Mom shakes her head and tries to stop crying, but she can’t seem to. Nobody says anything for a minute, until finally I say, “Your collarbone isn’t healed yet. Who’ll take care of you in LA?” My voice sounds shaky, but so far I’m managing not to cry. Everything is so hard already; how am I going to get through it if Uncle Walt isn’t here to help me?
Uncle Walt kneels down next to my chair and takes my hand. “I’ll be okay, Maze. My ribs feel better now, and even if I can’t drive right away, I can take taxis for a while. To tell you the truth, I probably could have stayed in LA and figured out how to get by. But I guess your mom’s right. When things aren’t working out for me, I run away. And this time I just wanted to come home. I needed a dose of my buddy Hitchcock to fix me up.”
His eyes look sparkly. I don’t want him to cry, so I throw my arms around his neck. Which it turns out makes him cry, because, duh, he’s still got a broken collarbone.
“I want you to stay longer,” I tell him. “I’ll miss you!” I feel so bad, I can’t even think of a film to compare it to. Well, maybe something really tragic, like Rebel Without a Cause.
“I’ll miss you too, Hitch. Tell you what. Save Tuesday night for me. We’ll stay up late and have a movie marathon with lots of buttered popcorn.”
I nod because I can’t really talk anymore. I’m waiting for Mom to say, “Tuesday is a school night. Maisie can’t stay up and watch movies!” But instead she looks up at Uncle Walt with shining eyes and says, “I want to believe you, Walter, but…”
He gives her a sad smile that should, in my opinion, shatter box-office records. “Have a little faith in me, Cin,” he says. “I won’t let you down this time.”
She stares at him for a minute and then says, “Okay. Go, then. Go back there and do what you love, Walter. Get famous for all of us.”
Monday is bad. I skip breakfast because Mom and Uncle Walt are in the kitchen with Grandma, and I can hear her quietly crying. I guess they’re telling her about Uncle Walt leaving and her having to live at our house now. I already did my crying last night, and I don’t want to get all puffy-faced again before I go to school, so I yell good-bye and run out the front door.
I saw Cyrus ride off on his bike fifteen minutes ago, earlier than we ever leave for school. I guess he’s avoiding me, which normally would make me feel terrible, but nothing is normal anymore. If he wasn’t avoiding me, I’d be avoiding him.
At lunch I see Cy sitting with Gary about two seconds before Gary sees me. He starts waving at me, but I pretend I don’t see him and head straight for a table full of girls from my English class. They look at me funny when I plunk down my tray.
“Where’s Cyrus?” this girl Katherine asks me. She looks confused, like I’ve come to school undressed or barefoot or something. Like Cyrus is a part of me I don’t leave home without. Which I guess is true. Katherine has known me since kindergarten, and she’s probably never seen me without him.
I shrug, and they go back to their conversation about where they’re going on their summer vacations. Florida, Minnesota, the Grand Canyon. They’d probably feel sorry for me if they knew, but I’m glad I’ll be spending the summer at home, watching movies. The girls ignore me, and I’m happy to be ignored.
When the last bell rings, I race out the door and grab my bike from the rack. I’m half a block away when I hear Gary yelling my name. I don’t stop pedaling, even though I feel like a creep for running away from him. What else can I do? I can’t let him like me, and I can’t like him back. He’ll just have to think I’m a rotten human being.
When I get home, Mom, Grandma, and Uncle Walt are sitting silently in the living room, watching old episodes of Everybody Loves Raymond. If you saw their faces, you’d have no idea the show was a comedy. I go into the den and wait for this day to be over.
But Tuesday is worse.
Tuesday is the day Mr. Halters’s two sixth-grade English classes are taking a field trip to the Saint Louis Art Museum—an hour on bumpy buses, everybody singing and yelling, and the chaperones telling us to be quiet or else. Which would be bad enough, but oh yeah, Cyrus and Gary are in the other class.
I’m not sure what art has to do with English, but everybody always does field trips the last few weeks of school, and sometimes the destination is kind of random. I like Mr. Halters. He’s an easygoing teacher, and he looks a little like Cary Grant in Bringing Up Baby. When he wore the glasses.
