Nobody Was Coming to Save Her

I am cleaning out my parents’ house as my husband and I prepare to move to our new home. I find buried in the attic a pink heart-shaped box with a paper rose as a bow that Amelia gave me for my birthday in 1998.

“To Cassie: Happy 8th Birthday. Love, Mellie.”

I haven’t seen or even thought about Amelia in years. I have no idea where she might be. I don’t even know if she’s alive.

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I wouldn’t say that Amelia and I were friends, exactly. Our parents were natives of all parts of New York City and lived near each other in the East Village in the mid to late 80s, but moved to Westchester soon after we were both born in 1990–the last straw was seeing their block featured on a Dateline special about the crack epidemic. We grew up being from New York City but not ever feeling genuinely of it.

Even though both of our families moved to the same town in Westchester, we ended up in different worlds. Amelia’s family moved to a large, beautiful home by the Long Island Sound, while we moved to a perfectly nice (but not as fancy) condo on the other side of town, near the edge of town. Adam and Linda, Amelia’s parents, had joined high-end law firms in Midtown. My mom was a nurse and my dad was a school counselor in another county. We certainly weren’t poor, but in our town, it was hard not to feel like it. I always felt a little embarrassed to have kids from school come visit my obviously inferior home.

Growing up, we were friends in that way you were only because your moms brought you together for playdates and invited you to each other’s birthday parties at an arcade or pottery painting place–like the one where she gave me that heart-shaped box that her mom probably picked out.

When we did talk or occasionally spend time together, we both longed to feel like real New Yorkers, not just coddled suburban kids. Movies like Rent gave us a weird nostalgia for a place we wish we knew better, as if we had known it in a past life, even if we had to be grateful that our parents brought us to live in a better one.

We didn’t go to private schools, but growing up in our town it felt like we did. Our town was consistently near the top of the list of the richest towns in America, and our schools too. We were being prepped for college, it seemed, as soon as we could walk. School, especially high school, was an intense pressure cooker. I struggled under this pressure, especially in math. I was known as “the girl who played violin,” and my friend group reflected that. I was hoping to get into one of the good liberal arts schools, never even giving a thought to applying to the prestigious Ivies.

Amelia, on the other hand, never seemed like she struggled. We were in some of the same classes together here and there (we barely talked unless we were assigned together, of course), and she was the star of the class, whether it was pre-Calculus or AP American History or English Lit. All the teachers loved her, describing her as “simply a delight.” Some of us joked amongst ourselves that she would probably grow up to be the first woman president.

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Although we were never close, things with Amelia drastically started to change during our junior year of high school.

“Happy birthday, Mellie.” It was her 17th birthday, and we were at one of the usual gatherings our two families would have that we humored our parents into thinking we still enjoyed.

We ended up at the table set up with food around the same time. I tried awkwardly to make small talk, since I couldn’t remember the last time we had had a conversation.

“So, how’s it going? Have you decided where you’re applying yet?”

Amelia’s eyes looked bloodshot, like maybe she hadn’t slept. She seemed unusually fidgety and unfocused.

“Uhh…no, no, not yet.” Her voice lowered to a whisper, never looking directly at me. I couldn’t say for sure that she knew who I was. “Hey, listen–you got any cash on you?”

I stood back. “For what? Can’t you ask your mom?”

Amelia’s eyes were focused on the floor, her foot tapping nervously. “Nah…no.” She swallowed loudly.

“You got any pills?”

I didn’t recognize the person those words were coming out of. We weren’t close, but this wasn’t her at all–the bubbly, happy-go-lucky, effortlessly brilliant student and popular friend had been replaced by some sort of intruder. 

“Pills? What kind of pills?”

“Never mind,” she said hurriedly. “Forget I mentioned anything. Don’t tell anyone I asked, okay? Especially my parents, or yours.” She seemed angry at herself for even bringing it up.

“Um, okay? Are you all right, Mellie? You seem…off.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. Just…” she put her finger over her mouth to tell me to keep it shut as she scrambled out of the room.

