I try to hide a swift itch of tears, but I’m no match for Mom Radar. “The semester will go by in a flash, you’ll see,” she says to my back.
“I know.”
I feel her hesitation before she asks, “Are you and Abby going to be okay?”
Now it’s her turn to sense my hesitation, but I meet her concerned gaze. “We will be.”
Over the river’s rush, I hear Abby picking her way across the rocks behind me. She sits down next to me on our flat rock, wearing shorts and a pale blue polo shirt from her shift at the market. She hands me a white paper bag. “Twice-baked potatoes.”
“What, seriously?” I peer into the bag. The Blue Market’s deli has the best twice-baked potatoes I’ve ever eaten in my life. “But they only make these in the winter!”
“Dan made an exception.”
I pull out two still-warm paper containers and hand one to Abby. “I’ve always liked that Dan.”
“Yeah, you two are tight.” She takes her container and the fork I hand her. Setting them down next to her, she kicks off her shoes, dipping her feet into the cool water at the far edge of the rock. “You all packed for tomorrow?”
“Pretty much.” The twilight turns the river into an inky mirror, the horizon holding its last band of pale light. Above us, the sky grows dark, with only a few first winking stars. It is an ordinary summer night, one I’ve seen hundreds of times. Only tonight its beauty cuts invisible slivers into every inch of my skin. The last month here in Yuba Ridge has been filled with packing and planning, hanging out with Abby when she wasn’t working, helping Mom get her garden back together. Each day, though, felt like air, a translucent placeholder until London. Now I’m leaving tomorrow. And it seems too abrupt.
“Are you excited?” Abby opens her container, mashing some of the potato with her fork before she takes a bite.
I nod, my untouched potato warming my lap. “And scared.”
She looks at me across our rock. “It’ll be incredible. How can it not be? You’ll be there.” She motions to my lap with her fork, her mouth full. “You should eat that before it gets cold. Cold twice-baked potatoes suck.”
I watch her chewing hers for a moment, then dig into my own.
Dang, that’s a good potato.
She watches me, sees something shadowy move across my face. “Don’t worry,” she says. “I hear London likes its potatoes.”
It is nearly seven in London. In an hour, Riya will step onto a lit stage for the first performance of her college life. And I’ll be missing it. In fact, I’ll be sitting in AP English trying to make sense of King Lear. Fathers and daughters. Apparently, it’s not a new theme. But for now, I can at least make sure Riya knows I’m thinking of her before she goes on. And she’ll be especially pleased that I’m about to use a favorite page from her playbook. I slide out of my desk. Everyone around me in Economics works on the group projects we’re about to present. Mr. Song sits at his desk, sorting rubrics, looking up only when I’m practically leaning over him.
“I left the poster in my car. Can I go get it?”
Mr. Song is a cool teacher—young, uses hair product, wears designer jeans and brightly colored New Balances. He must have about ten pairs. But he also hasn’t been teaching long enough to loosen up on most of his rules. “What’s the rule about using the pass on Fridays?”
“No passes on Fridays.”
“Yep.”
“But, Mr. Song, I left our group’s poster in my car. I don’t want them to be affected because I made a mistake. Can I take a lowered grade and go get it?” I even try Riya’s earnest smile, the one that says, See, I know how to do the right thing. Personal accountability matters.
It works, and moments later I’m pushing through the hallway doors and out into the crisp light of early October, my phone to my ear. I find a spot behind the high wall of the cafeteria, near the loading dock. School security never seems to make the effort to check back here. It’s been the best place for calls to Riya this semester.
She picks up instantly. “The flowers are gorgeous!” She’s already hyped up on preshow jitters. “Thanks for remembering.”
“Break a leg. You know, I looked up the origin of that expression—some historians think it had to do with performing on a table-like stage so enthusiastically that a leg would break. Drama history tidbit.”
“Fascinating. I’ll make sure to tell my theater history professor he should fold that into his next lecture. Aren’t you supposed to be in Econ?”
