Catch the Light, page 9
9
Here’s another secret about my dad: I’m not sure if he ever really liked me at all.
Of course, of course, I know that he loved me. I can see it in some memories, the ones I have remembered until they don’t even feel real anymore, like a bumping piggyback ride under an electric, iPhone-photo blue sky.
But even before the dream, the lasting, indelible impression in my memory, the final taste in my mouth, is one of indifference. The thing I remember most is watching the closed door of his backyard office where he was always writing.
Yes, there were jokes and car rides with the windows down and secret trips to Arby’s when Mom had to work on the weekends. But even then—even in the fullest, freest moments—I’d catch him staring into space, I’d notice his absent responses: sure, yeah, right, of course. It always felt like part of his brain was plotting his escape.
* * *
• • •
The next day, Mom and Bea don’t talk to each other at all. Bea seethes quietly, like an underwater volcano. Mom slinks from window to window, listlessly watching the yard. They move around the house on opposite tracks, an invisible energy field keeping them separate.
I text Hannah.
Me: Bea and Mom are fighting. I need some words of wisdom.
Hannah: Make them watch Steel Magnolias. It will cure everything.
Me: You’re so weird.
Hannah: It’s called eccentric. I’m working on a paper but I’ll call later. You got this.
She keeps saying that but I’m pretty sure I don’t.
* * *
• • •
El invites me on a walk in the woods after breakfast.
“Bring your camera,” she says. “I’ll bring some pens.
“Bea,” she calls up the stairs, pulling on her boots. “Come walking with us. There’s an entire deer skeleton just waiting to be added to your treasure collection.”
“I don’t do that anymore,” Bea calls back.
We push and cajole, but in the end it’s just the two of us, walking side by side under the leaves.
“How are you feeling?” El says.
“I’m fine,” I say.
“You’re always saying that.”
It’s cloudy today and wet and there’s a pinkness to the air. The light is thick. It feels like dusk, even at eleven in the morning. El doesn’t say anything for a long time. It seems like we are in some kind of gentle standoff; she’s not going to ask me again, but she’s also not going to say anything else until I give up the goods. Finally, when the house is far out of sight, I give in.
“I’m worried about Mom and Bea,” I say.
El stops, wiping her brow with a green handkerchief. “Me too.” Then she turns to me and says, “This is the hard part.”
“What is?”
She leads us into a clearing, settles onto a stump, reaches into her bag for her sketchbook. The whole time I’m wondering what she could possibly mean. But then she finds a blank page, tapping it once with her index finger, and says, “When it looks like it should be over but it’s not.”
I stand next to her, fiddling with my lens cap.
I wonder if that’s what this feeling is. Showing up in a new town where no one even knows it happened. New school, new locker, new friends. Underneath my backpack and my sundresses, I’m walking around with a hole in my side. But no one here can see it.
Maybe it will be better now that every part of our life is gone. Maybe we won’t know that Dad is missing because we won’t know where to look.
El takes out a tin of watercolor pencils. She runs her fingers over each of them before selecting a color. She’s not really looking at me at all, and it feels like some kind of therapist/lion-tamer trick to get me to keep talking. It works because eventually I do, aiming my camera at a spot in the distance, twisting the lens in and out.
“I keep thinking that if I can just get through this year then I’ll get my life back,” I say. I bring the camera away from my face without taking a picture.
“I’m not sure it works like that,” El says. Her expression is cloudy, thoughtful. I want to ask her, How does it work? But a drop of rain breaks through the treetops, falling onto the place where her hand is drawing a thick blue line, and suddenly it feels like our talk is over.
“Well,” she says, folding up her glasses. “I guess we should go back.”
She takes her finger and rubs the splotch of rain into the page, spreading the color around. Then she closes the notebook, wipes her finger on the front of her jeans, and leads me back through the trees.
* * *
• • •
The afternoon drags. I’m bored and can’t stop thinking about California. I’m thinking about shopping at the flea market and picking Pixie tangerines out of the tree in the backyard. I’m thinking about sitting with Nora in the front seat of her ancient VW Beetle, eating Shrimp Crackers and listening to the Shins. I’m thinking about kissing Bennett and the way his mouth always tastes like mint and limes. I’m thinking about how it almost never rains in LA and we’re always lamenting it while secretly happy with endless sunny days.
For a while I try to photograph the rain making tracks on my window. Then I write in my journal but not about Dad. Everything is present tense—Sam’s fuzzy sweater, Jesse’s fingers nearly touching my wrist, the new void Bea opened up in my heart last night, right next to the old one.
Finally, at one o’clock, I knock on Bea’s door.
“Come in,” she yells.
She’s going through her bursting closet, pulling out long black dresses and piling them on the bed.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
“Working on my Halloween costume.”
“Already? It’s barely even September yet.”
She sighs like an old lady. “At this point it’s all I have to look forward to.”
Stab. Another guilt skewer, right between the eyes.
“Hey.” I look down, twisting up my fingers. “I’m sorry I went out last night. I would have stayed in if I’d known how you were feeling.”
