Pictures of You by Juliette Caron Read Free Book Online

sleep.
     
    ***
     
                  In the morning I had a throbbing headache. A Twinkie hangover. Realizing I should take some aspirin and go to work, I called in sick instead. On the phone Janice sounded unconvinced. I was lucky she didn’t fire me right then and there for lying. But I wasn’t being totally deceitful. I felt completely trashed—physically and emotionally. Hit and flattened by a steamroller.
                  I tumbled out of bed and peeled off my strangling clothes. There were seam marks in my skin where my jeans had been. I raked through Abby’s drawers and pulled out a massive vintage Depeche Mode tee and a pair of plaid boxers and dressed myself. Her essence engulfed me, giving me the impression I was being hugged. My eyes got all leaky again.
                  As if she had psychic abilities and sensed I was coveting Abby’s things, Hannah, her mom, called to say she was coming over tomorrow afternoon to collect Abby’s things and will I please leave a key under the doormat for her?
                  Crap. The bed frame.
                  “What are you going to do with her stuff?” I asked, an ice-cold panic washing over me. I picked up her favorite guitar, a Yamaha acoustic-electric and pressed it against my chest. She can’t take the guitar. That thing was a part of Abby. Like an appendage. It still had her fingerprints all over it. It was proof she was once here.
                  “Keep a few things that are sentimental. Donate the rest to Goodwill,” Hannah said absently. I heard Abby’s brothers wrestle in the background.
                  I wanted to say, “How can you get rid of her stuff like that? She died like three weeks ago. Are you really that anxious to put her behind you? Maybe you should scratch her face out of all the family photos while you’re at it. She was only your daughter . Shouldn’t we leave things be? Leave her stuff the way it is? Maybe even consider opening an Abby museum?” But instead I said, “I’ll be here. Come over whenever you’d like.”
                  I looked around Abby’s room and suddenly felt like hoarding. My inner pack-rat began scheming. I wanted her stuff. All of it. I’d lusted after her music collection for half of my life. Although she was a size smaller, her clothes were baggy and I often borrowed them. And her scrapbooks. I could not let Hannah take those. They meant the universe to me. Untidy and swimming in graffiti, those scrapbooks sandwiched our dearest memories. Dozens of photos of us spanning eleven years of friendship. Her crazy poems and lyrics and memorabilia flat enough to stuff under a plastic sheet protector overflowed the binders. Not to mention the hundreds of concert ticket stubs. Like me, she kept each one.
                  Like a winner of a thousand dollar mall shopping spree, I began grabbing fistfuls of stuff, shoving whatever I could into a Washington Apples cardboard box. First I snagged the scrapbooks, then some of my favorite clothes: her band tees, her punk-rock plaid pants with zippers, her military-style jacket with a Siouxsie and the Banshees patch sewn on the back. Next the CDs. I considered taking them all, but then realized Hannah would be suspicious. So I took the most coveted ones. The imports, the bootlegs. The rare ones: Cuddly Toys, Freur, Dali’s Car, Celebrate the Nun. The Top album signed by Robert Smith himself.
                  I decided to keep her favorite guitar. I would let her family have the red and white Fender. I had no use for that one. After all, my only musical talent was appreciation. Plus Hannah would probably notice if that was missing. Her folks splurged and bought it for her for Christmas two years ago.
                  I scanned her jewelry and grabbed a favorite turquoise ring and her sterling silver cat necklace. She loved cats. (Tiger was actually