Pam laughs, but it sounds more charitable than genuine. “I suppose the fact could be as big or as small as you’re comfortable with. But that’s not necessarily the idea.”
The fire crackles. No one volunteers to go first.
“I don’t call on people,” says Pam, “unless I absolutely have to.”
I’m kind of curious to see what absolutely have to looks like, but Felix pipes up. “I’ve got one.” He pauses. “I hate Milk Duds. I think they’re slimy and disgusting. And, um . . . I personally wrote a bunch of online user encyclopedia entries for the Six and Eleven movies.
Rory, fascinated, asks, “Is that true?”
“You tell me,” replies Felix, lifting his eyebrows.
“Oh . . .” she says. “Hmmm.”
“I can’t believe anyone hates Milk Duds,” says Nate. “If you could chew happiness and get it stuck in your teeth, it would taste like that.”
I happen to know Felix loves Milk Duds, and if Nate remembers too, he doesn’t let on. Rory and Keira vote that the truth is the Milk Duds thing, and Nate votes for the online encyclopedia. I do too, although I feel like I’m cheating. The encyclopedia is news to me but makes perfect Felix-sense.
When it’s time to reveal the answer, Felix just says to Lance and Leslie with raised eyebrows: “You guys should probably be thanking me. I corrected a lot of wrong information on those pages.” They don’t look like they want to thank him.
“Felix,” says Pam. “I like how the truth you came up with is something to do with the bond you all share.” Felix looks at the ground. For someone so desperate for approval, he’s not good with compliments. “Okay. Who’s next?”
Keira holds up one long finger, and Pam nods at her. She stares into the fire for a few moments and then says, “I like to pretend I have migraines. Sometimes I’ll do it at school when I need a break, and I make sure the nurse tells my dad. Because my mother used to get them all the time and I know he’s afraid I might have the same, uh, issues as her. It’s like a little weapon for me, for when I’m mad at him for pressuring me into something.”
This sounds alarming and she must realize that, because she quickly adds: “For instance, agreeing to do this film, just so we could show the world how okay we have been.” She stops, then starts again. “Also, my girlfriends are like sisters to me and I would never, ever think of them as total bitches.”
Keira says all this matter-of-factly, almost reciting it while gazing at the flames. My eyes go to Nate, who is regarding her with protective worry, but there’s something off about it. It’s not even brotherly. It’s more . . . paternal.
I’m guessing we’re all taking a moment to process the same thing here, that Keira has sneakily told us two very personal truths and zero lies. No earths have been shattered by the revelation that Keira thinks her friends are bitches, because they are, but it’s a relief to hear she agrees.
“I’m sorry you feel that way about your friends,” says Rory. Nobody is doing the voting thing.
I’m focused on the irony of the headache fact. It’s the flip side of my situation, but feels strangely similar.
“I still get stomach cramps all the time,” I say suddenly, forgetting that we were supposed to guess at Keira’s statements or whose turn it might be next. “I hide them from my parents. So you and I, we’re kind of like opposites.”
Now, Keira’s eyes unlock from the fire and shift to me. To mine. In an instant she’s the same Keira she was five minutes ago, but also the Keira I remember from kindergarten, and a totally new and unfamiliar Keira as well. One with a dark side.
I guess we all find our little ways to stay in control.
Keira seems about to speak to me, to me, her face soft and her jaw slack, when Rory says, “You have to say a second thing, Justine.”
Everyone else is looking at me expectantly. “Okay. Um. I am, in fact, wearing day-of-the-week underwear. But just to be a rebel about it, I never wear the right day.”
The other kids and the crew laugh. Again, it makes me so happy. This time I’m not afraid to show it.
Pam, however, sighs and actually rolls her eyes, which seems very un-Pamlike. “This would be a really great activity if you’d take it seriously.”
“I took it seriously,” says Felix.
“Me too,” adds Rory.
“I know you did,” says Pam.
“It’s late,” says Leslie, finally piping up. “They’ve been at school all day. Why don’t we try again tomorrow, now that we’ve all got the hang of it? Nate and Rory, you don’t mind, do you? You didn’t get a turn.”
