by Nina LaCour
I’m not even sure he recognizes me—I can’t see why he’d recognize me—until he asks, “So, did everyone like the other photograph? Did it have the desired effect?”
“Yeah, I guess,” I say. “I mean, everyone was talking about it. Everyone but the guy I wanted the most to like it.”
He pats me on the knee, in a way that Katie would, not in a way that someone at Happy Happy would.
“I can’t believe I’m saying this, because I’m really not that much older than you. And I know that when I was your age, this kind of advice would have gone in one ear and out the other. But I’m gonna say it anyway. Most lives are long, and most pain is short. Hearts don’t actually break; they always keep beating. This is not to diminish what you’re going through, but I’ve been there, and I’ve been through it. As that famous homosexual Winston Churchill once said, if you find yourself heartbroken, keep walking.”
“Winston Churchill was gay?”
“Well, no—I was just trying to add some levity there.”
I can’t say I feel much better. But I do feel a little calmer. So there’s that.
The photographer stands. Raises his camera back to his eye.
“One more, for posterity.”
I don’t pose. I let him see me as I am.
“Imperfect,” he says. “Which is perfect.”
And then, like everyone else, he asks the question of the hour:
“Where’s your friend?”
14
Kate
I find him on the sidewalk, exactly where his text said he would be.
“I can’t believe you came,” I say.
“I can’t believe you didn’t.”
Even though we’re behind the gallery, the lights and voices from within it tell me that the party is still going strong almost four hours after it began. I saw Ms. Rivera and Ms. Gao getting back into a car when I got here, but I can hear Lehna’s voice and Brad’s and a laugh so shrill and joyless it must be Audra’s. I don’t even listen for Violet’s voice because I know Violet isn’t here. She’s somewhere else, waiting for me to make it up to her.
Brad’s voice booms from inside, announcing one hour left to bid on the auction.
“Can we go somewhere else?” I ask. “We can come back here later, but I can’t go in now.”
Mark stands up.
I look at him; he looks at me.
We are not the same as we were on Sunday.
He runs a hand through his hair and even the way it falls has changed. He isn’t a golden boy, charming a bar with his winsome looks and wholesome sex appeal. He’s wounded and damaged, tired and lost. If he were dancing atop a bar now, just as many people would watch him, but not a single one would smile.
I can feel the change in me, too, but I don’t want to think about it. It’s one thing to be wrecked by another person, entirely something else to be wrecked by yourself.
“Garrison showed up here looking for you.”
“Are you serious?”
“He took my picture and gave me advice. He may think he’s my fairy godfather.”
I smile in spite of myself, and then I think of Saturday night, of that mansion and all those people and the feeling that anything was possible.
“They aren’t ever going to ask us what happened,” I say. “If they haven’t done it by now, they never will.”
“I know.”
The car parked in front of us rumbles to life, shines its headlights into my eyes.
“What advice did he give you?”
“Some stuff about hearts. And that Churchill quote about walking through hell, only he made it about heartbreak.”
“Mr. Freeman loves that quote. Did you have him for history?”
“Yeah, sophomore year.”
“I love his classroom. All of those nice posters he put in frames instead of just tacking them on the walls like all the other teachers do. How he always has tea on his desk and the electric kettle that makes the room all foggy when it’s cold out. I never wanted that period to end. Even though we were talking about wars and betrayals and death, about all of these horrible things and how they repeat themselves, when I was in his room, everything somehow felt safe.”
Mark is watching me as I’m saying this as though I’m answering his question from earlier tonight. And maybe I am. Or, at least, I’m doing my best considering that I don’t know what the answer is.
What’s going on with you?
If I could put it into words, it might not sneak up behind me like it does.
I close my eyes.
Violet.
But it isn’t working anymore. She’s no longer an idea or a spell or a daydream. She’s someone whose mouth I’ve kissed. She knows I have issues and that I run away, and even though I should find comfort in the knowledge that she wants me anyway, I don’t.
I can’t find comfort anywhere.
“Let’s walk,” Mark says.
We pass the Japanese restaurant we went to with Violet. We pass a karaoke bar and a man laying out blankets in a doorway for shelter from the night, fast-food restaurants and a fancy jazz club, hipsters and beggars, a tattoo parlor and a church. And then the street becomes quieter, lined with apartment after apartment and no one but us and the rushing cars and the occasional person returning home.
We get to the end of a block and we stop. The city lights stretch below us.
Mark says, “I didn’t even notice we were walking uphill.”
“I didn’t, either,” I say, though I find that I’m catching my breath.
I’m trying to figure myself out. I keep failing.
“Tell me about that night,” I say.
He turns to me.
“They aren’t going to ask us, but it’s still ours.”
He nods.
“Okay,” he says. “We showed up on the doorstep and we didn’t know what to expect. We rang and waited for what felt like forever, but then that guy—George—he opened the door and he let us in. It was like a scene out of Gatsby, but gayer. Unless you agree with Mr. Chu and think that weird part with the ellipses means that Nick and Gatsby hooked up, in which case it was like a scene out of Gatsby, and just as gay. The place was full of ferns and overlapping rugs and champagne on silver trays carried by hot caterers and being drunk by even hotter guests. And George said, ‘We’ve been waiting for you!’ and even though it felt impossible, it also felt true.” He takes a breath. “Now you.”
