Diva

by Alex Flinn

  I glance at her plate, then at the clock. Almost eight. Weird. Mom always makes sure guys buy her dinner. I don’t say anything. It will be way better having her out of the house while I’m making whatever noises go with my favorite animal.

  “Fine. No prob.”

  I finish my salad and start to clear the table. I eat the salad Mom left. After this act of piggery, my cell phone starts playing “March of the Toreadors.” Caller ID reveals it’s Peyton. I pick up the phone. I have to keep up with my friends in case performing arts school doesn’t work out.

  “Dude!” I easily slip back into my old persona. Who says I can’t act?

  “Is it terrible? Are you ready to come back to us where you belong?”

  “It’s great,” I say, then realize she means living with Dad. “I mean, a lot better than I expected. Thing One and Thing Two have … um … junior peewee cheerleading four days a week, and with this new school, I hardly see them.”

  “Well, I’m glad you’re having such a great time. We’re destitute without you.”

  “Desolate, Peyton. You’re desolate. Destitute means you’re broke.”

  “Yah, like that’s possible. Anyway, there’s this new girl on the squad, and she thinks she’s all that, sticking out her boobs and trying to be in charge.” She keeps going, but I’m thumbing through Mom’s Find a Husband After 35 book.

  Packaging: Create Your Best Look.

  Advertising: Promote Your Personal Brand.

  “So are there any cute guys there at least?” Peyton asks.

  “Um, a few.” I think of Sean Griffin’s incredible eyes. “Well, at least one.”

  “That’s good. I thought that guy at Wendy’s might be the best player available. Such a loser. You’re so sweet to be nice to people like that.”

  I laugh. “Oh, no, I didn’t mean him.”

  “Saw Nick today.”

  “Yeah. So?”

  “So nothing. He has a new car. A Beemer.”

  “Wow.” I get a flash of memory. Nick behind the wheel of his old Mustang. I’m next to him, his arm around me. Not fat, not lonely. It was so easy being his girlfriend.

  Except when it wasn’t.

  “So, is it a convertible?”

  “Yeah, a roadster. They’re like fifty thousand dollars, aren’t they?”

  I want to ask Peyton if there’s some other girl, riding shotgun in that car. But instead, I tip Mom’s salad plate into the sink and say, “So, what’s your favorite animal?”

  The second I get off the phone, the doorbell rings. Mom yells at me to get it.

  I open the door to the toadiest-looking guy I’ve ever seen (and considering I live in Miami, where people go to die, that is saying a lot). This cannot possibly be Mom’s date. He’s wearing sandals with socks. I can see the outline of his undershirt through his shirt, and he’s bald but he’s combed hairs over the spot, as if no one will notice that way.

  “You must be Katie,” the Fashion Don’t says.

  “Caitlin, yes.”

  He sticks out his hand. “I’m Dr. Arnold Mikloshevsky.”

  Arnold? He’s kidding, right? I mean, I know there’s Arnold Schwarzenegger, but no mere mortal can get away with that name. Definitely not this guy.

  Omigod! I sound like my mother. Maybe this guy has a beautiful soul.

  Nah, Mom wouldn’t date someone with a beautiful soul. He must have money.

  I take his hand. It’s damp. “Nice to meet you, Doctor.”

  “Arnold.”

  “Arnold.” Ah-nohd. “Mom will be out any second.” But I’m thinking life as we know it has ceased. My mother, shallowest puddle in the rainstorm, is actually dating someone … clammy.

  He looks me up and down. Well, down anyway. His eyes stop at my chest, and I realize I’m still wearing my leotard. “So you’re a dancer?”

  Still looking. Come on, guy. You’re short, but you’re not that short.

  “Um, not exactly.” I cross my arms over my chest. “Mom!”

  “I’ll be right there!” she sings.

  A sudden, horrific thought occurs to me. Oh. My. God. She didn’t want onions because she’s planning to kiss this guy.

  “So, what kind of doctor are you?”

  “Podiatrist.”

  “Podiatrist. That’s…?” Rear ends?

  “The foot. Conditions of the foot. Calluses, fungi, bone spurs.” He looks down. “But a young thing like you wouldn’t have to worry about any of that.”