Nate and Rory shrug. Pam gives Leslie a sharp glance. Leslie sees that glance, and raises it one proprietary suggestion. “But I would like to wrap tonight with Felix doing a song. It’s a campfire and all, and he did lug his keyboard all the way out here. Felix, that still cool?”
Felix nods, but not with the enthusiasm I would have expected from him at this request. Nobody ever asks Felix to sing, even if this isn’t an ideal situation. Still, he takes the keyboard out of its case, rests it on his lap in the canvas chair. Turns it on. Waits for Leslie to find a good spot with the second camera and finally takes his cue.
He plays into the night and I learn something else: When you’re outside on a mountain with nothing but infinite sky and stars and rising campfire smoke above you, when you’re in a situation where everything is screwed up but also seems utterly natural, even Felix’s hesitant chord changes and reedy vocals sound exquisite.
I’m sitting with Felix on one of the couches in the great room. Nate, Keira, and Rory have gone upstairs. My skin, clothes, and hair smell like campfire and I can’t stop sniffing them.
“I’m counting to five hundred,” says Felix. “That should give Nate enough time to get settled into bed.”
“I may have to go to a thousand,” I say. “You know. Girls.”
We’re silent for a moment, listening to the shuffling sounds coming through the ceiling. The back door opens, then footsteps through the kitchen and into the great room. Pam.
“You two okay?” she asks, taking off her jacket.
“That’s a relative term at the moment,” says Felix.
Pam laughs. “This will sound cruel, but that’s actually the kind of reaction I like to get.”
She gets paid to make people uncomfortable, to force them to do and say things they don’t want to do or say. The people are supposed to be glad about this. It seems like a line of work worth pursuing.
“We do have a strict lights-out policy here,” says Pam, removing a notebook and pen from her jacket before hanging it on a hook in the foyer. “So how about, five minutes and you guys are in your rooms? It’ll be an early start tomorrow.”
Felix and I just nod, then watch her climb the stairs, her notebook and pen tucked under one arm. We sit in total silence now, Felix running his finger in strange patterns on the couch, making the microsuede change grain back and forth. I pick at a mysterious scab-dot on the back of my left hand. Gradually, the shuffles from upstairs die down, and then we hear Pam call from the top of the stairs, “It’s time,” and we rise.
Once we’re up in the hallway, I hug Felix goodnight and watch him disappear into his room. When I open my own door, the room is only half-dark. Rory is in bed, clutching Misty and reading with a flashlight. Keira’s bed is empty. The bathroom too.
“Where’s Keira?” I ask Rory.
“Not sure,” she says, not looking up.
I grab my sweatshirt and pajama bottoms out of my backpack, along with my toiletry case, and disappear into the bathroom. Once I’m changed and washed up, I return to find Rory’s eyes closed, her mouth open, the flashlight still on but rolled down into the bed so it’s shining on her face and looks very dramatic. I watch her for a moment. I can stare at her right now. I can really stare.
Her features have changed a bit since our sleepovers, the nose longer and chin pointier. Those nights when we whispered in the dark until one of us passed out first and
it was always her. “I’m not asleep,” she says suddenly, not opening her eyes. Scaring the shit out of me.
“Okay,” I say.
“Why are you standing there? Are you watching me?” Eyes still closed.
I don’t know what to say to this, so I just turn around and leave the room, mortified.
I hear murmurs down the hall and light glows from under the door of Lance and Leslie’s room. Where is Pam and her lights-out policy enforcement? I inch closer, floating heel to toe on the wood floor, mentally chanting no creak no creak no creak.
The murmurs are a little clearer now. I press my ear to the wall.
“That’s all we could find so far, and we’re not sure she still lives there,” Lance is saying softly.
“But you must have a cell phone number or something!” It’s Keira’s voice.
“It’s not that easy.” Leslie.
There’s a pause. “But you’ll check out the address?”
“We told you we would, and we will.” Lance again.