“It was true. They had been waiting for us. We crossed under this giant chandelier to where the photographer was lounging with his friends. They asked us to tell them about our night, and everything we said, they loved.”
“I can’t believe how interested they were in us.”
“I can,” I say. I concentrate. I try to find the reason behind it. “What’s happening to us—the decisions we’re making and not making, the things we can control and the things that we can’t—they are huge. And people can choose to forget how it was for them, or they can remember. They can half-listen to us and roll their eyes when we leave because we’re young and we have no fucking clue what we’re doing. Or they can actually listen, and they can think about themselves when they were like us, and maybe we can bring some pieces of them back.” And now my eyes are welling up, my hands are trembling. “Because we lose it,” I say. “We grow up and we lose ourselves. Sometimes when my favorite songs are on I have to stop what I’m doing and lie down on my carpet and just listen. I feel every word they’re singing. Every note. And to think that in twenty years, or ten years, or five, even, I might hear those same songs and just, like, bob my head or something is horrible. Then I’m sure I’ll think that I know more about life, but it isn’t true. I’ll know less.”
Tears are covering my face now.
“Look at me,” I say. “So stupid. You were probably expecting something real, but all I have to explain myself is some existential crisis.”
“No,” Mark says. “Don’t say that.”
“But really. Here you are, going thro
ugh an actual event with Ryan, and here I am, freaking out because I’m thinking too much.”
“No,” he says again. “That’s your future self talking. Your grown-up, dumb-fuck self.”
I laugh. He reaches for my hand.
“Tell me what happened next.”
“Okay,” I say. “Let me think. Garrison’s friends pulled out their phones and said they only needed ten minutes to make me famous. ‘What’s the gallery’s name again?’ they asked. ‘What’s your Instagram handle?’ As they worked their magic, Garrison said he wanted to photograph us. He wanted to do it right there. He traded places with me so that I was on the sofa and he asked George—”
“—did we ever figure out who exactly George was? Like a young, hip butler? Are there even butlers anymore? Maybe a personal assistant?”
“I thought George lived there. Like he was one of the owners. He was so hospitable.”
“Oh, crazy. Maybe he was.”
“Anyway. He asked George to hand me a bottle of whiskey. I told him thanks, but I was driving. He said, ‘I’m just asking that you hold it.’ I said, ‘I don’t know how I feel about having a portrait taken of me holding a bottle of whiskey that I’m not even going to drink.’ He said, ‘It isn’t in the frame.’ And he had you look through his camera and you told me it was true. I guess it was supposed to make me feel something.”
“Did it?”
“I don’t know. Okay, yeah. Maybe it made me feel reckless.”
“Do you think it came through in the picture?”
“I couldn’t tell you. I’ve hardly looked at it.”
“Why not?”
I shake my head. I can’t find a reason.
“We can pick it up another time,” he says. “Let’s keep going.”
Make it up to me. Make it up to me.
“What is it?” Mark asks. “You just stopped walking.”
I guess I did.
“Violet,” I say. “I don’t know how I’ll ever recover from this. She bought all my paintings. People were probably asking her questions about them and me, and I left her there to guess.”
“So call her,” Mark says.
But I can’t. I couldn’t stand to hear the disappointment in her voice.
“Text her, at least.”
“What do I say?”
“Ask her where she is. Go wherever she says.”
“But I look like shit.”
“You look beautiful. Go. Sweep her off her feet.”
Violet, I text. I’m so sorry. Where are you?
The dots appear immediately. Then they stop. Then they’re back.
Just got home.
“She’s home,” I say. “I don’t know where that is.”
“Ask her for the address.”
I do.
I hold my breath.
She gives it me.
“It’s in Hayes.”
“That’s close,” Mark says. “Let’s go.”
I wish I could buy her a gift, but all the shops are closed, so when we show up at her house ten minutes later I’m empty-handed.
“Do you want me to wait for you?” Mark asks.
“Are you kidding?” I say. “You’re coming with me.”
“Ummm,” he says, shaking his head. “That is not very romantic. Don’t worry. I won’t leave you until you tell me to go.”
I nod, and enter the gate alone. I follow the instructions she sent in her text and round the house to the back, where there’s a small studio, lit up in the night. I knock on the door.
She opens it.
It breaks my heart to see her. She’s still dressed for the party in herringbone pants and high heels, a skinny black tie around her slender neck. If I saw her on the street I would stop still in lust and wonder.
But seeing her now, as she steps back to let me into her room, is too much for me to take. I look at her walls instead. They’re mostly bare save for some black-and-white photographs pinned to one of them. I step closer. They’re all of the circus.
“Did your mom take these?” I ask her.
She nods.
Her laptop is open on her bed, a YouTube video paused on the image of a trapeze artist in silver against a black backdrop, dangling from the bar by one leg.
