The Universe Is Expanding and So Am I

  “What’s your sister like?” Sebastian asks.

  “It’s been so long since I’ve seen her,” I say. “She’s really pretty. Like people used to say she should be a model. She was premed at Brown and wanted to go to medical school but decided to take time off and do the Peace Corps. Also—” I watch some clouds drift by, all wispy like cotton candy. There’s something I want to tell Sebastian, but I can’t think of how to say it without it sounding weird.

  “What?”

  I shake my head. Sebastian’s hat is on the blanket next to my shoulder. I grab it and put it over my face so he can’t see me.

  He quickly snatches off the hat. “You may be cute with your obsession with my hat, but if you don’t tell me what you were going to say I’m going to have to tickle it out of you.”

  I giggle and attempt to wriggle away, but he’s rolled partway on me, pinning me down. He waggles his fingers over my underarms like he’s about to tickle me. I’m laughing and shrieking. Eventually he slides off me and kisses me hard. I kiss him hard right back.

  After a few minutes, Sebastian says, “What were you going to tell me before? About your sister?”

  I shake my head. “It’s just that when I met your sister last year she reminded me of Anaïs. That’s all.”

  The other day, I told him about how I went up to Columbia in December to apologize to Annie for what happened. I wasn’t sure how much he already knew, but I wanted him to hear it from me.

  “How does she remind you of Annie?” he asks curiously.

  I nibble at a strawberry, thinking. He brought a container of berries and shortbread cookies, too.

  “Long hair,” I finally say, dropping the green strawberry top onto a paper towel and rubbing off my fingers. “Confident. Independent.”

  Sebastian opens his sketch pad and grabs a few pastels out of a pencil bag.

  “What?” I ask.

  “It’s just weird, that’s all.”

  I think about how Dad told Mom that his family might sue my family. It’s not his family and my family, though. It’s Annie and Byron. But what if my parents run out of money paying them a large financial sum and can’t send me to college? Then it is me, too.

  I sigh heavily. “I know.”

  “We’re doing this family therapy session tomorrow,” he says. He begins swirling light green across the page, punctuated by streaks of brown. “I’m dreading it. Annie’s having a really hard time. She says there’s no point in talking about it, that nothing will make it better. My parents want to meet with Columbia about getting a refund on my tuition, but they’re also saying they’d consider forfeiting the money they’ve put down for me. No one but me can see how Annie’s issues and my going to Columbia aren’t related.”

  Sebastian picks up a white pastel but then sets it down again. “Annie’s like how you described. She was the first girl in our high school to skate as well as the guys and to describe herself as a feminist. I was a freshman when she was a senior.”

  I nod. Anaïs also identifies as a feminist. I am, too, though I don’t go around declaring it. It just means you think women deserve the same rights and privileges as men. Putting it that way, I can’t imagine a woman not being a feminist.

  Sebastian glances across the sloped lawn at a lilac bush and then reaches for a pale purple pastel. “But my sister’s also … she can be prickly. She’s not this tragic victim who is only nice and sweet and good. That’s not real life.” He shakes his head. “We shouldn’t talk about her, I guess.”

  As Sebastian goes back to drawing, I pull The Great Gatsby out of my bag and lie on my side with the book propped on the blanket next to me. It’s been such a hazy few days that I’m rereading the early chapters to remember what’s going on.

  “What?” Sebastian asks.

  I touch my finger against the page to hold my spot. “What what?”

  “You said ‘wow.’ ”

  “No, I didn’t,” I say. I totally didn’t.

  “Need another tickle to prove it?”

  I glance at him. He’s smiling, which makes me realize that I must have said “wow,” because I thought “wow” in my head. I point to a line in the book. Sebastian leans in, and we read it together: It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life.

  “Nick is describing Gatsby, but when I read it I thought of you,” I tell him. “Of your smile. Of how it makes me feel.”

  He sets down his sketch pad. “Virginia.”

  “Yeah?”

  “You’re awesome.”

  “I know,” I say, laughing uncomfortably.