Suddenly there is movement in the room and I panic, darting back down the hallway and through my door. I hear another door open, then close, then footsteps. Within moments I’m up on a top bunk, burrowing under the covers like something small and hunted.
Keira enters the room quickly but then freezes, switches gears to close the door slowly and silently. She moves to the bed and climbs in, and it shakes a bit. This is when I realize that in my haste I’ve chosen the bunk above hers, and wonder what she’ll think of that.
We told you we would, and we will.
It all makes sense now. Keira agreeing to do this film. Agreeing to do whatever they asked of her, in exchange for something.
She’s lying underneath me, and I listen to her turn over and sigh. It’s like her pissed-off energy is radiating upward and then there’s the weirdness of her knowing I picked her bunk, and the extra weirdness of my knowing her knowing. I don’t think there’s any way I’ll sleep.
But it’s been a long day. Eventually, I’m dreaming that Felix has just told me he’s leaving to play keyboards on tour with Michael Jackson in heaven, and I’m begging him not to go.
When I open my eyes to a streak of unfamiliar light on the ceiling above me, I have no idea where the hell I am. Someone is knocking hard somewhere. The door.
To the room I’m in. With Keira and Rory. At Aikya Lodge and oh yeah, life blows.
“Time to get up!” Pam’s voice. “Everyone dressed and in the kitchen for breakfast in fifteen minutes! Comfortable clothes and sneakers, please!”
From across the hall, we hear a loud yawn from one of the guys, a roar that’s got the funny of a monkey and the scary of a lion, and it goes on way longer than you’d think possible. I bust out laughing.
“That’s funny?” asks Rory, sitting up and looking at me.
“Yes.”
She nods and then, staring across at Keira’s bed, frowns. Glances up at the bathroom door, which is open.
“Keira’s already up,” she says.
I peer over the edge of my bed to verify. “That figures,” I say.
I climb down and after Rory has retrieved her clothes from her drawer, I grab mine and move into a corner, turning my back to her. I glance over my shoulder to see that Rory is standing naked in the middle of the room, slowly getting dressed.
Downstairs, Lance, Leslie, Kenny, and Pam have already eaten breakfast, which is oatmeal and fruit and eggs and bagels. Lance has a camera on the tripod in the corner.
“Load up,” says Pam. “You’ll need the energy.”
Nate comes down next, his hair uncombed, his eyes shaped differently than usual. He’s wearing his swim team sweatshirt and olive green cargo pants and black work boots, like a recruit for the prepster army.
After another minute, Felix appears. He looks even less rested than Nate.
“Is Keira on her way?” asks Pam.
“I thought she was already down here,” I say, scanning the room again to be sure. No Keira.
Pam plunks her coffee mug on the counter and marches through the great room, then up the stairs, calling Keira’s name. It echoes through the house. Keira? Keira? Hello? Keira?
Now Pam is downstairs again, pulling on her jacket and opening the front door. Lance and Leslie look at each other, a little bit of panic. Lance moves to the camera and takes it off the tripod. He’s got a perfect shot as Pam comes back inside, moves quickly into the room, her face completely drained. She looks right at Leslie, then takes a deep breath and delivers news.
“Your car. Is gone.”
THIRTEEN
Turns out, Lance is a pacer. I wouldn’t have guessed that.
He’s treading the wide planks of the kitchen floor back and forth, back and forth, while he scratches the same spot on the back of his head. It all seems a little overdramatic. Maybe he thinks that if he keeps moving, he won’t feel like such an idiot.
Because during the night, Keira managed to sneak into their room and steal their car keys, both cell phones, and Leslie’s wallet.
I’m a little shocked and a lot—so much that I can’t even contain it—impressed.
“Who’d have thought?” I say now to Felix. We’re sitting on a bench on the front porch. It’s warm, so the door is open and we can hear everything that’s going on at the back of the house. Rory sits on the steps in front of us, reading. We’ve been rather forgotten at the moment. It feels like a wide crushing pressure has been lifted off my chest, and the sun is shining and this weekend is turning into something pretty terrific.
