Loud Awake and Lost, page 17
“I was tired.” I fell in with her deliberately slower step as we moved down the hall. At the end of the stretch, which felt like it was thirteen miles long, I knew that Rachel would hook right for AP Biology, and I’d turn left for the Friday yearbook meeting.
“Tired,” she repeated.
“I’m sorry,” I said again. Except that “sorry” wasn’t cutting it. And she was right, anyhow. It had been strange and rude to just drop out on our plans.
“It’s just I thought we’d agreed on Floyd.”
“I know; you’re right. We had.”
“So I guess what I’m trying to say is that I think it was totally not cool that you didn’t show up.”
“Smarty, I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to kill your night. I needed to be alone. Don’t you think it would have been worse for me to come out with you all if I wasn’t up for it?”
“If you say so.”
“Go ahead,” I told her. “You want to rage at me. I’m listening.”
“Fine. Okay.” Rachel stopped walking and planted herself squarely but gawkily, as if she’d been given a stage direction she wasn’t sure how to implement. “Here’s the deal. When you first came back from Addington, I know you were unsteady, but I swear, I felt like I finally recognized you. You’d been so distant, so out of touch those weeks before your accident. Right in the beginning, we were back. We were real, true friends again.”
“Of course we’re real, true friends, Smarty—this is, like, a blip.”
“It’s not.” Color stained all the way across Rachel’s cheeks. “For you to take off from the party last night. For you to keep me in the dark while you make me cover for you. For you to not be in touch, to totally drop out of our plans together—how’s that supposed to make me feel? And it’s not just about last night. What about Halloween? What about your wonderful idea to jump in a cab with some stranger and leave me to deal with that?”
“You had Jake,” I said faintly.
“Whatever, Ember. I’d just started hanging out with him that night. You didn’t know if or how that was working out. But since we’re speaking of Jake, sometimes when I tell you I’m doing stuff with Jake, you look relieved. As if you’d way rather be by yourself. I guess the point I’m trying to make is that I feel like you’re disappearing from me again.” She gulped, braving it. “Why?”
I had to tell her; there was no real reason not to. “Smarty, I’ve met someone,” I answered. “The guy from Halloween.”
“That same one, Kai, who was in the cab that took off?”
I nodded. “And I don’t know exactly what’s going on between us. But I do know he’s been on my mind a lot, I guess. More than our plans, more than school. More than anything else. It’s hard to explain.”
Rachel crossed her arms and stepped back. To anyone else walking down the hall, she’d have seemed casual, in control. But I knew the agitation of my best friend’s gaze on me. I’d seen it since she was little, when she used to worry that I’d use up all her yellow paint, since that was her favorite color. “So this person, Kai, is someone you don’t ever want to introduce me to?”
“It’s more like he’s not someone I want to share right now. Not while I’m trying to work things out with him. I guess what I’m saying is I need my space.”
Rachel flinched, as if my words were a stick that had poked her. “Fine, Embie, okay. I can handle that. He can be your secret Mr. Wonderful; I’ve got no problem with that. But don’t shut me out completely, either. I mean, come on…” Her voice trembled, and I knew she was trying to keep it together. “Best friends since kindergarten should count for something. And I still want to be friends—if you just tell me how.”
But Rachel had said this to me before, last year. We’d had this fight…I could feel the reverberations of it, a distant ripple through my brain. “Let’s talk about all of this later, okay? Or I’ll be late for yearbook,” I said. “I’ll come find you after, and we can hang out.”
“Only if you want,” she said quietly. “Don’t do it as a favor to me, Ember.”
I nodded. “Right.” She knew me too well, knew that I ached to make it better. But in half confessing Kai, I’d put her on guard, and I was thankful that I didn’t run into Rachel again—though it took some careful footwork, including leaving campus to hit the corner soup kiosk for lunch and skipping my last afternoon class.
Mom was waiting for me as I walked in the front door.
“So I thought you could take me on an errand!” She tossed me the car keys. “I need to get to the post office. I already took the car out of the garage, so we’re set.”
