Positively Beautiful

by Wendy Mills

  “What about Trina, have you talked to her?”

  “What is this, a who’s-who list of those-who-refuse-to-acknowledge-Erin’s-very-existence?” I ask. “Plenty of people are still talking to me. Actually, I’m the closest I’ve ever been to popular this year.” I made national news, and it’s amazing what that will do for your social status. “It’s all good. I’m all good. Okay? Don’t worry about me.”

  “It’s hard for me not to worry,” she says. She winces, and turns the hair dryer back on. “I’m a mother. And somehow I don’t think you are really dealing with it all.”

  “You and Mr. Jarad both,” I mutter.

  “What?” she shouts.

  “I’m going out!” I say. “See? It’s Friday night, and I’m going out.”

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  I head to the airport, which is probably not exactly what Mom thought when I said I was going out, but there’s still plenty I’m not telling Mom.

  She doesn’t know I’m positive for the breast cancer gene. There just never seemed to be the right time to tell her. She’s been on this big treatment roller coaster, and I didn’t want to take her attention off what she needed to do to get better. I suppose I could tell her now, but it seems like a secret either becomes too big to keep to yourself or wound so tight and small that it’s too hard to unravel.

  I pull into the small airport. It’s closed for the evening, and there’s only one car in the parking lot, Stew’s clunker. As much time as he spends on his planes, you’d think he’d take better care of his car.

  I check my phone, and Jason has left a text: Where r u?

  Airport, I text, but he doesn’t reply. He texted me this morning, saying he had something to tell me tonight, to make sure I answered when he called. My heart triple-jumps a little, because maybe he’s going to tell me he changed his mind, that he thinks we should date after all. But the phone stays silent.

  Tweety Bird is in the same place she’s been all summer. Parked beside the hangar, forgotten and sad in the golden October light, still listing to the side because of the strut I bent when I landed in the field. They shipped her back on a tractor-trailer a few weeks after I returned from Florida. I keep waiting for them to start fixing her, but as far as I can tell, no one’s touched her. I don’t know if it’s because she’s too damaged to fix or because of the ongoing investigation of my accident. If I’d known how seriously everyone was going to take me flying away, I would have jumped in my car instead. Of course, I wasn’t thinking straight, but I didn’t know Stew would get in trouble. I never would have done it if I’d known he could lose his instructor’s license. He hasn’t lost it yet, but he’s under investigation because he let me solo.

  Nobody was real happy with what I did, least of all the FAA, the Federal Aviation Administration. I talked to several different investigators, but my explanation for flying away didn’t make sense even to me, so how could I explain it to someone else? They pulled my medical certificate, which means I can’t fly, and required me to get a psychiatric evaluation while they continue their investigation. I didn’t make the appointment for the evaluation until after my mom rang the chemo bell in August. And even then it took me a while to work up the nerve to make the call, knowing that what I said could determine whether I ever got my pilot’s license. The talking and battery of tests with the FAA-certified doctors was just as bad as I expected. I’m not sure I did very well at all, I was so nervous.

  But it was done, and all I can do is wait to see what the FAA decides. They say it could be months. So we’re waiting, me and Tweety Bird, waiting to know whether we’ll be able to fly again.

  Stew is messing with one of the planes, conspicuously ignoring me. Yes, Stew, I know you hate me.

  I pull out my phone and get on one of the BRCA websites. I’ve been doing this a lot lately, coming to the airport to read about other women’s battles with BRCA and cancer. I’ve gotten used to the benign-sounding abbreviations that mean terrible things. “BC” is breast cancer, “BPM” is a bilateral prophylactic mastectomy, when you take off both breasts before you even have cancer. “Ooph” is an oophorectomy, the removal of one’s ovaries. And “surveillance” is what they call it when you go every six months to get felt up by a breast doctor, to take a test to monitor for ovarian cancer, and a lot of times, get biopsy after biopsy when suspicious shadows show up on mammograms. When you have the BRCA gene mutation, you might not have cancer, but they treat you like you do.

