She sat down on her bed, enjoying the warm flush on her skin and the feeling of clean, and wondered what to do next. She looked around the room. She could try to wash some clothes in the sink. (She hadn’t washed anything since London, and it was becoming a problem.) She could go out. But then she saw them—Olivia had books and magazines and music just sitting there on her bed.
From the way Olivia had carefully set out her things, Ginny was more than a little leery of touching anything. And it wasn’t in Ginny’s nature to use something that didn’t belong to her without asking.
But what could it hurt to look at a book or listen to music a few minutes, especially since she really hadn’t had anything to listen to or read in about three weeks?
The temptation was too great.
She locked the door and carefully studied the exact arrangement of all the items. She tried to code it all in her mind. The magazines were lined up with the third pink stripe from the bottom of the bed. The earphones were resting in a stethoscope shape, with the right one just a little below the left.
Olivia’s music choices were more edgy than Olivia herself appeared to be. Ginny listened to it all, the folky stuff and electronica…She paged through the glossies hungrily. It was all so new, so fresh. She didn’t even read these kinds of magazines at home, but now, she was totally content examining the lipstick ads and reading about the best bangs for her bikini buck.
There was a rattling at the door. A knocking. Ginny ripped the earphones out in a panic and fell off the bed in her haste to rearrange them on Olivia’s side as she had found them. Right earbud above left? No. Whatever…She threw them down and smacked the magazines next to them. She had just enough time to pull her hands away from Olivia’s stuff before the door swung open.
“What are you doing on the floor?” Olivia asked.
“Oh, I…fell out of bed,” Ginny said. “I was asleep. I got startled. Did you come back early…or what time is it?”
“My parents started talking to some people,” Olivia said, unenthused. She glanced at the things on her bed. She didn’t register any suspicion, but she kept her gaze there for a while. Ginny pulled herself up by the blanket and climbed back into her bed.
“So, OK…”
“Nobody calls me that,” Olivia said sharply.
“Oh.”
“Your clothes are all over the place.”
“They got wet,” Ginny said, feeling an odd wave of guilt for being so damp. “I’m trying to dry them.”
Olivia didn’t reply. She picked up her iPod, turning it over and examining it closely. Then she stuck it in the front pocket of her bag and loudly pulled the zipper. It sounded like the angry growl of a massive bee. Then she vanished into the bathroom. Ginny rolled toward the wall and squeezed her eyes shut.
Life with the Knapps
“Rise and shine, porcupines!”
It took a tremendous effort for Ginny to unglue her eyelids. She had been sleeping so peacefully, and the light was soft coming in through the little curtains. And though her bed was narrow, it was so clean and cozy.
Now a hand was on her leg, shaking her.
“Up and Adam, Miss Virginia!”
Across from her, Olivia was swinging out of bed with robotic discipline. Ginny looked up and saw Mrs. Knapp standing over her, wielding a plastic travel mug. She put a paper on the pillow next to Ginny’s head.
“Today’s schedule,” she said. “Lots to do! So let’s get bright eyed and bushy tailed!”
She yanked the curtains open and switched on the overhead light. Ginny winced and blearily looked at the paper. The top of the page read: DAY ONE: MUSEUM DAY I. There was a chart of activities and times, beginning at 6:00 a.m. (wake up) and running down to 10:00 (off to bed!). In between were at least ten separate events.
“Meet you guys downstairs in half an hour?” Mrs. Knapp chirped.
“Yeah,” Olivia said, already halfway into their little bathroom.
An hour later, they were waiting in the plaza in front of the Rijksmuseum—apparently, the biggest, baddest museum in Amsterdam—just before it opened. Ginny tried to take in the grandness of the building and ignore the fact that a number from 42nd Street was being discussed and there was a very real chance that the Knapps were going to start dancing. Fortunately, the museum opened before this nightmare could become a reality.
The Knapps had a very clear idea of how they planned to tackle the Netherlands’ most comprehensive collection of art and history—they were going to make a series of well-planned strikes. This was an operation.
