Girl Unwrapped

by Gabriella Goliger

  “Nice spot you got,” she sighs over a deep drag.

  They sit in silence for a while, Toni holding herself very still, as if an exotic butterfly had come to rest beside her and she mustn’t scare it away. Janet lets coils of smoke unfurl from her half-open mouth. Out of the corner of her eye, Toni steals glances. Janet is better looking than she realized. Her loose hair sticks out on both sides of her head, a wild, coppery mass blazing in the evening light. Her ruddy face swims with freckles, pulsing like dark lights beneath the fine skin. There’s even one funny freckle in the bow of her lip, like a spot of chocolate.

  Catching Toni’s gaze, Janet winks again. A surge of heat flares up Toni’s chest, neck, and ears, but if Janet notices, she doesn’t let on.

  “I could just sink into that, couldn’t you?” Janet waves her hand at the panorama before them. “Makes me want to do something wild.” She takes another drag. “How ’bout you? A sunset do something special to you?”

  “It makes me feel blue,” Toni stammers.

  Janet nods her head slowly, as if Toni had just said something very deep. There are freckles on Janet’s knees and between the knuckles of the hand holding the cigarette. Her bare feet have high arches—deep, audacious curves—and bright red toes, as if the blood pulses close to the surface. The word “sassy” comes to Toni’s mind. Those feet are sassy. It’s not a word she can remember ever thinking of before. Her heart flutters strangely.

  “You put your finger on it,” Janet says and Toni stares in surprise. “Heartbreakingly beautiful. A view like that makes you want to weep.” Janet sweeps her cigarette hand in a wide arc. They watch while the sun shrinks into a twinkling green eye atop the hills, then vanishes, leaving behind layers of crimson clouds and dark silhouetted humps.

  “Shit. I’m supposed to be introducing the play,” Janet says, flinging the smoking butt end into the lake. “Toodle-oo.”

  She rests her hand on Toni’s shoulder for a moment, perhaps just to get her balance as she stands, but the hand seems to be saying something more, that it belongs there. Then she’s gone, walking swiftly up the grassy slope. Toni watches Janet join the streams of campers heading back into the dining hall. What just happened? What? Something amazing. She blinks hard. Green and gold sunspots still dance before her eyes. Janet never addressed her by name. Does Janet even know her name? Doesn’t matter. A connection has sprung up, a connection beyond ordinary words. She is lost yet knows exactly where she is. She pulls in the moment like a newborn with its first gush of warm milk. She feels she has swallowed the sun. Then, for no reason she can fathom, Toni leaps from her perch on the up-ended rowboat and marches directly into the lake with all her clothes on, her Bermuda shorts, T-shirt, bra and underpants, sneakers and socks, ploughing forward against the resisting pressure until she stands up to her neck. Only her head sticks up above the glassy surface. Her clothes feel both heavy and light, clinging here, billowing there, while the water swirls, flows, nudges, tugs, and is transformed from the first shock of cold contact into a pleasant bath-like temperature. If a counsellor came by now … there must be a rule against walking into the lake with your clothes on. She’ll have to sneak back to the bunk to change. It pleases her immensely to break this unknown rule. Janet would understand.

  chapter 9

  Dear Mama and Papa,

  Camp is better now. My swimming is coming along swimmingly (ha, ha) since I graduated from the dog paddle. I’ve learned to canoe. Also, I’m production assistant for the musical, Fiddler on the Roof, which is being directed by Janet Bloom, the Singing Instructor. I’ve told you about Janet. She’s very talented and creative and will be famous some day, like Joan Baez, except her style is more bluesy and beautiful, I think, more real.

  Toni lifts her pen from the writing block that rests on her knees and gazes at the rough-hewn beam above her head. Afternoon heat has gathered beneath the rafters. The whole cabin roasts, especially the upper bunk, so that sweat trickles down Toni’s neck and moistens her palms. Down below, her bunkmates scribble away, filling pastel sheets of paper. Letters home. Letters to cousins and friends and boyfriends. Angela’s toenails glisten with a fresh coat of candy-pink polish, each tanned toe separated with a wad of cotton wool and wafting a sweetish chemical smell directly into Toni’s offended nostrils. Janet’s toes are ruby red. Janet’s eyes are smoky green, the entrancing green of fir-clad hills. Toni furiously scratches out the sentence that wrote itself upon the page. The blatant words seem dangerous, and besides, what would her parents know, stuck as they are in the grooves of old 78 records, Strauss waltzes, and Marlene Dietrich songs? But once again, the pen in her hand moves of its own accord, forming the letters “J-a-n … ”

