How to Save a Life by Sara Zarr Page A

She’s told me more than once, only somehow it doesn’t stick. It’s something important, I know that, and she has a lot of meetings with neighborhood boards and city officials and things like that. If she’s not home around lunchtime, she calls me and we chat for a minute and she makes suggestions about what I could eat, and reminds me to take a walk and a nap.
    This morning, while she put our breakfast dishes into the dishwasher, she asked me if I’d thought more about my plans for after. “You don’t think you’ll go back to Omaha?”
    “No.” I can’t do that. Can’t and don’t want to.
    “How about what we talked about in terms of college?”
    “Maybe.” I can’t do that, either, though. At least not until I finish high school, but Robin thinks I have, and I want her to keep thinking that.
    There was a silence then, and I knew exactly what Robin wasn’t saying. She wasn’t saying, You could stay right here in Denver. Be a part of the baby’s life .
    We already talked about that in our e-mails before I got here. With open adoption, one of the points is that you could do that. You could be somewhere on the fringes, in the corners, lurking there and being called an aunt or a friend, or sometimes the baby even knows the truth. I told Robin I don’t want that. I don’t think.
    “I just want you to know, Mandy,” Robin said, closing the dishwasher, “that I’ll do whatever I can to help you get settled somewhere. When you decide what you want to do. I don’t want to pressure you, but it would be smart to have a plan worked out fairly soon.”
    “Okay.”
    It’s not that I don’t have a plan. I have Kent’s watch. I guess that’s a safety net more than a plan—one that I think is best to keep to myself.
    I like watching Robin around the house, doing things like making breakfast or sitting at her desk downstairs and looking at her computer. Everything she does, she does with confidence. Like she’s sure of who she is and not waiting for someone else to tell her.

     
    During my afternoon talk shows, the doorbell rings. It’s an old-fashioned ding-dong . Not like the buzzer at Kent’s apartment, which was so loud it made you jump.
    It takes time to get from the couch to the door, and when I open it, there’s a boy walking away. “Wait.”
    He turns, surprised. “Oh. Hey. You must be… okay, I don’t remember your name, but you’re the one who… with the baby. And everything.”
    “Mandy.”
    “Right. I’m Dylan.” He takes a few steps toward the door. “Is Jill home?”
    “Not yet. Do you want to come in and wait?”
    “Um…” He looks over his shoulder at the street. “She’s not expecting me or anything. I could call and stop by later.”
    “Come in. I don’t mind.” Honestly, I would like the company; waiting for the baby is a little bit boring.
    Dylan is Jill’s boyfriend. I recognize him from the pictures hanging on the door of Jill’s closet. There are some on the inside door, too, which I saw when I looked around in her room yesterday. Like I said, this can be boring, especially between The Young and the Restless and lunch, and Jill’s room gave me something to do. Originally I only wanted more stationery, but I found some other stuff. The pictures of Dylan and some letters from him, too, inside Jill’s desk drawer. Also there was a school yearbook on Jill’s bed. I found her picture, and in it she’s got lighter hair, but what really makes her look different is her big smile. I spent an hour looking at the yearbook. Her school is just like mine; there are cheerleaders and sports teams and a drama club and academic clubs and homecoming. I never had a yearbook, though, because it was eighty dollars.
    A lot of people wrote in Jill’s. Stuff like Stay great and I’m glad I sat by you in fifth and Wasabi Funyuns R.I.P . She has a lot of friends. If I’d had a yearbook, I wonder if anyone would have written in it and what they would have said about me.
    Dylan