Why Can't I Be You (9781101602843)

by Larkin, Allie

  On my last day of high school, my mother picked me up and we went to the movies in the middle of the afternoon. She’d been having a good week. We saw Moulin Rouge. We shared a big bucket of popcorn and a Diet Coke, and I watched her eyes light up each time she recognized one of the songs they were singing. She seemed lighter, softer—happy. We hadn’t been to the movies in such a long time.

  On the way home, we heard “Roxanne” on the radio and sang along at the top of our lungs. When we got back to the house, the song was only halfway through, so we sat in the garage with the music blaring, singing together like it was the performance of our lives. I remember thinking that maybe after that everything would be okay. Maybe she was better. She was wearing a red sweater set that I’d bought her for Mother’s Day. She had blush on her cheeks and her lipstick had all but worn off. She looked so pretty. I remember thinking that maybe she was finally better.

  I reached up and turned the dome light on to drain the battery. I closed the door behind me quietly when I left.

  I drove to Wegmans, called the police from a pay phone, and gave them her license plate number. “Please watch for her,” I said, my heart pounding in my throat. “She drives drunk sometimes.” I felt like a traitor, but it was all I could do. I couldn’t make her happy. I couldn’t make her stop. She was never going to be the person I wanted her to be, and I couldn’t give up any more of my life to keep her in maintenance mode.

  When I got home, I found Yarah on Facebook and sent her a request.

  She wrote back a few minutes later: “My dear old friend! How happy I am to find you!” I responded: “I loved being an eight-legged sea creature with you,” and she knew exactly what I meant.

  The drive across country with Mr. Snuffleupagus was brutal. Snuffy cried in his crate and vomited every couple of hours, filling the car with the smell of cat food and stomach acid. There was too much time to think and too much time to worry that I was making some sort of colossal mistake. I spent my nights in crappy motel rooms, watching home-makeover shows, eating vending-machine burritos, and trying to get Snuffy to use the little travel litter box, instead of the motel carpet. So driving up to the apartment complex and seeing Robbie waiting in the parking lot for me, leaning against his truck, made all the difference. It made it less scary. I stopped doubting that I was making a colossally dumb decision. Even if I had nothing else, I had a friend, the kind who knew my deepest, darkest secrets and liked me anyway.

  “Jenneroo!” he said, giving me a great big hug. “It’s good to see you.”

  Heather didn’t come, but she sent cookies. “I think she’ll come around, you know?” he said, putting the container on the kitchen counter. “And she knows you’re my friend. She knows how you get me.” He leaned against the counter. “Plus a woman in her condition shouldn’t really be lifting boxes.”

  “Wait! What?” I said, clapping my hand over my mouth. “Robbie! Wow!” I hugged him and gave him a big kiss on the cheek. “You’re going to be the best dad, Robbers.”

  We blasted Meat Loaf and sang along while I hung my clothes in the closet and Robbie inflated my air mattress. I’d have to go furniture shopping, but I wanted to wait until I knew what I wanted my apartment to look like. I wanted to give myself some time as a blank slate.

  We finished unloading all my boxes. Snuffy was settled on a windowsill, glaring at us.

  “Can I buy you a beer, Robbers?” I asked.

  “I quit,” Robbie said. “I’m not going to be like my dad.” He smiled wide enough for the gap before his incisor to show. “But I could go for a milkshake.”

  “So, we’re not going to have our last drinks together too?” I said, laughing.

  “When my kid gets married,” Robbie said, laughing. “You and me. We’ll go out to the field and drink champagne and toast to Jessie Morgan, wherever she is.”

  “Deal,” I said.

  “So, be honest. Was that your first cigarette?” He was grinning ear to ear.

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “I should have known,” Robbie said. “You coughed way too much.”

  The next day, I stopped at Myra’s store to give back the Jessie dress.

  “Hey,” Nancy said, when I walked in. She smiled, but it was the way you might smile at someone who just got released from the loony bin. Kind but cautious. Myra must have told her.

  “I don’t feel like I can keep this,” I said, pushing the dress across the counter. “I know I wore it, so it’s not like something you can sell, but I just feel like Myra should have it back.”

  She took the dress from me.

  “And I think I should pay for it,” I said.

  “Nonsense,” she said. “We can still use it for display. Myra wouldn’t want you to pay for it. But if you want to shop, we appreciate your business.”

  I stayed for a while, trying on clothes. I was hoping Myra would show up, but she didn’t.

  I didn’t have to get dressed up anymore. I didn’t have to dress for anyone but me. I bought a fabulous pair of corduroy pants, a gray sweater knitted from recycled yarn, an organic cotton flannel shirt, and a necklace with a tiny octopus charm to replace the necklace Deagan had given me.

  I paid and was halfway to the door when I remembered the other reason I’d come in.

  “Nancy,” I said, pulling the canvas board with the sign design out of my messenger bag, “can you give this to Myra?”

  “Oh my God!” Nancy said, holding her hand over her mouth. “It’s perfect. She’ll love it.”

  I wasn’t ready to go back to my empty apartment just yet, so I went next door to the coffee shop to get a latte.