Our class went to the art museum last year too. Cyrus and I had a great time that day. When we looked at paintings, we imagined what the movie would be if the painting was a poster for it. Like, there was a painting of a covered wagon and some mules crossing a prairie with blue mountains in the background, and we decided it was a poster for a sci-fi movie called Happy Trails, Aliens, directed by Clint Eastwood, about a lonely old cowboy who gets lost in magical blue mountains inhabited by creatures from a crashed spaceship. We thought Harrison Ford could star, and Anne Hathaway would be perfect for the alien leader. (They would not fall in love.)
But today everything is different. Today I have to hide from Cyrus, who hates me, and from Gary, who likes me too much and ruined everything.
I keep to the back of the group when the classes are starting to get on the buses. I inch forward as I watch Cyrus and Gary, who are standing together and looking back and forth from one bus to the other. Looking, probably, for me.
I notice Katherine isn’t talking to anybody, so I sneak over to her. “Hey, Katherine!”
She jumps. “Oh! Hi, Maisie. I didn’t see you. Where’s Cyrus?”
My smile falters. “Why do you always ask me that? He’s not the only person I ever hang around with.”
“He isn’t?”
“No,” I say. “Sometimes I like to be with girls.”
“Oh. Okay.” If Katherine was in a movie, she’d be the third-best friend of the main character, somebody who mostly stands quietly in the background and says, “Yeah, me too,” like Joan Cusack in Sixteen Candles.
“Are you…Can I sit with you on the bus?” I ask her. I don’t really want to. It’s always been so easy to talk to Cyrus that I never bothered to figure out how to talk to people I don’t know as well. An hour on the bus with Katherine will be work, but I need to have an explanation ready in case Gary finds me.
“You want to sit with me?” Katherine asks.
“That’s what I just said!” Already she’s starting to get on my nerves, but I don’t know who else to ask. Most of the other girls I know have best friends they’ll be sitting with, but as far as I can tell, Katherine is up for grabs.
She shrugs. “Okay.” She doesn’t seem any more enthusiastic about it than I am.
Just as we’re getting on the bus, Gary spots me. “Maisie!” he yells as he runs over. “Cyrus and I have seats on the other bus. Come with us!”
I point at Katherine. “Sorry! I promised Kath I’d sit with her.” Kath? I’ve never referred to her that way in the entire time I’ve known her. No one does. She turns and stares at me. I don’t think she’d have been any more surprised if I opened my mouth and butterflies flew out.
I climb up the bus stairs, having managed to escape riding with Cy and Gary. Cyrus will be happy, even if Gary isn’t. I guess this is how it’s going to be from now on—I’ll have to stay away from them. I miss Cyrus, though, even if he doesn’t miss me.
It’s a long ride. Katherine tells me all about the church camp she’s going to for two weeks in August. Apparently she goes every year and they do a lot of praying and horseback riding. I don’t know much about either of those things, so I just say “uh-huh” a lot until she gets tired of talking to a robot and looks out the window. I guess I was lucky that Cyrus wanted to be my friend all these years, because I don’t seem to know how to make any others.
The museum is okay. Katherine walks around with the same group of girls she had lunch with yesterday, and I tag along with them as if that’s not weird at all. Four out of five of them are wearing shorts and tank to
ps, and the other one, Esther, is in a dress so tiny that her hair is actually longer than her skirt. In my jeans and T-shirt, I look like their little sister.
Gary has figured out that something is wrong. He’s stopped begging me to join him and Cyrus, but he keeps staring at me until I’m so self-conscious that I feel like I’m in a movie. Like I’m acting in a silent film and everything I do is exaggerated so my audience (Gary) understands it. Look at us girls appreciating these Van Goghs! [Mouth open in awe.] But this Picasso is dark and depressing—we’re not sure how we feel about that. [Eyebrows scrunched together.] Oh, my herd is moving to the next room now. I must hurry so I don’t lose them, these girls I barely know. [Big smile to show how much I’m enjoying myself with my new skimpily dressed pals.]
