His shoulders kind of stoop. “I did. I’m sorry. I don’t know what else to say.”
“Last chance. They only take rising freshmen and sophomores.” He opens his mouth to say he’s sorry again, but evidently decides against it.
“I should go,” he says, after a while of us just standing there. “My mom is waiting.”
“Your mom drove you here?” He’s totally old enough to have his own car. Maybe his driving privileges got revoked. Good.
His shoulders stoop even more. “Yeah.”
“Was this her idea?”
He nods. Wow. You break a girl’s wrist and you can’t even come up with the idea of taking her flowers yourself. Pathetic.
“Okay,” I say.
“Clara, I’m really sorry,” he says again, and leaves.
Twenty-Nine
“Wow,” dad says, after the door clicks shut behind Tim. “Way to be gracious, Clara.”
“He didn’t deserve my graciousness.”
“That’s the point of graciousness. You take the high road to be kind when the other person doesn’t deserve it.”
I shrug. “He only came because his mom made him.”
“Still,” dad says. “Those are nice flowers.” That is objective fact.
“Yes,” I say. “They are nice.”
“And he sounded really sorry.”
“Well, "sorry" doesn't put the Triscuit crackers in my stomach now, does it Carl?”
We’re always quoting this line from Billy Madison at each other. Sorry’s all well and good and it makes the person saying it feel slightly better about themselves even though they don’t deserve to. But it doesn’t change what happened. It doesn’t fix my wrist. It doesn’t give me another shot at a LACHSA audition.
“You know, Clara, your mom and I had an agreement that we wouldn’t punish you, because you’ve been punished enough with the pain and the audition and all. But this is not exactly not your own fault.”
“That’s a double negative.”
Even I can hear what a smart-ass I’m being, and not in a good way.
“Yes,” dad says. “It is.” He crosses his arms, leans against the wall, and looks at me very seriously. Dad’s serious face freaks me out more than him raising his voice would. His eyes are always smiling; he always has a pun on the tip of his tongue. And he always likes movie quotes. It makes me nervous when he’s like this.
“You didn’t have to go up that mountain with him. In fact, you shouldn’t have, and you know it.”
What am I meant to say to that? Am I meant to tell dad that I thought Tim might kiss me on the chairlift, and that was the whole point of me being on this stupid ski trip in the first place? To get him to like me just for me, not for the Hollywood parties he thinks I can get him into or the Madison Harpers I can introduce him to? That it would feel good just to be liked for who I am, for once? That I’m nearly fifteen and this never-been-kissed crap is getting kind of embarrassing? That I have some gorgeous lingerie from Tres Jolie that I can’t wait to use and then report back to Katie? Yeah, no, I don’t think so. I just kind of stand there with tears prickling my eyes and wait for the rest of the lecture.
But there’s no rest of the lecture.
“Here,” dad says. “Hand me those.”
I give him the flowers and he rifles around in the kitchen for a vase. He arranges them pretty well, for a guy. Ebba would do a better job, if she was here, but she’s out teaching a ballet class. I certainly can’t do a better job myself, one handed.
“Want them in your room?” dad asks me.
“No,” I say. “Leave them down here. That way we can all enjoy them.”
But that’s not the real reason. The real reason is that I don’t want them up there, reminding me of what I’ve lost. Accusing me of being who I’ve become.
Thirty
For the first week, I can’t look at my viola. Failure failure failure, it whispers to me from the corner of my red-accented bedroom as Mariah Carey’s dulcet tones drift up from downstairs. You’ll never get into LACSHA now. You’d better White Out that list in the front of your bullet journal. Or: How could you think skiing was more important that your audition, than your Entire Life Plan? Are you out of your mind? It wasn’t the skiing, I say very quietly, so nobody will catch me talking to an inanimate object. It was Tim. A boy! My viola says back. A boy. You chose a boy over me. How am I supposed to feel about that? In my head it morphs into a little green cartoon character and crosses its little green cartoon arms and turns away from me and sulks in the corner. And part of me wants to say, you’re an inanimate object, you don’t feel things, stop it, and part of me wants to cradle my viola in my arms and cry and say I know, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.
