“More screwed up than you,” Diver echoed, nodding thoughtfully and looking out the window.
“I guess I always figured helping them would help me. I mean, it was selfish, really. That’s why I never told anyone else about it. I didn’t want people thinking I was trying to be some kind of plaster saint, when I knew I was just doing it for myself.”
“So why didn’t you go today?”
“I don’t know. I’ve been feeling…ever since Ross died. I don’t know.”
“Lost,” Diver said.
Diana stared at him. She nodded slowly.
“Like you don’t know who you are anymore,” Diver said. He was still gazing off into the dark night. “You used to have a meaning. Hating Ross. Hating Adam.”
“Hating myself is more like it,” Diana said bitterly.
“Kind of the same thing,” Diver said.
Diana turned off the highway, shooting down the off-ramp at twice the speed limit. The institute was dark but for a few muted lights behind shaded windows. The cars of the overnight staff were parked in a little knot to one side, clustered under a streetlight for safety.
The housemother led Diana and Diver straight to Lanessa. “She started about five hours ago, just sobbing,” she said. “All she would say was that she had been bad. Then we figured out she was distraught because you hadn’t come today. I think she feels she’s being punished.” It was not an accusation, but Diana didn’t need any help to feel terrible.
They found Lanessa in her room, curled up with her thumb in her mouth. She was convulsing with dry sobs.
Diana rushed to her and lifted the little girl’s head onto her lap. “I’m sorry, Lanessa, I’m so, so sorry.”
But Lanessa didn’t react.
“Come on, Lanessa, I’m sorry I didn’t come today. I…I don’t know what happened. I just wasn’t feeling right, I guess. Come on, honey, come on.” She stroked the little girl’s hair. “Did you think I didn’t like you anymore? Is that it?”
Lanessa shook her head.
“Did you think I was mad at you?” No response. “That’s it, isn’t it? You thought I was angry at you?”
Finally Lanessa nodded.
“Sweetheart, I wasn’t angry at you. Not at all. I could never be angry at you.” Diana remembered the details of Lanessa’s case. For Lanessa, having someone angry at her had not just been a reason to pout. Anger had been followed by terror and pain. An adult’s anger had nearly killed her.
“Lanessa, I was angry, but not at you,” Diana said. “I was just mad at the world, and all these different things. But not at you.”
“I don’t think she understands the difference,” Diver said. “The people who hurt her, they were just mad at the world, too. Just like the people who hurt you, Diana.”
“And you?” Diana said to him.
“Yes,” he said tersely.
“So what am I supposed to do?” Diana asked him. “What’s she supposed to do?” she continued, stroking the child’s head.
“I don’t know,” he admitted. He looked troubled, agitated, uncertain.
“And here I thought you were all-wise,” Diana said sarcastically. She could feel Lanessa pulling away from her. “Lanessa, no, it’s all right, this doesn’t have anything to do with you.”
“Of course it does,” Diver nearly shouted.
Diana was stunned. She had never seen Diver upset. It didn’t even seem possible that he could shout.
“Of course it has to do with her,” Diver said more quietly. “It has to do with everyone. Everyone gets hurt. Everyone has bad things happen to them, and then everyone wants to hurt those who hurt them. Till pretty soon every single person on earth is either being hurt or hurting someone else. It’s insane.”
“So what’s your brilliant solution?” Diana demanded. “You want us all to forgive and forget? You think Lanessa should maybe just forgive her parents for what they did? That’s what you want?”
“No,” Diver said. “I want the people who hurt Lanessa to burn in hell, that’s what I want. And the ones who hurt you, and the ones who hurt me. That’s what I want.” He clenched his fist in the air, as if choking a person visible only to him. “I want them to cry. I want to see them suffer.”
Diana shrank away, shielding Lanessa with her arms. But Lanessa was not afraid. She was watching Diver with bright, glittering eyes.
He took several deep breaths. “But I figured out after a while that I couldn’t spend my life punishing everyone who deserved to be punished.”