  I guess I think if I read other people’s stories enough, maybe I’ll figure out what to do.

  So far, it isn’t working.

  I don’t want to cut off my breasts.

  I don’t want to do surveillance.

  I want it to all go away.

  I want to never have had this gene. And as much as I know I’m not supposed to be worrying about the gene right now, that I have years before I need to do anything, I can’t seem to make myself stop.

  A cloud drags shadows across the airport and raindrops splatter onto my windshield, popping onto the hood with hollow ringing sounds.

  Abruptly one of the panic attacks hits and my heart starts racing. I’m sweaty and cold and shaking.

  “Stop it, stop it, stop it!” I mutter, putting my forehead down on the top edge of the steering wheel. It’s a bad one, and as much as I try to think calming, happy thoughts, the waves of anxiety sweep through me, and I feel like I’m going to drown.

  The sound of a car pulling up behind me snaps me out of it, though I’m still panting as I look in the rearview mirror.

  A blue Jeep is parked behind me and as I watch, Jason gets out.

  He’s big, and windblown and oh so beautiful, and I sit for a moment, just watching in the mirror as he walks toward me. Then I swipe my hands across my face, hoping I don’t look like I just had a monster panic attack, and jump out of the car.

  “What are you doing here?” I ask, going for a hug, and then suddenly feeling shy. It’s the first time I’ve seen him since I left Florida, though we talk almost every day.

  He’s not shy, though, and sweeps me up into a huge hug, lifting me off of the ground. My feet dangle for a moment and then he sets me down gently. Over Jason’s shoulder I see Stew standing in front of the hangar looking at us; he shakes his head in disgust and goes back inside.

  “I decided it was time to celebrate,” Jason says, leaning up against my car. “Your mom finishing treatment and all. I got someone to take my charters for the weekend, and here I am. All yours for two whole days.” He swings his arms wide and I laugh.

  “You’re here. You’re really here,” I say.

  “Well, since your mom won’t let you come see me—”

  “Are you kidding? She’ll be happy if I never set foot in the state of Florida again.”

  “—I figured I’d do a mountain-and-Mohammed move.”

  “I’m so happy you’re here,” I say, and it’s true, I feel the happiness bubbling from some quiet place deep inside of me.

  “Me too,” he says quietly, and touches my face. It’s all I can do not to lean into his hand.

  “So,” I say, clearing my throat. “What are we going to do now that you’re here?”

  “I’ve shown you my Florida,” he says. “Show me your Atlanta.”

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  “You can see forever,” Jason says as we sit on top of Stone Mountain.

  “It’s not hard to impress you mountain-challenged Floridians, is it?” I say, rubbing my hands across the warm roughness of the rocks we’re sitting on. I’m still out of breath after our hike up the mountain, which of course Jason insisted on doing. Usually I took the Skyride, but I wasn’t about to tell Mr. Outdoorsman that.

  It’s a beautiful Sunday, so we are not the only people who had the bright idea to hang out on the top of a mountain. Children squeal and pretend like they are planes with arms held out, people point at the Atlanta skyline, and boys and girls feel like they are all alone under the big, wide-open dome of the sk
y.

  “We’ve got mountains,” he says. “They call them landfills.”

  He flops over on his stomach and puts his face near one of the many pools that dot the top of the mountain. “I don’t see any shrimp,” he says.

  “What, you come all the way to the Georgia mountains and you’re complaining because you don’t see shrimp?” I say, and punch his arm playfully.

  “You said there’s shrimp in dem dere pools,” he says, sitting up and leaning back on his hands. “What can I say? I like shrimp.”

  “You can only see them sometimes. It’s crazy, because even when it doesn’t rain for a while and there’s no water, they leave behind eggs that will hatch when it rains again.”

  “Ah, they are opportunistic little guys,” Jason says. “I like them better and better, these invisible shrimp of which you speak.”

