Dear Emmie Blue

by Lia Louis

  “Emmie, I don’t know what you—”

  “Stop,” I say calmly. “I want you to tell me.”

  Lucas stares at me, his chest rising and falling, lips parted. “I… Em, you need to remember that I was young and stupid—”

  I remember the music playing that dusky summer’s evening. A fast, soulless dance track that Eliot kept complaining about. I remember the way Stacey, from under Eliot’s arm, giggled as she stood, her drink in hand, raising high above her head. The way her belly button was pierced with a rose-colored stud, and the way Lucas kept eyeing it, his eyes traveling over her body, laughing at everything she said.

  “My turn,” she’d said, and Eliot had held on to her hand, trying to pull her back down onto the sun-lounger with him. “Never have I ever…” she started, a grin on her face.

  My heart speeds up now, pulsating in my throat, at Lucas, biting his lip.

  “And Stacey, she was a bitch, Em, she was. I didn’t realize that at the time, I was so stupid, but… but I was—I liked her. And she wasn’t Eliot’s girlfriend, not really. They’d had a couple of dates, and—Emmie, please, please look at me…”

  “Never have I ever…” Stacey had giggled. Then she looked at me and I’d smiled, held up my drink, ready, because I thought she was my friend. I thought that whole group were my friends. Not like the kids back home. A new start, with friends like Lucas and Eliot. Friends who didn’t know me as “that girl.” Friends who saw me like them.

  “And earlier that night, she asked if you and I were an item and—Emmie, please, don’t.”

  I stride away from him, toward the exit of this clinical, encompassing balcony. I know. I know now. I don’t even need him to finish the sentence.

  “You told her,” I say, voice wobbling. “About the assault. About Robert Morgan. Those were your words. ‘No of course I’m not dating that tease; she tried to shag her teacher.’ Is that what you said?”

  “No. No, she said them, not me. I don’t think that. I have never thought that.” He speaks urgently, rushing his words out, striding to close the gap between us, hand outstretched, but I step back again. “I told her the truth. That I wouldn’t get with you because you… you’d been through this thing with a teacher…” He stops, eyes closing. “God, I don’t know what to say to you.” Lucas’s voice croaks now. “Besides, I was nineteen and stupid and a dick and trying to impress some idiot girl. Em, you are everything to me, you know that.”

  “But Eliot. You let him take the blame for that. Why?”

  “I didn’t want to lose you. It was a stupid, drunken mistake, and I have regretted it every single day.”

  The night rushes through my head now, and I want to remember everything about it. How did I miss it? And why didn’t Eliot tell me? Why would he let me walk this earth for so many years believing it was him that threw me off track, when it was Lucas. When it was the only person I had relied on for practically my whole life.

  “A prick tease.” I remember her smirking mouth as she said those words. “Never have I ever been a prick tease and fucked a teacher’s life up.”

  Those words hurt just as much now as they echo through my brain, as they did that evening, in the new dress I’d saved up for, excited for another year of college, sitting among a group of people who saw me for me. Emmie Blue. One of them.

  “Emmie.” Lucas reaches for my hands now and takes them, his gray eyes desperately pleading. “You are everything to me. Please don’t let this ruin us.”

  He holds my cheek, face inches from mine. “Me and you. You and me. It’s all that matters to me.” I look up at him, and I am winded by how much I longed for this moment, him looking into my eyes, beautiful pink lips inches from mine, strong hand holding my face as if it’s the most precious thing in the world. And he leans in. I freeze, feel his breath on my mouth. He kisses me. Lucas pushes his lips to mine. I reach up, a hand around his neck, and when his lips part, that is when I fall away from him—a huge lunge backward, freeing myself from his arms.

  “Oh my God.”

  We stare at each other.

  “What are you—what are we doing?”

  He looks shocked. “I don’t—I don’t know—”

  “You’re getting married, Lucas,” I say. “To Marie. To beautiful, kind Marie. I don’t want this. I don’t.”

  And he says nothing. He just stares at me. He doesn’t say he isn’t; he doesn’t say he’s made a mistake and that it’s me. And when I say, “I need to go home,” all he does is nod, and I watch the Adam’s apple contract in his neck.

