Color tells me they cooked one of the frozen turkeys for Thanksgiving, and that the house was so filled with love and good smells that it really felt like a holiday. That’s when her mom dropped the Blockbuster bomb.
Color imitates a bomb dropping and hissing and exploding on my floor. And then she flops over on my bed, like she’s so exhausted she just can’t stand anymore. Color’s grandma doesn’t have as much money as Color’s mom thought, and bills are bills, and they need to be paid. On time, preferably.
“I know I shouldn’t be disappointed,” Color says. “I know we need to do this to, like, keep our house and stuff. But it’s like Heaven is dying. And I would never tell my mom how much it hurts because I love her, but it hurts a little.”
“I’m sorry,” I say.
Color puts her head in her hands. “What am I going to do with everything I’ve saved? I can’t just get rid of it.”
I wish I could make it better. I wish I could force Color’s mom to make better decisions. I wish love wasn’t so complicated.
Color points to the windowsill where my fish is. “At least we still have the fish. Did you figure out a name yet?”
I shake my head.
“Well, it will come to you. And you put the stars on your ceiling.” My galaxy twinkles over Color’s head. “So many suns that only come out to light the darkness. It’s so poetic.”
I lie down next to her so our heads touch. If I stay here long enough, can I get Color’s knowledge through osmosis? Because that would be poetic.
“Beth told me that the sun will burn out in five billion years,” I say.
“Beth is so freaking awesome.”
“It’s crazy that one day it won’t exist.”
“Nothing is permanent,” Color says. “I’m really feeling that truth right now.”
“Except infinity,” I say. “It goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on . . .”
Color rolls onto her side. “I like when you speak Math.”
As we lie together, wrapped in sad smiles, I feel the moment passing, carried out the window and into infinity. Someday it will reach the sun and beyond.
Eventually Color says, “Am I destined to be just like my mom? You know, the whole ‘Cat’s in the Cradle’ thing. Ending up like her is just . . . inevitable. Is that my ‘truth statement’?”
“Nothing is inevitable,” I say.
I think I see relief cross Color’s face. “Except infinity.”
“Except that.”
Standing up on the bed, I jump and grab for one of the stars. Color watches me, intrigued, as I place it on her forehead.
“You are your own unique star,” I say. “And I’ve made a vow to only tell the truth, so you can believe me when I say that.”
“Only telling the truth? What’s the fun in that?” Color laughs, touching the star between her eyebrows. “It’s on my third eye.” When my total confusion registers, she says, “Your sixth chakra. The seat of intuition.”
She imitates meditating, sitting up straight and closing her eyes softly, her palms open and facing up on her thighs.
“You’re speaking in Dharma language now,” I say. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Color touches the star, her eyes still shut. “It’s like your gut, but in your head. It’s like that thing that tells you, ‘This is your path, Esther Ainsworth, now follow it.’ My mom says it’s meant to guide you, if you let it.”
Her moment of meditation complete, Color jumps and grabs another star. She puts it on my forehead, the third eye that I was unaware of until this very moment, though it’s been with me the entire time. Color leaves her hand pressed to my forehead, closing her eyes again as if she’s trying to read my thoughts.
“What’s your intuition telling you?” I ask.
She opens one eye. “My intuition is telling me that we knew each other in a past life. It’s also telling me that you’re eating chili for dinner.” And then she freezes and sucks in a breath. “And . . . oh my God.”
“What?”
“Oh my God. It worked.” She starts jumping on the bed. And because she’s jumping, I start to jump, too, even though I’m not sure what we’re jumping about. But suddenly, it feels like I’m on my old trampoline again, the rusty springs giving way but ultimately catching us again and again.
“What is it?” I ask.
“Infinity! Reincarnation! That’s the answer!” Color is so ecstatic that I can barely keep up with her jumping.
“What?”
“I don’t have to get rid of everything in Heaven!” Color jumps and jumps and jumps. “I need to give it brand new life!”
“How?” My sight is blurring with all our movement. All I can see is the star marking Color’s forehead. Her intuition floats through the air, glowing, and I wonder if mine is doing the same.
“We’ll hold a garage sale for all the lost items in Heaven,” Color says. “They can finally be reborn!” She gets off the bed, her feet returning to solid ground, the light back in her eyes. “We’ll give everything a brand new life.”
It turns out Color was right—Mom does cook chili for dinner. Also, my intuition is so freaking broken. I want a new one. The empty pool surrounds me as I lie on the cracked floor, a glow-in-the-dark star on my third eye, waiting for my intuition to show up. It’s drifting and mingling with the suns above.
I ask, Are you there?
I ask, Can you hear me?
I ask, Do you speak a different language? Because I’m having a hard time hearing you.
I ask, Just tell me this—Is the ocean warm in California?
I ask, Do you think Tom will ever fill this pool?
Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.
I ask, Did I have an intuition to begin with?
That’s what Tom said was the worst part of all. That I didn’t think having sex with Amit was wrong.
Tom: Sex out of wedlock is a sin.
Tom: Sex is sacred.
Tom: Sex is something you save for someday when you meet someone special.