  I had my order and was ready to leave when I heard someone call, “Jenny?” And this time I was sure she said Jenny.

  Myra was sitting at a table in the corner, with a huge cup of coffee, a mess of papers, and a calculator.

  She got up and hugged me. It was probably obvious to anyone watching that we both felt awkward about it, but I was happy she saw me and didn’t want to hide. I had been in my own little world. I would have walked right past her if she hadn’t said something.

  “Do you have a second?” she asked. She waved her hand in the direction of the chair across from her and gathered up the papers into a stack as she sat down again. “I have to do receipts over here,” she said. “If I’m in the store, I just want to play with the clothes. Plus, see that guy over there?” She pointed to a good-looking man with curly brown hair, sitting at a table in the corner, typing on a laptop. “He’s the owner, the one I told you about. He’s always here.” She smiled and raised her eyebrows.

  I loved that she was confiding in me, even just the smallest bit, but I knew I shouldn’t get my hopes up. “I brought the dress back,” I said.

  “You didn’t have to.”

  “It felt like the right thing to do.” I stared at my coffee cup because it was hard to look at Myra.

  “I’ve thought about it a lot,” Myra said. “I should have known, I guess. You’re nothing like Jessie.”

  I thought it was an insult. Angry words. But when I looked up, she was smiling.

  “And don’t think that I don’t love Jessie. Because I do. But Jessie being Jessie was way more drama than you pretending to be her. She always stirred up trouble. She had to. She couldn’t keep her life simple, and if there was, like, the slightest hint of calm, she’d pick an epic fight with Robbie or tell me Karen said something mean about me behind my back. It was all drama, all the time. It was exciting when we were fifteen, but if she hadn’t disappeared, I think we would have drifted apart anyway.”

  I picked at the seam on the cardboard sleeve of my coffee cup. I didn’t know what to say.

  “We talked,” Myra said. “She called me. And, you know, she’s Jessie. She said she was sorry and all of that, but it was, like, her grand statement to me.
And it was all about protecting her boundaries and how she didn’t want to feel like she ever had to come back here. She didn’t want to feel like she owed it to anyone to be her old self.” Myra shook her head. “That’s Jessie. And I will always love her for the things in my life that I never would have had the courage to do if it weren’t for her, for getting me to live outside my comfort zone. But even the way she pushed us to do things—all of that—I think every single moment of it was for her. So she could have partners in crime. So she could feel less alone. Not because she was being a good friend. It’s easy to look back and fix it all in my head and say, ‘Wow, Jessie was really trying to make me more brave,’ and I did that when you were here. Your version of Jessie made me rewrite the real one. I believed you because that’s who I wanted Jessie to be.” She laughed. “And let’s face it—I had no reason to think you weren’t! I mean, who pretends to be someone else?”

  “I know,” I said, laughing. “Right?”

  “It’s weird, because I know you and I don’t know you. And I think I probably don’t know you more than I know you. That’s a lot of knows. But, I mean, I can’t just jump in and be your long-lost friend. And I think I’m still processing all of it. I’m still trying to figure out how I feel. So I guess what I’m saying is that maybe the door is shut right now, but it’s not locked. Does that make sense?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “It does.”

  “I do, however, have to tell you,” she said, smacking the table, “Blackberry loved my stuff and they want two more seasons from me, and a resort line.”

  “Really?” I said. “That’s incredible!”

  We talked for a little while longer. I told her about saying good-bye to Deagan and my mother, and about the series of paintings I’d been working on. “I’m not doing it to stalk you or anything. In fact, I tried really hard to find a program somewhere else. But it’s just the right place for me.”

  “I’m really glad,” Myra said, “that you’re figuring out who you are. I think I know you enough to know that you’re going to find a great person in there. You’re going to find someone you want to be.”

  A few weeks later, I drove past Myra’s store on my way to the DMV to get my Washington State driver’s license. Her old sign had been replaced by the one I designed. The mannequin in the front window was wearing the Jessie dress.

  “So,” Luanne said—I could hear her slurp her coffee over the phone—“have you gone grunge yet?”

  It was our new tradition. Once a week, when Monica left for her weekly nail appointment, Luanne would take a coffee break and call me from the office. I’d be just getting up and having my first cup. It was still a little weird between us but getting better. We didn’t want the same things anymore. I didn’t trigger her competitive side. She wanted to be my friend. That counted for something. As did her attempt to understand why anyone would want to quit a decent-paying job to go back to school, live on a research assistant’s stipend, spend time around “germy college kids,” and live in a studio apartment.

  “Not entirely grunge,” I said, “but I did buy a flannel shirt.”

  “No! Really?” she said, sounding slightly exasperated.

  “Deal with it,” I said. “It’s not the end of the world.”

  She told me about Monica’s latest meltdown, and I told her about the new painting I was working on. It was a self-portrait. I was trying to paint the most honest picture of myself that I could. “Zits and all,” I said.

  “Why?” Luanne said. “It’s a painting. You can paint yourself with better hair and clear skin.”

  “I have great hair,” I said. “And I think it’s time that I face myself, you know?”

  “Just promise me that you’ll face yourself in something that isn’t flannel.”

  “I make no promises,” I said.