Felix has his keyboard on his lap and plays a few random, distracted chords in a melancholy key. “Keira’s always had a lot going on below the surface.”
“Yes,” says a voice to our left, and I turn to see that Nate has stepped onto the porch. As the resident expert on the subject in question, he had been asked to remain in the Holy Shit Keira Is Gone headquarters. Here, the light hits his face but doesn’t brighten it; it’s drop-shadowed with worry. “She does have a lot going on.”
“Any news?” I ask.
Nate shrugs and leans against the porch railing, facing us but focused on the side of the house above our heads. “They finally got ahold of her dad. He said he had a voice mail message from her, telling him she was okay and she wanted to be left alone for a day or two, and to ask that nobody come find her unless they hadn’t heard back from her by Sunday night.”
“That sounds incredibly thought out,” I say.
“That’s Keira,” says Nate. “She plans.”
“Did she say anything to you about where she was going?”
“No,” he says, his head drooping. “But Leslie said something cryptic about knowing where she might have been headed.”
I’ve been thinking about the conversation I heard last night, trying to make sense of it. It sits like a tiny sparkling something in an inside pocket of my jacket, and I need to show it off.
“They had some kind of information for her,” I finally say.
Nate’s head snaps back up and looks straight at me like suddenly, miraculously, I matter. “What do you mean?” he asks.
“She was in Lance and Leslie’s room last night, and I overheard her talking to them about finding an address for someone, and she was pissed.”
“Her mom,” says Nate after a pause.
“I figured.”
He thinks about that for a moment, then shakes his head with I should have known heaviness. We’re all quiet again. Rory has stopped reading and is staring out at the woods. Felix has stopped trying to find the world’s saddest chord. From inside the house, Leslie’s voice is rising and Lance’s voice is rising with it, and it sounds like they’re performing a bad operetta.
Finally, I can’t stand the silence so I state the obvious. “Keira went to find her mother.”
“It would seem,” says Nate.
“When was the last time they saw each other?”
“Not since, you know, that day. But Keira told me she’d gotten
a few letters from her, over the years. Nobody was even sure where she was living these days.”
“If Keira’s driving to the last address, it can’t be too far away.”
“True,” says Nate, who seems microscopically comforted by this idea.
“I bet it’s killing L and L that they can’t go along and shoot,” I add.
Nate puts his head in his hands. Felix and Rory continue to say nothing. I try to see what this means for the rest of us and keep talking. “If she doesn’t want help, if she’s got money and transportation and a way to get in touch, then why are we worried about her? We can go home and the rest of our weekend is saved, and we’ll hear about it all later.”
Nate shakes his head. “But if she does find her mom, who knows how that will go down. And then she’s alone. . . .” He pauses, maybe playing out a mental scenario, then adds, forcefully, “I have to find out where she went.” And I realize he’s in love with her. They may not be a “couple” or public about it and maybe she doesn’t even feel the same way, but it’s like a title card with big red letters inserted into the scene: KEIRA MEANS THE WORLD TO NATE.
I keep returning to the facts. They’re all I can offer. “Lance and Leslie know where she went. They gave her whatever info she has.”
Now Nate gives me this look of pure duh. “They’ll tell us.”
“I wouldn’t bet on it.”
“That’s right,” says Rory, now standing up to join us. “They won’t tell us. They’re going to make us stay here and talk about what happened, and then we’ll still have to do the bouldering thing, which will actually be easier now because there’s an even number.”
“How do you know this?” asks Nate.
“Because while you guys have been talking, I’ve been listening to every word they’re saying in there.”
We all freeze and listen. It’s just murmurs now.
“Wait for it,” adds Rory. “They’ll be out here in a second.”
So we do. And they are.
Pam looks paler, if that’s even possible. Leslie’s eyes are red and she’s clearly been crying, and although this thing has seemed mostly amusing to me so far, it hits me how this must hurt her. How she must really care about Keira and maybe even about all of us. It’s very possible that she’s a much nicer person than I am.
You Look Different in Real Life Page 13