  “I’ll see what’s taking Mom.”

  But that’s when she shows up.

  It sounds clichéd to say that my jaw drops when she walks in. But my jaw does, literally, drop. She has on a pink-and-white-checked fake Chanel suit with a skirt which, while short, would cover her underwear—even if she bent over. She has her hair and makeup all done like a flight attendant at the Dallas airport, instead of like an exotic dancer. In fact, her whole ensemble is classic, conservative, and … well, classy. Her nails are French-manicured and not one bit of her glitters.

  Packaging, indeed …

  She holds out her hand to Dr. Toe-Jam. “Shall we?”

  “Valerie, I had no idea…”

  “Yes?” She looks at him, like, Adore me!

  “When you mentioned your daughter, I pictured a little girl, not such a lovely young woman.”

  Annoyance flickers across her face, just like anytime someone compliments me. But this particular time, I’m right with her. I’m as grossed out as she is, but for different reasons. Is she actually going to let him touch her?

  “You must have been a child bride,” he continues.

  That helps. “Oh, well, that’s true. I was married when I was only twenty.”

  “Which explains why you two look like sisters.”

  “Hmmm, which of us is the prettier sister?”

  I make my escape. “It was great meeting you, Dr. Mikloshevsky.” I look at Mom like, Are you sure about this? “I have a ton of homework.”

  And then I go to my room and sing until my lungs hurt.

  * * *

  Opera_Grrrl’s Online Journal

  * * *

  Subject: Chasing My Tail

  Date: August 20

  Time: 5:10 p.m.

  Listening 2: “Vesti la giubba” (sad clown aria from Pagliacci)

  Feeling: Seriously bummed

  Weight: 110 lbs. (Cookies! Cookies!)

  1st week’s almost over. Picture the next 3 days being pretty much like the 1st. People here aren’t like @ Key Biscayne, but the laws of the jungle still apply. Every1 hangs w/their own kind. At Key, that meant lions w/lions and gazelles w/gazelles. Here, it’s more like hyenas w/hyenas and warthogs w/warthogs. Every1’s funny and different and special ....... except me. I’m standard issue ............. like a yellow Lab. Or a mutt.

  Speaking of dogs............ I spent hours prepping for My Favorite Animal, based on this little dog our neighbors used 2 have. Silky. I *was* that dog, prancing around in my jeweled collar, chasing my own tail. Then I got 2 class.

  1st off, hardly any1 chose anything as boring as a dog. Gigi (I HATE HER!) was a sea anemone, and Gus scored BIG by doing a baby kangaroo, fighting its way up 2 its mother’s nipple. The only other person who did a dog—Misty—was waaay more creative than me. She pretended her dog had on 1 of those cone collars they put on pets 2 keep them from chewing their stitches or whatever. Then she played a dog w/a compulsion 2 scratch ....... and got a standing O.

  So, of course, I had 2 follow her.

  I was chasing my tail, all right. I think I even saw Miss Davis yawn.

  * * *

  CHAPTER 10

  Friday afternoon, instead of Dance (a.k.a. the third circle of hell), we get called into the auditorium. “I hear they do this all the time,” Gus says on the way in. “Pull us out of class to watch some program that’s supposed to be good for us. Gives us a chance to catch up on all that sleep we’re missing, having to catch the bus here at six-thirty.”

  I shrug. “To
get out of Dance, I’d watch eye surgery.”

  Gus grins. “Hey, you wouldn’t be bad at it if you’d just loosen up.” He grabs my arm and pulls me toward him like Antonio Banderas with Madonna in Evita. He tries to dip me, sending me crashing to the floor. Crowds run for cover, and I think one girl screams. But maybe that was me.

  “Take your seats everyone!” It’s Rowena onstage, and I try to scramble up before she sees it’s me. But that just means I almost knock someone down. Specifically Misty.

  “Watch it!” she says. “Do you get off on hurting people?”

  I ignore her. “See?” I tell Gus. “I’m hopeless.”

  I wait for him to agree with me, but he says, “Nah, you’re not hopeless. You just got to shake it, baby. You should dance with us at lunch.”

  “Take your seats quickly.” Rowena sees me. “Caitlin, are you okay?”