  Marion’s transistor radio buzzes, crackles, then picks up the faint chorus of “Mrs Brown, You’ve Got a Lovely Daughter” by Herman’s Hermits. A cheer goes up in the cabin and the girls join in. “Luvely daaawter” they sing in fake British accents. A month ago, Toni liked this group too, but now the sequins-and-lollipop sound grates on her nerves. Janet has introduced her to real music: Folkways records of authentic artists who sing Negro spirituals or old English ballads, accompanied by acoustic guitars and the autoharp. Some evenings, a few devotees gather in Janet’s room in the staff house amid candle glow and cigarette smoke to listen to her record collection and talk the kind of serious talk that must grace the air of Greenwich Village coffee houses.

  Last night, the conversation touched on civil rights marches, ban the bomb, the Mariposa Folk Festival, dropping out of college to live on a kibbutz, and rival interpretations of the liner notes of The Times They Are a-Changin’. The in-crowd consisted of a few counsellors, a French-Canadian guy, Alain, who works as kitchen staff, a senior boy, Samuel, who always wears a kippah, a skullcap, and is one of the most religious kids at camp, plus Toni. A bottle of wine in a brown paper bag passed from hand-to-hand, but Samuel bristled and shot Toni a warning look, and she too declined, feeling noble. She wouldn’t do anything to get Janet into trouble. From her place on the floor in the corner, Toni absorbed every silvery, tremolo note of Joan Baez singing “Babe, I’m Gonna Leave You.” Arms wrapped around her legs, chin on her knees, she peered from under her bangs and watched Janet who sat cross-legged on the bed with her head thrown back in ecstasy. “You play now,” Alain, the French guy, had said, handing Janet her guitar. Janet’s fingers dancing over the strings produced a stream of golden notes, and even the little squeaks her left hand made as it slid up and down the frets sounded exquisite. Then Lorna rapped with uncouth knuckles against the screen door. Her white cats-eye glasses caught the glare of the porch light.

  “Come on, come on! Curfew!” she hollered, clapping her hands sharply as if Toni were a dog to be brought to heel.

  “Good grief,” says Lorna now, bringing Toni back from her reverie. She fans herself with a magazine. “Can you believe this heat, girls? My kishkes are boiling away.”

  Toni turns back to her letter. “I hope Papa’s ulcer will be better soon,” she writes. “Looking forward to seeing you at Parents’ Day.”

  Should she drop a hint about the generous tip that is the song instructor’s due? Maybe not. Better to work on her father in person. If he decides to be cheap she will die of shame.

  But now there’s time before next period to run an errand. Janet had asked her to stop by the kitchen and collect a couple of big pots to use as pails for Tevye the Milkman in the play. Toni clambers down the bunk-bed ladder and shoehorns on her sneakers with her forefinger. On the way down the aisle, she accidentally hooks her foot against the leg of Angela’s cot, sending a bag of jumbo rollers tumbling to the floor and bouncing in every direction, including into the dusty gloom under the bed. “Oops, sorry.” Toni holds back the smirk that creeps into the corners of her mouth.

  “Well, isn’t someone in a hurry?” Angela drawls, without looking up from the Harold Robbins paperback she’s reading. Then she raises her head to fix Toni with a gaze of cool appraisal.

  “Such a
n eager beaver. You do have it bad,” she says in a pitying tone.

  Toni stares back coldly, as if she has no idea what Angela is talking about. Of course you know. And I know you know. Toni’s eyes are the first to drop. “Got a problem?” she stammers, but before Angela can answer, Toni lurches out of the cabin and lets the screen door slam. An insect compared to Janet! But Angela’s words and the look of penetrating intelligence eat into her anyway. She must race down the hill to be rid of them.