“Oh! Cool.” I’d assumed that Mom was either going to “forget” about my request to drive today or put up a resistance when I reminded her. “Let’s go.”
Unlike the station wagon, the Prius handled light and silent. Sort of like maneuvering a paraglider after steering a barge. With Mom buckled in, I eased it gingerly out onto the road, then began the journey by inching around the block, and finally onto Cadman Plaza.
The cold snap was here to stay, and there was a threat of rain in the wintry air; plus the Friday-afternoon rush hour was in full trafficky tension. Similar, I realized, to the conditions of that night. Which was not a good thing to dwell on.
“You can go a little faster,” Mom murmured. Mom was a good driver, and I’d liked to think I’d inherited her skill. I wondered if I’d ever be considered a “good” driver again.
A guy behind me zipped past me illegally, honking long as he leaned out his window.
“Learn how to drive, you idiot!”
“Some people.” Mom sighed. But as I pressed and released the gas-brake-gas, I knew that I was going too slow, second-guessing basic actions and overly attentive to the road rules. By the time we pulled up to the post office, I was sweaty with the effort.
“Stay here. I’ll be right out,” Mom promised.
I nodded, but after a minute or so I got out of the car myself, to buy a coffee at a corner food cart. I felt shaky, and flashbacks of this afternoon’s conversation with Smarty weren’t helping. Through my nerves, my longing for sleep was like a brick wall I could feel myself hurtling toward.
Back in the car, I leaned against the headrest and closed my eyes. The rapping on the window startled me. Hot liquid sloshed from my cup onto my wrist—“Oh!”—as I pressed the button to unroll the window.
It was Isabella from El Cielo. She looked even tinier in her street clothes—a beige plastic raincoat that flapped past her calves and a clear rain hat that poked up like a wizard’s cone to accommodate her bun.
“Ember.” Her eyes on me were a complicated fixation of sorrow and curiosity—the same as when she’d seen me at El Cielo.
I nodded.
“It was good that you came in, that night.”
“It was?”
“Yes. You were right to come.”
I stared, shy. My brain was a thick fog, offering me no certainty for what I was supposed to say next.
“And I want you to come back again,” she continued. “Come assist me in the kitchen. I watched your hands—how you wanted to chop, to work. I saw it in the way you were watching me. You want to learn. I will teach.” She touched her fingertips to her heart. “Ayúdame, and it will help us both.”
I laughed, a bit anxiously, a dry, sandpapery sound. “Me, working at El Cielo?” That was crazy; it would be like stalking. “Thank you. Thank you so much. But I would be an inconvenience. A trouble to you, even. Underfoot and all that. And I’m really busy with school. So I’m not…” My barricaded defenses sounded false. Isabella could see right through me. I looked down at the reddening scorch mark of coffee across my wrist.
She knows about the accident.
Looking back into her black eyes, I was sure of it. She knew about Anthony Travolo. She knew what had happened, and she also knew that once I’d loved to cook, that cooking had been my joy and comfort. She knew, and she pitied me.
“It would be the right diversion,” she said.
“You’re very kind. It’s amazing that you would offer me your kitchen. But I…I don’t think I can.”
Such a weak response. All that I wanted to say and instead I said nothing. Mom was exiting the post office. Her brow furrowed when she saw that I was speaking with someone. Isabella straightened, turning to follow my gaze.
“Entonces,” she said quickly. “You have the address. We are open six days, six nights a week. Closed on Monday.” She hurried off. Her head—nearly doll-sized and much too fragile—was bowed against the wind as she pushed in the direction of the subway.
My hands gripped the steering wheel; I was braced for Mom’s questions.
“Who was that?” she asked as she opened the car door.
“Some lady, asking for directions.”
“But you didn’t know her? You seemed to know her.”
“Nope.”
Thankfully, she said no more. We drove home in silence. Whatever sliver of nerve had given me the confidence to think I could drive this car—even poorly—was gone. I’d lost. I bumped the curb twice and almost turned the wrong way down a one-way street. At least Mom didn’t say anything, for which I was grateful.