“I told Mr. Song I’m getting the poster from my car.”
“You don’t have a car.”
“He doesn’t know that.”
“So. Proud.”
“I should let you go,” I tell her. “And I should get back to class.”
“Totally.”
“Riya?” My voice catches.
She hears it. “I miss you, too.”
The next morning, Dad taps on my door. “You up?” Without waiting for me to emerge from under my mound of covers, he comes into the room with Henry on his heels.
I sit up, rubbing my eyes. Henry leaps up next to me, curling alongside my legs, leaning in so I can pet his head. “What time is it?”
“Just after ten.” Dad hovers in the doorway. He needs a haircut. I’ve reminded him twice this week. “How’d Riya’s show go last night?”
Yesterday, she texted: amazing! amazing! amazing!
I motion for Dad to come see it. He grins. “So, it went okay?”
“I think it did.”
He sits down on the bed next to Henry, giving him a scratch behind his ears. “Seems like she’s loving it.”
“She is.”
He smiles sympathetically, knowing I still have to practice being brave about Riya’s new life in London. He gets that I haven’t quite found the tricky balance between staying in her life and moving on into our separate futures. I’m trying, though, even as fragments of jealousy remain like pieces of broken mirror inside me. A few weeks ago on a hike, I talked to Dad about them, and he confessed he knows the feeling, knows how we have to actively keep brushing those pieces away so they don’t lodge themselves inside us.
Most days, I’m genuinely happy for Riya.
Dad crosses his arms, watching me settle back on the bed. “You working at the museum today?”
I nod. “Twelve to five.” When school started, I cut back on my shifts at the Blue Market and started volunteering at one of our local museums, just two rooms in a downtown storefront, but the owner, Leslie, has an infectious passion for local history. I’m there Tuesdays after school and most Saturdays. Leslie even let me curate an exhibit this fall called “The Wonders of the Gold Rush” that got written up in a Sacramento tourist magazine. I bought two copies and sent one to Riya, who took a picture and reminded me to post it on my Instagram. I’m pretty sure I’m the only person on social media who seems to lose more followers than she gains in any sort of consistent way, but I’ve managed to attract 168 people who seem to like history as much as I do. And that’s kind of fun. Okay, I love it. They post great stuff. And I’m back in touch with our friend Ian Campos, who is a bit of a history geek himself.
Even Neel got himself an Instagram.
Dad stands and walks back to the door. “You need a lunch? I’ll pack you one.”
“No thanks. Mom’s taking me to brunch before the museum.”
“Glad to hear it. Come on, Gimpy,” he says to Henry. “Let’s take our little walk.” Dad waits for the dog to limp past, and then closes the door behind him, but not before I notice his smile fade. Each day, I see the effort he puts in, see him trying to emerge from the pain of losing her, of letting go of our former life, but it’s in slow motion, the way someone moves through waist-level snow. It’s this way for both of us. It helps that we’re partners in the struggle, our new lives like drastic haircuts we can’t quite get used to but might end up looking good on us when they grow out a bit. He’s glad I take the time to see Mom each week. She and I are picking
slowly over the rocks in our way. It takes work and it’s not linear. Some days I feel more forgiving than others. Some days I cry. Today, at least, there will be peach pancakes at Helene’s, my favorite brunch place. Mom’s, too. I even said she could bring Dr. Spits-A-Lot. And I manage to not call him that to his face. Baby steps.
Each day, I practice my new life.
I flip the covers back, studying the familiar walls of my room: the posters and pictures of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, the dozens of photos of me and Riya, the newest an eight-by-ten Neel took of us standing near Gullfoss in Iceland, laughing as we get caught in a sudden burst of spray. He sent it a couple of weeks ago.