  “I’m serious. You’re not like the girls back home. Okay, that sounds stupid. But you’re not. You’re real. I know we’re not talking about my sister, but I love that you went up to Columbia to apologize to her even though you didn’t do anything wrong. You think deeply about things. You’re not scared to say what’s on your mind. I don’t know, it’s just …”

  As he trails off, I nod. Even though this is totally not how I am with the rest of the world, I feel like I’m my best self around Sebastian.

  “What about your ex-girlfriend?” I ask. It just came out. Or maybe I wanted it to. After all, I’m the girl who’s not scared to say what’s on her mind.

  “Maddie.” Sebastian flops down next to me and covers his face with the straw hat. His fingers are smudged with several shades of pastels. “She cheated on me with a guy she went snowmobiling with. She singlehandedly obliterated my ability to ever trust again.”

  “Wow.”

  “Yeah. Atomic. Especially for a clumsy ESFP who couldn’t snowmobile to save his life.”

  I lace my fingers through his. After a minute, he lifts the hat off his face.

  “I feel the same way about you,” he says. “Your smile of eternal reassurance.”

  Since I’m on an honesty kick, I blurt out, “After we pick up my sister tomorrow, we’re going to Connecticut. I won’t be back until Monday. I’m going to miss you.”

  “Three days?”

  “Three and a half.”

  “We’re on strawberry, by the way,” he says.

  I glance at the container of berries, trying to make sense of what he just said.

  “The very hungry caterpillar,” Sebastian adds. “Today is the day when he eats four strawberries.”

  “Then what?”

  “Then there’s an epic food binge coming.”

  I giggle. “Sounds fun.”

  We stay at the Botanical Garden for the rest of the afternoon, wandering around, sketching, reading, kissing. On the bus to the subway, he gives me his straw hat to borrow for the weekend. We take the subway to 125th Street together, but then I get out and switch to a separate car for the rest of the ride back to the Upper West Side.

  17

  My sister’s plane is landing at Kennedy airport around noon. Gerri lets me do a half shift and leave the gym at nine. After finishing at Whole Fitness, I quickly swing by the post office and mail a package to Shannon. I address it to a place called South Lake Tahoe. It’s about 150 miles from the Tuolumne Meadows stop, where I sent her last package. This time I’m sending the Chinatown candies, a few packs of gum, and orange Tic Tacs. I wait until I’m in line at the post office to scribble a note on the back of a flyer for a personal trainer who works at the gym.

  Dear Shannon,

  Hey there, pooping-in-the-woods woman! How’s the hike? Have you been chased by any bears? Anaïs is getting home today! We’re picking her up from the airport as soon as I mail this. My dad says I can’t do the internship at Ciel because of the Byron stuff so I’m working at Whole Fitness instead. Before you die of total shock I’ll tell you that it’s actually not so bad. Sometimes, during breaks, I take a small walk on a treadmill. Not 150 miles of rugged terrain like you, but still. Being on workout equipment hasn’t caused me to barf in disgust.

  Also, remember that guy I wrote about in my last letter? Sebastian? I’m go
ing to write this and then send it before I can take it back.

  I might be falling in love with him.

  Now, eat this letter. Or burn it in a campfire. Or, no! Use it for much-needed toilet paper.

  Love,

  Virginia

  I write that one sentence really tiny, like if she doesn’t look hard enough she might not see it, like if I write it full size then it might be full-size true. And it’s hard to imagine that full-size thing truly happening to me.

  On the drive to the airport, I keep imagining the moment we see Anaïs. I wonder if I’ll feel comfortable around her. My big sister was the one who told me about boys and what sex is actually like versus what it says in the puberty books Mom gave us. Yet thinking about her now, she seems like a stranger. Also, I hope she doesn’t let it slip that I told her about Byron’s arrest. I know she wouldn’t intentionally, but like she said on the phone last week, she’s out of practice with the way we keep secrets in our family.