  “Okay. Okay, Emmie,” he says.

  On the way down the stairs, neither of us speaks. “The car,” he says. “I don’t recognize that car,” he says, motioning to the empty, white, parked Corsa on the drive. I say nothing. “Probably a neighbor,” he says. “Was it here when we pulled up?” But again, I say nothing.

  By four o’clock I’m on the ferry home, on that same ocean I had stared out at beside Lucas mere hours before.

  I watch France disappear into the horizon.

  Me: I know it wasn’t you. I wish you’d have told me sooner.

  Eliot Barnes: What good would it have done?

  * * *

  I am carrying a tray of empty breakfast plates when Rosie bursts into the kitchen, breathless, cheeks flushed, eyes wide.

  “Emmie!”

  I freeze, tray to my chest. “What? What’s wrong?”

  “You need to come into reception,” she says. “Right now.”

  “What?”

  “Now. Immediately.”

  I look over my shoulder at the busy, bustling kitchen, at the chefs, shouting to one another over the sizzle of pans, over the whoosh of open ovens, the scooting of waitstaff in and out of the kitchen door.

  “Rosie, we’re so busy—”

  “Emmie. Seriously. Dump that and come. Now.” Rosie turns and dashes out again, and by the time I get to the reception area, I’m not sure what I’m expecting. Mum glimmers into my mind for a second, for some reason. Lucas, fleetingly. And then of course Eliot, whom I haven’t been able to stop thinking about.

  But there is only one person in reception apart from Rosie, and it’s a woman. Short, with bobbed blond hair, in a black furry coat, a black leather handbag on her shoulder, and she’s looking around the room as if she’s never stepped foot into the hotel before. I don’t recognize her. I wait for her face to register—a disgruntled customer, perhaps, from this morning, but I recognize nothing. I have never seen her before.

  “Excuse me.” Rosie leans forward. “This is Emmie.” And as the woman turns to me, Rosie sits down at her desk and busies herself, typing.

  I look at the woman. “Hi?” I say.

  “Gosh,” she says, laughing, eyes shining. “You’re Emmie.”

  “I am.”

  “Of course you are.” She smiles nervously. “It—it’s unmistakable.”

  I look at Rosie, but she’s staring at her screen, purposefully avoiding my gaze.

  “Sorry, I—who are you?”

  She steps forward then, and I see that her green eyes are watery and her hands are shaky as she holds one of them out. I take it.

  “Carol,” she says, voice wobbling. “Marv’s wife. Your… your dad’s wife.”

  * * *

  “He told me last week,” Carol tells me, the both of us sitting on a small two-seater in the quiet reception. “It was a shock. Ever such a shock. And of course my first reaction was a negative one. Shamefully.”

  I shake my head. “I understand.”

  “But then I thought of you, and our Cadie, and… I thought there is no way you should be punished for something you had no part in.” Carol swallows, a tissue balled in her hand.

  “And I went up the next day; visited Cadie. Who…” She laughs to herself, eyes skyward, shoulders rising and falling. “Well, it was like she’d had a win on the pools.”

  I smile, warmth spreading through me. “Really?”

  “She’s wanted a brot
her or a sister her whole life.” She stops, looks at me. “But that was never to be. But. Well. Half is just as good as, isn’t it?”

  I nod, warmth spreading through my bloodstream like wine. “I—I think so.”

  “So, I told Marv he was to ring you. Invite you round. That we could work through it as a family, and if we could just meet you—” She stops, shaking her head and bringing her hand to her mouth. “Gosh, you do look like Cadie. When you do that. See, that.” She laughs. “Those eyebrows going up. That’s her, that is.”

  I laugh, tears caught in my throat. “I love that you say that,” I tell her, my words barely there. Carol has a warm face. Glowy and welcoming and like every smiley, motherly dinner lady I’d chat with, sometimes, in the lunch queue.

  “Did you block his telephone?” she asks.

