“Oh my God, Stephen, hi,” I say. His hug is the millionth I’ve received in the last hour but it feels better than the others, even though I end up inhaling his starchy tie. “I’m so sorry. I entirely forgot to find you before the funeral.”
“Don’t worry about it. You had a lot going on. Are you feeling okay?” He grew a stubbly beard since I last saw him, which works for him, mostly because it makes him look more like nineteen and less like twelve.
“Come on, let’s talk outside,” I say, grabbing hold of his hand and taking the long route out of the house so we pass Kate and Liz. It’s not that I’m trying to plant any ideas in their heads, but if they were to jump to conclusions, as gossipy people do, I wouldn’t object. “Your hair looks nice, by the way,” I add when they’re in earshot. “You’re very handsome in your suit.”
“Thank you,” he says and blushes. Ugh, I hate boy blushes. “You look beautiful as always.”
I mean, I definitely wouldn’t classify myself as an “always” type beauty. I probably have my moments, but usually I troll around in sweatpants looking prepubescent.
“How have you been?” he asks as we sit by the pool. I’m not sure how to answer him, but it feels good to be away from the constant bombardment of Sara memories. Out here it feels a little bit more like I can breathe. “Sorry, that’s probably a stupid question. I’ve never been in a situation like this, so I have no idea what to say.”
I decide it’s kind of cute how nervous he is, in a fourth-grader-at-the-spelling-bee type way. “Don’t worry, so far you’re getting a solid A minus in Supporting Your Bereft Friend.”
“No! Not an A minus. That’s going to kill my GPA.”
I roll my eyes at him. “Don’t even talk to me about GPAs.”
He and I share a knowing look, full of love and hatred for our 3.9 and 2.9, respectively, then I try to get serious with him. “I’ve been okay. I don’t know. It’s very weird. I’m here but not here. And when I do feel here it doesn’t feel normal. It feels like I’ve been freshly submerged in an ice bath. You know, that caught-up, can’t-catch-your-breath feeling.”
He nods and lets me talk more.
“And life seems weirdly fragile. Before, I thought I was running around with a bowling ball, but it’s actually a robin’s egg.”
“Yeah, I can’t believe how unexpected it was,” he breathes.
Since Sara’s whole disease situation isn’t public yet, I shouldn’t tell Stephen what I’ve been googling. But since Stephen is also pre-med, I tell him about how Sara could have upped her chances of survival by getting tested once she knew Cal had hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, seeing as there’s a 50 percent likelihood of a parent passing the disease down to their kid. After she got her diagnosis she’d have had to quit tennis, but she probably could have lived thanks to medication, surgery, and other marvels of modern medicine. But I guess to Sara quitting tennis felt like death itself.
“Wow,” he says when I’m done. “I don’t think I love doing anything enough to risk my whole life for it.”
“Me either.” I dig my heels into the grass and feel them sink into the soft ground.
“If someone said, hey, you have this weird block in your brain and every time you study medicine you’re at risk of an aneurism, I’d be, like, ‘Later, med school.’ And I’ve wanted to be a doctor since I was in utero.”
I laugh. Stephen is one of those good guys who wants to be a doctor to save lives, and not just to get paid lots of money to save lives.
“Sara was more dedicated than anyone I know,” I say, wishing I could loosen the collar of my funeral dress. “We were both really intense about the things we cared about and I think that’s why we respected each other so much, but what I cared so much about pales in comparison to what she cared about.”
He squints into the sun to look at me. “Well, what is it that you cared so much about?”
I don’t even know how to describe it. Being the smartest, being the best, doing everything according to The Plan… there isn’t one word for that. “I guess I wanted to be Valedictorian of Life. The best college was a big part of it, but then it’d be the best med school and then the best hospital, and on and on. For Sara it was tennis because she truly loved the game, not because she wanted to prove she was the best at arbitrary things.”
A rogue tear rolls down my cheek and Stephen wipes it. Wipes it. It’s the gentlest boy-action to date.