My eyes fall on a photo Dad must have tacked to my bulletin board in the last few days. He took it in front of the Legion of Honor in San Francisco last weekend. I’m with Lucy, a junior with wild red hair and an odd sense of humor who just started a History Club at our school. So far we’re the only two members. I haven’t once seen her wear a pair of socks that actually match, but she’s funny, smart, and obsessed with the Civil War. The Legion of Honor was our first field trip, and she made T-shirts that said #historygeek. We wore them proudly and have another trip planned next month to see a private exhibit of Civil War letters in Sacramento. I can’t wait.
As my eyes trail over the crowded, ever-evolving bulletin board, I’m aware of having my own archaeological site hanging right in front of me. And if my study of history has taught me anything, it’s that the world is full of mysteries, most of which don’t have a singular answer. If you dig enough, though, when you care enough about finding what’s under the rubble, you can unearth treasures, and if you’re lucky, you let these wonders light your way forward, no matter how uncertain the future may seem.
For another addicting read by Kim Culbertson, turn the page for a peek at Catch a Falling Star!
if my life were a movie, it would start with this moment. The scene would open with one of those expansive overhead shots of a vast, forested landscape, the bleached summer sky threaded with clouds. The music would be something rumbling, like thunder, or maybe more liquid as the shot found the curve of our river cutting through granite mountains, its waters famous for their inky green swirl, reflecting all the pine and sky. In that introductory, melting sort of way, the camera would dip in, fastening to the yellow line of the single band of a remote highway leading into our small town tucked into the endless mass of Tahoe National Forest, zeroing in on the passing of a road sign:
LITTLE, CA
3 MILES
Next, the shot would pass that sign and slide into the slender downtown of Little, California. My town. It would move along the pretty pastel rows of Victorian shops and houses, the corners of streets marked with wrought-iron lampposts, past gaggles of people at outdoor cafés or leaning their bikes against storefronts or waving as they crossed the street. It would highlight the way our town had a sort of sunlit glaze in the summer, a slow ease that built the slimmest of armor between us and the rest of the world.
In the movie version of my life, the shot would slow as a sleek black Range Rover turned the corner and made its way like a mirage up our main street, people stopping to shield their eyes from the sunlight glinting off its perfectly washed windows.
The audience would know instantly that nestled inside that air-conditioned car sat someone bigger than our small town.
But this wasn’t a movie.
This was my life.
And I still had three more hours before my shift ended.
My friend Chloe, though, could make any moment feel like a movie. So Chloe would make sure to magnify it for both of us. “Carter, that’s him!” she shrieked, clenching my arm as we cleared dishes from the patio of Little Eats, my family’s café on the main street of downtown Little. A half-filled cappuccino mug slipped from her hand, breaking into two clean pieces on the cement of the patio, the handle separating from its white porcelain body.
“Ouch, Chloe.” I unpeeled her death grip, quite sure my circulation had been compromised. “That’s coming out of your paycheck, not mine.” We watched the onyx car glide by, our café a watery and strange reflection in its tinted back windows. In the front passenger seat, a man in his thirties rested his tanned arm on the rim of the window, tapping absently to music we couldn’t hear, his mirrored sunglasses miniature versions of the tinted backseat windows.
The car came to rest at the stop sign right outside our patio.
“Do you think he can see us?” Chloe breathed, drinking in the Range Rover’s idling purr.
As if in response, the back window slid open, and before we could blink, we had a full view of its famous passenger.
Adam Jakes.
Movie star.
Chloe gasped, her face going slack with shock. Framed in the backseat window, Adam Jakes peered out, his famous blue eyes hidden behind sunglasses. Everyone in the café patio stilled, as if a mountain lion had entered a field and all inferior wildlife held their breath. There, framed in that window, was the same tousle of burnt-sugar hair, the symmetrical face, the same pair of wide shoulders, the slouchy look of his mouth that always seemed to say, Yeah, this is how I look when I wake up. The last time I’d seen one of his movies, he’d been playing some sort of teenage James-Bond-goes-to-high-school. The plot escaped me. Still, seeing him there in the window, I felt a strange ribbon of nerves move through my stomach.
He reached out the window, dumped a cup of ice, and then the window slid closed again, its tint reflecting our astonishment before the Range Rover moved away up the street.