He kept exaggerating all the Ss and I wanted to scream, Just say it like a normal person instead of the snake tattooed on your arm, you lunatic!
He never said what I felt, which was that sex is love. I guess there weren’t enough Ss.
Maybe that’s been my problem all along. I was born without an intuition. After all, my father left my mom with two young kids and no money. He clearly didn’t have it either. Maybe it’s a genetic disorder.
Hannah pokes her head out the sliding screen door and shouts, “Tom says you need to get out of that pool and come in for dinner, Esther.”
I lazily sit up.
“Why do you have a star on your forehead?”
The lights coming from the house surround Hannah in a halo of yellow gold. Her breasts seem more pronounced than usual, and her hair more buoyant than ever. She is literally wearing her body like a different person, but one small move and the radiance that surrounds her would disappear.
And then I feel it. My intuition decides to pop up. There it is. Tom has a snake tattoo on his arm that he hides every day. In essence, he’s lying, trying to cover up his past. Mom is lying about who I’m hanging out with, and who knows what else. Even Color is lying to her mom, in a way, by not telling her how much it hurts that she’s selling the Blockbuster.
And Hannah . . . I stare at her standing in the doorway, her body looking almost like a costume.
“What?” she barks at me.
My intuition says Hannah is lying about something, too. I’m not sure what, but I am sure that everyone hides something. I’m not the only one. Even the stars hide during the day. And hiding isn’t necessarily lying, but liars hide the truth.
“What?” Hannah says again.
That’s a good question. What, Hannah? What are you lying about? I ask silently.
“Take that star off your forehead,” she says. “You are so weird.” As she turns, Hannah flips her hair over her shoulder.
&nbs
p; We may not look or sound alike, but Hannah and I are more similar than she thinks.
Liar, liar, pants on fire.
24
Complex Math Problem: If the whole world is lying, does truth really exist?
A heat wave hits in December. December. This is the time of year when it’s supposed to cool down, just as Tom promised, but it’s hot and dry. The lie gets added to the pile, and I start to flake and crack.
The heat makes napping by the river hard. I’m just so darn hot, and no one likes to sleep in sweat. That’s gross. I end up sitting under one of the small trees, trying to squeeze into as much shade as possible.
Shade in the desert is as abundant as truth is in this world of liars.
I come home every day sweating profusely, so Mom thinks I’m really working hard at losing weight. Mom’s even lying to herself.
A few months ago, I came to the river to sleep and escape, but if I’m being honest with myself, and I’m really trying to, my reasons for occupying my small space of shade down by the river have changed.
At the familiar pitter-patter of Moss’s feet on the path, I jump out from my patch of beautiful, cooling shade and bolt into the sunlight. Doing this also happens to scare the crap out of Moss again, and I think for a second he might pass out from fear. My track record with him is abysmal.
Moss bends over, heaving. “I told you to stop doing that!”
“I’m sorry,” I say, my eyes burning with sudden light, as Moss tries to regain his breath.
Droplets of sweat rain down from his chin to his chest. I watch them trail his body. Jealousy edges into my stomach. Has a girl made that same trek with her hands? If she has, why did Moss let her in, and not me? Has Moss allowed that access to a lot of girls? The questions only make me want to demand contact.
“I just wanted to make sure you really don’t like surprises.” I try to laugh off my poor choice in approaching him, but Moss only glares at me. “Sorry,” I say, defeat inching closer. When I nervously kick a rock with my shoe, it hits Moss in the shin.
“Seriously?” He gapes at me.
I throw my hands up. “Forget it! I never do anything right with you!”
Hastily grabbing my bike from the ground, intent on getting the hell out of here as Moss rubs his shin, I say, “I just thought we could ride or run or whatever together. I wasn’t going to talk to you or anything. But forget it.”
But then Moss says, “Wait.”
And I do as he says, coming to look at him hesitantly, forcing myself to be the silent one for once.
“Are you trying to do things right?” Moss says.
I pinch my lips closed, not wanting to offer words in case they stifle his.
“You don’t need to try, Esther. You’re fine just the way you are.”
His words attempt to knock me over. It’s what I’ve wanted to hear, but actually having them materialize in the air . . . I start to melt on the pavement, and not a bit of it is from the heat. Waiting in the shade for this moment in the bright sun was so worth it. With a single declaration, I’m back on the roller coaster ride, flipping around and around. But that’s how powerful statements can be. They can change your life, turn it upside down, in a matter of a few words.
“You think I’m fine?” I ask Moss. Out loud.
He nods, simultaneously wiping sweat from his forehead. Today, he’s wearing little running shorts that show the majority of his really muscular thighs and a sleeveless shirt. Right now, I’m wearing a blush. I can feel it heat my cheeks.
“I didn’t know that you felt that way about me.”
“I might not be big on talking, but that doesn’t mean I don’t think about things,” Moss says.
“You think about . . . things . . . me being a thing?”
Instead of watching me, Moss examines the sweat that drips from his chin onto the hot pavement. “I think . . . I’m done running for the day.”
“Oh. OK.” Weren’t we just having a deep conversation about things?
“Do you want to go for a swim?” he asks.