As soon as they got inside, they asked the person at the information desk to circle the really important things that they had to see. Then they tore off, guide in hand. They speed walked through a display of four hundred years of Dutch history, pointed at some blue-and-white Dutch pottery. Once they got to the art wing, it became a game of speed tag. The mission was simply to find the paintings on their guide, stare at them, then run as quickly as they could to the next one.
Luckily, the third stop was Rembrandt’s The Night Watch. There was no problem finding it because signs everywhere pointed to it (and unlike in the Louvre, the signs seemed to be telling the truth). Plus, the painting was massive. It took up a good chunk of a wall, stretching almost to the ceiling. Amazing, the people in the painting looked life-sized, though it wasn’t really clear to Ginny what they were doing. It seemed to be a gathering of noblemen with big hats and ruffles around their necks, plus some soldiers with huge flags, and a few musicians for good measure. Most of the painting was dark, the figures in shadow. But a sharp wedge of light cut through the middle, illuminating a figure in the center, dividing the canvas into three triangular sections.
(“When in doubt,” Aunt Peg had always said, “look for the triangles in the paintings.” Ginny had no idea why this was important, but sure enough. Triangles everywhere.)
“Pretty neat,” Mr. Knapp said. “Okay. Next is something called Dead Peacocks….”
“Can I stay here, then meet you?” Ginny asked.
“But there are so many paintings to see,” Mrs. Knapp said.
“I know, but…I’d really like to look at this one.”
The Knapps weren’t getting this at all. Mr. Knapp looked down at his guide with its many circles.
“Okay…” he said. “Meet you at the entrance in an hour.”
One hour. That seemed like enough time to find Piet. What was a Piet? Piet was probably a person, since she had to ask the Piet something. Okay. Who was a Piet?
She examined all of the title plates of the paintings first. No Piets. She sat on the bench in the middle of the room and looked around at the crowd shuffling past The Night Watch. Obviously, no one knew when she would be here, so Piet wasn’t coming here specifically to meet her. She walked through all of the adjoining exhibition rooms, read all of the title plates. She poked her head around corners, checked in the bathrooms. No Piets anywhere.
She had no choice but to give up and rejoin the Knapps, who had absorbed the massive museum to their satisfaction. They headed to the Van Gogh Museum. Mrs. Knapp had scheduled only an hour for this, but even this was too much for them. They looked weary in the face of such swirling, hallucinogenic paintings. Mr. Knapp also felt these were “something” and mumbled, “What was he on?”
They had to take a tram to get to their next museum, the Rembrandt House Museum, which was (as the name suggested) Rembrandt’s house, and kind of dark and creaky. The Maritime Museum came next (2:30–3:30; boats, anchors). They had from four until five to see the Anne Frank house. This got a serious “something” from Mr. Knapp, but it didn’t slow down their furious pace, since they had to get back to the hotel for “Knapptime” (5:30–6:30). Once they got back, Olivia dropped onto her bed, rubbed at her legs furiously, stuck her earphones in her ears, and fell asleep. Ginny stretched out as well, and even though she was exhausted, she couldn’t rest. Just as she felt herself drifting off, the door flew open, and they were on their way again.
They had dinner at the Hard Rock Café, almost all of which was occupied with a discussion of Phil’s fabulous girlfriend. They’d never been separated before, so Phil had to take a break at the end of dinner to call her. When he was gone, Mr. and Mrs. Knapp switched topics to talk about Olivia’s running. Running was Olivia’s thing. She ran in high school, and she had just finished her freshman year of college. She was a nursing major, but mainly, she ran. While they were away, Olivia was looking forward to doing some running. Olivia didn’t say any of this herself. She just ate her grilled chicken salad and scanned the room in steady right-to-left movements.
After that, they had to hurry to catch a glass-topped sightseeing boat for a night cruise, during which the Knapps did a few highlights from Phantom of the Opera. (Specifically, they explained, the boat scene.) They weren’t as loud as they had been in the morning; they were sort of singing to themselves. And then, mercifully, the day ended.