“You think I’m not ready,” I said once I’d gotten us into the garage.
“Practice will help,” she answered. “But maybe you and Holden could figure out another, nondriving plan for tomorrow? And then you and I can practice again together. We’ll ease into this.”
“Sure.” No way. I was going, and I was going with Kai. If Kai was with me, I’d be my best me. For driving, for everything.
Inside, Dad had made enough tacos to serve a soccer team, but soon I grew weary of him asking me if I wanted to have Holden or Rachel over for dinner.
No, I didn’t. I couldn’t. I wouldn’t.
Upstairs in my room, the night stretched empty.
I played and replayed my saved voice mail.
“Hey, Emb, it’s me. We are on for Coney Island—I got Chris to cover my shift, so…totally looking forward to Saturday. Got me thinking, too, that I haven’t been out there since I was like, what, eight years old? Okay, so I got class in twenty, better roll. Looking forward to it. Said that. (with a sheepish laugh) Awright.”
My lips moved along with his words. I smiled every time I heard him laugh. Each time I played the message, it was like the very first time. Over and over and over again, and it never got old.
My body was sleepy, but my brain was avid for more activity. I resaved Kai’s message, did some homework, then spent a bit of mindless time online. My usual searches, my usual obsessions. I went into my mail. I’d been searching my in-box archives for so long that I thought I’d covered everything. In my downloads, there’d been some other invitations to art exhibits, to a documentary showing at the Landmark Sunshine, and an invitation to a student group show at LaGuardia High School, where Anthony Travolo was listed showing his work along with a bunch of other kids, including Maisie.
But I’d placed this email in a folder marked “Travel.”
It was the only email. It was from him.
Okay, you wanted a story about something from fifth grade. You are kind of freakishly specific sometimes, Leferrier.
But I’m at your service.
So here it is: An All-True Fifth-Grade Story by Me, A. Travolo.
First time I struck out with a girl was fifth grade. Anna-Luisa Renaldi. I knew I’d caught her attention earlier that day, with my mucho kickass oral report on Ralph Nader (an A-minus, my only A that year). Me and my swollen head were on the playground at lunchtime recess when I saw: it was time to make my play. Problem was, I had nothing to offer except a few lame Jet Li moves. I’d practiced jujitsu over the summer. The more Anna-Luisa watched me, the stupider and riskier I got, until in my final action-hero sequence, I jumped and swung out into a high-kick slash half-gainer.
Instant wipeout. Face, meet pavement. Pavement, face.
No way to recover from that one. I blamed greasy monkey bars. I blamed my no-friction tennis sneakers. I blamed Anna-Luisa’s shiny eyes. I blamed all of her schoolyard girlfriends for chattering and pointing at me like a pack of monkeys.
But she pretty much never looked at me again.
I’m too old for the monkey bars. But now I think there’s a pattern to the insanity. When I saw you that night, I remembered every single thing about Anna-Luisa, and what I’d thought was love. Or at least my best fifth-grade version of it. I knew it all over again times a thousand.
I’m not wiping out this time, Ember. And when I see you next, I’m gonna show you my best Jet Li. Watch for it.
His email address was there in the address bar. On impulse, I sent a blank message to the account. It bounced back to me—null, of course.
My heart pounding, I printed his note, folded it, and buried it in my jewelry box along with everything else. His story knew how to make me laugh. It was sweet and charming. It was Anthony, talking to me so easily, so winningly—this guy and I had connected, and I couldn’t or wouldn’t look deeply enough in my heart or my mind to find him there. The boy I’d killed. Something was wrong with me—more wrong, even, than what Dr. P and all the Addington staff and my parents and Holden and Rachel and every last person in my orbit could begin to understand.
How could I have forgotten him? I was a freak.
23
Blink and Gone
I woke up in a fog. Finding Anthony’s note last night had spiraled me into a dark and restless mood. I hadn’t been able to complete my homework, or even a clear thought. Instead I’d roamed around the house, accepting Mom’s cups of tea and half watching television, and I’d gone to bed unsettled. Awake again, I was wrapped in a thinner skin of the same depressed confusion.
