Finding Paris

by Joy Preble

  We shook on it once, when we first moved to Vegas. Paris started having these nightmares, and I’d wake up in the middle of the night and there she’d be, sitting on the edge of my bed, shivering. “What did you dream?” I’d ask her, only she would always say she didn’t remember. Maybe it was the truth. I don’t know.

  “Tell me a story,” she’d say, because I was good at that and so that’s what I would do. “But it can’t be about us,” she’d add, so I made stuff up for her and pretended it was about other people, even though in my head, I knew it was sort of about us. Two girls who had a pet dragon. Two sisters who got lost at Disneyland. Sometimes we’d sit on the floor in front of my old dollhouse and I’d set the stories in those rooms. Always they had a happy ending. That’s how Paris liked it. Eventually, she would be calmer and drift off to sleep. Usually so would I.

  One night I was going to sleep at Natalie’s.

  “What if I have a bad dream?” Paris asked.

  “Tell yourself a story,” I said. “I can’t always be here.”

  “But if I really needed you?” she persisted.

  “Always,” I told her. And we spit in our palms like we’d seen someone do in a movie and shook on it.

  That’s the way it was.

  I look around again. It’s too quiet. The place is empty. No Paris. Just a guy in coveralls tinkering with one of the rides.

  “She’s not here,” I say to Max, pointedly ignoring Nate, who is watching this all unfold. He looks befuddled, and why shouldn’t he? He’d expected romance, not this. “How could she not be here?”

  “Maybe somewhere,” Max says vaguely, looking around, and I yell, “No!” because it’s obvious she’s not. Max looks down at his boots.

  Nate says, “Lovers’ spat,” in this singsong voice, and without warning, Max shoves him—a quick push of hands against chest.

  “Dude,” Nate says.

  “Don’t,” I say.

  “Leave her be,” Max tells Nate, his voice a low and dangerous growl. A series of thoughts race through my head: Max has a temper. A quick one. Nate is an asshole. My sister is still missing.

  They stare each other down while my gaze shifts to the Big Shot—a huge red-and-white tower (World’s Highest Thrill Ride!) on top of the already huge Stratosphere Tower, with seats we could strap ourselves into and zoom to the top, then free-fall, which maybe if I’d had enough wine coolers or reefer might be possible if only we weren’t already on the 108th floor.

  And then I see it on the otherwise pristine white railing. My heart skips a beat.

  There is no mistaking the tight, neatly printed writing. No mistaking the now-familiar silver Sharpie. I want to run to it, but my feet are still stuck to the ground. We are so damn high up.

  Paris has been here. So why not stay? Why not end this?

  “You’re kidding me,” says Max Sullivan, walking swiftly toward the ride. He shoves his hand through his already messy hair.

  Nate has wandered off to talk to the guy in the coveralls. Has he seen my sister up here? The security cameras would show her, right? My head is spinning with it all.

  I run my fingers over each silver letter. My pulse is in my ears, throbbing with my heartbeat, which is going very, very fast.

  I knew you could do it, Leo.

  Do what? Find the note? Walk around up here so high off the ground? What, Paris? What? I press a hand to my chest, willing my heart to slow the hell down.

  My gaze lands on the other tiny folded slip of paper, affixed with yet another Hello Kitty Band-Aid.

  Max unsticks it and hands it to me. Unlike my own sweaty hand, his is cool and dry as his fingers brush mine.

  It’s a receipt from the Heartbreak. Not ours, but some random tally of what someone else ate and paid for in cash. A double-cheeseburger basket, a Coke, a Cobb salad, and a Children’s Pancake Platter, those ones where they put a face on top with chocolate chips and a cherry for the nose.

  On the back, scrawled this time, but still Paris’s handwriting, as though she was writing fast, with missing letters and scratch outs, is this: Near the water, Leo. Remember? That’s where we were happy, right? You and me. Sisters.

  Max squints at the note, frowning. “What does that mean?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You have to know.”

  “Why?” I clench my hand around the note. “Are you the expert on what I should and shouldn’t know about my sister?”