Chloe shrieked, “Get me a cup!”
I shook my head. “Oh, you are not going to —” But before I could finish, a woman with a blond bob tossed the remains of her iced tea into a shrub and thrust her glass into Chloe’s outstretched hand. As if she’d unearthed a treasure of gold, Chloe hurried to scoop up the fallen ice.
The door of our café banged open, and my dad emerged with two plates of mango chicken salad for the women sitting near the small fountain in front, the dinner plates like saucers in his large hands. He checked to make sure they didn’t need anything else before noticing that one of his employees was in the gutter scooping up dirty ice cubes.
He frowned and glanced at me. “Do I want to know?”
I grinned. “Nope.”
He disappeared back inside.
Chloe held up the glass, triumphant, the melted bits of ice glimmering in the afternoon light. She blew a strand of dark hair from her face. “Take a picture.”
Shaking my head, I clicked a picture with my phone and sent it to her. “You’re ridiculous. Now get back to work before I have you fired.” I nodded toward her empty busing tray. “You can start with the glass you’re holding.”
Her look suggested I’d asked her to move to Yemen. “I’m not throwing this out.” She placed it gently on a nearby table. “I’m keeping it.”
“It’ll melt, brainiac.”
Chloe plopped her nearly empty busing tray back on the rack. “I love you, Carter, but I worry about you. This ice belonged to Adam Jakes. Adam Jakes. That’s going in my freezer. I don’t care if your dad makes me pay for this glass, too.”
I laughed, picking up the pieces of the broken cup Chloe had abandoned earlier, knowing Dad wouldn’t make her pay for either of them. “You’re a highly disturbed individual.”
She squinted after the departed car, wiping absently at a coffee spill on one of the empty two-top marbled tables near the fence. “Did you see the guy in front? That was Parker Hill, Adam Jakes’s manager. He’s thirty-two, British, and a Pisces.”
I tossed the broken cup into the garbage. “Why do you know that?” I pulled my long brown hair away from my neck. We’d only been outside a few minutes, but already the heat was getting to me.
Chloe handed me a hair tie. “I know things. And how can you not think that was exciting? Adam Jakes just drove right by us. Adam Jakes just dumped his ice on our street.” She pointed at the small pool of wet his
ice had left, now quickly drying in the sun.
I frowned. “Kind of rude, if you ask me. When Crazy Jay dumps his ice on our sidewalk, you think he’s disgusting.”
She frowned at me. “You’re hopeless.”
“I know.” I grinned, clearing a stack of dishes. “But that’s why you love me.”
Shaking her head, she leaned against the fence, the tables behind her forgotten.
The café door banged open again, and Dad emerged with two more salads for a different table. Pausing, he caught Chloe idling against the fence. “Funny thing, Chlo — those dishes still haven’t learned how to wash themselves.”
She pushed away from the fence. “I’m on it, Mr. Moon.”
“I’ll be inside, not holding my breath.” Dad disappeared back through the front door, wiping his hands on the burgundy half apron I almost never saw him without.
I filled the rest of my busing tray with the remaining dishes (sans Chloe’s celebrity ice) and checked to make sure one of our regulars, Mr. Michaels, was okay on coffee. He smiled at me from his roost at the farthest table tucked back against the side of the café, his wrinkled face even more dappled with the afternoon light coming through the leaves of the old maple that made umbrellas unnecessary for most of our patio seats. He raised his coffee cup, so I scooted over with a pot of decaf.
He gave my arm a nice squeeze and nodded toward Chloe. “What’s all the excitement about?” His voice had that whispery sort of fatigue people got in their seventies, like they’d just gone and talked themselves out over the years and didn’t have much left.
“That car that just passed there,” I told him, putting my hand on his flannel-shirted shoulder; it was pushing ninety degrees outside, but Mr. Michaels was always in flannel. “It had a movie star in it. Adam Jakes. The one who’s filming here for the next few weeks.”
The Wonder of Us Page 25