“So you just forgive them?” Diana said.
He shrugged. “I guess so. Not because they deserve to be forgiven. They don’t. It’s just that when you go around hating people and wanting to hurt them…You just can’t do that. That isn’t life. You forgive so you can live.” He sat down on the bed, rested his head in his hands, and stared at some remembered scene only he could see.
After a while Diana said, “I didn’t know you could talk that much, Diver.”
“I don’t usually,” he said, a little sheepish.
“You know what I’ve been feeling for the last couple of days?” Diana asked him. “I’ve been mad because Ross died. I was angry because he escaped, in a way, before I could hurt him.”
Diver nodded. “Been there.”
For a while none of them said anything. Even Lanessa was quiet, her sobbing stilled. “Can we go see Jerry?” she asked at last.
“Oh, sweetheart, Jerry is asleep now,” Diana said. “We should let him sleep.”
“No, he’s up,” Diver said wearily. “He’d like to see Lanessa. As a matter of fact, he’s waiting in the tank for us to go see him. He thinks maybe Lanessa would like to see him catch his Frisbee.”
Diana smiled at him. “Diver, you may be very smart about certain things—smarter than I am—but you cannot really communicate with animals.”
Diver laughed. “Of course I know I can’t communicate with animals, Diana. I’m not crazy.”
Naturally, when they arrived at the tank, Jerry was up. He was waiting patiently by the side, amusing himself by tossing a Frisbee up in the air, as Diana was not really very surprised to see.
J.T. was not Jonathan. That single fact occupied Summer’s entire mind. J.T. was not Jonathan.
The little boy in her dreams really was dead. The brother she had never met, but whose tragedy had shadowed her entire life, was not suddenly going to turn up in a big, happily-ever-after ending.
She had left J.T. at his parents’ house, the three of them crying and laughing and retelling the story of how J.T. had come to be suspicious, and the story of why J.T. was not the biological child of his parents.
Summer had been crying too, but for different reasons. She left with a gaping feeling of loneliness, no longer anything like a part of their lives, and had walked back into town. She never had gotten any barbecue. But the Bacchanal had opened its arms to greet her, drawing her into the crowds, squeezing her in, carrying her along in the shrill high spirits.
Someone handed her a paper cup, and she drank its contents without thinking. Some kind of punch. She winced at the sweetness.
J.T. was not her brother. She was surprised by how much it disturbed her. She hadn’t ever really absorbed the possibility that he might be, until suddenly he wasn’t. She told herself this was good, that she hadn’t wanted to believe, because if J.T. had been Jonathan, then all the laws of probability had to be rewritten, and the impossible would have been possible, and miracles would have popped up in the fabric of ordinary life.
No, that wasn’t true. She had wanted to believe. She’d wanted to believe in miraculous happy endings. She’d wanted to believe in improbable things…that long-lost brothers would be found, that true loves would not be lost at the end of the summer.
And yet J.T. was not her brother. And Seth was not even here. He was off working with his grandfather. Just a taste of the endless stream of excuses she could expect in the future, after they each went to their separate homes. He would be
in Eau Claire. She would be in Bloomington. How many times would they make dates and then break them because something had come up? Sorry, Summer, I know I said I would come, but the weather…this job I have to do…this exam I have to study for…I can’t borrow the car….
In the back of her mind, Summer knew she was being unfair. Seth wasn’t like that. If Seth said he would do something, he could be relied on.
“Yeah,” she muttered darkly, “like I could rely on him to be here tonight.”
The crowd carried her toward music, two live bands pounding out competing covers of everything from salsa to punk, all at terrific volume. Everyone was dancing, and, without meaning to, so was Summer, rising and falling as dictated by the crush of bodies. A feeling of dizziness crept over her.
Then she saw Marquez atop a bench, dancing with someone Summer didn’t know, someone Marquez probably didn’t know, either. Her brown curls were flying. Her face was beaded with sweat.
Summer pushed her way through the crowd, ignoring various calls of “Hey, baby” and “Come on, dance with me.” She grabbed Marquez’s shorts by the pocket and yanked.