  “Kind of like cancer just waiting in the wings for the right conditions,” I say, and then immediately wish I hadn’t. I broke some sort of unspoken agreement we’d had all weekend not to speak about cancer or mutated genes.

  He doesn’t say anything and after a while the weirdness fades away and we sit in contented silence watching the colorful kites crisscrossing above us and the soaring birds.

  Finally, Jason says, “What next, Kemo Sabe?”

  Jason has already oohed and aahed over the humongous—I’m talking as big as two football fields—Confederate Memorial of Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, and Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson carved into the side of the mountain, so we wander through some of the other touristy attractions until we come to the SkyHike, which is basically a big rope adventure course high above the ground.

  “Let’s do it,” Jason says immediately.

  “Uh, no?” I say. “Are you crazy?”

  “Why?”

  “It’s like in the trees,” I say. “You have to wear a safety harness because it’s so easy to fall. No way, José, not my idea of fun.”

  “Wait a minute. You have an annual pass to this park and you’ve never been on the SkyHike?” Jason plants himself right in front of me, arms crossed. “Nope. Not acceptable.”

  “Not acceptable? Really?” I’m laughing though. “It’s just that … I’m not big into trying new things.” It’s the reason I don’t try out for clubs or do much of anything out of the ordinary, except for that one spectacular thing, which seems so unlike me it’s like some other girl did it.

  “How do you know you won’t like walking barefoot in the grass if you’re always walking on the sidewalk?” he asks, pulling me toward the ticket booth.

  “Alternatively, walking on the sidewalk would spare me that run-down feeling I’ll get from walking in the road,” I say, but let myself be pulled. I try not to read anything into the hand-holding thing, because Jason is just like that, but it’s hard not to hope that it means something.

  We get fitted into the harnesses and the attendant lets us go. It’s getting late, so there aren’t that many people on the course and we climb up to the first level by ourselves.

  “Really? You’re stopping here?” Jason says. “Bawk-bawk-bawwwk.” He doesn’t sound anything like a chicken.

  I stick my tongue out at him and then climb as high as I can go. We are in the treetops here, and I stare down at the narrow board in front of me, spanning two trees. Yes, I have a safety line that will catch me if I fall, but what if it breaks?

  “I’ll be right behind you,” Jason says.

  I take a deep breath and edge out onto the board. I freeze for a moment, and then I take another tiny step, and then I’m moving quicker until I make it all the way across, and I twirl on the platform, laughing. Jason is standing on the other side, and he’s watching me and there’s an intensity to his gaze that makes me hot and cold at the same time, and then he’s laughing too, yelling, “I knew you could do it!”

  He runs nimbly over the board to the platform where I am standing and sweeps me up into his arms, swinging me in a dizzying circle. I close my eyes. I could stay like this forever.

  He releases me and looks into my face, his eyes dancing with happiness.

  “So, scaredy-cat?”

  “Yeah, yeah, you were right,” I say, smiling. I look over at the next part of the course, which is just a single rope stretching from one platform to another with a few vertical ropes to hold on to.

  “Watch, it’s easy,” he says, and steps carefully out onto the rope. Then he moves faster, his feet flying as he practically swings from one guide rope to another, never losing his balance. He is glorious to watch, his feet sure, his muscles moving smoothly under his white T-shirt. He reaches the other side and looks at me.

  “Think you can do it?” he calls.

  “No problem,” I say, and mean it.

  We spend hours clambering around on the ropes, and I even try a rock-climbing wall, shrieking with excitement when I reach the top. One the way back home, we’re both tired but happy.

  “I’m thinking anchovy and pineapple pizza,” Jason says, stretching himself out in my passenger seat. He’s leaving soon so he can drive all night to make a charter tomorrow morning, but I’m trying not to think about that.

  “Uck,” I say. “I thought you were making all that money doing the charters. You can’t spring for steak?”

  “Not when I’m really feeling pizza,” he says and grins lazily.

