A Field Guide for Heartbreakers

by Kristen Tracy

  Watching that wounded pigeon made me so sad, but I couldn’t stop. When it was finished with the french fries, it found a smashed muffin. It was then that my loneliness hit an unacceptable level. It was stupid for me to stop talking to Veronica. I’d let Corky put a wedge between us. Why had I done that? What happened with Hamilton hadn’t been her fault. And I had lied to her about Kutná Hora. And I had let Waller take her fox idea. I watched the wounded pigeon fly off. And that settled it: with eight days left to go in Prague, I decided to patch things up with her.

  I went back to the dorm and started writing her a heartfelt note. But I kept having to start over because I couldn’t finish a whole paragraph without rehashing our last fight. Halfway through my fourth attempt I heard her phone ringing. I stopped writing and instinctively pressed my ear against the wall.

  “I’ve had it up to here with you, Hamilton,” Veronica said.

  My knees felt quaky and I sat down right on the floor.

  “Of course I haven’t told Dessy,” she said. “It would kill her. And I’m not the kind of person who kills my friends.”

  Veronica’s side of the conversation with Hamilton revealed a few key, tragic things. First, Veronica had totally betrayed me. Second, this was not the first time Hamilton had called Veronica in Prague. Third, they’d been in communication with each other for some time. Fourth, feeling screwed over by my ex-boyfriend and former best friend made my internal organs wobble painfully inside of me.

  The call lasted less than five minutes.

  “No, she hasn’t read your letter,” Veronica said. “I grabbed it out of the mail pile before it could be delivered. Sometimes you’re such an idiot. What were you thinking?”

  But I was the one who felt like an idiot. Never in a million years would I have thought Veronica would interfere with my first boyfriend and international mail.

  “There is a lot of heat on this situation. Hamilton, this is really going to hurt her. I don’t see why we should tell her. Look, don’t call me again. I’ll call you.”

  I heard a snapping sound and the obvious noise of the handset being smashed back into the cradle. Then I heard Veronica open our bedroom door and go into the bathroom. The shower squeaked on.

  I stood up and opened the door. Veronica was singing. Something tuneless and happy. The soft sound of her voice drifted alongside me as I hurried down the hallway. I shook my head, trying to make the noise go away, but it was already deep inside my brain. Then I heard myself scream. It didn’t last very long, but it was loud. A guy in front of me turned around and asked, “Are you okay?”

  “I don’t know!” I said, jogging around him.

  The man’s question haunted me. Are you okay? What a ridiculous thing to ask. I might not ever be okay again. I flew down the stairs. I needed fresh air. How could Veronica do this? She knew that I loved Hamilton. What was she trying to prove? That she could steal him away from me? Didn’t she have enough men? I reached the bottom of the staircase and stopped.

  My sadness had turned into a boiling anger. Without thinking, I flipped around and climbed upward, taking the stairs two at a time. At the second-floor landing, I started running. Not a casual jog. I ran with intensity. I threw open the door and stormed into the bathroom. When I dramatically pulled back the shower curtain, Veronica unleashed a bloodcurdling scream.

  “I heard everything!” I yelled. “You are such a phony! And a traitor! You are so terrible! After you die you’re going straight to hell, where you’ll coexist with other people who have broken moral compasses!”

  “Agh!” Veronica yelled. “Don’t hurt me!”

  She squatted down and shielded herself with her arms. The shower instantly drenched my front with warm water. I reached out and turned the knob off.

  “How could you?” I asked.

  She kept her head down and didn’t make eye contact.

  “Are you going to say anything?” I asked. Water dripped off me and splattered on the floor.

  “I’m really surprised you caught me,” Veronica said.

  I couldn’t believe it. This was the worst thing that anybody had ever done to me, and she didn’t sound sorry at all.

  “How could you?” I asked again. “I mean, why would you want to?”

  Veronica looked up at me with her guilty, wet face. “I think we need to go somewhere and talk about this. I know the phone call with Hamilton looks bad,” she said. “But it’s just the tip of the ice cube. There are things you need to know.”

  I pulled the shower curtain shut. “This is the worst vacation ever,” I said. “I don’t think I can stomach hearing more. I feel like letting Corky just go ahead and kill me. And you!”

  “You don’t mean that,” Veronica said. She stepped out of the shower and grabbed a towel.

  “Don’t tell me what I mean and don’t mean!”

  “If you keep yelling this loudly, you’re going to attract dorm security. Come to the room while I get dressed. We can talk.”

  “I can’t talk to you!” I said. “I hate you!”

  Veronica turned and stared at me. She reached out to touch me, but I slapped her hand away.

  “Dessy, there’s something I need to tell you. Follow me.”

  I was in shock. I followed Veronica back to her room. She opened her desk drawer and handed me a slim envelope addressed to me. The return address said it was from Hamilton.

  Before I even realized that I’d raised it, I felt my other hand slap across her cheek. Veronica gasped and held the side of her face. Veronica Knox was the first person I’d ever struck. A stinging sensation traveled through my hand and up my arm. It felt like I’d been shocked.