By the second week, when the Christmas decorations are finally gone, my arm almost aches from not being able to play. You know how they say that people who have limbs amputated still feel pain in those limbs after they’re gone? It’s kind of like that. My viola was an extension of my arm and it isn’t there anymore, and it hurts. Sometimes I take my bow and hold it in my right hand, and I put my left arm in as close to a viola-playing position as I can manage, and I play the phantom viola with my bow hand and wiggle my fingers as much as I can in a vague approximation of what those fingers might do if they were still capable of moving on a fingerboard. I think about getting my viola out of its case, feeling it on my shoulder, rubbing under my chin, but I don’t want to drop it. The skin under my chin where the curved end of it usually rests against me has started to soften. I don’t hate that – it looks better, too – but that probably means it will hurt once I start playing again, and boy am I going to have playing again, five or six hours a day to make up for lost time while I hope LACHSA will let me have a deferred audition for medical reasons.
When I was little, I used to think it would be cool to have a cast, to have all my classmates sign it in different color marker pens. I thought I’d enjoy being the center of attention. And that part, admittedly, is pretty enjoyable, but it’s also over quite fast. For a day and a half after we’re back from winter break, week three of the cast, people keep asking if I need help, or they get me to tell the story of how it happened; by Wednesday, they’ve all moved on to more interesting pursuits. Meanwhile, my wrist still hurts, my cast still itches me, I can’t have a shower without covering myself in plastic, and my viola case sits forlornly and accusingly in the corner of my bedroom.
I’m at my locker trying to find my math book when I notice a shift in the air, something there, something not moving, in a super-awkward way. Tim. Well, he’s moving a bit: he’s chewing gum. But he’s standing there, in his jeans and navy shirt, the one that brings out the color in his eyes, waiting for me to acknowledge him. He’ll be waiting a while. The first day I saw him last August, right here in this very spot, I knew he was trouble. I knew that, nice as it was of him to show me where the room for orchestra rehearsal was, he wasn’t doing it out of the goodness of his heart. I knew it, and I tried to steer clear, but I had something to prove: that I may be my father’s daughter, but that’s not all I am. I wanted him to pay attention to me for who I am. I wanted the whole world to pay attention to me, or at least the part of the world that cares about symphony orchestras. And now look at me: a cast on my wrist, a pathetic girl in need of people’s help to accomplish the most basic of tasks.
“Want help with something?” Tim asks, like he can read my thoughts and is trying to rub it in.
“Not from you.”
“Whoa,” he says. But he doesn’t leave. “I guess I deserve that.”
“Yes.” I’m still wondering where my math book is and until I have the math book I can’t leave and it doesn’t look like Tim is going to leave, either. I make a quick calculation: if Tim helps me, Tim can leave. Or I can leave. Either way, this skin-crawlingly horrifying moment can end.
“You know what,” I say. “Actually, I could use some help to get my math book. I think it’s on the bottom of that pile there, and it’
s kinda hard to move stuff around with just one hand.” I say this without looking at him. It’s hard to say mad at someone with those eyelashes for long, and even though I’ve managed it very well so far, it has taken all of my concentration and a lot of energy, and my reserves of both are rapidly depleting.
“Sure,” he says.
I move away from my locker so our bodies don’t accidentally touch, since that would be bound to confuse me. I smell him, though. He smells like mint, like he’s just this minute put the chewing gum in his mouth, and of his own salty skin.
“There you go,” he says, giving me the book. His hand brushes mine, which was wholly unnecessary. My stomach lurches. I break my not-looking-at-him to glare at him, like, dude? Really? But that, according to the further lurching of my stomach, was a mistake.
“Thanks,” I say, because I’m not a monster.
“You’re welcome,” he says, because he’s far too polite. And he’s still standing here. Why is he still standing there?
