I leaned against the teacher’s desk, waiting for our next move.
When it went to voice mail, she waited for the beep. “Whoops. False alarm. Sorry about the embarrassing towel incident. That was so not part of my plan, but kudos! Now, just so we’re on the same page, if you ever even think about seeking out retaliation against Tyson or anyone you think might be related to this little episode, this picture will go public. Whether I’m dead or alive.” She took a second to let that sink in for him. “And, Luke,” she said, “if girls aren’t your thing and you realize you’re lying to everyone including yourself and you decide to be honest, just remember I saved that moment for you. I kept your secret, which isn’t something I can say you did for me.” She hung up the phone.
I tried to process her words. Secret. “Alice,” I said, “what secret are you talking about?”
She looked down at her feet. “Nothing. It’s not important.”
I watched her, waiting for her to talk.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” she said.
I nodded. I could wait. “The picture,” I said. “I’m proud of you.”
“Everyone was distracted. It would have been a waste. And at least now I’ve got some leverage on him.”
I covered her hand with mine and she didn’t pull away. “Let’s skip and hang out at my place.” Alice yawned. “I’m tired and my head hurts.”
“Yeah, that sounds good.”
We walked to my car, and I didn’t let go of her hand once.
The next day, I headed to gym with Dennis as he told me what had happened after Alice and I left.
“He got suspended for a week, ya know?” said Dennis. “Apparently, the police sent him to the lockers to get changed and he punched one of the mirrors above the sinks, so Principal Kirby said he’d have to sit out the first three baseball games this spring too.”
“Wow,” I breathed. “How did you find all this out?”
“Debora was in the office when the whole thing went down. She said Luke’s hand was wrapped in gauze.” Dennis stopped in the middle of the hallway, letting everyone else on their way to class pass us. “I don’t know what he did to Alice, but remind me never to get on her bad side.”
Before gym class, I stopped in front of the only sink missing a mirror. Small shards of glass that the janitor had neglected still glistened against the white porcelain. I turned on the water and guided the last bits of glass down the drain with my thumb, wondering what hell I’d gotten myself into.
Alice.
Now
“So, Allie Cat, what does your weekend look like?” This was Eric’s attempt at making plans, and I was over making plans. Plans were promises in disguise. “Maybe I could take you out Saturday?”
I had to hand it to Eric. Without an “umm” or a pause, he had asked me out.
“I’ll let you know Saturday,” I said as I climbed out of his old Range Rover.
Eric didn’t seem bothered. “Saturday,” he said.
Eric had started driving me home on my third day of school. I’d been back for about three weeks now. Every day I seemed to pull farther away from Harvey. I’d never had a problem with confrontation before, but I didn’t know how to tell Harvey that the idea of “us” terrified me. I couldn’t promise him the things he wanted because Harvey wanted forever. And that had been so much easier to give him when forever had an expiration date. Still, I missed him, and I didn’t expect for it to hurt so bad.
Yesterday, I watched him in the hallway from an alcove of water fountains. He walked out of the bathroom and to his locker. I started to follow him. I didn’t know what I would say, but I thought that maybe I was ready to say something. I was a few steps away from him when Dennis’s sister, Debora, walked out of a classroom and into step with him. She touched his elbow and stood on her tiptoes to tell him something. He leaned his head over a little so he could hear her. My stomach twisted, and I felt my ears turning red. I spun around and went back to the gym to find Eric.
The novelty of me coming back from the dead had worn off, and now everyone at school was more concerned with whether or not the vegetarian sloppy joe in the cafeteria was actually vegetarian. I hadn’t seen much of Luke or Celeste, but I hadn’t written them off either. That would have been stupid of me.
Eric reversed down the driveway. I wondered what his story was, but I didn’t plan on asking. If we got personal, our friendship would no longer be one of convenience but instead something to maintain. Before unlocking the front door, I checked the mailbox above the doorbell. All junk mail and advertisements. At the bottom of the stack was a giant postcard folded in half. The postcard showed families on mini trains and in spinning teacups. It read:
Chill of winter got you down? It’s never too early to book your summer vacation to Lake Quasipi Family Amusement Park!
Below that was all the booking information, including local lodging rates and a list of some other nearby attractions.
Once inside, I dumped all the mail in the trash and walked to the living room. Up until fifth grade, we’d gone to Lake Quasipi every summer. It was this old, rundown amusement park that never had any lines. My memories from Lake Quasipi were perfect little slices of nostalgia where everyone got a happy ending. I remembered riding the mini mine train with Harvey when we were kids, which was basically a mini wooden roller coaster with tunnels like a mine would have. It was Harvey’s favorite, and he would beg to ride it again and again. One time the bar that sat in our laps got stuck, so we couldn’t get off the ride. The manager had to come over and help the teenager manning the ride jimmy the bar up. We both howled, thinking we would be stuck forever. My mom stood next to us, calming us down as my dad told us jokes and Natalie held our hands.