“Don’t,” she says, sounding annoyed. “I’m fine.”
She picks up a lace maxi dress and tears it down the seams, an unreadable look on her face. My fingers itch for my camera. Like if I looked at Bea through the lens, maybe I would understand.
“Okay.” I’m not sure of what else to say. “Let me know if you change your mind.”
“Yep.”
She turns back to the closet, suddenly immersed in looking for something on the top shelf. I look around the room, trying to find a reason to stay. But Bea’s back in her own world, like she’s already forgotten I’m there.
* * *
• • •
Nora sends me pictures all day long:
She’s drinking a mocha Ice Blended outside of Coffee Bean: I got your order, is that pathetic?
She’s watching K-dramas and making a sad puppy face: Wish you were here.
She’s up to her ankles in the Pacific Ocean: Bennett is hanging with the cool kids so it’s just me today.
I miss her so much. I think about actually calling her, about telling her what happened last night—Mom and Bea and the latest chasm that seems to have cracked open between them. She would know what to say to make me feel better. But then I would have to tell her about the bonfire and about hanging out with Sam, which feels weirdly like cheating. So I just say: I’M JEALOUS. And: Me too. And: Tell him to stop being such a sellout.
And I think she can tell I’m half-assing because she says: What’s up pup? You’re not yourself today.
I stare out the window, at the dramatic purpley-gray sky and the raindrops pelting violently against the glass. I wish I could just ask, How many days to UCSB? But something about my talk with El has shaken that idea loose.
Me: I don’t know. Things are just weird here.
Nora: I’m sending you a hug. Can you feel it?
I type, I can’t feel anything today. But then I delete it and write: I’m sending you one back.
* * *
• • •
After dinner, Hannah calls on the house phone. Everyone gets a turn and I’m last. I’ve been sitting on my bed staring at my phone for an hour, willing Bennett to text me. My message window is open and I keep pulling it down to refresh the messages. Refresh. Refresh. Refresh.
I’m trying to forget an image I saw this afternoon on someone’s Instagram story, Bennett’s arm around some girl’s waist. It was a group shot but it still filled my belly up with lead. I kept clicking through the story again and again, my eyes snagging on the way his fingers curled into the bare stripe of skin just above her hipbone.
I should just quit all social media. It’s a constant California parade, a flashing neon sign that says: LIFE IS GOING ON WITHOUT YOU.
Bea comes in and thrusts the phone toward me, then turns and leaves in the curt manner with which she’s doing everything today.
“I’m lost,” Hannah says when I answer. “Who is this?”
“Mary.” I roll my eyes. “You dork.”
“Hey!” she protests. “It’s not my fault. I keep getting passed back and forth. I’m losing track.”
“Well,” I say. “Now you know.”
“My second-favorite little sister.” She sighs. “How are you? I miss you.”
It’s so good to hear her voice. It’s been weeks. I’ve been the big sister for way too long.
“I miss you too, Han. This shit is unreal,” I say, settling back onto the bed.
“I know. Bea was just filling me in on everything. You have to ride in a yellow bus?”
There’s absolute horror in her voice.
“Oh yeah,” I reply. “It’s awful.”
She sighs again, deep, dramatic, familiar. “Mom is the worst.”
“Truth.” I close my eyes. “Seriously though, Han, I need your help.”
“Bea and Mom?”
“It’s worse than before,” I whisper. “I don’t know how to fix it.”
“It’s okay, Mare-bear. It’s not your job to fix it.”
I frown, my fingers tracing the edges of a quilt square that’s covered in strawberries. I remember Hannah’s big sister magic. She definitely would have solved this already.
“Isn’t it?” I say.
“No. Definitely not.” I can hear Hannah rummaging around. I try to picture her, in a nondescript dorm room, her desk littered with colorful pens. “Look,” she says. “Things are just hard right now. You have to try to be there for Bea but know that she probably won’t let you.”
“Then what?”
“Just be relentless. You’ll figure it out.”
But I’m not really sure if I will.
I clear my throat. “What about Mom?”
“What do you mean?” she says.
It’s so weird having to explain things to Hannah. Normally she would already know everything. And anyway, I wonder if it’s even possible to describe the way I felt this morning as I watched Mom at the kitchen counter, furiously typing on her laptop next to a plate of untouched, hours-old toast.
I keep trying to compare and contrast my different versions of Mom. The one who stopped existing when Dad did. The one who was so far gone we needed a search party. Then this new person who is smiling and leaping into the river but also not home and then crying last night at the kitchen table.
“I don’t know. I can’t stop worrying about her,” I finally say.
Hannah sighs, as if she can hear all of the noisy thoughts tumbling around my mind. “She’ll be okay. She’s just figuring things out. Give her some time.”
I can barely think it, but the words come out anyway. “What if she’s not okay?”
Hannah pauses and I hear a soft rustle like she’s wrapping herself up in her immaculate white duvet, the way she used to on winter mornings. “Then we’ll figure it out.”