“There’s nothing wrong with being driven, Danny. It’s my favorite thing about you,” he says, and then he does the weirdest thing ever, which is that he kisses me on the cheek. I become a statue, but he doesn’t seem to notice and carries on with the conversation as if his lips usually occupy my face. “So are you excited to come back in the fall?”
I ignore the question and look out at the pool. “Oh no.”
“What?”
“The beach ball.” Instead of rolling cheerfully on top of the water, it’s lying deflated and waterlogged in the shallow end. “Whatever, it’s a beach ball,” I console myself, but it still seems to capture how I feel.
“We could get a new beach ball?” he offers, puzzled, but I shake my head. It’s not worth trying to explain how much more consequential the inconsequential things are now.
To change the subject, I ask, “So, what have you been up to?”
“Lots of volunteering at this hospital. I love it. I think I might want to do pediatric oncology.”
“Isn’t that the kiddy cancer?”
“Yeah, you’d love interacting with them, Danny. They’re so sweet.” Actually, I can’t imagine electing to do something so depressing. “Anyway, should we get you back inside? I’m probably going to head out—don’t want to take you away from your friends any longer. I’d like to, but it seems selfish of me.” He stands up and I let the sun turn him into a silhouette. “I’m here for you, though, Danny, and I want to see you again before the summer ends.” He grins and I should qualify that Stephen is cute, in a nerdy puppy way.
He reaches his hand down to help me up, which is a very gentlemanly gesture. As I turn around I see Bugg watching us through the screen door, but when she sees me looking at her she looks away.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Going home is a relief. I don’t feel sick anymore, which makes me think I did make myself sick with nerves, which, according to my mom, would be totally logical. As I plop down on my bed, I tell myself I’m ready to cry for real now. No more dainty sniffles and two-to-three small-to-midsize tears. I’m ready to hiccup and sob. But nothing happens. Bodies are so weird, not to mention annoying. Mine never does what I want it to. The longer I lie there, the more the hot itchy feeling starts to creep into my body. Or rather it creeps in at first, all gentle like, then takes over violently. I don’t know what else to do, so I sneak into the basement and fill a water bottle with some of the vodka from my parents’ liquor cabinet. They never lock it or anything because I’m an A+ kid, which feels a little shitty to take advantage of right now, but I think they’d understand. I’m just not going to risk it by asking them.
With my generous serving of inebriant, I sit down with my journal. I wish I’d started writing in it before You-Know-Where. I’d like to read about the night of my birthday, right after Sara slapped me in the face with the piece of pizza. It was buffalo chicken, by the way, and the spice made it sting even more. Instead I reread “Wild Geese” on the napkins Bugg wrote on for me. Mary Oliver is the sort of poet who not only makes you believe in poetry, but makes you want to be a poet too. Since I have Cynthia’s class tomorrow I try to finish her latest assignment. I make doodles on the page in between sips of vodka but don’t seem to get any closer to being able to adequately complete our final project. Honestly, I’m many things, but I don’t think “poet” is one of them. This mentality changes when I’m halfway through with the drink I’ve poured, at which point I’m like, Wait, am I a literary genius? Keats in disguise? Destined to die on a gurney of tuberculosis? Why, yes! Yes, I am!
I
finish the vodka, then the poem, and decide to send it to Bugg first in case I’m wrong about my newly appointed destiny as the greatest female poet of this millennium. I pause before I send it, though. It’s a very exposed thing to have someone read your writing. You may as well invite yourself over to their house, take all your clothes off in their kitchen, and then wait for them to say something about it. Which sort of gives me an idea.