  She stands outside the empty Culture Hall clutching two enormous, battered soup pots along with their lids. Sweat pools in the hollow of her throat, trickles down between her breasts. The pots had bumped against her thighs as she ran, and twice a lid fell off and rolled along the dirt path. A note on the door reads, “No rehearsal today. See you tomorrow, Fiddlers. Love, Janet.” Everyone except Toni seems to have known about the cancellation because not a single cast member has shown up, not Tevye and his daughters nor any of the little kids in rubber boots and shawls or vests who play the villagers. Why didn’t Janet tell her, why? A sense of betrayal stabs Toni’s heart. She had imagined how she would place the pots very carefully at the back of the room so as not to disturb Janet in the middle of directing a scene, then would lean quietly against a wall and wait to be noticed and thanked, maybe with a hug. She’d imagined the hug, Janet’s arm encircling her waist and pulling her close. But Gita, the dance instructor, has taken over the Hall with records and posters of Israeli dance troupes and peppy music. Numb with disappointment, Toni bangs the pots down and sprints away so as not to have to meet Gita’s startled glance. She stops in mid-stride, sneaks back to snatch the piece of paper off the door. She wants that note, written in Janet’s bold, loopy hand, especially the part that says “Love, Janet.”

  She wants to tell Faye as they paddle together in a canoe on the still, glassy lake in the shimmering heat. On her knees in the stern, Toni arrows the canoe forward with brisk, firm strokes while Faye dips her paddle more tentatively. They make good canoeing mates: Toni supplies direction and muscle and Faye manages to hold the rhythm, following Toni’s lead, humming as they skim along. Now and then Faye slaps nervously at a deerfly and apologizes for making the canoe wobble. Or she’ll ask if it’s okay to rest—as if it’s up to Toni to grant permission— then lay her paddle across the thwarts and trail her fingers in the water. She doesn’t feel obliged to chatter, is content to sink into the dreaminess of the afternoon. Her faded blue thimble hat, too big for her head, lies low over her ears, shading her elfin face. A large dragonfly quivers on the hat’s crown, which would make Faye jump if she knew. Her parents sent her half-way across the country, far from the sea-washed shores of her island home, so she could meet Jewish kids from Montreal, expand her horizons. Faye has confided to Toni that she wept into her pillow night after night the whole first week at camp.

  Because of all this, words rush to the tip of Toni’s tongue. Have you ever felt … I know it’s weird, but … do you think I’m crazy?

  She steers the canoe toward a secluded bay with a raft of water lilies whose pads scrape softly along the hull and whose long stems coil around their paddles. Hundreds of glossy green lily pads spread out around them, some with fat, yellow, multi-layered flowers, some holding well-camouflaged frogs that utter tiny shrieks as they leap away. The docks of camp, all the other boats, all signs of civilization have vanished. This place exists for itself alone. Toni rests her paddle on the gunnels and Faye turns to face her.

  “Are we stuck?” Faye asks anxiously.

  “’Course not.”

  “We better go then.”

  “Don’t be such a scaredy cat. It’s nice here.”

  Toni speaks gruffly, but in thinking over what she wants to say her throat has gone sandpaper dry.

  “But the period’s almost over. We’ll be late.”

  A touch of panic strains Faye’s voice, and there is a doubting look in her eyes, as if she’s not so sure about Toni after all, whether she’s the right kind of person to hang around with. Nothing to be done, Toni realizes, but to dig her paddle into the mass of lily pads, work the wobbling canoe around, and retrace the journey. There is no one to tell.

  Every step holds danger, every twist of the hard-packed dirt path that runs down the hill from the bunkhouses to the quadrangle of buildings around the flagpole. Any moment her breath could freeze, her heart could leak out through her pores for all to see. Fists thrust deep into the pockets of her shorts, Toni shuffles along trying to look like someone without a care in the world. She keeps her eyes straight ahead, but she’s aware of every flicker at the periphery of her vision. Every shape could be Janet. Any moment Janet could appear and ignite the air, blast the ground beneath Toni’s feet. Yet every moment of Janet’s absence is an abyss. Oh beautiful, terrible anticipation. Hope soars to the stratosphere, crashes to the depths, rises again—and oh, my god, what if someone sees how she trembles? And she is only halfway down the path.