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“Linda told me that Amelia got a perfect score on her SATs!” my mom excitedly announced one afternoon. “She definitely has a shot at getting into Harvard.”

“Yeah…” I trailed off, thinking about the odd conversation we had had the other day. “Did Linda tell you anything else about Amelia?”

“Only that she hurt her back playing softball. But she’s doing great on these new, non-addictive pain pills–amazing, right? Ah, that girl is going places. Linda and Adam must be so proud of her.”

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During a break between classes a few months later, I stopped into the bathroom. As I looked under the stalls to see which of them didn’t have feet inside, I found one that looked empty. I pushed open the door and gasped. Someone was leaning over the toilet–at first I wasn’t sure if she was throwing up or snorting something. She turned around, startled.

It was Amelia.

I wasn’t sure if she recognized me, or even knew where she was.

“Mellie–what are you doing? Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. Just not feeling well today. You have to be so nosy?” I saw a white powder floating in the toilet water, a last ditch effort to hide it from me.

“Mellie–you’re doing drugs? In school? What the hell is wrong with you?!”

“Look, just leave me alone, my life is none of your business. We’re not even really friends, right? And stop calling me Mellie, we’re not 3 anymore, we’re almost 18.” She pushed me out of her way and burst through the stall door and out of the girls’ room. My head spun at what I had just seen. What could I do?

Was she only functioning because of these pills?

************************************************************

“Hello?”

“Linda, hi, it’s Cassie.”

“Oh, hello, honey, how are you? I feel like I haven’t seen you in ages, since you two were little girls” My throat twinged a bit. She was always so kind to me. Everything in me hated that I was making this call.

“I’m okay, but I’m calling to talk about Amelia. I’m really worried about her.”

“I know, she does seem worked up over college apps and all…”

“No, it’s not that. It’s…something else.”

“What do you mean, dear?”

“Hey, Cassie.” I realized I was on speakerphone when Adam came on, probably thinking (hoping) I was just calling to chitchat. “What’s up?”

I swallowed then sighed loudly, which I was sure they could hear through the phone. “Well…I’m really concerned about Amelia. I believe…I mean, I’m pretty sure…I think she may have a problem with drugs.”

The line went silent.

“You bite your tongue, Cassie,” Linda said, her voice going from sing-songy to cold within a second. “She’s taking some pain medications for that back injury she got playing soccer. How dare you say something like that about our daughter?”

“I wouldn’t be saying it if I didn’t think it was true. I’m really sorry to have to tell you this.”

Linda started speaking again, but Adam cut in. “After all we’ve done for you and your parents over the years, how we’ve helped you out when you needed it. And this is what you do?”

“You’ve always been jealous of her, haven’t you? She’s prettier than you, has more friends than you, will go to a better school than you.”

My eyes started welling up. “That’s not true.”

“You know what, Cassie?” Adam again. “Here’s an idea: maybe just stay out of our business. Don’t bother with Amelia, and we’ll make sure she doesn’t bother with you. And tell your parents to take us out of their speed dial–all they’ve done is mooch off us anyway.”

I realized I wasn’t going to get anywhere with them. They either had no idea what was going on with their own daughter in their own house, or were in extreme, painful denial. I wasn’t sure which was worse.

“If you ever need anything, please call,” I said as I hung up the phone. Who knows if they even heard me above their hands over their ears.

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I didn’t recognize her at the checkout counter at the Stop & Shop soon after high school graduation–from what I had heard, Amelia barely made it there. Or maybe my brain just didn’t want to.

“29.98, cash or card?” She looked up at me after having her head down the whole time I was there. Her eyes met mine with a flash of recognition, then quickly looked away. She looked like she’d rather crawl in a hole and die than ever have to have me see her like this.

“Mellie–is that you?” I asked softly.

She met my gaze again. She had dark bags under her eyes, like she hadn’t slept in weeks. Her hair looked like a bird’s nest, her pale skin red and blotchy.

“No…don’t know who you mean…” She tried to shield her eyes.

“You grew your bangs long enough to cover the scar from softball above your eyebrow.”