I get up and take my terrible curtain funeral dress off, then my bra and even my underwear. It definitely feels uncouth to put my bare butt on my bare desk chair but, honestly, nudity is an improvement over my usual granny-panty situation. I open Photo Booth for the hell of it—well, actually I do it because I have this sneaking suspicion that I, yes, wouldn’t you know it, I look good, really good, which I think has something to do with my nipple-to-boob ratio and certainly not the vodka-to-empty-stomach ratio. Now, I know you’re not supposed to take naked pictures because of dignity and stuff, but when I look this good I can’t help myself. Besides, it’s symbolic, what with the whole stripping of the soul thing that’s going on with this poem. I put my MacBook camera on timer, back up a little, then wink, but since the timer is set to fifteen seconds, I have to close one eye for way too long to be sexy. Whatever, it’s the thought that counts.
I attach the picture along with the poem and hit SEND before I talk myself out of it. With Operation Reveal My Truest, Sexiest, Most Badass Self complete, I wrap a towel around myself, tiptoe downstairs for a smidge more vodka, then hightail it back upstairs with my loot.
While lying naked on my bed and drinking what is certainly the drink of the gods, I realize that I haven’t slept naked since I was born. Sometimes I take a shower in a bathing suit to avoid looking at myself in the mirror. I should at least start going topless, if not at the beach, then at least in the shower. But you know what, it’s totally fine in Europe to be naked at the beach so why is America such a prude? “Fuck America!” I say cheerfully, then promise myself to never wear a shirt again.
I look at my bed but it’s obviously absurd to sleep in it so I rip my comforter off and make a new, better bed for myself on the floor, like the animal that refuses to sleep in the straw that some Farmer Dude laid out for her because screw the Farmer Dude, I make my own bed, yes, I certainly do. One time my mother threatened that if I make my bed I have to lie in it, but I don’t understand why that’d be such a grueling punishment.
I fucking love lying in my own bed.
I wake up with the worst hangover I’ve ever had. For a second I think I’m dead, but nope, that pounding thing is my head.
“Holy moly of cow,” I gasp. “Need. Water. Now. And why the hell am I naked?”
Feeling embarrassed, not to mention cold, I take an oversized collared shirt from my closet, button it as close to my eyebrows as I can, then throw a smock over it.
“What even time is it?” I ask myself, which is not the usual order of those words but my brain is vodka soaked and therefore borderline pickled. Twelve thirty, stupid, the clock says, and I stick my tongue out at it.
Luckily my parents are at work so I get to do some serious mutant snack concocting in the kitchen. I can’t give away the complete recipe, but it involves bacon, ice cream, eggs, and chocolate sauce, which only sounds disgusting if you think about it. Everyone knows the whole purpose of eating is to not think about it. As I’m going to town on what will one day be featured only in the ritziest of restaurants, the doorbell rings.
“Come in,” I shout, shoveling the last forkful in my mouth. I didn’t check to see who it was, but certainly a burglar wouldn’t announce himself first.
“Hello?” Bugg’s voice calls.
“Hey, in the kitchen,” I say, wiping my mouth quickly and trying to smooth out my hair. When I see the look on her face, though, I realize I must look pretty bad.
“You doing okay?” she asks. I’m a little disappointed that she doesn’t try to hug me or touch me at all. Do I look that disgusting, or is she still feeling awkward from our subpar funeral interaction?
“I think so,” I say. I try to squeeze her hand, but it’s like a dead fish in my hand. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” But she avoids my eyes when she says it.
“Are you lying?”
“Not really.”
“Well, what is it?” I take her face in my hands, guiding her to meet my gaze.
“I was wondering who that guy was yesterday,” she says, and for the first time I register something like jealousy on her face. I know people say that jealousy isn’t the same thing as love, but they have to at least be cousins.
“That’s Stephen. He’s literally the only friend I made all of freshman year. Gold star for me, amirite?” I punch her playfully in the arm, but her face is as steely as the kitchen accents.
“Are you in love with him back?” she asks, and I feel my cheeks burn. Sara seemed to harbor this same suspicion that Stephen was into me, but I assumed she was desperately hoping I had a potential love interest.
“No, of course not. We’re friends.”
“Kate and Liz didn’t seem to think so.”