  I nod, look down at my lap. “I did. The waiting and checking my messages—I couldn’t do it. I’ve waited my whole life, and waiting any longer, having it so close… it was just too tough.”

  Carol nods slowly, golden teardrop earrings swinging. “Of course,” she says. “But anyway, that’s why I’m here. He’s at home. I didn’t know if you wanted to see him.”

  “I do,” I say.

  Carol smiles, a gap in her front teeth, like Brigitte Bardot. “I wondered if you had plans for Easter. We’re going up to see friends on Good Friday, but on Easter Sunday, I’d like to do a dinner. A nice lunch. Just us. Cadie. You. Me and… your dad.”

  Tears tumble now, suddenly, uncontrollably. I nod, can’t speak.

  “Oh my love,” says Carol. Then after a while, she rubs my hand and says, “So dinner. Do you eat meat?”

  I smile. “Yes.”

  “Oh, good,” Carol says, hands squeezing the tissue at her lap. “Marv can do his lamb. One bloody thing he is good at.”

  Carol cuddles me when she leaves, and I wait, watching her walk away, block heels clopping on the tarmac, the tissue pressed under her eye. She stops at the corner, takes out her phone, and smiles as she speaks into it. I imagine it’s to tell Marv that I’ll speak to him. Or to tell Cadie that she’s seen me. Cadie. My sister. I have a sister. I have a family.

  A few nights later, Rosie sits at the kitchen table at Fishers Way, looking down into the silver-and-white gift box on the tablecloth.

  “I only ever got one mix CD when I was fourteen. And that was from a boy who used to eat his own face.”

  I look blankly at Rosie, from the stove, stirring chicken around a wok.

  “You know, his own dry skin.”

  “Lovely,” I say. “Really looking forward to this pad Thai now.”

  “Sorry,” she laughs. “Fox said to me yesterday that there isn’t a tone I won’t lower, and I think he meant it as a compliment.”

  “And even if he didn’t, I think you need to take it as one.”

  “Oh, I already have.” Rosie smiles. Then she takes out one of the CDs and turns it over in her hand. “God, look at this one. ‘Because I should’ve asked you to dance.’ That’s what he’s put here.”

  “I know.”

  “Romantic teenager or what?” she says, putting it back down. “So, eight of them.”

  The pan sizzles as I stir, and I nod over at Rosie. “There should’ve been nine,” I tell her. “I was owed another, but—”

  “He forgot?” Rosie puts the lid back on the gift box. “I hate when things like that suddenly fizzle, because while you’re doing them, you’re so bloody sure and determined that they never will, you know? You can’t picture it stopping.”

  “You’re right,” I say. “And really, I think things just changed after that night. They were just one of many things that stopped. And now, as an adult, I can see it as a nasty comment from some clueless girl.”

  “But at the time…”

  “At the time it was catastrophic, really. It had taken me such a long time to accept I was a victim. And her saying what she did… I spiraled. I felt like I could never escape it. And that I couldn’t even trust Eliot. And nothing really mattered anymore. Not college. Not anything. Especially not the CDs.”

  Rosie nods gently and picks up her glass of wine.

  “Well, I think this is good,” she says, gesturing toward the gift box of CDs on the table. “It’s closure, in a way. On that part of your life.”

  “I think so,” I say. “That’s how it feels.”

  It’s been almost a fortnight since Lucas kissed me on that balcony. Almost a fortnight since we said nothing to each other on the way home. We haven’t spoken either. I got a text message from him that night, saying he was so sorry, that I was his best friend and his life would not have been the one it’s been without me. But I didn’t reply. Plainly because I didn’t know how I felt. I wanted to. So much, but I just didn’t know where to begin. I haven’t spoken to Eliot either, except for the one text, which I sent on the ferry back.

  That was it. And it’s been hard, rattling about in Louise’s huge house without them both on the end of a phone, without Eliot popping by. But I’ve needed it, I think. To be away from them. It’s helped me get here. It’s helped me realize what I need to do.

  “You are incredible, do you know that?” Rosie says. “Like, you are fucking incredible. And I know you think everything is a mess, Em, but it isn’t. You are out the other side of something, and not only are you standing, but you’re standing strong.”

