyer I don’t see her anywhere.

“To class, please,” a hall monitor says.

“Um, I’m just going to the office.” I skirt around him toward Ms. Lamberton’s room. But when I turn the corner to the main bank of offices, I stop.

Celeste slips out a door and away from me toward the main exit, her arms loaded with books. This time, I’m pretty sure she didn’t see me. Ducking past the office windows, I bolt after her, keeping silent to avoid the hall monitor’s attention. I make a point of stopping to make sure the double
doors close gently behind me. Halfway across the parking lot, Celeste climbs into her SUV.

“Celeste!” I wave to catch her attention. I’m so glad I caught up with her. The outside air suddenly seems so much easier to take into my lungs.

Her eyes dart to me. I expect at least a slight smile, even if she is pretty sad. Nothing, though. She just stares across the empty cars.

I wonder if her grandma did die. When I take a step toward her, something jolts her back to the moment and she starts her ignition.

I pick up my pace. She must have seen me, unless she’s in that same dazed state I’ve been in. When she backs out of her space, I break into a run. She stops to switch gears and I land right in front of her red SUV, bending forward to catch my breath.

I look up and meet her eyes. Not only is she not happy to see me, her eyebrows tilt inward and she looks downright scared. I walk toward her driver’s door, but as soon as I leave the front of her vehicle, she hits the gas, sailing past me and out of the parking lot.

Watching her taillights, I’m stunned. I grip the car beside me for balance and try to swallow a breath of thick air. What’s wrong with her? It’s not like I blame her for not being at the funeral. I just wanted to talk.

Plan P: Get some answers from someone.

After last class, I march to the Senior Wing again. No sign of Celeste, of course, but I scan the halls for the gossipy glass-haired girl I followed the other day. As I stand leaning against a locker, I notice whispering down the hall, and by the stray glances, I know it’s directed at me.

There’s something almost giddy about their whispers though, and it’s not until I see Dustin round the corner at the other end of the hall with his buddies that I realize what they’re murmuring about. Right. Now that I’d caught them, Amy was probably spreading around her happy boyfriend news.

I blow a breath through my nose. Dustin catches sight of me, but then obviously diverts his eyes. When one of the guys he’s with says something to him, he laughs too loud. A fake laugh. He’s uncomfortable. I’m at least glad for that.

Dustin doesn’t stop at his locker, but keeps moving until he turns another corner away from me. The whispers intensify and now I feel like everyone in the hallway is talking about me. As much as I want to run out the doors, I stand my ground. Faith used to get teased about her glasses in elementary school, and I remember Dad telling her, “Don’t show them that it gets to you, and they’ll get bored and stop.” I concentrate on breathing in and out and recite those words inwardly as my mantra.

Several minutes later, I notice the glass-haired girl chatting outside a classroom with a couple of others. They don’t seem to have noticed me, so I doubt they’re part of the Ridicule-the-Dumped-Girl Brigade. I stand across the hall, trying not to stare, but probably not succeeding. When I catch the girl’s eyes a couple of times, she moves toward me.

“You waiting for me?” she says.

I nod. Swallow. “Are you, um …”

“Sammy,” she says.

Not what I meant, but as I see her close up, I wonder if she was in one of the pictures from Faith’s Facebook page. “Did you know Faith Jenkins?” I ask, skipping my own introduction. If she recognizes me as Faith’s sister, now will be the time she’ll show it. I’m not sure if the nerves I feel are from being watched or from hoping she won’t recognize me. Or maybe hoping she will. I study her eyes. They close for a second, and then open with the same composed look.

“I didn’t know her very well,” Sammy says. “She was in my history class.”

This saddens me. I don’t want to talk to another person who barely knew Faith. I live in the head of one of those already. But I remember their gossiping the other day, and I want to hear what the rumors are.

“Did you hear how she died?” I ask, forcing a casual tone.

“Yeah.” Sammy’s eyes light with a flicker of interest. “Suicide. Off a cliff,” she says slowly, like she’s sad about it. “She was really a nice girl.”

When she says that it was suicide, outright, in my face, I suddenly feel like I have to defend Faith. Stand up for her name. I bite my lip to rein myself in.

“Somebody in her family told my parents the details. I don’t remember much else, sorry.”

Somebody in
my
family? If my parents aren’t talking to me, they sure aren’t talking to strangers about it. Why is she spreading this around? Just for a little excitement?

“No,” I blurt. “She didn’t kill herself. She couldn’t have.”

Sammy nods. Her straight hair looks like it’s ice misted in place and each piece moves like a spear with her nodding. “It’s sad, but true.”

“It’s not true! You didn’t even know her. You said it yourself!” I try to calm down, remembering I’m not sure of anything. Backing away, I say, “Maybe you shouldn’t talk about stuff you don’t know.”

Tears well up in my eyes, so I turn and jog out the doors before she says anything else. I’ve been doing a good job at holding myself together, but something about Sammy’s words, her confident tone, just broke me. Even if it could be true, how would she know? I can’t fathom my parents telling
her or anyone else that it was suicide, especially if they can’t even tell me.

At home, I race to my room and pull out Faith’s Bible. I scrounge for the list of Bible verses I’d found on Facebook, feeling an urgency to know something, anything, true about my sister. Flipping to the table of contents, I scan for the Book of Acts. It doesn’t take me long to locate the proper verse. It’s one of the ones emblazoned in yellow highlighter.

And when the blood of your martyr Stephen was shed, I stood there giving my approval and guarding the clothes of those who were killing him.

I’ve never understood this gibberish. I thumb back to the table of contents to find the Book of Romans. Maybe the next one will be in English.

Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship.

Bodies as sacrifices? I know what that means. People in the Bible were constantly killing animals and offering them as sacrifices, I’d
heard about it in Sunday School. But I’m sure this is talking about people. I have to read it again, because I can’t believe it actually says that.

Then again, I guess Jesus was sacrificed. Still, I don’t know much, but I’m pretty sure the Bible doesn’t tell people to go out and kill themselves. After all, it does say “living” sacrifices. This verse has got to be out of context here. I scan the other verses to make some sense of it all but it’s like reading another language.

I try to reassure myself that these verses were posted on Reena’s Facebook page, not Faith’s. But a glob sticks in my throat.

The verses are highlighted in Faith’s Bible too.

I drop the Bible wide open on the floor like it’s burning my hands.

Faith never would have committed suicide, but would she have become a sacrifice?

I wish I could tell myself flat-out
no
. But I can’t.

chapter
FOURTEEN

m
y parents don’t want to talk. Amy and Dustin are out of the question. Celeste doesn’t want to speak to me either, but I don’t care. She’s the one person who can clear some of this up for me. She’s going to talk to me whether she likes it or not.