Downstairs, I hear a burst of laughter echoing around the kitchen and I remember that Mom isn’t alone. At least not right now.
“Okay,” I say. I lie back on my gingham pillowcases, trying to stuff the anxiety back down. “Tell me about college.”
After the past few days, I feel desperate for information, details. Something that can make my plan for the future feel real again.
Hannah pauses, and in my mind I can see her twirling her long princess hair around her finger, thinking of the right superlative to use. “It’s kind of the best and kind of the worst.”
“Exactly the answer I would expect from you,” I say.
“What does that mean?” she says.
“Nothing.” I laugh.
She ignores me and launches into a long description of her freshman dorm and her hot RA, the cafeteria that has a soft-serve ice cream dispenser. I use these details to repopulate the vision of my own future. Me and Nora eating sundaes for breakfast, listening to lectures on feminist thought. Still, as soon as the picture is formed, all of the outlines start to wobble.
“Sometimes,” Hannah says, “I feel like I’ve been here forever.”
And then I remember Dad and my dream. The other secret I’ve been keeping. I want to ask Hannah about him. Just to make sure. But I can’t seem to get the words out.
I glance over at my phone, at the foot of the bed, and see that there’s a text. From Bennett.
I unlock the screen, and it says: Facetime? And suddenly all coherent thought flees my mind.
Oh my god. Oh my god.
“Hey, Han?” I cut into her monologue. “I gotta go. I think Mom needs the phone.”
“Yeah, okay,” she says. “I should go too. Call me anytime though, okay? I really miss you. And take care of Bea. She’s not as tough as she looks.”
“I know. I will,” I say. “I miss you too.”
I run the phone back downstairs to the cradle faster than the speed of light and then I’m racing to the bathroom, pulling my hair down from its ponytail and pinching my cheeks. That’s what people do when they need more color, right? It doesn’t feel like there’s time for makeup. I’ve been waiting so long for these particular stars to align and I don’t want to miss my window.
I spend a minute propping my phone on my quilt in an effort to find the exact most flattering angle, then I take a deep breath and try to lean casually back against the headboard.
Bennett answers the call right away and he’s sitting on his bed too, looking sun dazed and perfectly rumpled. I can practically smell the salt and sunscreen on his skin.
The screen freezes for a second, then starts working again as he reaches up to run a hand through his hair. “Hey, Mary.”
“Hey, Bennett,” I say, trying to keep my smile small and not creepy, despite the wild happiness I feel seeing his face again. It makes me think of before, when we’d never even kissed, when I’d ring Bennett’s doorbell and his dad would say, “Bennett, your girlfriend’s here!” and I’d try to hide how much I liked it.
“It’s good to see you,” Bennett says as one side of his mouth lifts into his signature smile.
My heart thuds to a halt. It’s a few seconds before it picks up again, before I can say, “Thanks. You too.”
“How’s New York?” he says. “I wanna know everything.”
I’m quiet for a minute, trying to figure out how to distill the one million different experiences I’ve had since I got here into something that could possibly make sense to another person.
“It’s . . .”
depressing, exhausting, strange, beautiful, awful, boring, weird
“All right.”
He laughs. “That’s it?”
I shake my head.
“No,” I say. “It’s just really complicated, I guess. It mostly sucks. But some things are nice.”
When I say it, I’m talking about swimming with my mom and walking with El and the way the air here is like something you can touch, but as soon as the words leave my mouth I think about Jesse. Shit.
“How’s California?” I say, anxious to shift the conversation somewhere else.
He sighs, shaking his head of golden hair. “Eh, it’s fine. School is school. We won our first water polo game . . .” Pause. “I miss you.”
And there it is again.
But it’s not Let’s make a plan. It’s not Be mine.
There was this time, in the history of Nora and Bennett and me, when Nora and I started saying, I love you. It was middle school and all the girls were saying it and I absolutely did love Nora. I loved Bennett too, but the feeling had a different kind of sting to it. I love you wasn’t the kind of thing that I could ever say out loud. So we made up this game where we’d say, I love U————nicorns. I love EU————phemisms. I love U————niversities, stretching the U out until it hurt a little. It’s been a while since we’ve played that game. But in another way it feels like we’re always playing it.
Now I say, “I miss you too.” And then, to push off the unbearable hugeness of the feeling of missing, I say, “And animal-style french fries.”
Bennett grins and says, “I miss your feminist critiques.”
And I say, “I miss stealing your water polo parka.”
Bennett says, “I miss stealing the granola bars out of your backpack.”
And I want to say, I miss feeling your eyelashes on my nose.
But instead I laugh and fall back onto my bed, and he laughs and falls back onto his, and the sound of him hitting the sheets hits my heart right over the head with a rolling pin. For the one millionth time I want to say something more meaningful than this.
When he said, You know I love you, right? I didn’t say it back.
Now I look at the sun-colored hair curling at his neck and think: maybe because the you know before and the right after made I love you seem so much smaller than the thing I was feeling.