Contact of Various Kinds
For the next three days, Ginny followed the Knapps’ grueling schedule. Every morning, at the crack of dawn, there was a knock, a shake, some unwelcome cheer, and a printed page on her pillow. Every bit of Amsterdam was broken into carefully scheduled increments. The museums. The palace. The Heineken factory. Every quarter. Every park. Every canal. Every night, she listened to Mr. Knapp say something like, “You know, even if you had a whole month, you still couldn’t do this city justice.”
Ginny almost wept with joy when she found out that day five on the Knapp Tour of Amsterdam had been marked down as a “free day.” Phil vanished after breakfast, and by eight, Olivia was already changing into her special high-tech running clothes. Ginny sat on the bed and watched, trying to convince herself not to lie back down and go to sleep for the entire day. She still had to find the mysterious Piet and also to send a note to Keith. She’d been wanting to for days but hadn’t managed to escape long enough to do it.
“What are you doing today?” Olivia said.
Ginny looked up with a start.
“I was…going to send some e-mail,” she said.
“So was I, after my run. There’s a big Internet café a few streets over. I’m going there later. If you want, we can split a day pass. It’s cheaper that way.”
Olivia provided directions to the Internet café, and Ginny went over—after allowing herself a long shower and a chance to carefully braid her hair.
After sending Keith a note, Ginny switched on the messenger program and then killed an hour or so just surfing. It felt like…drugs…even better than the magazine and music a few nights before. It almost scared her how much she missed looking at the same stupid sites.
There was a bleep as Keith came online. well how is a’dam?
Adam? she wrote. amsterdam you twit.
Suddenly, Miriam’s IM profile lit up as well.
OH MY GOD ARE YOU THERE? she wrote.
Ginny almost screamed. She immediately put her fingers on the keys to answer, then drew them back, as if she had been scalded.
She couldn’t communicate with anyone from the U.S. online.
WHY AREN’T YOU ANSWERING? Miriam wrote.
YOU CAN’T WRITE TO ME, CAN YOU?
OH MY GOD.
OKAY.
IF YOU’RE THERE, LOG ON AND LOG OFF REALLY FAST.
She tried to quickly log on and off, but the computer was slow. She groaned in frustration. When she finally came back, a few messages from Keith quickly popped up.
hello?
do I offend?
where did you go?
have to go anyway
No, I am here… she wrote.
But it was too late. He was already off.
Miriam was still there, though, cyber-screaming.
I AM TOUCHING THE SCREEN. I MISS YOU SO MUCH.
Ginny felt her eyes tearing up. This was so stupid. Her best friend was right there, and Keith was gone.
She put her fingers on the keys. She started typing quickly, one line after another.
I’m not supposed to do this but I can’t stand it
I miss you too
things are so complicated
ARE YOU OKAY?
Fine.
I GOT YOUR LETTERS. WHERE IS KEITH? DO YOU LOVE HIM?
I think he’s still in Paris. He’s just Keith.
WHAT THE HELL DOES THAT MEAN? I SO WANT TO COME THERE.
It means I’ll probably never see him again.
WHY NOT?
Ginny jumped to see Olivia suddenly sitting next to her.
“Done?” she asked.
“Um…”
Olivia looked kind of impatient, and Ginny’s guilt reflex managed to kick in.
I have to go. I miss you.
MISS YOU TOO.
A few minutes later, after giving the computer to Olivia, she was back out on the street. The sudden contact left her numb, and she had a hard time uprooting herself from her spot on the sidewalk, so bikes and backpackers and people on cell phones wove around her.
There was still something to be done. Where was Piet? Who was Piet? Piet was somewhere back at the museum, so that’s where Ginny headed…back to the massive Rijksmuseum.
What had she missed? What else was there? Paintings. People. Names.
And guards.
Guards. The people who looked at the paintings all the time. The guard in this room was a sage-looking old man with a white beard. Ginny went up to him.
“Excuse me,” she said. “Do you speak English?”