“I’ve gotta go,” I say.
“Okay.” Tim looks like he has more to say, but he also looks like he’s about to wimp out of saying it.
“Bye,” I say, and I clang the locker shut and walk away, math book in my good arm and backpack on my good shoulder, but alas: too good to be true. Just when I think I’ve successfully made my escape, he calls out to me.
“Clara, wait.”
“I’m going to be late for class.”
He catches up to me, but has the wisdom not to get too close. “You know I didn’t take you up the mountain just to get you injured, right?”
“Just?”
“Or at all. Not even a little bit. It was an accident.”
“Yeah.”
He kicks one foot against the other. “You didn’t have to agree to come with me.”
I wanted you to kiss me! is what I should maybe see in response to this. I wanted you to think I was cool! But, come on. I have some dignity. Not much, these days, but I’m hanging onto what’s left of it.
“Why did you invite me on that stupid ski trip, anyway? Was it just so you could get Madison Harper’s phone number from me?”
“Whoa,” he says. He furrows his brow and steps back. I’ve got him. “Okay. I’ve got to get to class. I’ll see you around.”
He has no answer to my question. That’s how I know I’ve struck a nerve. That I’ve got it right. He finally leaves, and good riddance.
Thirty-One
The next day I stop by my locker before homeroom again, which is turning out to be a mistake when it comes to the whole Getting Through High School thing. Tim’s there, waiting for me, leaning against my locker so I can’t get to it without, at the very least, acknowledging him and asking him to move. He’s wearing a red and blue plaid button-down and, damn it, he looks good.
“I googled Madison Harper,” he says.
I chew on my spearmint gum a couple times before I answer him. “That’s nice for you.” What does he want, congratulations on deploying a basic literacy skill?
“She was in that show with your dad last year.”
I nod toward my locker so he knows to get out of the way. “Yes.”
“I never watched it,” he says.
“Too bad,” I say. I move the combination lock to the right code. “If you had, maybe it’d still be on the air. My dad was really disappointed when they cancelled it.” I’m just spit-balling here. I have no idea if dad even cared.
“Clara, I’m trying to tell you I didn’t know who Madison Harper was.”
“Don’t be an idiot,” I say, pulling out the book I need. “Everyone knows who Madison Harper is.”
“Everyone in your world, maybe,” Tim says, shaking the hair from his eyes.
“We live in the same world, in case you hadn’t noticed.”
He laughs. “No. We really don’t. You live in the glamorous Hollywood world. I live in the nerdy Scrabble world. I don’t even have time for TV.”
I spin round and face him as I shut my locker and move the combination lock back. “I know for a fact that’s not true. You told my dad you were a big fan. At Student Arts Showcase in the fall? Someone who doesn’t watch TV doesn’t go up to my dad and say that.” Does he think I’m some kind of imbecile?
“I watched The Classroom. Everybody watched The Classroom. Even people who don’t watch TV watched The Classroom.”
Seriously, people are obsessed with that show. I should really get around to watching it sometime.
“You could have spoken to me at my own recital,” I say.
“You’re terrifying,” he says.
That is ridiculous. I laugh. “Yet here you are, talking to me right now.”
“I’ve grown a lot in the last few months. I’m very proud of myself.” I laugh again. I forgot how easily he can make me do that. “In fact, I’ve grown so much that I’m not afraid to tell you this.” He is a little afraid, though, because he can’t quite look me in the eye. “I didn’t want to talk to you in front of your parents because I didn’t want them to see how much I liked you.”
“Huh?” I know what all those words mean but they don’t seem to make sense in that order.
“You heard me,” he says. He’s looking right at me now.
The bell rings. We’re going to be late, and I can’t afford to get yelled at for that two days in a row. Tim picks up his backpack and leaves. My feet, suddenly, are made of lead. He liked me? He liked me way back then? Despite not even knowing who Madison Harper was? The flutter in my stomach suggests I liked him too. That I still like him, despite everything. But he doesn’t deserve it. And even if I decide he does, I’ve probably blown my chances forever. Or have I?