  Supper is creamed salmon on toast. Toni looks down at her melamine plate, at the pinkish milky sauce dotted with grey-green peas. The fierce hunger she felt a moment ago has vanished, replaced by a rising tide of nausea. Her face burns. Sweat trickles down behind her ears. Yet a fine breeze blows through the picture windows of the dining hall, dishes clatter, and merry voices hum. She should ask to be excused.

  Instead she barks across the table, “What did you mean just now? About being a case? What do you think you’re talking about?”

  Angela’s fork stops in mid-flight toward her mouth. Her eyes gleam as if she’s been dealt a winning hand. Everyone falls silent.

  “I didn’t mean anything. Don’t get yourself all hot and bothered.”

  She and her twin sister exchange glances of suppressed hilarity.

  “A case of what?” Toni growls as she stabs the underside of the trestle table with her knife. She’s aghast at her own question. How could she leave herself so open? The knife thrust is meant as much for her own guts as for Angela’s.

  Sure enough, Angela gazes back calmly and asks, “You really want to know?”

  Toni grabs the table edge to steady herself. She swallows hard.

  “You better not mean anything,” she mutters. She picks up her fork and pokes around in the mush on her plate.

  In the thick darkness beneath the rafters, Toni hearkens to the snores and snuffles of her bunkmates. Eyes wide open, pulse racing, she slips her hands under the blankets and pushes down on the waistband of her pyjamas. Carefully she eases her legs out, trying not to wiggle the bed. Ho, ho, ho, a monkey chorus at the back of her mind hoots. Look at you. She’s got a brief spell of time before the counsellor on night duty swings through the bunkhouse, flashlight beam bouncing along beds and walls to check that all is well with the sleeping angels. Perhaps only a few minutes, but it should be long enough. She thrusts her pillow between her thighs and props herself on her elbows and begins to gently rock. Who cares about the jeering voices? Who cares about anything now? She sees herself as Ari, the Jewish resistance leader from the movie Exodus. He stands on the cool sand of a moonlit beach as a red-haired girl runs her hands up and down his bare sides. Up and down. Their lips meet. Luxurious flames lick inward. Miracles happen. Ah yes, any moment now, any moment.

  “Toni? What’s wrong?”

  Faye’s hoarse whisper pierces the black stillness. Toni freezes, holds her breath. But Faye persists, calling up from the bottom bunk. “Is everything okay?”

  “I’m fine,” Toni gasps.

  “But you were shaking. You were shaking the bed.”

  “I’m okay. Go to sleep!”

  Toni slumps forward, crushing her damp face against the mattress.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes!”

  Well-meaning, good-hearted Faye. At this moment, Toni wants to take her by the throat and throttle her.

  Angela begins a story. There was this creepy girl at school. Liz.

  “Oh stop!” Sharon squeals from the neighbouring cot. />
  “Liz the Lezzie,” Angela grins.

  “Don’t say any more. Just that name gives me the willies.”

  Sharon pretends to clap her hands over her ears, but her dark eyes dance with mischief and delight as she looks around the room to see whether the others have taken the bait. Indeed they have. They lean forward on their elbows. “Tell, tell, tell,” they chorus like baying dogs. Someone switches off the tinny transistor radio, and the cabin goes quiet. Toni in her upper bunk shields her face with her open paperback, though she peers over the tops of the pages.

  Angela sits up straighter, adjusts the pillow behind her back, and launches into her tale. This Liz had a beefy face, hefty shoulders, walked like a gorilla, and reeked like piss. Worse was how she stared at the popular girls, especially at Angela and Sharon, with big cow eyes. Angela bugs out her own eyes and lolls her tongue at Sharon to imitate the hideous, gawking Liz. Sharon waves her hands in front of her face, pushing away the appalling vision. Whenever Liz approached, Angela continues, their friends would form a protective circle around them. Unable to take a hint, Liz would try to wriggle her way into the group. Everyone would let her know she was a pervert. She would slink off like a big lump of misery. But then, just as the twins thought she’d got the message, she’d ogle them again from across the classroom.

  But that wasn’t the worst, Sharon tells them with a shiver. No, Angela agrees. The worst was how she played with herself. In public.

  “In public?” Marion exclaims in disbelief.

  “In the toilet stalls. That’s public enough, don’t you think?” Angela grimaces.

  “Some girls peeked in on her. Not us, of course,” Sharon says quickly.

  “Besides, you could smell it,” Angela says.