  “Yeah, sorry.” I half-stand and slink to the seat Gigi’s holding. “I am so glad you’ll still be seen with me after that.”

  Gigi laughs. “No Dance today. Be happy.”

  I am. For about three seconds. Then I think about what Gus said about dancing with them at lunch. Does everyone think I’m a snob because I don’t do stuff like that? Don’t they realize there are people on the planet who don’t want to be the center of attention at all times?

  I glance over at Gus, who’s grabbed another willing girl and is doing the cha-cha, yelling “one, two, cha-cha-cha!” Guess not.

  Finally, when everyone has settled down, Rowena says, “I thought it might be interesting for you to watch. The college-level students are having auditions for La Traviata.”

  Groans. Gnashing of teeth. Opera’s no normal teenager’s favorite thing, not even here. I, being abnormal, am instantly excited. I’ve heard that the college Opera Workshop program, which is held on the same campus as the high school, is really great.

  “Any duels in it?” a guy asks.

  “Can we go to Dance?” this girl, Kimberley, who’s an incredible dancer, asks.

  “No, we’ll be here today.”

  “Cool idea,” Sean says. “After all, we’ll be in college soon too.”

  I hear someone mutter, “Suck up,” behind me. I agree. Sean hasn’t said a single word to me since Monday. He just hangs out with his old friends all the time and acts like he’s better than everyone else. I don’t get it. He was so friendly at my audition.

  Rowena’s having all the tenors and sopranos audition by singing the “Brindisi,” a drinking song from the first act, where the two main characters flirt with each other.

  La Traviata is my all-time favorite opera. I discovered it years ago, when Mom was watching this movie Pretty Woman. Julia Roberts plays a hooker who gets hired by a millionaire played by Richard Gere. In one scene, Richard takes Julia to the opera to see La Traviata, which is about a woman of ill repute, Violetta, who falls for this guy, Alfredo, then leaves him when his family disapproves—then dies of tuberculosis. (They used the same plot in Moulin Rouge, with Nicole Kidman.) Julia loves it (and Richard), and in the big final scene, Richard drives down her street in his convertible, playing “Dammi tu forza, o cielo” on the car stereo, climbs Julia’s fire escape, and they live happily ever after.

  I loved that scene. I cried. I begged Mom to buy the movie so I could hear the music over and over. She bought it because she wanted to do her hair like Julia Roberts. It wasn’t until three years later when I started taking voice, and Rowena took a bunch of us to a dress rehearsal for La Traviata at the Florida Grand Opera, that I knew where it was from. I bought the CD and listened to it a million times.

  Anyway … back in the real world.

  The girl onstage is the third to sing. She’s a fatgirl, about forty pounds overweight, but beautiful, and has a lot of control in the difficult middle range of her voice and what’s more, she seems like Violetta—really strong and in charge of her destiny, which, of course, is what makes the story so tragic. If Violetta had lived today, she wouldn’t be a hooker. She’d be the CEO of IBM.

  “She looks like an opera singer,” the blond surfer dude behind me whispers. “All she needs are the horns.”

  A girl agrees. “Right. Moooooo.”

  I give them a look, but I know they’re right. The girl onstage is the best Violetta so far, but she wouldn’t be real convincing as someone dying of a wasting disease. My jeans feel tight, and I think of the pizza Gigi talked me into at lunch. Some girls I know would go and stick a finger down their throats, but that is one particular disorder I’ve managed to avoid. I’ll do better this weekend. Should be easy, as I no longer have a social life. I’m sure my friends have forgotten me completely.

  The pair onstage finish, and Rowena says, “That it for sopranos and tenors?”

  No one volunteers. Sean raises his hand. “Can we try? I mean, just for fun.”

  Rowena checks her watch. “Can I get a soprano to go with you?”

  Gigi nudges me. “You should go.”

  “What? No! Why?”

  “Because you’re really good. You’ve seen what everyone else can do—show them what you can do.”

  If someone at my old school had said that, I’d figure they were trying to make me look bad. But even though I’ve only known Gigi a few days, I think she means it.

  Sean’s making his way to the stage, and next thing I know, my hand’s up in the air.