  I push my seat belt to the side and wiggle my phone out of my shorts pocket. I consider texting Sebastian but decide not to with my parents so close. In the front seat, Mom is typing furiously at her phone. Dad is entering something into GPS. I open the Notes app and start writing. Ever since I told Sebastian I want to be a writer I’ve been jotting lists on my phone, in my computer, on random scraps of paper at the gym. Maybe someday I’ll publish a book of lists and it will become a bestseller and I’ll go on a book tour. Now that Mom’s “Purple Hair and Piercings” proposal has been scrapped, I am my only hope for fame and fortune. Anyway, here goes for today:

  A CURVACEOUS CHICK’S MUSINGS ON FULL-SIZE LOVE

  When I think about S., I smile with eternal reassurance.

  I love that I can be myself around him and he makes me laugh and I make him laugh.

  I love that he’s a klutz.

  I love kissing him, ChapStick and all.

  I clutched his straw hat while I was falling asleep last night. I’m guessing it’s the only time in history that a straw hat has been tenderly hugged.

  “Gin,” Dad says sharply. “Enough with the phone. It’s not becoming of your generation the way you’re always texting or playing video games. Just look out the window and be in your head for a while.”

  Stunned, I drop my phone into my lap. “I wasn’t playing a video game.”

  “Well, then texting. Your generation is never going to learn the art of conversation if you’re on your phones all the time.”

  I stare out the window, my hands clenched, my fingernails digging into my palms. At first, I think it’s no use trying to explain myself. Then I remember what Sebastian said, about how he likes that I’m the kind of girl who speaks her mind.

  “Did you know I actually hate video games?” I say to Dad. “I think they’re a waste of time, and I never play them.”

  Dad glances quickly in his rearview mirror and then shifts lanes.

  “Besides,” I add, “look at Mom. She’s on her phone. And you’re always on your phone. How is that different? Also, I didn’t realize I represent the unbecomingness of my whole generation.”

  Mom sets her phone in the center console but doesn’t say a word.

  “Are you talking back?” Dad asks.

  Just then, a van slows in front of us and Dad hits the brakes too hard.

  “Mike, easy,” Mom says as she loosens the seat belt from her neck area.

  “Don’t be a back seat driver,” he mutters.

  “I don’t think it’s talking back to say that you guys are on your phones a lot,” I say. “Don’t you want me to have an opinion? Also, what if I told you that I want to be a writer and I’m actually doing creative writing on my phone, not texting and playing games?”

  We pass a sign for Kennedy airport. Dad flicks his signal and then says, “Listen, I’m sorry. I’m under a lot of stress right now. We all are.”

  I’m about to say “it’s okay,” but the truth is that it’s not okay. I hate the way I’m the punching bag whenever my parents are stressed. Instead, I open Notes and add one final line.

  6.  Forget what Dad said about how I’m NOT becoming. I want to think about what I am becoming. About what we are becoming.

  A few minutes after noon, Anaïs emerges through the doors of customs. When we see her long brown hair and beaming smile, we hop up, waving and running toward her. She’s wearing a floor-length white dress and she looks as beautiful as always, with her big brown eyes, high cheekbones, and lean elegant body.

  Mom gets the first hug, then Dad, and then me. As she squeezes me tight, I breathe her in and I’m transported back to Anaïs helping me with my eighth-grade science fair project or teaching me how to ride a bike when everyone else in my family gave up.

  “Look at you, all grown up with your purple-and-green hair,” Anaïs says.

  My face is pressed tight in her shoulder and my eyes are teary. “I did it myself.”

  “I love it.”

  When we let go, I can see that Anaïs is crying, too, and so are Mom and Dad. They didn’t want her to go into the Peace Corps because it delayed her medical school plans, but I know they were also worried about her safety being in a remote village in Burkina Faso.

  “Sweetie.” Mom clasps my sister’s cheeks with her hands and leans in close. “You look gorgeous. How’s your health? I love your dress.”

  “We’re so glad you’re home,” Dad says, smiling. He looks genuinely happy for the first time since Byron’s arrest, or possibly for the first time since before the dean of students called last fall to say that Byron was getting suspended from Columbia.