Marquez looked down, annoyed, then, recognizing Summer, gave her a rueful smile. She climbed down.
“You mad at me?” Marquez yelled in Summer’s ear.
“What, for leaving me when you swore you wouldn’t?” Summer said sarcastically. “Why would I be mad?”
“Don’t be,” Marquez pleaded. “Come on, it’s the Bacch. Party and forget it.”
“He’s not Jonathan,” Summer said.
This got Marquez’s attention. She looked concerned. “He’s okay, right?”
“Do you care?”
“Jeez, Summer, look, I never said I was good at this stuff. I don’t deal with people’s problems very well, all right? So I’m selfish. So I’m superficial. I don’t care. I had to get out of there. I couldn’t just sit there and watch. Either way it was going to be bad. If he was Jonathan, then probably J.T. would have lost the only family he’s known. If he wasn’t, then you…your brother was…”
Summer nodded. “Yeah, I know,” she said, her eyes filling with tears again. “I guess I had started to buy into it. I mean, what if? What if Jonathan never died? Wouldn’t it be the greatest thing on earth to be able to go to my parents and say, guess what? Your son didn’t die in a gutter somewhere. He wasn’t killed. Here he is! He’s alive! No more sadness. Happy days are here again.” There was more bitterness in her own voice than she had ever heard there before. “The world basically sucks, have I ever mentioned that?”
“No, and I can’t believe you’re saying it. Where’s Seth?”
“He is working. He’s working, and I’m here, and he’s not, and I think that paints a pretty clear picture of my future with Seth,” Summer said.
Marquez began to look uncomfortable. “Okay, well, then let’s just dance and flirt with guys and forget all this stuff,” she said. “Forget it all.”
Summer grabbed her friend’s arm. She knew Marquez wanted her to shut up and stop being so grim, but she didn’t care. She felt desperate and sad. “I was going to go back to Bloomington in triumph. I mean, when I left I was just any other girl. But I was going to go back and say to my parents, hey, I found Jonathan. And at school I’d be one of those girls who’s all sure of herself and above it all because I was in love with this great guy. And now you know what? It’ll be like, yeah, I went to Crab Claw Key, and all I got was a tan. After a week that will fade, and I’ll be right back to being the same old Summer Smith.”
“Summer! There you are!”
Summer heard the voice but took a few seconds to recognize it. Sean. She managed to turn, elbowing a nearby reveler in the stomach.
Sean was right there. The crowd surged and threw her against him. He put his arms around her.
“Hey, I’m back,” he announced.
“Yeah, I see.”
“Back from Miami. Man, what a dump that place is. This is so cool! These people know how to party! Let’s try to get something like this started back home.”
Summer almost remarked sarcastically that it might be a little different throwing a street party in a place where everyone had to wear parkas instead of bathing suits. But she didn’t. “Yeah, when we get home” was all she said.
“Here!” Sean handed her another cup of punch.
“Thanks,” she said, taking a sip. In spite of the strange dizziness closing in on her, she didn’t stop to think about what exactly was in the punch.
He kissed her, and she let him.
She felt sick and strange and irritated. Too many things to worry about. All of it stupid and pointless. It didn’t matter, any of it. Marquez had the right idea—dance and party, and whenever anything serious threatened to rear up in your face, run away.
Summer looked around for Marquez, but she had been swallowed up in the crowd. So she danced with Sean and finished her second glass of punch, and let him kiss her and kissed him back, and stopped caring about everyone and everything. It was all going to come to an end, all of it: Seth, and J.T., and Marquez, and Diver. But mostly Seth.
She felt as if someone had stabbed a knife into her stomach and twisted it. Seth. He wasn’t even there with her. And already the feeling of emptiness was so intense. She should never have let it happen. She should have kept him away, at arm’s length. Then she would have been safe.
Sean drew her close. She felt strangely numb. Sean was holding her tight against him. She knew she should pull away, but she couldn’t seem to summon up the energy. What was the point?