I try to remember what I’ve said to him since the accident. Now that I think about it, I doubt I’ve been mean, as such. I’ve told the truth, and truth sometimes hurt – that’s one of its virtues, right? And I don’t want to kiss him anyway. I’m finally able to my feet in the direction of homeroom and I’m halfway there before I can admit to myself that actually, yes, I do. Very much. Want to be kissed. And not just by anyone. By Tim. But I should probably get over that, and fast. Because he liked me, past tense. English may not be my favorite subject but I can still recognize a past tense when it’s staring me in the face. And I’m not going to be that pathetic pining stereotype of a teenage girl. I’m better than that.
Thirty-Two
It’s finally Cast Off Day today, 26th January, and dad takes me to the doctor. Doctors are always hot on TV shows, but I’ve had a lot of experience with doctors of late, and they usually aren’t. This one has pockmarked skin like he had really bad acne when he was in his teens and spent too much time scratching at his zits. I’m not a fan of this saw thing he’s going to use on me, either, but I’m determined not to cry today so I brace myself. I’m sure it’s all very well-designed so that it will cut the plaster while leaving my arm intact. Almost sure.
“Relax,” dad says, as I hop up onto the blue exam table.
“That’s easy for you to say. Look at that thing.”
“You’re fine,” he says, and puts his hand on my good shoulder, my right shoulder, my bow-holding shoulder.
“It’s not actually going to cut you,” the doctor says. “The vibrations are what breaks the cast apart. Prepare to be tickled, if anything.”
I shiver, but that might just be because it’s freezing in here. The AC is on way too high. I close my eyes and wait for the knife, and dad’s right, I’m fine, it’s fine, it tickles a little as the plaster gets shaven off but that’s all. But then I open my eyes and my arm sits there, lifeless, thin, pale as an East Coaster on the first day of her California beach vacation. This the arm that was going to carry me to LACHSA, to Juilliard, to the First Chair of a Symphony Orchestra. We have a lot of work to do, my left arm and I. Which is fine. I’m no stranger to hard work. You don’t get to be as good at the viola as I am without knowing what hard work is.
“See?” dad says. “You’re fine.”
I wiggle my fingers in response. They feel okay. They feel free. Which, believe me, is not nothing. The idea that when my arm itches I will now be able to scratch it makes me want to jump for joy. I guess it’s going to have to be the little things that carry me through this.
“I’ll just grab my pad to write you a referral for PT,” the doctor says.
“PT?”
“Physical therapy. It’s going to take a while and a lot of effort to get your strength back up.”
“Playing viola can be my PT,” I say.
The doctor exchanges a look with my dad. I’m probably not meant to see it, but I’m also not an idiot.
“You’re a viola player?” he asks.
“Yes,” I say. “A violist. I have an audition for LACSHA coming up. And Juilliard.”
By coming up, I mean, obviously, in the next few years. Still, I’m embarrassed that I’ve said this in front of my dad. He’s shuffling on his feet, clearly embarrassed for me, too.
“Not imminently,” he says. “Not Juilliard.”
“No,” I concede. “But some day.”
“Yeah,” the doctor says. “No viola playing for a while.”
“What?”
My dad gives me this pointed look, like being polite matters at a time like this.
“I mean, what do you mean, sir?”
“Some PT first,” he says. He’s talking to my dad, like I can’t hear him, or like I’m a little kid who doesn’t understand. “Then we’ll see if the viola is a possibility.”
“A possibility,” I repeat. “What does that mean? How long till I can play again?”
My dad and the doctor look at each other again. A long look. They’re having an entire conversation in that look, I can tell. The doctor is begging to be let off the hook. My dad is begging the same, and he is good at this game of holding someone else’s gaze. The doctor looks down first. But still nobody speaks.
Girl, Unstrung Page 10