She looked down in sadness. “Never thought you’d see me here, huh?”

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After that day at the Stop & Shop, I didn’t see or hear from Amelia or her parents for years. She didn’t become valedictorian, or get into Harvard, or do any of the other things on the laundry list of what was expected of her, while the rest of us went off to college in equally idyllic places as where we grew up and got entry-level jobs at Manhattan PR firms that barely required a high school diploma to do.

In quiet moments, I would often wonder where she was, if she was doing better, if she was even alive. My parents and I tried calling her and her parents, but they neve answered or responded to our messages. It’s like they had all checked out, fallen off the map–they weren’t dead, but there wasn’t much of a difference.

She was supposed to be the success story. People like her weren’t supposed to become drug addicts, out on the street like a bum. And even if she did become addicted, she was as privileged as it got–surely she could get good treatment and be okay again, go on to cure cancer or save the rainforest. But it didn’t matter if she was from the richest suburb of New York or was a poor coal miner’s daughter from West Virginia. Nobody was coming to save her.

Her parents could have given her anything. This was the only thing they couldn’t.

Even some of the most well-connected people in one of the richest towns in America couldn’t stop her from getting addicted. 

Looking out the window of our terrace where you could faintly see the Manhattan skyline, the one we always felt weirdly nostalgic for, I felt sad at the thought that Amelia was likely dying from the very thing our parents had tried to escape, just in pill form. 

We all needed an escape growing up in that town. Maybe pills, by a horrible twist of fate, became hers.

It’s easy to feel sorry for someone like her, but on the other hand, it seems like how could this have happened to her if she had absolutely everything going for her?

Would it be worse if she were dead?

************************************************************

After finding that heart-shaped box in the attic years later, I couldn’t get Amelia out of my mind. With Google becoming a staple of our lives, I decided to look her up and see if I could find anything about her. I hoped, at the very least, that she was still alive.

The first search result was an inmate record at the Bedford Hills Correctional Facility, #12748-23: Amelia Jane Hoffman.

Her hair looked like it was already going grey, and she looked older than her 20-something years.

Probably against my better judgment, I decided to drive up to see her in Bedford Hills. 

When Amelia walked into the visiting room, the young woman with the thin, bony face in the tan jumpsuit didn’t match up in my mind with the happy-go-lucky girl I knew. Who was this person?

Amelia sat down. “Thanks for coming to see me, Cassie. You’re the only one from town who ever has.”

“Not even your parents?”

She let out a laugh. “My parents are so ashamed of me, I think they just pretend I don’t exist. I think they’d rather I was dead. This was the one problem they couldn’t fix by throwing money at it or calling someone in the governor’s office.”

I wasn’t sure how to respond to that. There wasn’t a good response.

“At least you’re here. You still have a chance.”

She scoffed at my (admittedly lame) attempt to be optimistic and shook her head.

“How’d you end up here?”

She laughed. “Robbed a bunch of my parents’ shit. They turned me in.”

I decided to stay silent. What could I say?

“You know what my mom is doing now?”

“What?”

“Working for a company that makes ‘anti-addiction drugs.’” She could hardly hide a wry smile. “The irony escapes her.”

We chatted for a while, about how Amelia tutored other inmates to help them earn their GEDs, how she actually made friends with people she never would have met otherwise. Despite the worst of circumstances, she seemed to be making the best of her situation. 

After a while, I got up to leave. Amelia made eye contact with me for the first time since I arrived.

“Thanks for being my friend.” I didn’t know how to respond to that. I reached out to hug her.

“Bye, Mellie. You’ll be out of here someday.” I hugged her tightly and gave her a kiss on the cheek.

Amelia smiled sadly. “I love you, Cassie,” she whispered in my ear. I started to turn to walk out of the visitors’ room.

“Hey, Cassie?”

I turned around.

“I’ll let you know when I’ve launched my campaign for President.” I saw her smile, if briefly, for the first time in what seemed like many years.

I smiled and walked out. I hoped, for her sake, that she would.