  “You wanna go up?” The question is Nate’s, who has returned and is now looking at us expectantly.

  We both ignore him.

  But what I can’t ignore is this: I need to find her before I’m due at work. If I don’t go to work, I won’t get paid. I am officially sick and tired of this whole thing. I am tired of not sleeping. I am tired of pretending that it’s perfectly normal that we drive around Vegas all night. Paris is making this scavenger hunt up as she goes along.

  Near the water. We used to live near the water in Cali. No mystery there.

  But the words from the first note flash: “He’s making me.” My lungs feels too small. What if this isn’t just my sister being her flaky self? What if something has actually happened? What if this is all . . . real?

  “I didn’t write that shit over there,” Nate informs the guy in the coveralls. “So don’t you go blaming it on me.”

  I realize again how high up we are—how far it is to the ground.

  “Let’s go,” I tell Max. “I need to get down from here.” I turn back to the elevator, but suddenly everything’s a blur. My heart is racing and sweat prickles cold at my hairline. The tightness has migrated to my throat. I press my hand to my chest again. There’s not enough air.

  You know what this is, I tell myself. You’re just afraid. Walk it off. It’s just a tall building.

  “Leo?” Max sounds far away.

  I bend at the waist, but it doesn’t help. Every piece of me feels both jagged and numb.

  And then his arms are wrapped around me.

  “I’ve got you,” Max says. “Just breathe, okay. I’ve got you. Don’t worry, Leo. Do you hear me? Breathe.”

  He keeps holding tight and somehow we’re on the elevator without Nate and going down, down, down so fast that my ears pop again and my fingers feel tingly and I still can’t get a good breath, but Max doesn’t remove his arms. “Breathe with me, Leo,” he says, hugging me and my zombie-and-ninja shirt against his chest and somehow my empty lungs fills with air because I’m following the in and out of Max’s oxygen. The steady sound of his heartbeat thumps against my own floundering heart.

  “Shit,” I say against Max’s chest. “Why is she doing this?”

  His arms are still around me as the doors open and we stumble out and back into the hotel, almost sideswiping a woman wearing what looks like the ugliest prom dress ever. It’s floor length and purple and strapless and covered with enough sequins that it makes my eyes hurt.

  “You’re breathing,” Max says, voice gentle. He lets me go.

  Hands on hips, I inhale deeply. Then press two fingers to my stomach and inhale again, this time through my nose. Everything seems to be working. Including my utter humiliation at this happening in front of Max. The thought makes my stomach dip.

  I focus on the lady in purple who sits down at a Pai Gow table, passes the dealer some money, then rests her head in her arms. Watching her both settles me and makes me sad. I know how it is to want something so fiercely it tangles your insides, making the rest of your life feel shabby and small.

  “She’s just messing with you, I bet,” Max says, and for a second I think he means the lady in purple. But he’s talking about Paris.

  “I don’t know. She’s never—none of this is like her.” The words are both a lie and the truth. It is totally like her. But not like this.

  Max purses his lips. “I think you had a panic attack, Leo Leonora.”

  “No kidding. And it’s Hollings.” The words come out sounding brittle and angry. Does he think he’s be
ing cute with the two names? Maybe he is—a little.

  “I’m sorry,” I tell him then, because I don’t know what else to say. “About the whole . . . thank you. You didn’t need . . . thank you.” I turn away. I don’t know what to do with nice boys who hold tight when I’m freaking out and act like it’s no big deal.

  We’re back on Las Vegas Boulevard now, the sun firmly set in the pale sky, a steady stream of people headed into the IHOP down the block. A vague scent of bacon frying wafts our way. The air is cool, but underneath, a heat presses against my skin.

  “I know how it feels to be out of control,” Max says, looking down and then back at me. It is the first truly personal thing he’s told me. “I don’t know if that’s panic. But that’s why you have to breathe—”

  “I don’t like heights.”

  “Okay.” Max draws out the word like he’s waiting for me to say more.

  “It’s a long story. We need to go.”

