The Bermudez Triangle

by Maureen Johnson

  “You go to AHH?” Nina asked as they claimed part of a row. “I’m not sure if I’ve seen you around.”

  “I just moved here a year ago,” he explained.

  “From where?”

  “Buffalo. My grandmother invented the wings.”

  “She did?” Nina asked.

  “I wish. No. My grandma is the only grandma in the world who can’t cook We eat at Arby’s when we go to her house for Thanksgiving. We go to the nice Arby’s, though.”

  “The nice Arby’s?”

  “There’s this Arby’s in her town that has a fireplace, and a waiter, and tablecloths, and real plates and silverware. But it doesn’t cost more. It’s just the really nice Arby’s.”

  He seemed genuinely excited just thinking about it.

  “So you were at Stanford, right?” he asked, picking through his tub of popcorn and plucking out the butter-soaked pieces. “That sounds like major advance planning.”

  “It was just a summer program.”

  “Still. It’s, like, college. Which is, like, impressive. See. I didn’t go. This is, like, what you sound like after a summer at Mortimer’s.”

  He pushed his popcorn in Nina’s direction, but she declined. She was a strictly Junior Mints kind of woman.

  “So, what did you have to do there?” he asked. “Describe it. What’s college like?”

  “I guess the weird thing is, since you’re not in class as much, I thought there’d be more time. You know—you think three hours of class is nothing. But it’s so much, and it takes so much time afterward.”

  “Well,” he said, plunging his hand deep into the popcorn, “I have this plan. I want to major in graphic art, to make cartoons and stuff. That way I can screw around and surf the Web and watch Cartoon Network for research. And it’ll be totally legit.”

  “Do you draw?”

  “I do computer animation,” he said. “And other experimental art.”

  He cocked an eyebrow dramatically.

  The room darkened, and the green screen for the first preview came up. Parker craned his neck back over his seat, then turned back around to Nina.

  “Girls’ bathrooms scare me,” he said.

  “Yeah,” Nina agreed. “Where are they?”

  She was pretty sure that Mel and Avery were powwowing over this whole Parker thing in the bathroom. She wished she’d been included in it somehow—or at least told what was going on.

  They sat through four previews. The last one was for a movie about a renegade cop who thwarts a terrorist plot. Parker leaned over to Nina’s ear.

  “That looks so good,” he whispered. “A cop? Who breaks rules? And still gets the job done? And has an angry boss who yells at him? That’s groundbreaking. No one’s ever made a movie like that.”

  Nina giggled and shushed him.

  “I mean, a cop!” Parker continued, dropping his voice lower. “Cops are the people who hold up the rules. So, if you have a cop who doesn’t follow the rules, that’s irony, right?”

  The trailer ended with a huge explosion. Parker touched his heart and then rolled his eyes to the ceiling in ecstasy.

  “Irony is the word that I forget the meaning of the minute after I look it up,” he said as the green screen announcing the next preview came up. “But I kind of think I live in a constant state of it.”

  Mel and Avery finally rejoined them just as the theater intro rolled before the movie. They took the two seats at the end of the row. Parker accidentally formed a barrier between Nina and them. She thought about switching seats, but the movie started at that moment.

  Nina spent most of the movie trying to figure out whether it was Mel or Avery who was interested in Parker. He acted a lot like Avery, but Avery didn’t necessarily like guys who were like her. Mel, however, seemed to like people who acted like Avery—kind of snarky, lots of commentary. And there was something about the way that Parker had flashed glances at Mel as they’d been waiting in line for tickets that seemed to confirm the theory. It also made sense, now that Nina thought of it. Mel was shy and wouldn’t mention any interest in Parker if there was preliminary flirtation going on.

  By the time Nina had completed her analysis, the movie was a third of the way over and she really had no idea what was going on. It was a very Avery kind of movie anyway, so she just zoned out and waited for any kissing or good outfits. When it was over, Nina had every intention of heading out for some late-night ice cream, but Mel and Avery were very conspicuously yawning. Since she didn’t work (and since she’d gotten up so late), Nina didn’t feel like she could complain about cutting off their big reunion night at eleven-thirty.