  “Stop doing things you’re going to regret,” Veronica said.

  “I would never regret that. Go suck it, Veronica!”

  I was finished with her. Forever. So I walked out the door, trying to project an air of real certainty. I had no idea where I was headed. Or whether I’d read Hamilton’s letter. I suspected I’d never be able to speak to either one of them again. It’s as if my real world, the one where I was a high school senior living in Ohio being raised by my kind mother and disconnected father, ceased to exist. I was living in Bizarre Land now.

  I walked down the sidewalk holding Hamilton’s letter and looking at all the traffic rushing down the street. I never knew that I could feel so much pain. I was entirely unprepared for it. I lifted the letter and a light breeze caught it, making it flutter against my hand. I wanted to release it. I could let it slip into the street and it would be as if it had never existed. But I couldn’t do it. I had to read the letter. Maybe not right now. Or today. Or this week. But one day the curiosity would overtake the dread. I brought my hand down and folded the letter three times. Then I slid it into my pocket and kept walking.

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  The tail of a cheetah was much fatter than I realized. And when the big cat swished it, it didn’t come across as a playful act. The tail seemed capable of delivering a deadly blow. Cheetahs. It made sense that my excursion to Prague would finally lead here.

  Pacing atop their grass hillock, the spotted sprinters looked bigger and more muscular than I’d expected. According to a sign on the fence, the Prague zoo had been one of the first gardens in the world where cheetahs had been bred successfully. How ironic.

  I understood it now. Veronica and Hamilton were talking behind my back because they were secretly in love with each other. It explained so much. Why Veronica had compared herself to a cheetah. Why Hamilton had dumped me without any warning and why Veronica had likewise dumped Boz. Nothing course-changing had happened, and yet they’d both exited their relationships.

  I left the cheetahs in disgust and sought out the polar bears. I stood on the other side of the fence and thought about how sad it was that polar bears were going extinct. Everything was heating up. The whole planet. My mind was unraveling. I mean, Hamilton and Veronica had probably been denying this for years, and then finally their passion for each other had igni
ted in one big fiery burst. In retrospect, this wasn’t that surprising. Because Hamilton and Veronica always disliked each other so much, even when there was no reason to dislike each other. It had to have been unacknowledged sexual tension. I’d read an article about sexual tension in a women’s magazine. Apparently, desire is an emotion that can’t be successfully suppressed for longer than a year. Because when you push it down, it only tries harder to escape.

  I couldn’t recall what advice the article offered. I only remembered the picture of the exploding volcano at the top of the page.

  Everywhere I looked, there were signs providing a history of the flood. I remembered the word Waller had used to describe the situation: Apocalypse. I couldn’t shake that word. It seemed so apt, now that everything in my life had become a catastrophe.

  I made my way to the giant tortoises and watched one inch its ridiculously large, shelled body across a cement pond. Then I walked to the gorilla pavilion and read about the tragic death of one of them during the flood. Stupid flood. Lousy apocalypse.

  I staggered through the zoo like my own version of a wounded animal. I could never trust anybody again. Even people who I loved and had already been trusting for years. I don’t remember how I got home. I only know that I carried a small bird feather—I think it came from an owl—all the way there.

  At the crack of dawn, somebody knocked on my door, but I ignored it. Even when the knock was accompanied by the words, “It’s me, Veronica. Please open up,” I didn’t feel the need to respond.

  “I’m going to stand outside your door until you open it and are willing to talk to me,” Veronica said.

  I waved to the closed door and didn’t say anything.

  “I think I just felt you flip me the bird.” She was so smart. She was trying to trick me into denying that I’d flipped her the bird in order to trigger a conversation between us. It didn’t work.

  “Corky, leave me alone,” Veronica said.

  “Well, if it isn’t Veronica Knox talking to Dessy Gherkin’s door. How appropriate,” Corky said.

  I almost felt bad for Veronica.

  “You two acted like you had such a special friendship. But look at you. You’re just a couple of frauds,” Corky said.

  “You say one more unkind thing about Dessy, and I will stab you with a fork,” Veronica said.

  “No you won’t,” Corky said. “Because you know I’d stab you back so much harder.”

  I hoped that some sort of massive fork stabbing wasn’t about to occur outside my room. Because if it did, I’d feel compelled to open my door and try to tamp it down. And the last thing I needed to encounter in my present emotional state was blood.

  “Can’t you both go away?” I said.

  “Open the door!” Veronica said.

  “Keep it closed!” Corky said. “Teach this twit a lesson.”

  “I’m trying to sleep,” I said.

  “I can talk to you while you slumber,” Veronica said. “If you let me explain things, you’ll be less pissed.”

  “Honestly, Veronica, I don’t think there is anything you could say that would make me less pissed.”

  “Dessy, if you give me a chance, I can make sense out of all of this. You know me. I’m not a deceitful person.”

  “Yes you are,” Corky said.