It was still dark outside. Not even 6 a.m. But today was the day. My entire body was tingling as I looked out my window on the blue cold sky. As I showered and dressed, it began to distract and then take over me, winding me up like a cuckoo clock. It was like Christmas morning, when I was the only one awake, slipping and slinking around the house, silent as a cat.
There was my whole entire life to dwell on Anthony Travolo. But today…today was another kind of day. And since it was here, I wanted to reach for it with both hands.
I left my parents a note:
Went to the beach. On my cell if you need me.
They’d be frightened. They’d be furious. But technically, they hadn’t forbidden this. As I pulled up in front of the St. George, I knew my hopes for the hours ahead were what was giving me driving confidence. My thoughts were splintery with anticipation.
Of course I was here much too early. It was a little bit silly. Almost the moment that I turned off the engine, the need to sleep taffy-pulled at me, and eventually I succumbed to it, though for how long I don’t know, because my eyes opened to see that the sun had broken its clean gold into the sky. And there was Kai, walking out the door of the St. George, right on time.
Same green jacket, but this time he’d thrown it over a pewter-gray sweater, along with faded-to-charcoal jeans. His hair was sticking up sweetly and everywhere like a baby hedgehog, and his skin was scrubbed to a deep glow.
Kai had shown up. Why would I have doubted him? And now the reality of what this day could be sparkled. I yawned, stretched, struggled to sit up. A needle-shower of excitement, relief, and disbelief was spiking my skin as Kai opened the passenger door and climbed in.
“Hey, you.”
“Hey yourself.”
He fastened his seat belt, docked his iPod, pressed play.
No way. Although, hadn’t we been talking music that first time, out on the fire escape? I must have mentioned Weregirl. It was too obscure otherwise. “Good choice,” I mentioned after a minute or so.
“Yeah, I’m kinda fan-zoning Weregirl right now,” he said.
“I downloaded them a few weeks ago, and now I know every song by heart.”
“Me too.”
“There are no coincidences,” I joked. And while the day felt like fate, as if the stars had all lined up just for us, I hadn’t bet on anything. I hadn’t gotten my hopes up. When it came to Kai, I knew better. I just had to hold on to the tentative belief that so far nothing on the horizon pointed to this day going terribly wrong.
Coney Island was forty-five minutes out, according to my GPS. Almost the length of the Weregirl tracks twice through. Every song belonged to us. The music took Kai to the same place— I could tell by his fixed yet soft expression as he stared ahead, and by the way he sang along. His voice was low but clear, and totally unself-conscious. I loved the sound of Kai’s voice over Weregirl. I wished I could record it—I made my brain try.
The boardwalk was almost deserted. We parked and fed the meter, and as we headed up the wide-planked herringbone walk, Kai caught me off guard, picking me up and spinning me around. My eyes closed, I was transported, my fingers tested his pulsing throat, the sides of his face, as he kissed me and set me down again.
“Ooh, look…cotton candy!” Suddenly shy of the moment, I turned away and broke off from him toward the cotton candy cart ahead, trotting up the walk to buy a twist of spun sugar from the pudgy old man in the striped hat, who twinkled at me as if we were old friends. “A pretty girl, and all alone,” he said. “That’s no good.”
“No, no. I’m with him.” I pointed to Kai, but he’d drifted a ways down the boardwalk and was staring out at the sea. He looked so all by himself out there, so unattached to anyone, that I felt greedy claiming him just for myself. Especially when he didn’t seem to belong to anyone.
The cotton candy man gave me a funny look along with my twist as if he, too, thought I was mistakenly attempting to claim Kai. I took my change and bolted, running hard to catch up since he’d walked even farther ahead, so that by the time I got to him I was out of breath, and the candy was beaded up in crystallizing sugar.
We split the treat, the sticky blue staining our lips. Kai bought tickets for the Wonder Wheel—and we cranked up up up in the swinging seat until we were suspended at the top. Kai’s kiss was brine and salt and sweetness that melted on my mouth.