  “Shopping day tomorrow,” Nina said. “Pick you up at ten?”

  “Ten.” Avery nodded.

  “Shopping day?” Parker asked. “Do you guys do everything together?”

  “Pretty much.” Nina smiled. She noticed, however, that Mel and Avery didn’t.

  13

  “Nocurnmufel.“

  “What?” Nina looked at the doughnut man.

  “No corn muffins,” he repeated, staring off into the middle distance.

  “No corn muffins?” Nina stepped back and looked over the glass-domed case for visual proof. The corn muffin basket was empty. No corn muffin crumbs. They hadn’t even baked any that day.

  “Is there anything else that’s fat-free?” She sighed.

  “Apple, um … apple cinnamon?”

  He sounded unsure.

  “Never mind,” she said. “I’ll have the banana nut and an orange juice.”

  She took her juice and muffin over to a table and waited for Mel and Avery, who were on the other side of the food court. Nina pulled out her shopping list, the mall map, and a pen. There. At least Avery would be able to make her usual “Nina is an obsessive-compulsive” jokes. Finally they both came over with their cups.

  “So,” Nina said to Mel with a smile, “did Avery convert you to her evil caffeinated ways this summer?”

  “No,” Mel said. “It’s tea.”

  “Tea?”

  “Yeah. Tea,” Mel replied, looking bashful. “I like tea.”

  “Botswana Blossom Red Tea,” Avery said seriously. Mel elbowed her, and they both started to laugh. Nina smiled along, but she had no idea why that was funny. She was starting to wonder if she had that brain disorder that slowly scrambles the meaning of everyday words, so you start making crazy substitutions (like calling for your “telephone” when you want your “soup”), until you finally end up with your very own language that no one else can speak.

  “Okay,” Nina said, spreading the mall map on the table, “I think that I want to start at the Burberry store. Thoughts?”

  “Plaid hats,” Avery said, staring up at an enormous plastic pretzel that hung from the ceiling.

  “They have more than just plaid hats,” Nina replied.

  “We could go to J. Crew,” Mel suggested.

  “Chino land,” Avery mumbled.

  “I like that store,” Mel said. “I got that little blue tank top there.”

  “Which one? You’re the princess of tank tops.”

  “The J. Crew store here doesn’t do it for me,” Nina said, taking a piece of the banana muffin. It tasted wrong. She had been so ready for the corn. “I really would like to go to Burberry, and it’s just around the corner.”

  “I don’t really want to go to Burberry.” Avery sighed. “But I’ll go to J. Crew with Mel.”

  “You guys want to … split up?”

  “Just for the first store,” Avery said. “Then we can meet up.”

  That was another first. They always shopped together.

  “Sure …” Nina pushed the muffin aside and cracked open her orange juice. “So, do you guys want to get back together and look for shoes after that?”

  “Sounds good,” Avery said.

  Once inside Burberry, the first thing Nina discovered was that Avery was right—the Burberry outlet seemed to be a wide vista of plaid hats and rack after rack o
f raincoats and trench coats. It looked like a secret-agent supply store. Mixed in with these were a few funky shirts that must not have thrilled the customers at the retail stores. The things she did like came in the usual outlet size range (sizes 0, 2, and 18) or were way too expensive, even by outlet standards.

  Nina wandered in the direction of the J. Crew store to catch up with Mel and Avery a little early. She circled the tables and racks, making her way around a few clumps of unmoving, slack-jawed people who were contemplating the harvest of reject summer tank tops. She walked all the way around the shelves that lined the perimeter of the store, the Great Wall of Slightly Irregular Chinos. She poked her head back in the dressing room area but saw that only one was taken. She stepped back out to the sales floor and swiveled her head around again, searching one last time for the dark shock of Avery’s hair or the orangey burst of Mel’s.

  Nothing. They were nowhere in sight.