  After we hung up, I bundled up and walked over to the studio. It was actually sunny in Seattle. The air was crisp and clean. My feet felt firm on the sidewalk. My legs felt strong.

  I let myself into the studio, breathing in the smell of oil paint, watching the dust moats swirl in the light as I walked over to my painting: a canvas so big I’d have never been able to work on it in the confines of a tiny apartment. My self-portrait was larger than life-size. It let me examine every freckle and flaw, the curve of my chin, the slightly sad angle of my eyes. It let me see myself.

  I wet down my brush, wiping the excess water on my thigh, adding a stripe of leftover pigment, a flash of pink, to the history of my work jeans. Then I began mixing my paints for the afternoon. I hummed to myself while I turned yellow into orange and blue into green.

  I heard footsteps but I didn’t turn around, trying to cling to the vision in my head and the feeling I had when I was alone with my paints.

  “Hey,” a voice said. “I was just checking in with Matisse, and Anita told me you might be here.” I turned around and saw the person I’d missed the most.

  “Hi, Gilbert,” I said.

  “Hi, Jenny.”

  He smiled, his blue eyes crinkling at the corners, and put his hand out to shake mine. “It’s nice to meet you,” he said.

  Acknowledgments

  To everyone who read Stay, recommended it to friends, tweeted and blogged about it, and came to book tour events, you made this book possible and I cannot thank you enough.

  A gigantic thank-you to my editor, Denise Roy, for giving me the courage to take this story to the places it needed to go. Working on this book with you has been a wonderful experience. Thanks also to Phil Budnick, Kate Napolitano, Milena Brown, Lavina Lee, Jaya Miceli, and everyone at Plume for giving this book such a great home.

  To my fabulous agent, Elisabeth Weed, thank you for your help, patience, and support. This book would not have flourished without you. Huge thanks to Dana Borowitz at United Talent Agency and Stephanie Sun at Weed Literary.

  Michele Larkin, thank you for tirelessly sharing your beauty, brains, and bountiful common sense. You are the sister I always wished for.

  Oh, Neil Gordon, you guru of storytelling! Thank you for being such an awesome friend and teacher. You are the bees cliché.

  Joan Pedzich, thank you for lending your amazing talents as a reader and writer, and for loving my characters as much as I do. I don’t know what I’d do without you.

  Claire Cook, thank you for being such a gracious friend and mentor. I am so grateful for your wisdom and kind words.

  Erika Imranyi, thank you for the spark that started it all.

  Rainbow Rowell, oh goodness, I appreciate you! Thank you for all of your brilliant advice.

  Evan Dawson, thank you for your support and for the fabulous conversations.

  Sarah Playtis, you are circles and sea creatures and everything wonderful.

  So much thanks and love to Melanie Krebs, Jennifer DeVille, Julie Smith, Brenda Kirkwood, Rainbow Heinrichs, Lisa Malin, Michele Christiano, Erin and Ted Jackle, Carol Kirkwood, Marty Herezniak, Deb VanderBilt, Dash Hegeman, Carolyn Bennett, Kristin Dezen, Nick Tebrake, Chris Sutton, Armanda Zardzewiala, and Andi Winterfield.

  Mindae Kadous, thank you so much for your enthusiastic support and for being you.

  One of the greatest gifts of being a writer is getting to know other writers. I am so grateful for the members of the Fiction Writers Co-op, and also Shawn Klomparens, Amy Hatvany, M. J. Rose, Beth Hoffman, Matthew Aaron Goodman, Beth Harbison, Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Melissa Senate, Sarah Strohmeyer, Julie Buxbaum, Allison Winn Scotch, Alison Pace, Sarah Pekkanen, Caprice Crane, Jen Lancaster, and Alice Bradley.

  A huge thank-you to Christy Cain and her amazing team, especially Michael Miller, Linda and Roger Bryant, Rebecca Budinger-Mulhearn, and to the glorious gang at Titles Over Tea. Erica Caldwell and Terri Marchese, thank you for your support, hospitality, and amazing book recommendations.

  Thank you to Ka
tie at the Planet Dog Foundation for helping me with my research on service dogs. Thank you also to Wooftown Rescue, Mostly Shepherds, and GSRCNY.

  Thank you to everyone at the Greenists, especially Courtney Craig and Mickey Dye, for being great green friends.

  To my fellow Tuskers, I spent a great deal of time while writing this book thinking about what my life would have been like if I hadn’t had such wonderful friends. I’m so thankful that I got to grow up with you. Special thanks and so much love to Katherine and the Robs (especially Russell), Sohini, Danna, Laura, Lauri, Lauren, Larry, Missy, Ellen, Bryan, Sabrina, and Zeni.

  To John Cuk, thank you again for being an incredible teacher. Our chat was enormously helpful at just the right time.

  A huge thank-you to the Larkins and the Ashbys for your unending encouragement. I’m sure if you’ve met my in-laws, Doug and Terry, you’ve heard about my books. I feel very lucky to be a Larkin.

  Jeremy, thank you for being my home no matter where we go. I love you more than everything. And, of course, thank you to my trusty dogs, Argo and Stella, and the cat, even though she hates me.