  Anaïs wipes her eyes and then looks to her side. That’s when I notice that the whole time we’ve been hugging, a woman with curly red hair has been standing next to my sister, backpack on her shoulders, smile on her face.

  “Guys,” Anaïs says, “this is Lindsey. Lindsey, this is my family. Except for my brother. Where is Byron, anyway? Wasn’t he going to come?”

  “He’s in Connecticut,” Mom says quickly. “You’ll see him tomorrow.”

  Lindsey sticks out her hand. “Nice to meet you. Ana has told me so much about you.”

  Dad shakes her hand first, then Mom, and then me. She has one of those smiles that reveal her top teeth and a pink strip of gums, too. I wonder what she’s heard about us, the real story or the picture-perfect variety. I have a feeling Mom is wondering the same thing because she’s watching Lindsey closely, studying her jeans and tank top, her sneakers, the freckles across the bridge of her nose.

  “Were you in the Peace Corps together?” Dad asks.

  At the same time, Mom says, “Anaïs, you didn’t mention you were bringing a friend home.”

  Anaïs says, “We were both in the Gurunsi region but in different villages.”

  At the same time, Lindsey laughs and says, “Oh, no, I’m not coming home with you. My aunt lives in Brooklyn. I’m going to her place. Ana and I were in London visiting my parents and we flew in on the same flight.”

  Mom visibly exhales. She likes houseguests when she can be in show-off mode, flaunting our beautiful apartment and her successful children. But now, with everything going on with Byron, it’s not show-and-tell time.

  I, on the other hand, am still holding my breath because I just realized that Lindsey calls my sister “Ana.” But it’s more than that. It’s the way they’re smiling at each other. I know that smile. It’s a smile of eternal reassurance.

  Mom must be picking up on it, too, because she says, “You said you’re friends from the Peace Corps?”

  Anaïs takes Lindsey’s hand and holds it up to her chest. “Lindsey is my girlfriend from the Peace Corps.”

  Enter: Utter silence. Pin-drop silence. The most silence that has ever occurred in the baggage claim area at Kennedy airport’s international terminal.

  Mom and Dad are pros at the fakey-nicey thing, so they quickly recover. They hug Lindsey and ask her all these questions like how long she and my sister have been together, and wh
ether she grew up in London, and where she’s staying in Brooklyn.

  Lindsey tells them that she and my sister have been friends since they entered the Peace Corps, but have only been together for three months. She grew up in California with her mom and stepdad. Her dad and stepmom live in London. Her aunt has an apartment in Park Slope. That’s where she stays when she comes to New York City.

  As we lug Anaïs’s and Lindsey’s enormous duffels off the baggage carousel and heave them onto carts, Lindsey compliments my hair and tells me she can’t wait to get to know me more. She’s definitely talking a lot. I wonder if she’s nervous, or if she’s an extrovert, or both. Ever since I met Sebastian, I’ve been thinking more about personality types.

  We walk Lindsey to the taxi line and then give them some space to say good-bye. I watch Lindsey rise onto her toes to kiss Anaïs on the lips, and I see other people looking, too. I wonder if they’re staring in a homophobic way or a curious way, like it’s not every day you see two women kissing in public. I’m definitely in the curious camp.

  Once we’re in the car, with my parents in the front and Anaïs and me in the back, Mom says, “You could have given us some warning.”

  “Warning makes it sound like a bad thing,” Anaïs says. “I wanted to surprise you. We did the same with Lindsey’s parents, and they were thrilled.”

  I glance sideways at my sister. Her dress is embroidered with tiny cream-colored flowers and she’s wearing leather sandals. Her face is tan and she has creases around her eyes. Seeing her close up like this, she definitely looks older. I can’t believe she’s twenty-four.

  “Good for Lindsey’s parents,” Mom says. “So you’re a lesbian now?”

  “I don’t feel the need to identify with one particular sexual orientation,” Anaïs says. “I’m in love with Lindsey. Love is love is love. I don’t have to categorize it. That’s so your generation.”

  “Oh, right,” Mom says, laughing sharply. “Our generation and every generation that came before us for thousands of years.”