The Outskirts of Grief

They hug again, say how glad they are to see each other twice more, then go their separate ways.

Jesse shows Cody the pinwheel garden outside the art department, where pink-and-orange pinwheels attached to pencils have been planted in the ground with the invitation to "please pick one in memory." Why? Cody wonders. Jesse picks one, makes it spin, and answers sardonically.

"Because pinwheels make everyone happy."

They catch up with Scott at Starbucks and talk about what to do over the weekend. Scott, who's from Springfield and about to get his master's in health education, vetoes Frisbee golf and suggests hiking to a waterfall instead. Jesse, whose mother died of cancer when he was 8, goes to the campus Relay for Life, scheduled before this nightmare. He does his laps, then hears the announcers say that Caitlin Hammaren's father was there to run her laps in memory of his slain daughter.

When he reconnects with his friends that night, Scott wants to watch "Black X-Mas," but Jesse refuses. No horror movies, he insists. He's had enough horror this week.

* * *

They've all shed tears. Scott felt moved by rival schools like the University of Virginia offering solidarity and condolences. For Cody, it's when the news focuses on parents who've lost kids, or kids who lost their parents. His own father died in a motorcycle wreck when Cody was 2. His favorite dog, a Weimaraner, is named Willie in his honor.

"You're laughing and laughing and laughing, and suddenly you're overcome with sadness," Jesse explains. He felt the tears well at the candlelight vigil, and again yesterday as classes resumed for the first time. His afternoon genetics class was the worst. He knew already, from a professor's e-mail, that the stocky boy who sat in front of him had been killed in Norris Hall. When he walked in yesterday, Jesse remembers, "everyone in the class was sitting silently eating a Jolly Rancher lollipop." He compares it to the Buffalo wings last week, and to the church ladies handing out homemade cookies to students as they returned to school.

"Eating our feelings as a sort of condolence," is how he describes it. He wishes he had known the person, Mike Pohle, whose seat is now empty in front of him. He remembers him coming into class on what would turn out to be his last Friday alive, how he asked if there was a quiz today and Jesse said yes just to mess with him, and now he is left with a feeling closer to incredulity than sorrow.

"That's it?" he asks. "I'll never get to know him better?"

His father and brother keep telling him that he's going to remember this for the rest of his life, that he should take note. Jesse knows they mean well, but believes the details of this week are embedded in him forever now, an invisible tattoo.

Is there a difference between becoming a part of history, and history becoming a part of you?

They could all take the option of freeze-framing this semester now, walking away with their grades intact, not bothering with final exams or projects. But all three want to keep going, even though there's only a week left, because finishing just seems important. From there, Cody is thinking about doing some research in California before completing his doctorate here. Scott hopes to land a job in Florida. He's craving sunshine. Jesse will work for a friend's Internet business before considering grad school, maybe here, maybe not.

"How do you balance this?" he wonders. If there's no name for this space between sorrow and survival, is there some measure of its distance? "How sad am I supposed to be on a scale of 1 to 10?" he wishes he knew.

They have no funerals to attend.

They hung out at Cody's the day before returning to class again, but couldn't summon the energy or enthusiasm for the hike they had planned, Jesse reports.

Cody started rooting around in his closets and pulled out a 15-foot trampoline, which they assembled in the yard. They mixed up pina coladas and took turns bouncing, half-drunk on laughter and rum, jumping as hard and high as they could, exulting in that airborne moment of pure weightlessness.