  A twinge of panic ran through Nina—an odd one that seemed weirdly reminiscent of the feeling she experienced when she was just a little girl and she lost sight of her mother in a crowded store.

  “Can I help you?” A blond salesgirl in superlow khakis was at Nina’s elbow.

  “No.” Nina shook her head distractedly. “No thanks.”

  “Do you need help with a size?”

  A size? Nina stared at the girl.

  “No,” she replied steadily.

  “Have you seen our sale on summer dresses?”

  Maybe Nina really did have that word-substitution disease. She thought she was saying “no” but maybe what she was saying was, “I’d really like to troll through the dregs of your leftover summer crap. Would you be my guide?”

  “I’m fine, thanks.”

  “Okay,” the girl said uncertainly, “but I’d be happy to help you find anything you’re looking for.”

  The salesgirl drifted away to adjust a pile of straw hats. Nina turned back to the dressing rooms to have one final look. As she did so, she heard a tiny peal of laughter from the one dressing room in the back She moved closer and saw four feet at the bottom of the curtain. Two of the feet were in red Chucks, the other two were in Pumas. Definitely Avery and Mel. As she got closer, she could hear them moving around inside. They weren’t talking, just mumbling some kind of approval.

  Kind of weird, no doubt. Why they had chosen to share the room was beyond her; no one else was using any of the other compartments. She reached up and took a handful of the curtain. Gingerly she drew it back and peered inside.

  In the first moment Nina thought Avery was helping Mel with a necklace. Then she realized that Mel wasn’t wearing one. Also, putting on or removing a necklace doesn’t usually involve putting your lips on someone else’s. That’s called kissing—and that’s what Mel and Avery were doing.

  They were kissing.

  Kissing. As in kissing.

  The real deal. Mel had Avery pressed into the corner. Her hands were on Avery’s waist. Avery’s hands were lost somewhere in Mel’s hair. Full-on, serious making out. Nina got enough of a look to know that what she was seeing was real.

  Nina froze, holding the curtain to the side. One of her atomic laughs almost bubbled up, but then it stopped somewhere in her throat and sank back down. Nowhere in Nina’s arsenal of responses, replies, and reactions did she have anything for this. So she just stood there for a moment, trying to think of something neutral. Something you could say on any occasion at all.

  “What’s going on?” she asked. That was the best she could do. She meant it to sound cool, normal—but she heard a slight tremble in her tone.

  Mel squealed just a bit, and Avery wheeled around to face Nina.

  No one said anything for about a minute.

  “Nothing,” Avery finally said, stuffing her hands into her pockets. Mel just looked at Nina, met her square in the eye.

  “Okay. I’ll be out here when you’re …”

  She dropped the curtain and stepped back a few feet. Inside, Mel and Avery were mumbling and gathering up their things.

  Nina sat down on a bench at the entrance of the dressing room, on a pile of discarded summer clearance dresses, the ones with the hideous patterns that no one will ever buy, even if they are marked down to $9.99.

  Many things occurred to her at once.

  One, this explained a lot of what she’d felt since she’d been back from California. The constant feeling of being out of the loop. The in-jokes she couldn’t understand. Of course … Every bit of it made sense.

  Two, of course they hadn’t told her anything about the summer.

  Three, they’d probably asked to go to another store on purpose. Now Nina was someone to be escaped from, like an annoying parent or a chaperone.

  She could change that last one. She would show them, right now, in the first moments of discovery, just how fine she was with it. Because she was. She wasn’t homophobic. Homophobic—did that term apply only to lesbians and gay men? No, it had to apply to bisexuals as well. Were they bisexual, or were they lesbians? Should she ask? Did it matter? It wasn’t supposed to matter. Better not to ask.

  Had they been joking?

  Maybe this was a long setup for a prank. It didn’t look like a joke. But then, wasn’t that the sign of a well-executed joke? It looked so real….

  No. That was real. And they still hadn’t come out.

  Come out. Very funny.

  “Um,” a voice said, “you can’t sit there.”