Sighing, I doubled back and fished the postcard from the trash can. I smoothed it out and laid it on the kitchen counter. Then I called Harvey. I missed him and that was worse than not knowing what to say to him. After four rings, it went to voice mail, and I fumbled with the phone, unable to hang up before leaving a four-second message of silence.
I waited, but Harvey didn’t call me back.
When my parents got home from work, they said they were going out for dinner and asked if I wanted to join. I passed, unwilling to play a role in their sham of a marriage.
The two of them rushed out the front door after making a last-minute reservation. As I locked up behind them, the doorbell rang.
Harvey stood on the front porch, waving to my mom.
“Hi,” I said.
He turned to me. “Mind if I come in?”
I opened the door and he followed me through to the kitchen.
The house felt even quieter than it had when I was alone.
Harvey leaned up against the kitchen counter. “You called me, but I figured I’d stop by on my way home from work.”
“What made you think I’d answer the door?”
His jaw twitched with the promise of a smile. “I don’t know.” He drummed his fingers on the countertop. “I haven’t seen you much these last few weeks.”
“Yeah. Lots of catching up to do with school.” That was a lie. There was plenty of catching up to be done, but I wasn’t really doing it.
He nodded and pushed off from the counter, walking to the other side of the kitchen where the postcard from Lake Quasipi sat. “Alice—” The way he said my name. It was the way you say someone’s name when you have something to say that you’ve been sitting on for a while. But then he saw the postcard and held it up. “Feeling sentimental?” he asked.
I shrugged.
“You hungry?”
“I guess,” I said. “Let me get a jacket.”
I went upstairs for my maroon peacoat and a scarf. The coat was big and the scarf didn’t match, but right now, I didn’t care. I touched my fingers to my hair, which had begun to grow out into a poorly maintained pageboy cut. I took kitchen scissors to it the other night to even it out. My mom asked if I wanted her to take me for a haircut, but I declined. I had
so little hair that getting a haircut would have felt like buying a picture book for a blind guy. Unnecessary.
Outside, the wind was biting and relentless. Harvey ran ahead of me and opened the passenger door.
His heater made more noise than it did heat. I didn’t ask him where we were going, but was unsurprised when we pulled up to Prespa’s. We came here every year for Harvey’s birthday. It was a little kitschy Italian place with over-buttered garlic rolls and grapes painted on the wall, not to be overshadowed by the giant mural behind the bar that showcased everything that might in some way be Italian, from people to landmarks.
Inside, we waited for a table even though every single one was available.
When we sat down, Harvey asked, “What are your specials?”
The waitress, with her short, curly, black hair peppered gray, had worked here for as long as I could remember. And because the specials never changed, she pointed to the dusty chalkboard on the wall.
“I’ll have the chicken marsala and a Coke,” he said.
“And I’ll take the spaghetti and meatballs and a water. No ice. Extra lemon.”
The waitress nodded and walked off to the bar to retrieve our drinks. After she’d brought those back with a basket of microwaved bread, Harvey said, “Question game. What do you want to be when you grow up?”
You’d think that after all these years of playing the question game there would be no questions left to ask, but that wasn’t the case. We’d asked each other this same question—What do you want to be when you grow up?—a million times, but the answer seemed to change every time.
“This time last year I might have said ‘alive.’ But I don’t know,” I said, sitting in silence for a moment, trying to mentally sort this. I’d never thought about professions or anything. I guess when I was little I wanted to be a ballerina, but no one ever does anything they plan on, so I never thought much of it. Thinking about it seemed like a waste of my now time, but I guessed there was one thing I always wanted to be. “In control,” I said.
The corner of his lip lifted and he shook his head, like he’d won a bet.
A gust of wind blew in as our waitress went outside for a smoke break; I shivered.
“What about you?” I asked.
He shook out of his jacket and tossed it to me. I used it as a blanket on my legs. The lining of the jacket was warm with Harvey.
“I think,” he said, “I think I want to do lots of things, but I want to own something. Like a business or, I don’t know. I’d like to learn to play another type of instrument. Like the guitar or whatever.”
His fingers traced paths on the sticky plastic tablecloth. I wondered if they missed that act of creating, like my toes did. The healthier I got, the more my feet ached to move.
It was my turn now, and I wanted to ask him about everything that had happened between us those last couple weeks before I found out I was in remission, but I didn’t know how to. So I asked, “Freeze to death or burn to death?”
“Too easy, Al. Burn. What about you?”
“I’ve already done the dying-slowly thing, so burn.”
“We can burn together,” he said.
“Thick as thieves,” I mumbled. Skimming the edges of my memory were recollections of us whispering in the backseat while my dad watched us in his rearview, a smile on his lips as he muttered, “Thick as thieves.”
“My turn. Was there ever a time when you actually enjoyed playing the piano?”
He leaned back in the booth. “A few times.”
“Oh, come on, Harvey. That was awfully vague.”
“Well, so was the question, and I answered it,” he replied smartly.
“No you didn’t. Now answer my question.”
“When it was for you,” he said, his voice soft. “I enjoyed playing the piano when it was for you. Are you happy now?”
His words made my rib cage hurt, like it was too big for my body, but I didn’t answer. “Why did you quit?”