“Of course.”
“Are you Piet?”
“Piet?” he repeated. “He’s in seventeenth-century still life. Three rooms down.”
Ginny practically ran down the hall. There was a young guard with a tiny goatee standing in the corner of the room, playing with his belt buckle. When asked if he was Piet, he narrowed his eyes and nodded.
“Can I ask you about The Night Watch?”
“What about it?” he asked.
“Just…about it? Do you guard it?”
“Sometimes,” he said, eyeing her suspiciously.
“Did a woman ever ask you about it?”
“Lots of people ask me about it,” he said. “What do you want?”
Ginny didn’t know what she wanted.
“Just anything,” she said. “What you think about it.”
“It’s just part of my life,” he said with a shrug. “I see it every day. I don’t think about it.”
That couldn’t be it. This was Piet. This was The Night Watch. But Piet just scratched at his lower lip and scanned the room, already detached from the conversation.
“Right,” she said. “Thanks.”
Back at Het Kleine Huis, Ginny dug through her bag and tried to figure out which of her clothes were the cleanest—which was a tough call.
“I’ve got some great news!” Mrs. Knapp said, bursting through the door without knocking, startling Ginny. “Something big for our last day together! A bike ride! To Delft! Our treat!”
“Delft?” Ginny asked.
“It’s one of the other big towns. So, lots of rest tonight! We’ll be getting up early! Tell Olivia the good news!”
Bang. Door shut. She was gone.
The Secret Life of Olivia Knapp
Early the next morning, they were on a tram out to the far edge of Amsterdam. Ginny liked the tram. It was like an overgrown toy train that had gotten loose on the streets. She looked out the window and saw the Netherlands wobbling by—its ancient houses and constant canals and people in practical shoes.
One thing that the Knapps hadn’t said but Ginny could abundantly feel (really feel—like it was physically coming in through the back of her head) was that though they liked her enough, they were glad that she wasn’t their child. Or rather, if she had been, things would have been different. She would have been roboting herself out of bed at six in the morning automatically. She wouldn’t have dragged her feet on the mad rush from place to place. She would have sung show tunes. She would have liked runnin
g or at least thinking about running. And she definitely would have been more excited about riding a bike for fifteen miles. She knew this last one for certain because they kept asking her, “Aren’t you excited, Ginny? A bike ride? Isn’t that great? Aren’t you excited?”
Ginny said that she was excited, but she also kept yawning, and the expression on her face probably told the whole story: she didn’t like bikes. In fact, she hated bikes. She hadn’t always hated bikes. She and Miriam had gone everywhere on their bikes when they were kids, but that had all stopped one day when they were twelve, and Ginny’s bike decided not to stop as she took a big hill and she was forced to turn hard and wipe out on the asphalt to keep from running into traffic.
She tried not to think about this as she was being saddled onto a bike that was much too big for her. The tour director said it was because she was such a “big—I mean tall big—girl.” So that meant all the shorter people got bikes that were right for their height, and she got the big girl bike that was left.
And she wasn’t even that tall, anyway. Olivia was taller.
This was obviously “single Ginny out” day.
The ride to Delft was fairly easy, even for her, since the Netherlands was flat as a board. She only felt herself teetering off her towering bicycle once or twice, and that was only when she sped up a little to put some distance between herself and the Knapps, who were singing every song they could think of that referenced bikes, or riding, or going somewhere.
Delft turned out to be a beautiful town, a miniature version of Amsterdam. It was one of those places so absurdly cool that Ginny knew that either through legalities or luck, she would never, ever be able to live there. The citizenry simply would not permit it.
Also, they had wooden shoes in one of the first shops they got to. Mrs. Knapp was thrilled. Ginny just wanted to sit down, so she crossed the street (the canal, really) and sat down on a bench. To her surprise, Olivia joined her.
“Who were you writing to yesterday?” Olivia asked.
Maybe it was the shock of Olivia showing a sudden burst of actual personality that caused what happened next.
13 Little Blue Envelopes Page 14