I like looking at the paintings, but it’s a long, nerve-racking morning, and I’m grateful when we get back on the bus. To my relief, the chaperones announce we should take the same seats we had before. Katherine doesn’t look too thrilled. It occurs to me that if I’m going to find a girl to be friends with, I should probably look for somebody who actually likes me.
Our second stop is the Gateway Arch, that enormous silver croquet hoop that looms over the Mississippi River as you cross into St. Louis from the Illinois side. We’ve all brought bag lunches that we’re supposed to eat on the grassy lawn outside before we get into the tram cars that take us up to the top of the Arch.
I’m tired of pretending I want to hang out with Katherine and her friends, so I check where Cyrus and Gary are sitting, then choose a spot where I can be far away from them and alone. But my peanut-butter sandwich sticks in my throat. I can’t help it—I miss Cyrus. I even miss Gary, but I really miss Cyrus. We haven’t spoken in three days, which hasn’t happened in the entire history of our friendship.
I don’t care if Cy is gay as long as I can still be his best friend. Why didn’t I say that to him right away? But maybe he doesn’t want a girl best friend anymore. Maybe he wants Gary to be his boyfriend and his best friend. Probably he wants me to disappear so Gary won’t like me more than him. But then I wouldn’t have either one of them, my old friend or my new one. How is that fair?
A group of boys from the other class is sitting a few feet away, but they aren’t paying attention to me. They’re talking about the Andy Warhol exhibit we just saw at the museum, which was mostly portraits of famous people—Marilyn Monroe, Michael Jackson, Elizabeth Taylor—in bright, garish colors.
A kid named Tyler says, “I heard one of those paintings is worth millions of dollars. I don’t get it. They don’t seem that great to me.”
Another boy, Chris, laughs. “Like you know anything about art.”
“I know something about Andy Warhol,” Tyler says. “I heard he was gay.”
The boys’ ears perk up then, and mine do too. One of them says, “He was a homo?”
“All those artists are homos,” Chris says, like he’s an art expert.
“Ugh,” one of the guys says. “Why do they make us go and see stuff like that? I don’t want to see a bunch of gay art.”
I don’t even know I’m going to say it, but I turn around and all of a sudden I’m yelling at them. “God, do you have one working brain cell among the four of you? You don’t even know what you’re talking about! For one thing, not all artists are gay, and for another, so what if they were? The important thing is the paintings, not whether the painter is straight or gay…or anything else, for that matter!”
The boys are all staring at me, and so are a bunch of other kids. I guess my voice carries.
“How do you know so much about it?” Chris says. “I guess you must be a lesbian, huh?” They all crack up then, rolling around on the grass and hooting like demented owls.
I can feel how red my face is, and I wonder if people think I’m blushing because it’s true—that they think I am a lesbian. I don’t care what those dumb boys think, but a lot of people overheard them. I don’t look around, but I know kids nearby are watching me.
I crush my paper bag and stand up. I can’t just walk away without saying anything, but everything I think of seems wrong. Finally I just say, “Grow up!” and that makes them howl even louder.
I throw my bag in the trash and find Mr. Halters. “I don’t feel good,” I tell him. “Can I just wait on the bus?” He nods and doesn’t even ask me what’s wrong. He probably thinks I have my period or something, which is also embarrassing since I’m probably the only girl in my class who hasn’t gotten it yet. I climb into the hot, yellow box, and I’m relieved to see that the driver is fast asleep in his seat. At least I won’t have to deal with any comments from him.
I’m sorry to miss going to the top of the Arch, but I’ve been up there before. Grandma likes to go because she remembers watching it being built. (At least she used to remember that.) From the top you can see across the whole city, but it’s a little scary too. In the brochure we got it says the Arch is 630 feet high and was built to sway in the wind so it won’t break. When you’re up there, it makes you dizzy to think how high you are, swinging around like that.