  But there is something about the way that thin scar sits on his eyebrow and how his hair is now curling right at his ears, and how the bright desert sunlight dances across the tiny dusting of freckles on his nicely shaped nose. He smells good still—not like anything in particular anymore, just boy. And as he rubs his neck, his long fingers brush against a strand of curl.

  “I had a bad experience with a Ferris wheel,” I say, and when he doesn’t fill the space of my silence after, I add: “Couple years ago. We were at the Arizona State Fair. My stepfather thought it was funny to rock the car when we were stuck on top. I’d just had this greasy funnel cake. And . . . I don’t know. It felt like we were tipping, and the door wasn’t on right and . . . I got scared. Stupid, right? But it stuck with me.”

  I sound silly and babyish, I think. Everyone rocks the car at the top, right?

  Max is quiet for a moment, then says, “People do dumb shit.” He keeps his eyes on me. “Was Paris scared, too?”

  I get quiet, too, thinking. “No,” I tell him after a few beats. Then: “Mad, actually. But she laughed . . . Whatever. I felt like a dork.” I do not tell him how what I remember after that was my mother bitching because later I upchucked that funnel cake Tommy had bought me.

  I attempt a jaunty tone. “But then this dude got his arm broken by his opponent at the Arm Wrestling World Championship area right next to the Spam Mobile,” I say. “That pretty much distracted everybody. It was a huge cracking sound. His arm went like this.” I demonstrate, and Max wrinkles his freckled nose. The sun shines on him some more.

  “I’m not trying to rock the Ferris wheel,” he says.

  He leans close, then closer.

  I wonder again about what it would be like to kiss him. Is he wondering the same thing—this boy that I’ve known for just a few hours? The thought edges sharply at me, both hopeful and skittish. What kind of idiot am I to trust a boy I met at a diner? And why? Because he is cute and his gray-with-blue-flecks eyes look at me in a way I’ve always wanted to be looked at? Because we both knew the same physics joke?

  “I think you need to drive me home,” I say, ignoring the sparklers low in my belly when he rubs his thumb over his lower lip. Max’s lower lip, by the way, is my favorite of the two. It is full and nicely curved and just the tiniest bit chapped.

  “But we haven’t found Paris,” Max says, voice lifting like it’s a question.

  “Home,” I repeat. “Please.”

  He hesitates, although I don’t know why. She’s not his sister.

  “Okay,” Max says eventually. “Whatever you want, Leo.”

  As we pull up to my house, Max says, “I’ll wait for you.”

  But I tell him, “No.”

  My heart is hammering.

  The Mazda is not parked in our driveway and neither is Mom’s car or Tommy’s Tahoe. I can tell by the angle of the blinds in my mother’s bedroom at the front of the house that she’s gone out. When she’s gone she always lifts them just a little because she thinks it makes it look like someone’s home.

  Is she out looking for my sister? Or just out?

  I want Max to stay.

  Only that’s not going to happen.

  I am not a girl in some mystery movie. I am Leo Hollings, and later this morning I will put on my heinous-looking Yogiberry uniform and serve frozen yogurt and explain topping choices to people incapable of reading the labels on the containers.

  So I will go inside, and Max will go back to his life and his own secrets—which I will not ever know.

  “You’ve done enough,” I tell him. “There’s nothing else you can do.”

  Still, when Max scrawls his cell number on the back of a flimsy white napkin, I take it from him.

  “Call me,” he says. “Let me know what happens.”

  I don’t turn around when I walk up the driveway, but not because I don’t want to.

  TEN

  ALONE IN OUR HOUSE, I DO A QUICK TOUR—PARIS’S ROOM LOOKS THE same as before—then in the kitchen, I pour myself a huge glass of water and drink most of it. I start a pot of coffee. It’s too late to sleep.

  Tommy’s whiskey glass is in the sink now, and the kitchen table is wiped up. The pantry door is hanging open, the garbage can lid half off. A crust of toast sits on the kitchen counter, but there’s no other evidence of a meal. Did Tommy come back and they went to breakfast?

  Then I see it: a note from my mother in messy, slanted cursive, tucked under the toast plate.

  She was supposed to call Max’s cell!