  “Do you think?”

  “Fuck yeah, you are,” says Rosie, putting her hand on mine.

  You’ve had a lot to deal with, not just then, but recently. And look. You’re strong, you’re caring, and… I can’t even begin, Emmie.” She passes me my wine and dips her head, as if to say, “Go on. Down it.” “Listen, you were in love with a man who is getting married, and where I would be turning up on his doorstep in nothing but a trench coat and high heels, you’re fuckin’ suit shopping with him, spending time with his fiancée, not to mention you’ve just found out that he lied to you and yet, you’ve written this incredible speech, and this gift…” She looks down at the box on the table. “You’re brave. You’re selfless and brave and moral and God, there are so many people out there that need that shit in their lives. Including me.” Then she looks up at me, tears in her brown eyes. “I am gassed to have a friend like you.”

  And I laugh. “Me too, Rosie.”

  “And Eliot,” Rosie carries on, cocking her head. “I know how he’d feel about that trench coat and heels.”

  “I don’t know,” I laugh, and Rosie smiles and says, “I do. Gassed.”

  I serve up dinner for Rosie and me and move the box to the kitchen counter. Lucas’s wedding present. Every mix CD he sent me. His first email. The tag from my balloon: my mini confession. Our history, in objects, in a box I’ll give away, to him, on his wedding day. The day he starts a new life as someone’s husband. Lucas Moreau. My Balloon Boy. A grown man now. And soon to be, Marie’s husband.

  “So,” chomps Rosie. “I’ve got news.”

  I put down my fork. “Go on.”

  “The other night, Fox and I went out to a pub after work. And… well we sort of… well, I shagged him,” she says triumphantly.

  I am glad I have just swallowed or I would have definitely choked. “What?”

  “Yup. Twice. Two nights ago. Can you believe it?”

  I stare at her. My mouth falls open, and then I burst into laughter. “Are you serious?”

  “One hundred percent.”

  “I’m going to need details, Rosie. So much more than just that.”

  Then she grins, straight white teeth and lips the color of rubies, holds her glass up, and says, “Oh you can have them all. And they’re hot. Believe Auntie Rosie.” She giggles, and I am smiling so much my cheeks ache. “But first! Let’s toast. Here’s to you, Ms. Emmie Blue, the brave. And here is to me, Dame Rosie Kalwar, for I, just two days ago, had the best sex of my life—”

  “Of your life?”

  “Of my life, I swear!”

  “With Fox?” I ask,
still gawping

  “With Fox,” says Rosie, clinking my glass. “Fastidious Fox.”

  We clink glasses and drink.

  * * *

  Mix CD. Vol. 8.

  Dear Balloon Girl,

  Track 1. Because I worry this makes me a coward

  Track 2. Because for now, these CDs will have to do

  Track 3. Because sometimes I just want to send a letter

  Track 4. Because sometimes I lay awake wondering what you’re doing

  Track 5. Because I wonder if you’re awake, doing the same too

  Love,

  Balloon Boy

  X

  Lucas throws his arms around me when I show up at the cottage, the morning before the wedding, his face melting with relief.

  “You’re here,” he says. “God, Em, I’m so happy you’re here.”

  Amanda looks relieved at the sight of me too, and Jean, although mostly constantly unreadable, gives me an unexpected long hug and says, “My boy can now relax, no?”

  I don’t know if Lucas told them. I don’t know if they know we argued, or that he told me the truth, or kissed me. But I got on the ferry and researched buses in advance, to make sure I made it without anyone’s help. And I know, from now on, that things won’t ever be the same again with Lucas and me. Even if we put everything that happened that fortnight ago on the balcony behind us, which I’m sure in time we will, he’s about to get married. Something that will undoubtedly change the dynamic of everything between us forever. I might have loved him—and I still love him—but after finding out about Stacey, about Ivy and that text, and especially, more than anything, after that kiss on the balcony and how wrong it felt, it is what Rosie said. It is the idea of him, I am sure, that I am in love with. And I am ready to let that idea go. He is my best friend. That is everything. That is all.