I’m dizzy enough as it is. Not because of what those miserable kids said to me. I don’t think I’m gay because…well, because I like Gary Hackett even though I’m trying not to. But Cyrus probably is gay, and it’s pretty obvious some kids would be mean to him if they knew. Cy wasn’t just afraid of telling me—he was afraid of telling anybody, of letting the truth out into the world. I get that. Just knowing that I know his secret must make him feel like he’s 630 feet in the air, swaying back and forth with nothing underneath him.
I have to sit by Katherine again on the ride home, but I get the window seat this time, so I can lean against the glass and pretend I’m sleepy. Nobody says anything to me about the lesbian crack, but I know they’re all talking about it. That kind of thing circulates through a sixth-grade class like pee in a swimming pool.
Our bus gets stuck in traffic, so we get back later than the first bus, and Gary and Cyrus have already gone home. Which is fine. I don’t know yet what I’m going to say to Cy, and besides, I can’t say it in front of Gary.
When I get home, I call Cy’s house and his mom answers. “He’s not here, Maisie,” she says. “He’s over at Gary’s. I just assumed you were with them.”
“Oh, right,” I lie. “I forgot we were going over there today.” No reason to make her suspicious.
I get myself a glass of iced tea and walk out the back door. Grandma and Mr. Schmitz are sitting side by side in patio chairs, holding hands. It was weird enough to see this going on at Grandma’s house, but now it’s happening in my own house. I’m not freaked out about it because they’re old; I’m freaked out because they’re not in the least embarrassed. They really like each other, and they’re just sitting out here, letting everybody see it. I don’t know where people get so much nerve.
I’m just about to turn around and go back inside when Grandma says, “Sit down, Maisie,” and because I’m glad she knows who I am, I do.
“Where’s your boyfriend?” Mr. Schmitz asks.
Oh, for Pete’s sake. “I told you, Cyrus is just my friend,” I say, but then I’m not sure that’s true anymore.
Mr. Schmitz nods. “Right. You told me.”
“Aren’t you ever at the Lincoln anymore?” I ask him.
He grunts. “I’m there as much as I need to be. Besides, it’s about time I retired, don’t you think?”
“You wouldn’t close it, would you?” I ask. That would be about the worst thing to ever happen in New Aztec.
Grandma stares at her fingers, all knotted up with Mr. Schmitz’s, and doesn’t pay the least bit of attention to our conversation.
“Nah, I’ll get somebody to run it for me. Too bad you’re not old enough. Oh, I forgot, you’re moving out to Hollywood, aren’t you?”
“I hope so,” I say. I’m trying to imagine the Lincoln Theater without Mr. Schmitz prowling around it. “If you retire, can you still go there and watch movies for free?”
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He laughs a little. “I think I’ve seen enough movies for one lifetime.”
I don’t see how that could be true. “What’s on this weekend?” I ask him.
“Not sure. Check the newspaper,” he says.
“You don’t know?” I can’t even believe this.
“Kiddo, there are other important things now.” He winks at Grandma, and her face gets all soft and sweet.
“Okay, well, I have homework,” I say, so I can go inside and escape whatever is happening out here on the patio. There’s no homework on a field-trip day and not much left to do for next week either. And then school’s out for the summer. I always spend the summer hanging out with Cyrus, going to movies and talking about movies, and this summer we were supposed to be making a movie. If Gary Hackett hadn’t started hanging around us, that’s what we would be doing.
While I’m finishing my iced tea in the kitchen, I look out the window and see Mr. Schmitz stand up and put out a hand to Grandma. I can’t hear what they’re saying, but she’s laughing. She stands up, and Mr. Schmitz puts a hand around her waist and…they dance. There’s no music, and they’re waltzing around on a cracked-cement patio on a ninety-degree afternoon, but they don’t seem to care about any of that.
I get goose bumps watching them. Mr. Schmitz’s wish has come true. He’s gotten another dance with Evie.
When I go into the living room to give them their privacy, I hear grunting and groaning coming from the den—or rather, my room. Or for now, Grandma’s room. I don’t know what we’re calling it these days.
“Oh, good, Maisie’s here,” Mom says. “Can you help push? Uncle Walt only has one good arm.”
I stand next to Uncle Walt and brace my shoulder against the instrument. “Where are we moving it?”