  My heart drums in my ears.

  But she’s written only: Paris—if you read this, call me immediately. Leo—if you read this, stay put till I get back.

  The knot between my shoulder blades loosens, just slightly.

  At least she’s doing something, which is more than I can say for her lately.

  The note doesn’t mention Tommy. Has she talked to him? Where did he go?

  I wash the dishes while the coffee finishes, then pour a mug and carry it to my room. The routine calms me, but only a little. The house feels oddly empty and this bumps my pulse again.

  If something has actually happened to Paris, would I know? People say that sometimes, don’t they? I knew something was wrong. I had a feeling.

  Probably I don’t need the caffeine. I’m wired enough as it is.

  In the bathroom, door locked even though I’m alone, I stand in the shower until the water—its spray intermittent because the showerhead’s broken—is lukewarm and heading toward cold.

  I do not think about Max. Not for long, anyway. Probably he is not thinking about me, either. If he is, he’s wondering why I stopped this whole thing in the middle. Why I made him take me home. Why my sister is such a screwball.

  And I am wondering why I somehow feel responsible for it all.

  I look at Paris’s notes again. I change into shorts and my favorite black tank, the soft cotton one that looks good on me. I go online and leave messages everywhere I think she might check, but still nothing, which does not surprise me.

  I leaf randomly through my SAT prep book. Calculate five pages of algebra problems I could do in my sleep.

  Max’s phone number sits on the scrap of napkin. Even scribbled, his handwriting has an evenness to it, the lines and curves clearly defined. But it’s not like I’m going to talk to him again.

  When all this does not take away the swirly feeling inside me, I lay my head on my pillow, its smooth white case dotted with tiny wildflowers, and close my eyes. But my stomach keeps flipping, and I end up with one foot on the floor like I’ve done the few times I’ve had too much to drink and the room is spinning.

  Only when a clanking noise wakes me—heart pounding, mouth sticky yet dry, which means that maybe it was hanging open—do I realize I’ve fallen asleep, a deep dreamless sleep, the kind that feels like smothering.

  I stumble up and cross the hall.

  “Paris?”

  But she’s not in her room, just all that scattered stuff that isn’t like her. I sit down on the could-be-
cleaner rug and pick up one of her black boots. She’s glued the sole back on where it cracked. Vegas heat is hell on cheap shoes.

  Something new catches my eye, poking from under the dust ruffle. It’s a postcard of the Hollywood sign in LA, probably something Paris was going to use in a collage. She uses old postcards a lot, finds them in thrift stores. I turn it over. She’s written the name Toby on the back in thin black ink.

  Does it mean something? Has she run off with this boy I’ve never met? Or worse, has he made her go somehow? Or is it just random as everything else in our life—things that happen and then you’re stuck with them, can’t make them disappear no matter how much you try.

  I look at my sister’s precise, even script and wonder, not for the first time, if you can ever really know someone—deep down at that molecular level. Ever really understand what makes someone tick. Maybe you can’t. Maybe the truth is that we’re all in this alone.

  The thought deflates me, and I lean back against Paris’s bed. Ponder that last note, the one from the top of the Stratosphere. We were happy, right? And that part about being near the water.

  It makes as much sense as everything else tonight, which is to say: not much. We used to live in LA. Everything was near the water, more or less.

  Were we happy there?

  Sometimes.

  Like the day Paris and I wandered this flea market in Venice and I found Tiny Tim on a table next to a pile of Coach knockoffs and she found this red leather wallet with a plastic strip of pictures of people we didn’t know. At home later, she cut their faces out with a small, pointy silver scissors so she could use them in her art: a middle-aged man in a suit and tie; an old lady wearing a white wool hat with a pom-pom on top; two kids—a boy and girl—standing on the edge of the ocean. Which I thought looked weird.

  But we were laughing, and she pasted the lady with the pom-pom onto the upper branches of this tree she’d drawn with charcoal pencils and I dusted off Tiny Tim’s bony clavicle, and it was one of the moments you have with the people you love where you don’t need to explain how you are. They just know.

  If that was happy, then we were.