  And so are Rowena’s eyebrows. She knows I get scared. “Looks like we do have a volunteer.” I see that Misty also has her hand up, but Rowena’s pointing to me. I stand and walk to the front of the room.

  But now that I’ve raised my hand and committed, I worry I’ll look like a show-off. Why did I volunteer? To impress Sean, the unimpressible? No. It’s just what Gigi said—to show the rest of them I’m actually good at something, even if it’s not what they think’s a big deal. After screwing up in Drama and Dance all week, I need to do that.

  But I can’t think about that now, because the accompanist starts playing, and Sean begins to sing, and suddenly, I’m no longer here. I’m at a beautiful party in Paris. I forget all the people in the auditorium, the bored faces, the dance class I’ll have to go back to on Monday, even Sean’s cologne … soap … whatever. Now, I am Violetta.

  Sean starts his last lines. His voice is as good on the opera stuff as it was on musical theater:

  Let us drink, for with wine,

  Love will enjoy yet more passionate kisses.

  I take a deep breath and sing:

  In life, everything is folly

  Which does not bring pleasure

  I visualize myself as sparkling, popular, beautiful, and beloved. Sean is Alfredo, totally hot for me. I smile at him and remember everything Rowena taught me. I focus my voice in the mask of my face (what zit cream commercials call the T-zone) and remember to breathe, and my voice just flows out of me. I know I sound great. I sound perfect. But will people here get it, or will they think it’s lame? Sean and I finish the song together, and the college students who were auditioning explode with applause. They get it, at least. I stand a few seconds, enjoying it, living it.

  When I get back to my seat, Gigi grins and holds up her hand to high-five me. A minute later, the guy behind me, the surfer dude who made the comment about the horns, leans over and says, “Wow. If opera singers look like you, I’ll go to the opera.”

  I don’t answer. Gigi says, “That was supposed to be a compliment, Cait.”

  I smile. “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome. I’m Rex, by the way. Remember me when you’re a star.”

  Rowena’s saying something about upcoming talent, which makes me blush and squirm some more. Then she starts calling up baritones. Sean’s sitting on the other side of the auditorium. I figure maybe he’ll say something to me on the way out. But when we go, he walks out the opposite side door. The girl who sang before me stops me, though. “You were incredible. You’ll be some competition for us soon.”

  I can’t stop grinning. “Thanks. Yo
u were great too.”

  “Hey, us opera girls gotta stick together.”

  I smile some more. She smiles. I smile all the way to music theory class.

  At least I’m best at one thing, the thing I love best.

  * * *

  Opera_Grrrl’s Online Journal

  * * *

  Subject: I got 2 sing at school!!!

  Date: August 21

  Time: 5:35 p.m.

  Listening 2: “Brindisi” from La Traviata

  Feeling: Happy

  Weight: 109 lbs. (I’ve decided 2 leave my wallet @ home so I can’t buy food at school)

  The thing I love about singing opera is: when you’re doing it, it’s all you can think of ....... so you’re not thinking about how:

  1. You still have 2 go 2 dance class 3x a week.

  2. You might gain back 40 lbs. any day now.

  3. It’s Friday and you have no friends 2 do anything with.

  4. Your mother’s dating a podiatrist!

  Mom’s new bf, Arnold, took her out 2x this week + breakfast yesterday a.m. When I got home today, she was pacing the living rm in hot rollers ...... cell phone at her hip, and her portable in her hand, like a dr. waiting for word on an emergency surgery. “I’m expecting a phone call,” she said in case I had any doubt.

  I have no plans for 2nite except 2 stay home and pretend I’m Violetta, set 4 my date with Alfredo .......... I’m sort of ok with that.

  Unbelievable! Mom just knocked on the door. I figured she was just complaining about the noise, but she asked me if I wanted 2 go out 2 dinner. She called Arnold and he said he had 2 work late so no date.

  I was nice. I didn’t point out that she always says *never* 2 call guys ...... Mom has tons of “rules” for dating, rules she got from books. Don’t ask guys out. Don’t accept a date with a guy on 2-short notice. And one of her big, big rules is NEVER call guys. In Mom-world, a girl who calls a guy might as well show up in English class and give him a lap dance.