  Nina looked up. It was the salesgirl again.

  “Why not?” Nina asked.

  “You can’t sit there,” the girl repeated.

  “Why?”

  “Um, that’s the clothes bench?”

  Nina saw an empty rack not four feet away.

  “What about that? That’s a rack. It’s for clothes.”

  “You can’t sit here, okay?” the girl said, adjusting her pants on her nonexistent hips. “You’re going to have to move, okay?”

  With a sigh, Nina gave up the bench and slid down in front of the trifold mirror, the dressing room’s one luxury item. The salesgirl flounced away with a snort.

  To Nina’s horror, she found that her eyes were tearing up and there was a heaving sigh building deep in her solar plexus—all part of a prelude to a sob, which she couldn’t release here or now. Not in front of Mel, or Avery, and certainly not in front of that thing that had just tossed her off the clearance bench. Not under the fluorescent lights of the dressing room. Not sitting on the floor of an outlet mall, with all the discarded numbers and tags and crap.

  She clamped it down and closed her eyes.

  “We’ll be right out,” Mel called through the curtain.

  “Okay!” Nina called back cheerfully. “I’m just going to wait outside.”

  Nina stepped back into the store. Everything had a strange pallor—the pinks and oranges and yellows were so garish they seemed to vibrate. The bins of excess flip-flops and sun hats had a sad significance that she couldn’t quite pinpoint, and she was sure people were deliberately choking up the aisles so that she couldn’t get back out into the main concourse.

  She forced her way out and sat on a bench in front of the store. She looked up at the fronds of a huge potted plant. Celine Dion screeched about love over the sound system.

  It took Mel and Avery almost five minutes to emerge. Mel came right to Nina. Avery hung a few steps back.

  “I’m sorry,” Mel said softly. “We were going to tell you. We were just trying to find a good time.”

  Nina knew this was the moment she was supposed to say something wonderful. This was when she lived up to her beliefs in equality, her conviction that homosexuality was completely normal and wonderful. Except—she couldn’t seem to speak. “I need to get some air,” she managed to say.

  Nina was in a trance now. She got up and went back the way she had come, past Burberry, back through the maze of tables and people buying food in the food court, to the set of doors that led to the parking lot where they’d left he
r car just forty-five minutes before. It felt like her head was plugged up with something cottony that muffled the noises of the other conversations, the music, the mall. She stepped outside into the muggy afternoon.

  The first thing she did was stretch a smile across her face. It took a great deal of effort.

  Of course it was okay. She had no problems with this stuff. She was planning on having the council do stuff with the gay-straight alliance. She had no issues with this at all. So, she’d been surprised. That was okay. They’d understand that. The surprise would wear off. She just needed to turn around and show them it was all going to be fine.

  Her knees were a little wobbly. She laughed at nothing in particular and turned to go back inside.

  Nina guessed correctly that Mel and Avery would be waiting for her in the food court near the Orange Julius. She had a kind of natural GPS when it came to the Triangle. She fixed a smile on her face and sat down with them. They’d both gotten drinks and had one sitting and waiting for her.

  “I was surprised,” she said. “Sorry.”

  Possibly the understatement of a lifetime.

  They sucked on Orange Juliuses for a minute. No one seemed to know where to start.

  “So,” Nina said, “how long have you … ?”

  She left the definition open.

  “Since July,” Mel replied. “July Fourth.”

  “July Fourth?”

  Nina slowly counted back in her mind, even though she knew that July Fourth was almost two months ago. She needed this time to be shorter—a week, maybe two, something passing. But it was about the same amount of time that she’d spent with Steve, and in her mind, that meant that the whole thing had been set in cement.

  “How did this start?” Nina said.

  “It just kind of happened,” Avery said.

  “But you never said—I mean, you’ve both dated guys. I know that doesn’t matter. I mean, I know things can happen, but … you never said anything about girls.”

  “I knew,” Mel said, shredding a napkin. “It was in my mind, but I didn’t know if it was real. Then one day, I just knew it was.”