“Um . . . no.”
Moss decides to look at me then, and my heart skips a beat. “Why not?”
“Well, for starters, I don’t have a suit,” I say. “And for seconds, even if I did, I wouldn’t put it on.”
“We can wear our clothes . . . if that will make you more comfortable.” Moss is implying that we could go naked.
I picture me on a roller coaster, hands up: Ahhhhhhh!!
“Come on,” he says. “It’ll be fun.”
“You have fun?” I ask with false snark. Moss pretends to be insulted, which is actually a really cute way of flirting with me. I gave that look to Amit once, pretending I was going to walk away only because I hoped he’d grab my arm and make me stop. I wanted Amit to touch me and hold me still. He did what I wanted and so much more. But that memory doesn’t belong here. I cast it off into the river and let the current carry my past away.
“You know how to swim, right?” Moss walks to the river’s edge, leaving me on the path.
“Of course I know how to swim,” I say, more to myself than to him, as I follow him down to the water.
We stand at the edge, the river shimmering in the sunlight. With no wind, the top is as smooth as glass. I see my reflection in the blue water next to Moss.
“Do you think everyone has an intuition?” I ask.
“You’ve been talking to Color too much.”
“I mean it. Do you think there’s something greater out there?”
“My intuition is telling me that out there”—Moss points toward the center of the river—“we’ll be a lot cooler than if we keep standing right here.”
Moss runs into the water and disappears underneath it. When his buzzed head pops up, a wide grin brightens his face. “Come on! What are you afraid of?” He tries to splash me on the dirt.
Good question. What am I afraid of? Let me make a list: Spiders, peacocks, gagging, people in masks, bananas, balloons, balloons shaped like bananas . . .
I take off my shoes and socks and put my feet in the water.
Mannequins, Big Bird, porcelain dolls with creepy nonmoving eyes . . .
When the water is up to my knees, my profuse sweating stops. Damn, it feels good.
Moths, loose teeth that dangle by a string of my gum, rodents of unusual size . . .
The water is at wrist level now, and I skim my hands over the top, making small ripples.
That I’m damaged; that no one will ever love me again; that the world is one big lying, sucking vampire; that I’ll end up alone . . .
I wade out to where Moss is treading water.
I’m afraid of letting go . . .
“See, that wasn’t so hard,” he says.
He doesn’t know about the trail of fears I left behind.
“What are you afraid of?” I ask him as my arms and legs move through the water to keep me afloat.
“That I’ll be stuck here forever.”
He says it just like that. No hesitation. Just the truth. Moss’s honesty is so surprising, I stop treading for a moment and sink in the water. I have to pull hard to get level on the surface.
“And the red tacks on the map in your room?” I ask.
“The places I want to go.” And then Moss corrects himself. “The places I need to go.”
The Rio Grande might be filled with truth serum.
“If you could go anywhere in the world, where would you go?” I ask.
“Anywhere.”
“Yeah, anywhere.”
“No,” Moss says. “I’d go anywhere but here.”
My head bobs along with Moss’s. “Is that why you run so much?”
“My ticket out of here is a college scholarship. My mom sure as hell can’t afford to pay.”
All of the words coming out of Moss’s mouth—I want to catch them and save them in my pocket. “Color told me about the Blockbuster.”
“I knew my mom would do it eventually, but Color’s more of
a dreamer than I am.” Moss dips his chin in the water. “Which means life disappoints her more often.”
I understand that, but right now, swimming in a cool river with a boy who tempted me to leave my fears behind me, life is kind of amazing.
“What does your intuition say about how deep it is here?” I ask.
Moss is contemplative before he says, “It’s telling me twelve feet.”
“We should put your intuition to the test.” When he returns the smile plastered on my face, I hear the crank of the roller coaster inching up a really big hill. I feel it in my belly. Like sunlight just wrapped around my insides and gave them a really big, almost suffocating hug.
“We should,” he says.
We disappear below the water. Deeper and deeper, I pull myself, looking for the bottom.
Complex Math Problem: If the world is round, is the bottom really the bottom, or are we really just searching for someone else’s sky?
Moss and I surface at the same time, gasping for air, my lungs tight.
“It’s . . .” Moss gasps. “Deeper . . .” Gasp. “Than . . . I thought.” Gasp.
It’s then that I realize that Moss is right in front of me. Like right in front of me. His nose inches from mine. His lips, which he licks droplets of water from, are just as close. His legs swim in between my legs, his arms tangle in the waves my arms make. And in just a second, he’ll realize how close we are and back away.
One, one thousand.
Two, one thousand.
Three, one thousand.
Moss hasn’t backed away from me.
His hand comes out of the water and touches my bottom lip. “You’re turning blue, Esther.”
That’s funny. Because I thought I was just turning on. Back on after months of being off. Moss’s leg comes in between mine, and lifts me up by my seat to keep me above the water. I didn’t realize I was sinking. I thought I was floating just then. I think the rose quartz Dharma gave Moss is working.
“This was a good idea,” I say.
“I’m full of them,” he says.
And, by God, I believe him.
The Infinite Pieces of Us Page 12