  So I take him to Dino’s, and it’s crawling with kids from school because we have off the next day for a teacher workday. A couple of them wave at me, and I hear someone say, “It’s the Flyaway Girl,” which is an improvement over Va-jay-jay Girl so I guess I can’t complain. Molly Jenkins and Lynn Mitchell gesture for me to come sit with them, but I shake my head with a smile and slide into a booth. I’m trying not to notice Michael, who is drawing at a table by himself in the back.

  We eat, and Jason and I laugh and talk, and I completely forget the black hole in the room that is Michael.

  “Are you sure you can’t stay another night? You’ve made such a good impression on Mom I think she’d be fine if you decided to move in,” I say. Mom was initially surprised by Jason’s sudden appearance, and a little skeptical, but by the time dinner was over she was insisting that he stay in our guest room and now seems to genuinely like him. Not that Jason is hard to like.

  “Nah,” he says, “I can’t. I said I would be back tomorrow.” He reaches a long arm over my head and snags the bill from the waitress.

  “I was just kidding about you paying,” I protest. “I can pay half. We’re friends, right?” I say it a little suggestively, but he ignores me, as usual. Yes, we are friends, his silence is telling me, let’s not make a big deal about this, okay?

  Faith comes in as we’re getting up to leave, but she ignores me, as she has been doing ever since we got back to school, and marches toward Michael.

  “I wouldn’t want to be him,” Jason says easily, and I turn to watch as Faith reaches Michael.

  “When did you become such a zombie?” she says, loud enough for everybody to hear. “You’re supposed to be meeting me at Caitlyn’s, but I knew when you didn’t show that you’d either be home playing with your little houses or here drawing them. What is wrong with you?”

  “Wow,” Jason says and opens the door for me so I have to leave without hearing what Michael says. I notice that Stew’s Learn to Fly! flier is gone from the door, and I wonder if he decided to take it down so he doesn’t get another no-good kid like me signing up as a student.

  “That was Michael,” I announce as we walk to my car. “And Faith.”

  “The Michael?” Jason whistles, and then laughs. “I’m guessing he wishes he chose you right about now.”

  It kind of hurts, because it’s like Jason is saying he wouldn’t care if Michael and I were dating. And maybe he doesn’t care. Not like that. Maybe he truly thinks of me as his friend, and would be happy for me if I were dating someone.

  “It’s like Grand Central Station around here,” I mutter in exasperation as Chaz’s Mustang
pulls up. Chaz hops out and throws me an anxious look before scurrying around to let Trina out.

  Trina gives me a little halfhearted smile and I do the same, which is what we’ve been reduced to. At one point, right after I got back, I think we could have become friends again. She and my mom had talked a lot while I was gone, and she came over the day after I arrived home. But I was still messed up in the head, and it was uncomfortable, and she didn’t come back. And I didn’t reach out, and now we just smile when we see each other, which hurts, but I don’t know how to fix it.

  They disappear inside, and I look at Jason. “And that,” I say, “was Trina.”

  The front door opens and Chaz comes loping out.

  “Erin!” he calls, looking over his shoulder worriedly like Trina is about to come out with guns blazing.

  I turn and watch Chaz coming toward us. He’s taller, but still jerky and uncoordinated as he comes across the parking lot. But something’s different from last year, a newfound confidence in the way he holds his head, a bolder swing to his gait.

  Chaz stops about ten feet away from us, like he thinks if he comes any closer I might attack him. It’s the first time we’ve talked since I kissed him.

  “Hey, Erin.” Snap, snap, snap go his fingers. He Proactived out over the summer and his acne is gone.

  “Hey.”

  Chaz looks back over his shoulder again. It seems like he’s ignoring Jason, but I don’t think he’s even registered him. He’s focused on me. “She’s in the bathroom, and I … uh … wanted to talk to you about something.”

  “If you want me to be the maid of honor at the wedding, you probably need to talk to Trina first,” I say, beeping my remote at the car to unlock it.