I’m feeling pretty good about having pulled off Mission Impossible until I register how upset Bugg is. I don’t want to blow my own cover so instead I reassure her that Kate and Liz are gossipy ignoramuses. “Seriously, they pull shit out of their conjoined butthole all the time. You just gotta ignore them.”
Bugg smiles and looks relieved, which in turn makes me feel relieved.
“Well, good. I was hoping you’d say that because I brought you something.” She reaches into her tote bag. “Close your eyes.”
“Ooh, a present? I’ve always wanted to have Christmas in July.” I close my eyes and pray for a pony.
“Now open them.” She’s holding out a plastic pot with three long stems, the heads of which look like green spiky clams.
“A Venus flytrap,” she says. “For you and your newfound love of vaginas. And for us, and our destiny to become Trappers.”
It’s seriously the freakiest plant I’ve ever seen. “I’m very touched,” I say, taking the pot gingerly in my hands.
“Watch.” She puts her finger in her mouth and I follow her lips as they close around the base of her pointer, right before the knuckle. She pulls it out slowly, then touches the inside of one of the green spiky traps. The plant closes around her finger. “Pretty cool, right?”
“Very cool.” She might as well have touched the inside of my stomach, which reminds me that as nice as it was to see Stephen, nothing he did hit anywhere remotely near my insides. “Seriously, there’s nothing going on between me and Stephen. Even if he and I didn’t have the chemistry of candle wax, you’d still be the only person I’m interested in.”
I set the plant down on the counter and she looks at it lovingly. “Me too, especially after that picture you sent me.”
“What picture?”
She laughs. “What do you mean, ‘what picture’?” She pulls up her e-mail, resting her phone on the kitchen counter, and shows me the most appalling naked photo of myself to date, and believe me, I was a very ugly baby.
“Where did you get that?!” I ask, covering her phone with my hand, but it’s pretty obvious where it came from.
She looks at me a little confused. “What, did you mean to send it to your friend Stephen instead?”
“No! Seriously, Stephen and I are not like that,” I say, peeking at the photo again, then closing her e-mail app. “But I have no recollection of taking that photo, let alone sending it to you.”
She pulls up the poem I apparently wrote too, which I do recall writing but have no idea what it says. “Do you want to read your darling haiku or shall I?” Bugg asks.
“You do it,” I say miserably, closing my eyes and slumping onto the floor. It feels like a million ants are crawling inside me.
“Ahem,” Bugg says. “It’s titled ‘Ode to My Special.’”
I brace myself for a gooey heart-dump.
“�
�I have to tell you,’” she starts, and I check the syllables. Yep, five. “‘You’re so hot and I love you.’”
Dear god.
She ends with the final flourish: “‘Cheeseburger pizza.’”
She bursts out laughing and I do too, very, very relieved that I didn’t spill my heart to Bugg. Pizza can know my true feelings, but Bugg?
“I’d just seen a commercial for some cheeseburger pizza special,” I say sheepishly, “and apparently got quite inspired.”
While I’m patting myself on the back for getting the syllables of a haiku right even though I was shit-faced, the smile slowly leaves Bugg’s face, and she looks at me seriously.
“Were you drinking last night?” she asks quietly.
“A little.” But due to my liquid-inspired actions my credibility is entirely shot. “Okay, yes, a lot.”
Bugg frowns and I realize that she doesn’t look so good either. I almost ask if she’s hungover too, but I figure I have no ground to stand on here.
“I don’t want to tell you what to do, but drinking alone is no bueno, Danny.” She looks unnecessarily concerned for me considering how many times she’s been all for us getting drunk together.
“You’ve gotten us drunk, like, every day we’ve hung out,” I point out.
“Yeah, but we were together.”
“So you think I can’t handle my drinking unless you’re there to monitor me?” I pause for a couple of seconds, but she doesn’t disagree with me. “I already have a helicopter mother. I don’t need a helicopter friend too.”
Love & Other Carnivorous Plants Page 15