I came to apologize, to confess. I did worse than desert her. I didn’t even show up.
But instead I ask, “Do you miss it? The circus?”
She’s quiet. I finally look at her for the first time since walking into her room.
“I thought I wanted to stay in one place,” she finally says. “Make a life for myself here. But I can’t even bring myself to unpack.”
She gestures to her suitcase and her boxes and I see what she means. There is no dresser or desk or chair. Only a bed and a kitchenette without pots or pans or other signs of living.
“I’m not used to staying anywhere very long. I came here because I thought something might be waiting for me.” She looks on the verge of tears, but she blinks them away. “Let’s go out. I need some air.”
“Okay,” I say. “I should tell you that Mark’s out front, though. In case you wanted to talk. I can tell him we need some time.…”
“To be honest,” she says. “I don’t feel much like talking.”
I follow her outside, my throat tight, my eyes burning.
“Hey, Mark,” she says. “I’m in a shitty mood. I think we should all get ice cream.”
“I like ice cream,” Mark says, and we walk, Violet leading us toward the heart of the neighborhood where ultracool adults laugh on street corners and sip from pint glasses in a beer garden. We are the only teenagers in sight.
I see the ice-cream store in the distance, but before we get there Violet stops short in front of a woman, sitting on a blanket on the ground.
“New plan,” she says to us. And then to the woman, “I’m buying my friends readings.”
I step closer and see that a sign on the blanket says Tarot.
“I’m not sure about this,” I say.
“Yeah…” Mark cocks his head. “Thanks, Violet, but—”
“Admit it,” Violet says. “You could both use a little clarity in your lives.”
And even though I have done enough soul-searching for the night, I know that I can’t let Violet down again, so I grab Mark’s hand and lead him over. Up close, the Tarot reader’s younger than I thought she’d be. Her blanket is soft under my legs and small enough that my knee touches Mark’s.
“I’m Kylie,” she says. “Have either of you had your cards read before?”
Mark and I shake our heads.
“A good way to begin is with a spread of three cards. The past, the present, the future. Which one of you wants to go first?”
“Him,” I say.
“Oh, I don’t think so,” Violet says from behind us. Then, to Kylie, “Kate has a little problem with follow-through.”
Kylie nods as though she already knows. She takes my hands in hers and I can’t help but blush, and for the first time tonight I feel the cold of the evening, and wish I had brought a sweater or a jacket or at least a scarf, something to wrap around myself.
She lets me go and reaches for her cards but then stops.
She shifts to face Mark straight on and takes his hands. She inhales for longer than I knew was possible, and then exhales just as slowly.
“I’m going to do a joint reading,” she says.
I glance at Mark. He shrugs. I wait to hear why, but all she says is, “It feels right.”
She opens a gold box and pulls out her deck of cards.
“You shuffle,” she says to me. And then, to Mark, “You cut.”
He does. The fortune teller focuses.
“As I’m turning this first card, I already feel pain,” she says.
I would like to keep an open mind, but we are two tearstained teenagers. Three, if you count Violet. It doesn’t take intuition to see that.
She reveals a beautiful card: a naked, joyful woman floating in the sky, surroun
ded by a green wreath.
“Oh yeah,” she says. “Man. This card is the World.”
“I don’t get it,” Mark says. “It looks like good news.”
But the card, though beautiful, fills me with sadness.
“It’s upside down,” I say.
She nods.
“A reversed World,” she says. “No closure. Too much left unsaid and undone. You know, I’m feeling this card pulling me toward you, Kate.”
She looks at me.
“You’ve been holding yourself back.”
My throat tightens in hurt but then anger.
“Yeah, well, you were just told that I lack follow-through.”
She doesn’t respond.
“Okay,” I say. “So what am I supposed to do about it?”
She turns another card over. This time, a woman is blindfolded and tied up, with swords all around her.
“This is as clear as it gets,” she says. “You’re both hurting. You feel stuck.” She turns to Mark. “Your heart”—she holds her hand to her own—“is broken, and you don’t know how to move past it.”
Mark shoots me a skeptical glance and I have to agree. Heartbreak is an easy assumption to make about a teenage boy with straight teeth and nice clothing but a look of desperation.
“She is someone you’ve been close to for a long time,” she says. “I can tell by how deep the pain is.”
I’m confused, but then Mark’s smirk clarifies it: Kylie is just a woman in a costume, talking to a random boy about his love for a girl. She probably does this between semesters to make tuition money.
“Both of you, look closely,” she says. “This figure is bound and blindfolded. She appears trapped, but she isn’t.”
“She’s surrounded by swords,” Mark says. “It definitely seems like she’s trapped.”
“But look. The swords don’t go all the way around her, and only her arms are bound. If she would only trust herself to step forward, she would make it through. This card is a warning to you both. You can’t allow yourselves to be trapped by your pain.”
“Right,” I say. “If you find yourself in hell, keep walking. That seems to be the theme of the night.”
She says, “Could be. Or maybe, if you think you’re in hell, open your eyes. What you see may surprise you.”
She touches the last card, about to turn it over.
