Suicide Notes

anywhere to get away from people for very long around here. In fact, I
pretty much ran into her first thing at breakfast.
“Hey,” I said, which is so incredibly witty that you can applaud my
genius any time you want to.
“Hey,” Sadie said. “Take my advice, stay away from the muffins. They
look like blueberries, but they’re actually raisins. Totally disgusting.”
She was talking like it was any other day and not the morning after I
tried to have sex with her but couldn’t keep it up. I figured she was just
being nice and pretending it hadn’t happened.
“I’m sorry about what happened,” I said. Lucky for me, no one else had
come in yet, so I didn’t have to worry about anyone eavesdropping. Well,
except for anyone listening on the hidden microphones, which by the way I
totally believe are planted around here.
“What about it?” Sadie asked, poking at her oatmeal with her spoon.
“You know,” I said, not believing she was going to make me actually
say it. “Not being able to—”
“Oh, that,” said Sadie, waving her hand like she was shooing away a fly.
“Don’t worry about it. We were just fooling around, right? It’s not like it
was our honeymoon.”
“I just wanted you to know that it wasn’t because of, you know, you or
anything.”
“Oh, I know,” Sadie answered. “I never thought it was. It’s all about
you.”
“Gee, thanks,” I said. I felt like she’d slapped me.
“No,” she said, looking at my face. “I didn’t mean it that way. I mean I
know it’s because of you. You and Allie.”
“Me and Allie?” I repeated.
“Sure,” Sadie said. “You’re in love with her and she doesn’t love you.
Or something like that. I still haven’t quite figured it all out. But I know it’s
about Allie.”

---

“It’s not like that,” I said, shaking my head. “She’s just my best friend.”
“Best friend,” Sadie repeated, making air quotes with her fingers so that
I would know she didn’t really believe me. “Okay, so you and Allie are best
friends. That doesn’t mean you don’t want to be more than that. So what’s
the problem?”
“It’s not a problem,” I said. “Or at least it wasn’t. Not until Burke came
into the picture.”
“Who’s Burke?”
“Allie’s boyfriend.” It was the first time I’d said his name out loud since
coming to the hospital. It tasted like raw onions.
Sadie nodded. “I get it now. You’re jealous because Burke’s got Allie,
and Burke’s all jealous because you and Allie are friends. That is such a guy
thing. He probably gets all pissed off because he thinks she spends more
time with you than with him.”
“Right,” I said.
“And because she’s a girl and thinks boyfriends are the most important
thing in the universe, she told you she couldn’t spend so much time with
you.”
“Something like that.” Sort of.
“God, girls make me sick sometimes,” said Sadie. “Here’s this jerk
who’ll probably dump her in a month and she gives up her best friend for
him because he’s too insecure to handle the fact that she likes to hang out
with another guy. What a stupid bitch.”
I didn’t say anything. Allie isn’t stupid, and she isn’t a bitch. If she was,
what happened between us would be easier to forget. But she’s not like that
at all, only I couldn’t tell Sadie that because it would make her think I
wasn’t telling the whole story. Which I wasn’t.
“That’s why you did it, isn’t it?” Sadie said after a minute. “Because
you lost your best friend?”
“Pretty much,” I said. “I don’t know, maybe I thought it would make her
feel sorry for me or something. Pretty stupid, huh?”
“Not stupid,” said Sadie. “Sad. Especially because she doesn’t deserve a
friend like you.”
Then she got up and hugged me. I totally wasn’t expecting it. Like I said
before, my family isn’t big on the whole affection thing. I mean Amanda
hugged me when she saw me, but that was just a case of temporary insanity.

---

Normally she would never do that. Even Allie has never hugged me more
than a couple of times, and she comes from a big family of huggers. I guess
I just have this invisible sign on me that says no hugging.
But Sadie ignored the sign. She hugged me really hard, patting my back
and squeezing me. I wasn’t sure what I should do, so I patted her back. That
seemed to work, because she let go of me.
“I’m so sorry that happened to you,” she said. “But you know what?
You don’t need her. It’s time you had friends who see how great you are.”
“Maybe,” I said.
“No maybe,” said Sadie, taking my hands and holding them. Her
thumbs touched my wrists, and I could feel her rubbing my scars. I let her.
“I want you to know you can tell me anything,” Sadie said. “Anything.”
“Thanks,” I told her. “You too.”
“Aren’t you two a cute couple.”
I looked up and saw Rankin grinning at us. He was carrying a plate
piled with scrambled eggs, sausage, toast, and everything else he could fit
on it. I don’t think I could eat that much food in an entire day, let alone for
breakfast.
Rankin took a seat at the table while Sadie went back to her chair. To
tell the truth, I was kind of relieved that Rankin had interrupted us. I mean,
I was happy that Sadie wasn’t mad, and it was nice of her to say everything
she said, but I had pretty much used up all of my sharing time minutes, if
you know what I mean.
Rankin was ignoring us and concentrating on his breakfast. And I mean