  “Not when it comes to Dessy!” Veronica said.

  As much as I didn’t want to believe Veronica, as much as I wanted to remain angry and keep my distance, I knew that at some point I needed to listen to what she had to say. But was right now that point? I wasn’t sure. I stood up and walked toward my door, but I couldn’t open it. I wasn’t ready.

  “What do I need to do to make you leave?” Veronica yelled to Corky. “Throw a stick?”

  “You’re so shallow, it compromises your intelligence,” Corky shouted back.

  “So what if I’m shallow,” Veronica said. “You’re fat!”

  “I can lose weight!” Corky said.

  “I can gain depth!” Veronica said.

  “No you can’t,” Corky said. “You’re a douche bag!”

  “So are you!” Veronica said.

  I wanted the petty arguing to stop. Eventually I would have to face the truth. Rather than waste any more energy on this situation, I decided to give Veronica what she wanted. “Veronica, I’ll meet you at the bagel café in an hour.”

  “Don’t say that with Corky right here!” Veronica said. “She’ll follow us.”

  “Maybe I won’t,” Corky said.

  “Stop touching me,” Veronica said.

  “What are you going to do if I don’t?” Corky asked.

  “Veronica, meet me at the place where I went without you.” I knew she’d understand that I meant the Astronomical Clock.

  “You went someplace without me?” she asked.

  “Yeah, but you also went there with Alexej,” I said.

  “How do you know where I went with Alexej?” she asked.

  I guess this accidental confession meant that I wouldn’t make a very good spy. “I followed you a little,” I said.

  “Wait a minute,” Veronica said. “Were you carrying an umbrella, because I totally think I saw you!”

  “I’m done talking about this. Just go to that place.”

  “I’m not sure which place you mean,” Veronica said.

  “The place I went with Waller that wasn’t the Drunk House that you felt I should have visited with you.” I was disappointed that I had to give her another hint.

  “She’s talking about the Astronomical Clock,” Corky said.

  “Shut up, Corky!” I said.

  “Okay. How about this,” said Veronica. “I’ll meet you at Paul the Baptist in an hour.”

  I heard the front door slam.

  “Are you still there, Corky?” I asked.

  “Yes,” she said. “Don’t worry. I don’t plan on stalking you and Veronica.”

  “I wasn’t worried.”

  “Sure you weren’t.”

  The door slammed again. Then there was silence. And even though I really didn’t feel like it, I had to get up and get ready to go out into the world and live another possibly miserable day.

  As I was leaving the dorm, I walked past the pay phone and it nearly leapt into my hand. Before I could even question the impulse, I dialed my home in Ohio.

  MOM: I was just thinking about you, Dessy. How are things?

  ME: They could be going better.

  MOM: Are you low on funds?

  ME: I’m okay on funds.

  MOM: Well, if you’ve got money in the bank, all other obstacles are a matter of attitude.

  ME: That doesn’t make any sense. What if I was being attacked by a bear?

  MOM: Cities don’t have bears. Especially in Europe. Are you still in the city?

  ME: Yes. But it’s getting a little challenging. International travel isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be.

  MOM: You sound grumpy.

  ME: I guess I am a little grumpy.

  MOM: Is there anything I can do?

  ME: I sort of want to talk to Dad.

  MOM: You do?

  ME: Yes. That’s what I said.

  MOM: He’s working in the garage.

  ME: Really? He never goes into the garage.

  MOM: He’s fixing the lawn mower.

  ME: When did we get a lawn mower?

  MOM: Stewart raised his price, so your father bought a lawn mower.

  ME: But Dad doesn’t know how to fix things. Especially not a machine with sharp rotating blades and a motor.

  MOM: You’re being very critical.

  ME: I want to talk to him!

  MOM: Maybe you should calm down and call him later.

  ME: I am calm!

  MOM: What’s this about?

  ME: I’m concerned about something.

  MOM: You’re concerned about your father?

  ME: No. I’m concerned about me and Dad. The two of us. Have you ever noticed that we don’t connect? We don’t ta
lk about anything important. Ever. It’s like we’re related and then we don’t have a relationship beyond that.

  MOM: That’s not true.

  ME: Of course it’s true! We never talk about anything important ever.

  MOM: That’s just the way your father’s built. Some men are like that.

  ME: Dad’s got to talk about important things with someone. Why not me?

  MOM: You really need to stop yelling.

  ME: I’m not yelling! I’m just loud when I make international calls.

  MOM: Is something else going on? Is this about Hamilton’s letter?

  ME: I haven’t even read Hamilton’s stupid letter!

  MOM: Why not? Hasn’t it arrived yet?

  ME: Oh, it arrived here all right!

  MOM: Oh no!

  ME: Why are you screaming? How bad can Hamilton’s letter be? What’s in the letter?

  MOM: Blood!

  ME: What? Hamilton sent me blood?

  MOM: No. It’s your father. Don’t stand there, Walter. Come over here and bleed in the sink!

  ME: Is it serious?