Then she saw him. Seth. He was staring at her.
“Seth,” she whispered. He had come. Her heart leaped.
For a moment her view of him was blocked, and he was gone. As he would soon be gone from her life.
Sean grabbed her and kissed her again, pulling her against him. Seth reappeared, but now it was only a momentary glimpse as he turned away.
17
Terrible Truths: Sean Valletti's a Jerk and Maria Marquez Is a Sweetheart.
As a rule, Summer did not drink. Once or twice she’d had a single beer. Which was probably why she hadn’t thought much about the sickly sweet taste of the punch. Which was probably why the weird dizziness hadn’t clued her in about its alcohol content. Now that she’d spilled her third glass down the front of her shirt, she should have been worried, but instead she found it terribly funny.
In fact, everything was funny. The way she was walking. The way her words weren’t coming out right. The way Sean was propelling her down the street away from the Bacchanal, half dragging and half carrying her.
“Is this the right way?” he demanded.
“What?”
“Is this the right way to your house?”
“My house? Why are we going there?” Summer asked. She tried to focus, but couldn’t quite.
“Why do you think?” Sean said.
Summer didn’t know the answer, but she had the feeling she should. “I want to go back to the party.”
“We’re moving the party to your place,” Sean said. “Have a real party.”
“I don’t know.” Suddenly she was very tired. She sat down on the curb too quickly, bruising her behind in the process.
Sean took her hand and tried to pull her to her feet. But Summer offered no help, and after a few tugs Sean gave up. He sagged to the ground beside her. A passing car honked and gave a jeer.
“I think I may be kind of drunk,” Summer said.
“No kidding,” he said. “That punch was spiked with grain alcohol.”
“I’m sleepy.”
“You can’t sleep here,” he said. “I’ll take you home. You can sleep there. Or at least you can go to bed.” He laughed uproariously.
Summer leaned close. He tried to kiss her, but she fended him off. She had something important to say. If only she could remember what it was. Oh, yeah. “You know, everyone thinks you’re really cool. At school and all.”
He grinned. “Yeah, I know.�
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She whispered into his ear. “Did you know I used to have dreams about you? You and me?”
“Tell me about them,” he said. He kissed her and then trailed kisses down her neck.
“Now I dream about this little boy. The little ball boy.”
“Yeah? Forget that. Tell me what you dream about me.”
Summer realized that he had slipped his hand up under the back of her blouse. “What?” she said, squinting against a pair of headlights.
“Dreams. Tell me about them.”
“Oh, anyway, like I said…um…everyone thinks you’re really cool.”
“Hey, and if you’re with me, everyone will think you’re cool too,” he said.
“Who?”
“Everyone,” he said.
“What?”
He became impatient. “I said, if you’re with me, everyone will think you’re cool too, all right? Come on, let’s get back to your place.” He dragged her upward with more determination this time, and she staggered against him. “Then I’ll show you why all the girls think I’m the best.”
Summer began to giggle. She pushed him away, laughing loudly. “You’re such a jerk.”
“What did you call me?”
“I don’t care,” Summer said. “Because, like…I mean, it doesn’t matter. One way or the other, Seth and me…he goes boom, over that way, and I go the other way.”
“Who is Seth?”
“Boy number three,” Summer said, suddenly sad in a way that momentarily sobered her a little. “See, the tarot lady said guy one, he’s dangerous, right? Well, that was Adam. And the mystery guy was number two, and that’s Diver. And boy number three, the right one. That was Seth.”
“Did you call me a jerk?”
“She didn’t tell me that he was only temporary. Did I say that right? Tem-po-ra-ry. She didn’t say, oh, by the way, you’ll fall in love, but then it will be over. Like Jonathan, you know. Love someone, and then they go, and all you have is…” She started to cry, but at the same time she was laughing. “Then all you have is Sean Valletti.”
Sean retreated in horror. “Wait a minute. You’re only with me because this other guy dumped you?”
Beach Blondes Page 44