“It’s not your turn anymore.”
The waitress brought our food out along with a round of refills.
I took a sip of my water.
Harvey practically face-planted into his dish, shoveling food into his mouth. “Why did you quit ballet?”
I took a deep breath and decided to be honest. “I would never have been good enough.”
“What do you mean?” His face scrunched up.
“I wasn’t ever going to be good enough to make a career of it.” I paused. “I love your mom, Harvey, but I could never teach like she does. It wouldn’t satisfy me. Performance or nothing.” And I was never going to be good enough for the stage.
He leaned forward. “But you were incredible, Alice.”
I smiled. “In comparison to who, Harvey? All fifteen girls in my class?” I would never go back to ballet. Especially not now, when my body was still weak and out of practice. No matter how much I convinced my brain not to, my muscles still missed ballet. Then there were the pointe shoes Natalie had given me. I tried to hide them from myself. But it never worked, because all they did was haunt me every time I opened my closet or looked under my bed.
I was done thinking about this. I was done talking about this. “Now, you have to answer. Why’d you quit?”
He took another bite and swallowed. “Because I got tired of doing it for other people.”
We were quiet as we ate the rest of our dinner. Harvey finished before I did. He pushed his plate aside and said, “I think my father played the piano too.”
I didn’t know what to say. Harvey never really talked about his dad. I figured he’d always thought about it, but I felt wrong asking.
“Do you wonder where he is?” I asked.
“I try not to.”
I wasn’t a very good person unless I really made the effort to be. But I’d always wanted to solve this problem for Harvey. Because I had a pretty okay dad and Harvey deserved that—probably more than I did. But I had no idea where to start.
It was such a frank moment between us that I almost told him about my mom. But if I told Harvey that, there would be no more secrets and he would move in even closer. And that couldn’t happen. The closer he got, the more answers I owed him.
When our check came, Harvey insisted on paying. I argued, but finally said thank you.
We stood and I gave him his jacket back. Outside he hesitantly took my hand. The touch of his skin against mine sent a shot of electricity up my spine followed by the sheer relief that his feelings for me hadn’t changed.
We walked to the car, but he didn’t open the door for me. Closing the space between us with one step, he pressed me up against the car with the length of his body. I knew it was freezing out, but only because I knew it should be and not because I could feel it. He brought his hands up to my face, holding my cheeks in his hands; I tucked my arms inside his jacket and around his waist. It was a reaction, nothing my body gave my mind a chance to decide.
“I’ve missed kissing you,” he said. One hand slid around to the back of my neck.
My stomach tightened and my fingers tingled against his back. I should have stopped him right there and told him the truth—that I couldn’t promise him what he wanted. Because I wouldn’t let myself make promises any longer. Not when they could be broken.
Instead I replayed his words in my head because they were so delicious.
The heat from my chest filled my cheeks, and Harvey leaned into me. Even if I wasn’t pressed up against his car, I wouldn’t have moved. I stayed perfectly still except for the beat of my heart pounding in my ears, like someone was inside of me banging on the cavity of my chest, begging to be let out. He was so warm and near that when I inhaled, it was his breath in my lungs.
The car next to us beeped, the headlights blinking, and we jumped apart.
We drove in silence the whole way home, not because it was awkward. We didn’t have to talk and the not talking felt good.
When we got home, Harvey followed me inside, and I tried to cou
nt the hours until my parents might be home. I felt like I was at war with myself. I wanted nothing more than to feel something, but I didn’t know how to deal with what came after the feeling.
“You want some hot chocolate?” I asked.
“I’m okay,” he said, looking out the kitchen window, like he could see whatever was out there in the darkness of our backyard.
All I saw was the reflection of him in the window.
I poured a cup of milk and put it in the microwave.
“Alice,” he said slowly, “why have you been avoiding me?”
The question made me testy, like a cornered animal. “I’m not,” I said. “I called you tonight, didn’t I?”
He took in a sharp breath and exhaled. “You called me because you decided you wanted me here tonight, not because you wanted me.” His voice got louder with every word. “You don’t get to be the only person to decide when this works for you,” he said.
The microwave dinged as I closed my eyes for a moment and said, “Good night, Harvey.” I couldn’t look at him and say it at the same time. I wanted so badly to tell him to stay and that I was sorry, but calling him had been a mistake, and I didn’t know how to make him understand that. He had to leave because if he didn’t, I wouldn’t be able to stop myself from falling down this slope and into him.
“You never surprise me, Alice, which is such a disappointment.”
His words pinballed in my chest, every syllable hitting harder than the last, but I kept my back straight and my expression unmoving as I opened the microwave.
He turned, walked a few steps, and then spun back around long enough to say, “I can’t pretend to forget anymore.”
Alice.
Now
I went to bed before my parents got home from dinner. I wasn’t sure when I fell asleep, but it was somewhere in between thoughts of Harvey and my mom.
The next morning I slept in and found a note from my mom on the kitchen table.
A—
Doctor’s office called, had to reschedule your blood work for Tuesday.