The Last Wish of Sasha Cade
“Ah, here it is,” Elijah says, pressing the power button. The TV turns on, and then he reaches for the first DVD in the box. “Ready to watch Mean Girls?”
Sasha’s face appears in a little rectangle in the middle of my laptop screen. Elijah leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees. Whatever weirdness we had is gone because Sasha is here now, and she’s all that matters.
I reach for a bagel and a container of cream cheese while she talks. “Mean Girls came out when I was four, but it wasn’t until fifth grade that Rocki and I found it in the DVD bin at the grocery store. Mom bought it for me because she always bought anything I wanted, and Rocki and I watched it three times the first night we had it. Remember?”
She looks straight ahead, not trying to guess where I’m sitting. It was obviously filmed on a different day than the other videos, because she’s wearing a gray PCHS hoodie and the circles under her eyes are prominent, meaning she’s a little deeper into her sickness. She’s sitting in one of the black leather movie chairs in their small movie room.
“Is she in a theater?” Elijah asks, leaning over and tapping the space bar to pause the video.
“Yeah, they have a room on top of their garage that they converted into a theater. It has a ninety-inch flat-screen TV in there. Sasha and I made a fort out of the box it came in.”
“Whoa,” he mutters, reaching for his second bagel. He taps the space bar and Sasha’s frozen face becomes animated again.
“We fell in love with the movie, and that day can be marked as the day I also fell in love with Tina Fey and Amy Poehler. I mean, is there anything they can’t do?” Sasha lifts her hands, her eyes wide. “You should listen to their audiobooks when you get a chance, Elijah. These women are amazing and creative souls. They’re also best friends — they remind me of me and Rocki. Anyhow, I love this movie. Mom saw us watching it a few weeks later and she freaked because she walked in on the part where Coach Carr is talking about STDs and having sex and stuff. But when she saw that we’d seen it so many times already we could quote the damn thing, she just rolled her eyes and was like ‘whatever’ and let us watch it.”
Sasha grins and sits back a little, leaning over to grab the remote. “Get your DVD on the menu screen,” she says. “I’ll wait.”
I pause the video and queue up the DVD on my TV. The tension in Elijah’s jaw is gone. I turn to him. “You ready?”
“I’m not overly psyched to watch a girl movie, but I’m excited to hear what Sasha has to say.”
I scoff. “You’re gonna love this movie. It’s hilarious and there’s a ton of hot girls in it to keep your attention.”
The skin between his brows creases. “Why would I care about hot girls in a movie?”
“Oh,” I say. “I mean, if you’re not into girls, the guy who plays Aaron Samuels is also hot.”
He takes a slow sip of his coffee, his eyes peering at me from over the plastic lid. I shouldn’t care if he’s not into girls, but why is my stomach clenching in agony while I wait for him to confirm it?
He sets his coffee cup on the coaster on the end table next to him. “I’m into girls,” he says, settling back into the couch, his arm reaching dangerously close to mine while he taps out a rhythm on the seat between us. “I’m just not into girls in movies. It’s not like I’ll ever date them, so why should I care?”
“You’re weird,” I tell him, looking at my half-eaten bagel. Zack wouldn’t pass up an opportunity to comment on a hot actress in a movie.
Sasha tells us when to press play and her plan works perfectly. The movie starts and Sasha snacks on a package of candy, the camera watching her every move while she sits sideways in her chair with her knees tucked up to her chest. She laughs at the funny parts with us, and every so often, she’ll quote the words along with the actors. I find myself watching her more than the movie. I’ll never get tired of watching her.
After three movies, we take a quick break so I can order a pizza for lunch. I refuse to let Elijah pay for it, even though he offers. He bought the breakfast and wasted all the gas money driving over here. I’ve got lunch.
We queue up the next DVD and hang out while we wait on the pizza delivery guy. I make it a point not to ask anything that will send us back down the black hole of awkwardness, and it turns out that leaves me with pretty much nothing to say.
My phone beeps from its place on the coffee table and I lean forward to check it, seeing Zack’s name on the screen.
You’re not at school. You sick?
Ignoring it, I put the phone on silent and then check my email out of habit.
“You might want to hang out around the phone tonight,” Elijah says. He scratches the back of his head, his shirtsleeve rising up and revealing a ring of lighter skin around his biceps.
“What do you mean?” For some reason, I think he’s talking about Zack and my heart seizes up in my chest.
“You know, those automated phon
e calls letting parents know their kid missed school?” He makes a blank expression and then talks in a robot voice. “To the parents of Raquel whatever-your-last-name-is,” he says, and I laugh. “Your child was absent from school today, Wednesday the twenty-first —”
“It’s the twenty-first?” I say, jumping to my feet. “Oh my God. No. It can’t be.”
Eyes wide, I pace the length of the living room.
Elijah appears in front of me, two strong arms holding me in place. “What’s wrong?”